Screech

In Tolkien's Return of the King, the Nazgul (ringwraiths), riding upon their winged beasts, assault Minas Tirith. Their steeds let out a hideous, piercing screech that brings the defenders of Minas Tirith to their knees with pain from the sound.

Well, I'm proud to say that my son, Joseph, can put even the beasts of the Nazgul to shame with a cry so penetrating and horrific I can hardly describe it. He let out such a screech the other day when the family dropped me off at work, and absolutely stunned my wife, who sat there in the car with her ears covered; even I, who was out of the car and nearly 20 feet away about to enter the building, could hear the screech. I think that there are dogs somewhere in Europe who heard it, and have probably been deafened by it (poor things, I can only imagine their owners' confusion - "Why doesn't Otto come to me anymore when I call him?").

He uses it to express his utter disgust with the current state of affairs, whatever they may be, and it's very effective as such an expression. Hopefully, he'll get past it before we're forced to puncture our eardrums. In the meantime, he balances it out fairly well with his wrinkle-nosed, squinty-eyed, toothy grin (I'll try to get a picture of that sometime), and his unintelligible, but well-intoned and heartfelt conversations. It's great fun holding conversations with him; he answers your questions in a very serious fashion, as though he is speaking his mind, he knows exactly what he's saying, and he expects that you do, too, even though it sounds a lot like all he's saying is, "buhji-buhji-buhji." It's just that when you don't do what he wants, he may lets out one of those nerve-eating screeches! Argh!