Outtakes from The Butt Book

Now, just like a film in which some of the best scenes end up on the cutting-room floor—the outtakes—the book initially contained two noble verses that were deep-sixed by my original editor. They were:
    
Butts are found on cigarettes,
the Yankees and the New York Mets.

I had a vision of baseball players sitting in the dugout (at the time, perhaps, A-Rod and K-Rod), viewed from behind, furtively stealing a smoke. This one was cut because cigarettes are a truly forbidden subject for kids' books. Bee butts are okay, but cigarette butts—never!
     At my appearances, I enjoy asking the audience why they think a particular outtake never made it into the book. At a library in Queens, one boy,  without skipping a beat, cried out, "Because the Mets stink!" when I posed the question. Well, I thought that was pretty funny, so I would share this anecdote at subsequent readings. But then one day, after I told that story, a small boy reddened and began to cry. He, apparently, was a very passionate fan. I felt terrible and had to reassure him that the Mets don't, in fact, stink and how that other boy was most errant in his judgment.

    The second verse was:

From pigs' butts we get juicy hams,
which sure go great with candied yams.
 
Now, it wasn't the kosher police that killed this verse. It was the thought of pigs being eaten. Kids' sensibilities are much too tender to handle this, so it was felt. You kids out there: It would devastate you to know that pigs were actually eaten, wouldn't it? I thought so.