NOTICE: Next Saturday's Wall-Licking Party Has Been Postponed

This just in from The Commonwealth of Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services, Department of Public Health, Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program:

NOTICE TO TENANT OF LEAD PAINT HAZARDS

Lead in violation of the Lead Law (Massachusetts General Laws, chapter 111, sections 189A-199B) and the state Department of Public Health's Regulations for Lead Poisoning Prevention and Control (105 Code of Massachusetts Regulations 460.000) have [sic] been found apartment __[not mine]__ in this building. Children exposed to lead hazards are at risk of becoming lead poisoned. This disease can affect all parts of a young child's developing body, and in particular, can seriously and permanently hurt the brain, kidneys and nervous system. Even at lower levels of exposure, lead can cause children to have learning and behavioral problems. ...

Since lead violations have been found in an apartment in this building, it is quite possible that your unit may have lead violations too. If you have a child under six years of age, you should ask the owner of your building about having your apartment inspected for lead paint. ...

[And it goes on like this for a few more paragraphs, telling me about the deleading procedure, etc.]

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Three thoughts on the discovery of lead paint in my building (and potentially in The Submarine itself):

1) Does lead paint poisoning only affect children under 6? If so, can I continue flinging pizza dough and pie dough and cookie dough at the walls and then baking and eating that dough in relative safety?

2) What will happen to the young child who has suddenly taken up residence upstairs in Stompy's apartment, and whose darling little voice and pitterpattering feet can now be heard at all hours alongside those of Mr. McStompstomp himself? Will the little dear have to move out? Will he suffer "learning and behavioral problems" as a consequence of the lead dust kicked up during Stompy's all-night furniture bowling parties? As always, it's the children who suffer most in these situations.

3) What if the noun "lead" were pronounced like the verb "to lead" (i.e., LEED)? Suddenly lead paint would be lead paint - that is, paint that one leads with, or, alternatively, the paint that is ahead of all the other paints in some sort of contest (a child-poisoning contest, no doubt). Lead poisoning would be lead poisoning, which could either be interpreted as a command (Poisoning! Get out there and lead! Show some initiative!) or something that might happen were one accidentally to swallow a dog's leash, also commonly known as a lead. The comic implications of this homography are, you will have gathered, moderate in the extreme.