Abby Coogan in Crash

Abby Coogan

Crash's little sister has always loved nature, worms and all. Even at 4 years old, she loved nothing more than playing with bugs in the family garden. Now 11, Abby is a budding environmentalist. She throws herself into "Stall the Mall," a local protest effort, and she's on a campaign to turn the backyard into a wildlife habitat…for mice.

Hey, it wouldn't have been our first choice, but we guess you've got to start somewhere.

Like Penn, whom she admires, Abby tends to look on the bright side. When her grandfather has a stroke, instead of bemoaning his condition, she tries to focus on the positive: he can say one (nonsense) word, "a-bye."

"It must have been terrible not to have a single word," she says, "and now he has one. And he can use it for anything!" (37.19)

Like her plan for the mouse habitat, this sort of seems like a stretch, but who are we to judge?