Little pitchers

TheBoy has a new catchphrase. Or rather, what would be his catchphrase if we decided to pimp him out as the next Emmanuel Lewis or Punky Brewster or that guy from Diff'rent Strokes whose name I'm not going to mention because I don't really want us to come up in random and probably scary Google searches for him.

It goes like this: "That's kinda crazy."

It's sweet and cute and usually quite appropriate. (Mommy is riding her bike home when it's 30 degrees out. Dr. Seuss animals are accidentally sitting on cacti. Ima is asking him eat his salad.)

But it's also troubling, because it means we're firmly into the age at which we can do real damage. At least to our reputations.

Take the other night, for example. He had just gotten into bed, and I was gathering the paper recyclables to put them outside. The bag I was carrying them in broke, and let out a fairly moderate curse. Suddenly a tiny voice popped up from the bedroom: "Mommy say 'damnit?' Mommy say damnit. Damnit. Damnit."

Well, yes. I shouldn't have. And I won't again. At least, I hope I won't.

It could be worse. A friend and former coworker came home one evening when his son was somewhere in this age range to find his wife alternating between furious and off-her-rocker amused with him. She'd overheard TheirBoy getting very frustrated with his toys. Finally, unable to contain his anger any longer, he let out a loud and very clear version of what he thought was a curse. She was pretty sure he'd gotten it from Daddy:

"Buckit!"

I'm figuring y'all can figure that one out.


(On an unrelated note: Blogger spellcheck really, really wanted to turn 'catchphrase' into 'switchboards.' I'm not sure what the hell to make of that. There is good news, however. Spellcheck didn't recognize 'Google.')