Three Funny Kids in my House
Jason Crouch
My children are a constant source of joy and entertainment in my life. I enjoy the fact that my real estate career enables me to spend more time with them. The past week or two, they have had some funny moments that I wanted to share (again). BRIEF WARNING: If you are really easily offended, stop reading now. Otherwise, I hope you enjoy reading these stories about my family as much as I enjoy living them.
Our 18-month old daughter is talking up a storm now, and she actually speaks quite clearly a lot of the time. However, there is one food item that she particularly enjoys - "Goldfish" crackers. Unfortunately for us, whenever she requests "fishies", it sounds exactly like "feces". Not quite as appetizing, I suppose, but funny to my juvenile mind. Since this is a favorite food, it often sounds as though she is requesting a diaper change.
My eight-year old son Brandon is a virtual fountain of interesting and humorous comments and observations. Yesterday, at bedtime, he abruptly started describing the recent weather patterns to me:
BRANDON: Dad, it was really hot today. And sunny. And burn-y. Yesterday, it was differ
ent outside. Dad, what's the opposite of shiny? Is it matte?
ME: Uh... I guess it could be matte. Or...
BRANDON: Yesterday, it was MATTE. And we drove through a fog cloud on the way home (this part was true, by the way).
ME: I guess "hazy" might be a better word to describe the weather than "matte", Bran.
BRANDON: Yeah, hazy. It was hazy yesterday. And it was pretty cloudy and white. Well, not exactly white. It was kind of like white with some other color. I guess it was beige, or off-white.
I don't know why it struck me as so funny that he needed to get it just right with his description of how the weather and the sky appeared to him.
On Tuesday at lunch, my six-year old daughter decided to take an unusual stand and defend a principle that she thought was important. My son had been extolling the incredible value of the internet, and my daughter suddenly said, "Encyclopedias are better than the internet!" I don't even know what made her think or say this, or why it was important to her, but they debated it for a couple of minutes, and my wife and I even moderated the discussion to some extent.
Frankly, although my initial reaction would have been to laugh off the idea that the archaic encyclopedia had any value in today's fast-paced information world, my little girl made a valid point in favor of the books: THEY DON'T HAVE ERRORS, but the internet may. Well, I suppose they could contain the rare mistake, but the internet is a bit of a mixed bag, truth be known. Do I ever open an encyclopedia? No. But my daughter may have inspired me to occasionally consult an actual book sometimes, rather than depending on Google or Yahoo for all of my research. My son made some great points as well, such as the speed with which one can find information. Overall, it was a funny and spirited discussion between two smart kids.
Today, I took my son along with me to take some photos of a listing and run some other errands. One of the funniest games that we play is a variation on "rock-scissors-paper", but we are each allowed to pick ANYTHING we want. Here's how it works:
BRANDON and ME (together): ONE, TWO,...
HIM: Dinosaur! ME: Blade of Grass!
Then we get to figure out who wins. Usually, he overuses "atomic bomb" or "stick of dynamite", while I spend considerable mental effort to make him laugh, by using "pepperoni slice" or "bucket of dog saliva". We ended up with a lot of tie games today. Who can say which one would win - the pile of mud or the barrel filled with milk? Actually, some of them were pretty gross today and probably not suitable for any of my more sensitive readers, but that's part of the fun of being a dad with a boy this age!
Thanks for reading! If you liked these, here are a couple of other recent posts you may enjoy:
Laughter is the Best Medicine - My Funny Children
Where is Art Linkletter when you need him?
