Slices of Life, Vol. 31

When Honor visited recently, we took the kids out to a Japanese steakhouse for supper one night. We sat down at our table and waited for our chef to make his appearance. Several minutes later, our Very Authentically Japanese chef arrived at our table and welcomed us:

Chef: "Good evening and welcome to Sumo! I am pleased you've joined us tonight."

Nick: [shock and awe on his face] "MOMMY. I UNDERSTAND JAPANESE!"

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Nick: "Mommy, I gave myself a new name: Nicholas Pooteus."

Me: "Nick, that is very appropo. Good job."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

On the way to the beach, we'd barely left our overnight stopover town when Nicholas started asking when we'd be there.


Nick: "Mommy. How much longer 'til we get there?"


Me: "About five and a half hours."


[15 minutes pass]


Nick: "Mommy. How much longer 'til we get there?"


Me: "About five hours and 15 minutes."


[10 minutes pass]

Nick: "Mommy. How much longer 'til we get there?"


Me: "A little over five hours, and I don't want to answer that question again. We'll let you know when we're getting close, or -- even BETTER -- you'll know we're there when we pull into the driveway."


[3 minutes pass]

Nick: "Mommy. How long has it been since we LEFT?"

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

One evening while we were at the beach, supper was being served a little later than usual. The boys had gathered in our room while they were waiting. Jakey was particularly ready to eat, and Nick was trying to help me distract him.

Nick: "Jakey, do you want to watch a show?"

Jake: "NO. I WANT TO WATCH SUPPER."

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

While we were out to supper the other night, Jake spied one of these across the room:

Jake: "I want a treat. I want a treat. I want a treat. I want a treat. I WANT A TREAT. I WANT A TREAT. I WANT A TREAT."

Grayson: "Did you bring a quarter, Jake? Because those treats cost a quarter."

Jake: "I want a quarter. I want a quarter. I WANT A QUARTER."

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

A couple of weeks ago I taught Nathaniel how to add things to his Amazon wish list so that I wouldn't have to do it anymore. Then the other night, he called me in to the computer:

Nathaniel: "Mommy. I can't find Metroid Prime Hunters on my wish list."

Me: "It should be right there about halfway down the page."


Nathaniel: "It's not there."

Me: [peeking over his shoulder] "Well, good Lord, Nathaniel, you've added so many things to your list you've got three pages of items now!"

Nathaniel: [exasperated] "I KNOW. You REALLY shouldn't have taught me how to do this." 

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Nathaniel: "Mommy, it would be great if -- when you put a drink box in with my snack for school -- YOU'D INCLUDE A STRAW."


Me: "I DID include a straw. It fell off the juice box and was laying right on top of it. You're just like Daddy, with your visual disability. You have no peripheral vision, you only see what's right in front of you, on the top layer of everything, and you won't dig to find anything to save your life."


Nicholas: "HEAR THAT, NATHANIEL? YOU CAN'T DIG ANY BETTER THAN AN OLD MAN."

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And I don't think I've ever shared a conversation between me and Grayson in Slices before, but this  made me laugh for five minutes when it happened. On Saturday at Chick-fil-A:

Me: "I think we have too much ice cream. Next time instead of an Ice Dream for each of us, we should just get two larger Ice Dreams and five spoons."

Grayson: "Umm, would one of those Ice Dreams be for you and the other one be for the rest of us?"

Me: "Nooo, I WOULD SHARE."

Grayson: "Oh. Because sometimes you aren't the best sharer when it comes to something like ice cream."

Me: "You must have me confused with your second wife."

Grayson: "No, SHE'S a GOOD sharer."