Kids say the darndest things

Just to get things started, I'll start with a couple of cute things my kids have said in the past week:

Before I tell the first story, I have to give some background. My wife and I have always said "I love you" in sign language to both our kids as we close their bedroom door for the night, a family tradition we picked up from some deaf family friends of ours. Part of the reason we do this (apart from the obvious reason that we really do love our kids) is that it is really fun to see them struggle to get their little fingers to obey the commands their brain sends them as they try to get their hands to return the gesture. If you aren't familiar with the gesture, it combines the "I", "L", and "Y" signs from the finger-spelling alphabet (see picture at right). When we went to Hawaii last time, we had fun showing them how similar the sign for "hang loose" was, and then when we moved to Texas last year for me to start b-school at UT, we showed them how similar it was to the "Hook 'em Horns" sign.

So, about a week before Texas won the national championship (Yea Orange! Yea White! Yea Longhorns! Fight, fight, fight!), I was putting my son to bed and told him "I love you" in sign language as I was closing the door. Completely out of the blue, he yelled out, "NO DADDY! Hook 'em Horns!!" and flashed the Hook 'em Horns sign at me. I had to close the door to keep from laughing and getting him all excited at bedtime.

Then, a few days ago, I had just come back from running to Home Depot to pick up some painting supplies. When I came in, my daughter asked me where I had been. When I told her, she asked if next time I was out, would I please buy her and my son a surprise? Of course, I answered like most parents of a five year-old probably would in this situation would and said "Oh I don't know, we'll have to see..." When I said this, however, she got really excited and said "Oh thank you, thank you, Daddy!".

I explained to her that "We'll see" does not mean the same as "Yes," but she looked at me very matter-of-factly and said, "Well, Daddy, it was a 'restorical question'".

After suppressing a chuckle and explaining that the word I thought she was looking for (you never can tell with five year-olds) was "rhetorical", I asked "So what is a rhetorical question?"

"Silly Daddy," came her reply, "A rhetorical question is one to which the answer is 'Why yes, I would be happy to!'"

This time I did laugh out loud. And hard. You can't make this stuff up.