the good thing about having the only children in the city of memphis who have not started school yet is that i have the prolonged opportunity to test out my latest parenting hypothesis by way of an extremely unscientific, completely non-randomized study of one (myself). the theory, and the theme of my last couple of posts, is that parents say ridiculous things to their children because parenting invites a hailstorm of ridiculous situations.

here is a bit of my recently-gathered evidence:

please move your cape so i can bite off your hangnail.

i don’t know what else to tell you. yes, i am the only one in the family without a scrotum… no, i am not sad that i don’t have one… but you should be happy you have one!

and finally,

please stop biting the soap.

and then, there are all the things i dare not send out into the world wide web for fear that my children will bill me for their therapy in 20 years (can you imagine the cost of therapy in 20 years?). but trust me. the best and most ridiculous material is reserved for my own personal fits of hysterical laughter. who needs daytime television when i’ve got a monkey and a bird?