Tuesday, 16 December 2008

• My Little Geniuses- Should I Be Worried?

  Guest post submitted by eleven_bee

  

  Earlier this week, I flew back to Denver from Oakland on an insanely early flight that required that I get up at 4 in the morning.  Charley and the boys picked me up from the bus stop, and brought me back home, where I managed to nap for an hour before having to drive Charley back to the bus stop so that he could catch his flight back to the bay area at noon. 
  
  Needless to say, I was tired.
  
  So later that afternoon, I was lying on the sofa with my eyes closed, not really napping, but certainly trying to conserve my energy, while listening to the boys having a conversation. 
  
  Colin:  "Hey Kai, I've got gum."
  
  Kai:  "Ooh.  I want gum."
  
  Colin:  "I know where there's some Hubba Bubba..."
  
  My ears perked up a bit.  I recalled that there was one last piece of gum in the cabinet above the refrigerator.  But surely that was high enough and out of the way enough... right?
  
  And then I heard the scooting of a chair. 
  
  Still, I reasoned, they're only a little over 3 feet tall, so even with the chair, they couldn't possibly be able to get to the cabinet.
  
  And then I heard, "Hey let's go down to the basement to get..."  followed by some mumbling and the sound of two sets of little feet running down the basement stairs, and then back up just a minute or two later. 
  
  "This should work," said Kai.
  
  "Yeah," said Colin, "My lasso is longer than yours, so..." 
  
  So now they had chairs and lassos.  None of this was enough to roust me from my spot on the sofa yet.  I listened to them working together, Colin on the chair, Kai on the floor beside him, in charge of hucking the lasso loop up to try to hook the cabinet knob.   "Zing it up higher," coached Colin.
  
  "Wait a minute," said Kai after a dozen or so unsuccessful "zings."  And then the sound of Kai bringing the step stool over to Colin. 
  
  At this point I rallied and shuffled over to the kitchen to investigate the situation.  And this is what I saw:
  
  

  

  

  

  

   (By the way, that's Kai jumping up and down with excitement in that second picture.)
  
  On the one hand, I was pretty impressed by their ingenuity.  On the other hand, I was tired, and it was early in the afternoon -- still a lot of hours left to go before bedtime.  And that's not just the Hubba Bubba cabinet - it's the liquor cabinet too.  Hmm.  Foreshadowing, anyone? 

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