I've been biting my lip trying not to laugh at things my kids say because they are just so serious when they say them but it is also so funny.

First there's this afternoon as my daughter and I walk to join Nels and Ralph in their photo-shoot at our downtown favorite deli / eatery (Ralph's working on some new menus et cetera for the proprietor).

"Oh man! I forgot to put Harris' ass outside," I exclaim, deliberately using bad language because Sophie loves when I talk that way about the cat.

But she's having no playful banter in this case: "The point is, it's not our fault. It's Harris' fault," she says in clipped, decisive tones. "He should have gone outside when we opened the door."

"The point is ..." ?! Who talks like that in this house?

Then tonight as my son runs through the living room top speed with my quilting ruler (look, there was some reason he was doing this - none of us knows what it was) and suddenly the ruler, only three inches shorter than he, stutters on the ground and scrapes the top of his foot. And he cries. Then he sees some of his skin is gone and he really cries. I mean Nels hardly ever lets life get the best of him; he's either belligerent, angry, or whining but in this case he's actually afraid. His chin lowers and trembles and everything. Ralph is trying to explain to Nels his skin will grow back; patting Nels tenderly on his tiny, bandaged toe.

Sophie steps in: "Nels," she says sagely, "When I lost my toe..."* she goes on reassuringly, with all the veteran wisdom of like, some kind of grizzled old Marine telling combat stories.

Ah yes. Belly up to the bar, young 'un - Ole Stumpy can regale ye with thrilling tales.

Labels: hilarity, Nels, Sophie, verbatim