Questions

Satchel and I were having a discussion about places that humans cannot live, like outer space, under water, etc. "Oh, I know another place!" he said. "The jungle!"

I explained that humans could indeed live in the jungle. "But how would they cook their food?" he asked. Considering he had just camped out in a friend's backyard and cooked hot dogs for dinner, I was a little surprised he didn't know the answer to this one.

"But what would they eat?" he asked.

"In Cameroon, they ate monkeys," I said. "But there's lots of other things to eat like fruit, vegetables, etc."

"Do they eat wart hogs?" he asked. "Or are they too spikey?"

While I pondered this he kept firing questions at me. "Oh! Do they have African Canadian pigs in the jungle?" he asked as if he were ready to pack his bags.

African Canadian pigs? I thought. "Oh, you mean so they can eat Canadian bacon?" I laughed.

I later asked Warren what makes bacon Canadian and he said to google it. (In the United States, back bacon is called Canadian-style bacon or Canadian bacon, but this term refers usually to the lean ovoid portion.)

* * *

Jiro's questions are even harder to answer than Satchel's. Recently, while watching an episode of Charlie and Lola (or Lolo as Jiro likes to say), he asked, "Where are the parents?" (He asked the same thing with Little Einsteins.) "Uh, they're around," I said.

"Where?"

"In the other room."

"Why?"

"Because this is a show about the kids," I said.

This appeased him until Charlie and Lola were in the backseat of a car. "Who's driving?" he asked.

"Their mom," I said.

"How do you know?"

"I just know."

If anything, I guess I can now appreciate that Charles Schultz at least put in some waa-waa noise to represent the adults.

Last night while I was watching Mad Men, Jiro came in and watched for a few minutes. "Where are the kids?" he asked.

"This is a show about adults," I answered, suddenly feeling silly that he only watched shows with kids and I only watched shows with adults.

"Why?"

"It just is," I said wishing he'd be quiet so I could hear the dialogue.

"Oh, there they are!" he announced happily when the Drapers' kids appeared. We watched together as Mrs. Draper, in a drunken stupor, tried to send them to bed at 7:30pm with no dinner.

Satchel barged in to see what I was watching. "Aw, man, when are you going to watch Design Star again?" he asked before quickly exiting.

When Jiro seemed like he'd be happy to watch the whole episode of Mad Men (it's irresistible!), I decided to turn it off. Considering that by the end of the episode, the Draper's little girl had passed out at the ad office with an empty glass of her own, I think it was a good move. I can only imagine the questions he'd have after seeing that...

"Can I drink beer when I go to Daddy's office?"