He just turned 8. He wants to be an author and screenwriter when he grows up. More than one person has thought something is wrong with him because of his "creative schock" experience (he does look a little weird sometimes) but I have always considered it creativity rather than pathology or disorder(though this is the first time he has explained in detail what is happening to him). At home, I would say to him when I needed him to come out of his "creative shock" (LOL) - "pause it, DS... pause the story for now." DH says to him "beep! it's paused!" I am sure his teachers love his "creative shock" expereinces...

Irena, I used to be able to stay in that state for hours and hours. The down side of that was, I forgot to sleep or to eat. I never understood why people needed to take drugs since the natural high I used to get from working on my projects was more satisfying than any chemical high I could imagine. I suppose this is (or rather, was) the positive side of my ADHD.

DD5 swings her folding tape measure close to my face.

Me: HEY! use some judgment with that thing, ok?
DD5: my frontal lobe is on vacation - after all, it's Fall Break.

Love it, doubtfulguest!

Conversations with a 24-month-old

DH and DS2 return from a walk, and DH relays this conversation to me:

Conversation 1

DS: Let's go downstairs and watch the subway trains.

DH: Sorry buddy, I don't have a pass anymore or any tokens, either. Mum has the tokens.

DS: Then let's walk home, take the elevator upstairs, get the tokens out of Mummy's wallet, take the elevator back downstairs, walk to the subway station, go downstairs into the station, put the token in the box, then go down to the tracks to see the trains.

DH: You know how tokens work?

DS (exasperated): Yes! You put the token into the box in the subway station and then you walk through the machine.

DS also wasn't told where the tokens were kept.
---
Conversation 2

Later, DS' mittens kept falling off, and DH would put them back on loosely to keep DS' hands at least partially warm.

DH: There! That's better than nothing.

DS: No, that isn't better than nothing.

---
Conversation 3

Me: Okay DS, we need to leave now to go swimming. Can you please choose 1 truck to bring.

DS: How about 3 trucks? Do we have a deal?

Me: I think one for each hand is reasonable. You're running out of hand space.

DS: I can hold two trucks in one hand.

Me: Okay, but you can't drop any. If you drop a truck, next time we take two. Deal?

DS: Deal. *Handshake*

He negotiates everything these days, and I like him to win when he offers reasonable terms. I hear the word "deal" a few dozen times a day.

oooh, aquinas, welcome to the slippery slope! our tiny human was so amazingly REASONABLE in her negotiations for years and years that we essentially never had a moment of conflict. it was a little creepy - she was so logical that most of the time her suggestions really improved a plan! this was great until her mental age outstripped what we could safely allow her to do - you know, wanting to walk to the corner store by herself to pick up batteries at the age of 3. she knew she could find her way, she knew she could ask the clerk for help, and she knew she could pay, so what was the problem?!

cue the screaming fits - it really was a lot like living with that girl from the Exorcist. brace yourself - your sweet little lawyer is going to give you a run for your money!

and i love that your DS2 can give an 8-part instruction. i think those development charts say kids should follow 3-part ones by what, about three years old? hee!

doubtfulguest, he goes one of two ways: negotiation or shriek. Negotiation happens in, oh, 95% of cases. Shriek is what happens when whatever he's doing is wrapped up before bed. It used to happen with brushing teeth until I waged an oral hygiene propaganda campaign, so maybe it's time I campaigned for sleep health, too. IDK.

Love your example of your DD's independence! I can just imagine her determined insistence that, "of course I'm perfectly capable of running errands independently, thank-you-very-much"! I'm fully anticipating push-back with DS in the later years. Heck, I have a decade with his lawyer dad, so that counts as some training, right?

squishys, so glad your DS could prove them wrong in spades!

Our son's 6th grade teacher is teaching climate science for the first time. She has handouts with climate science questions, but for some reason, she doesn't have the answers to the questions.

Fortunately she has a way out. She waits until DS finishes answering the questions, and then she accepts those as the "official" answers that get put on the board at the end of class!

You probably think we should leave the school system. Fortunately the Jr. High and High School are excellent.

DD5: can we go and walk around the graveyard today after you finish work?
Me: ok. how come?
DD5: i like thinking about the old graves and the people in them. who they were. what their lives were like. i really like the way we talk about dead people.