Y is for … Go Ask Your Father: Dealerships, Babies, Passwords, and Freebies #atozchallenge

is for all the questions. Why? Y? Why?

Okay. Sue me. Or unfriend me. Why doesn’t start with Y. They sound the same which makes them homophones. That means they’re kind of the same thing.

Y? Because. This is my blog and I said so because I’m the dad. Yes, I use that argument. It’s totally valid. Especially if I’m losing that argument against a 4 year old (or an 8 year old).

1. What’s a dealership?

What If I Could Drive A Car Hauler? It’s only one of the “What If I Could Drive…” books we read at bedtime. There’s also a tanker truck, fire truck, ambulance, and tow truck. Imagine being responsible for transporting 10 cars on a busy highway. I’m barely responsible for the one I drive. But to deliver them to a dealership? That giant parking lot full of brand new cars where I’m nervous to drive. Do they have a “you break it, you buy it” policy? It’s where we got our baby (our RAV4) last June after visiting many dealerships for many weeks.

A rolling parking lot

2. Don’t you have to be in a hospital to be born?

Another question that arose because of a book. I guess this is part of the reason why I read to them. This one came from an author I read frequently because I love his characters. Carl Hiaasen. He has two chapter books for middle school readers. Hoot and Flushed. Like the rest of his books, this takes place in the Florida Keys and deals with the destruction of the environment. In Flushed, a casino boat is accused of emptying their toilets into the bay instead of paying to empty them into a sewage tank. It’s up to 12 year old Noah and younger sister, Abbey, to catch them and bring them down.

Anyway, Noah was born in a car on the way to the hospital. Crash thinks babies come from hospitals, so naturally he was curious to discover you could be born in a car, too. Fortunately, I didn’t have to get into HOW he was born, just that he was.

3. Can you do the password?

I put a password on Crash’s tablet. Otherwise he’d be sneaking extra time on it. Most times he is limited. Otherwise he’d do nothing else. On rare occasions, I’ll ignore the timer. But, damn, it’s frustrating to hear this question over and over and over. More Minecraft. More Piano Tiles. More Slither.

However, thanks to his teacher setting up an account for her class, we’ve discovered a new app – Get Epic. It’s a book app. Thousands of books ranging from infant’s picture books to middle school chapter books. He logs into his account and reads. Some books even have a “read to me” feature. His teacher receives feed back on what he’s reading like how much time he spends reading, how long it takes him to read a book. So when he asks, “Can you do the password so I can go on Epic?” I’m all for it. He can rate books. He can select favorite  books. He can change his icon from the class list. They receive “awards” and “level up” according to how much time they spend reading and how many books they read and various other tasks. It has certainly motivated him to read. He has spend 8 hours reading this week alone! Check it out!

 

4. What are you doing?

This is a question asked of anyone in our house at any given time.

“What are you doing?”
“I’m letting Dozer run on my face because it tickles!”

“What are you doing?”
“I’m riding my snowboard down the slide!”

“What are you doing?”
“I’m getting a free newspaper!”

That last one happened just days ago while we were walking home from the park. It was me who said that. It was the rest of my family who looked embarrassed and hurried away like I had the Black Plague. I’m not revealing my source, but I found a place to get free newspapers. This place throws away their unused newspapers! Of  course, they’re in the dumpster. I ain’t too proud. I read some it, but I mainly get it for the crossword puzzle. DW can’t believe I’m dumpster diving for newspapers.