Eating my words

I am, I confess, given to hyperbole. Dramatic understatements and, perhaps more often, overstatements, sometimes pass from a spice to a staple in my conversation.

Unfortunately, I now have a toddler who can repeat what I say.

So this afternoon, as I put a cranky D2 in his high chair for lunch, D1 knew what the problem was.

"D1 starving to death!"

In fact, it was a general problem. She stood and watched me spooning food into D2's mouth, cheerfully chanting, "D2 starving to death. Mama starving to death. Papa starving to death. D1 starving to death. Starving to death. Starving to death. Starving to death."

I finally got her distracted by singing "Five Green and Speckled Frogs," which turned her towards chanting "Nice and cool, nice and cool."

Meanwhile, our lunch was waiting on DOB finishing balancing the checkbook and riding his exercise bike. He did the first and went into the bedroom to ride the bike. Only first, he lay down on the bed to contemplate the meaning of existence.

D1 followed him, propped her elbows on the bed, and observed with approval, "Papa takes forever!"

Now where did she get that phrase? A little while later I had lunch dished up and went in to ask if he was almost ready.

"Just a few more minutes," he said.

"Well," I said, "uh . . . Don't take forever."

"And why not?"

"Because I'm, uh, starving to death."