Monday, March 4, 2013

The Return of the Owl Game, Now With More Noise

Although The Owl Game is by no means a nightly entertainment around here, Cubby will occasionally request that I turn off all the lights so he can be an owl.

Or, lately, I'll go into the living room to find him swaying precariously atop his rocking horse as he reaches to turn off the lamp on the table. This is the problem with small children: Their increasing independence is so often tied to increasing peril.

Anyway.

Whether I do it or he does, the lights get turned off and then he hoots around, stopping periodically to whisper thrillingly that he can hear something and it's . . . a snuffling skunk. But then he pinches his nose shut and informs me that he can't smell the stinky smell now.

I suppose he's not an owl at these times, since as far as I know owls can't pinch their beaks shut. Or whisper.

Anyway again.

Tonight he added a new twist to his game, unfortunately prompted by my attempts to play along. He was hooting around while I sat in the dark and made stupid comments like, "Is that a great horned owl I hear?" To which he would gleefully announce, "It's me! Cubby!"  And then I'd say, "Is that a barn owl I hear?" Repeat ad infinitum.

Once I asked if it was a screech owl I heard. And instead of saying, "No! It's me!" he just started screeching.  Over and over.

Then we had a talk about how screech owls use outside voices because they're outside and their voices have to carry a long way so other screech owls can hear them. But Cubby the screech owl was inside and his voice didn't have to carry so far, so he should be using his inside voice.

An inside screech owl voice.  My evenings just get better and better.

6 comments:

tu mere said...

Guess Cubby's supercharged imagination doesn't need any fuel. However, it's hard not to play along since his responses are so unpredictable - the good new and the bad news. I wonder if Albert Einstein was like Cubby in his youth.

mil said...

From what I hear, Einstein didn't talk until he was about four years old. So -- I guess no Einstein --

Anonymous said...

Better than Einstein then.

We know Cubby won't be lonely when he becomes a mountain man/hermit in the future. Beth

flask said...

who cooks for you?

who cooks for youuu-allllll?

Kristin @ Going Country said...

Flask: That made me laugh. That's one of Cubby's favorite birds in his audio bird book from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Daisy said...

If you don't have it already, it's time to get Jane Yolen's "Owl Moon." He will love it.