Communication-shmaken

I guess I can add "to teach the names of animals" to my list of reasons why having a child is a good thing. This will be added right behind "to eventually clean my house" and "a good excuse not to travel for every holiday because she is no longer free to fly." Now my pro-child list is longer than my con-child list, which consists of "sometimes makes me want to jump out of a window" and "exhausting."

Anyway, this morning Sophia was holding a plastic figurine of an animal that came as a part of a Go! Diego! Go! Rescue Pack set I bought for her. I was thinking that the only good thing about this toy was that the noise feature that constantly screamed AHHHHH! RESCUE PACK! COMING TO THE RESCUE! broke within a day. That was the only good thing until this morning when she held up the animal that resembles a dog with an extra chromosome, but what do I know, since no one seems to care about this genetic probability with all of the pure-breeding that goes on in the dog world.

"Mmm-hmm, Dog," I muttered over my lukewarm coffee.
Sophia twisted up her face and stared at me point blank. "Tapir!"
Honestly, I thought this was toddler mumbo-jumbo and correcter her, "Yup. Dog. Maybe wolf. Do you like wolves?" I thought I should get a mom-of-the-day award for having such an interactive conversation at 7 am.
"Nooooo, Tapir!" She held the thing up higher.
I sighed, "No, that is not tape in your hair. That is yogurt in your hair. It is sticky like tape though, and there is no way that we are going to get a brush though it, so you just going to have to walk around with it sticking out of your head for the day because there is no way I am giving you two baths."
This caused her to move onto something else, as I felt the mom award slip away. However, after that last bit of coffee converted itself to brain cells I had a memory of an animal from the Zoo? or Biology Class? with the name Tapir.

I had to check it out. Lo and behold.
At least one of us is paying attention.