Huh?

As part of C's military training, he attended SEER's school - survive, evade....something something. It's where they train you for the possibility of being captured, landing in hostile territory etc... He also attends a refresher course every once in a while. At one of those refreshers a few years ago, the instructor was speaking about tactics to use while being interrogated. He told those in attendance that if they had children, they had seen first hand how to be evasive during interrogation. Here is an example of what he was talking about taken from our dinner table last night.

Set the stage: during dinner conversation, we find that there was some behavior that needs to be corrected... Maggie was with her friend and yelled at the neighbor boys. I asked what happened:

Me: What did they say?

Ashlee: They started talking to us first.

Maggie: Yeah, they started it.

Me: What did they say?

Ashlee: We were jumping on the trampoline and looked over at them.

Me: What did they say?

Maggie: They started it, we were just minding our own business.

Me and Chris in unison: What did they say?

Maggie - they started talking to us.

Ashlee - yeah

Maggie - covers her face and says "We weren't doing anything."

Me: "What did they say? (starting to get a little alarmed, maybe they said something really awful....) Was it inappropriate?

Maggie: yes

Me: Well, you didn't say it, so you will not be in trouble. Now, please, what did they say?"

Whispered conversation between the two girls - Ashlee can't remember what they said, her head is "full of math and spelling."

Maggie: "They did give us Brody's ball back."

Hello.....WHAT DID THEY SAY???????

Six or seven attempts later, out it comes, they said.....drumroll please...."We know you want to kiss us." It hardly seemed worth the effort.

If you have kids, I'm sure that you have experienced one or two or three thousand conversations like this. Just tuck them away so that if you are ever captured, you will be able to avoid answering questions while being interrogated. You know...is your homework done? I'm so tired. Have you practiced piano...I haven't had a snack yet....

Maggie responded by calling them jerks and morons. Chris had some other ideas for how to respond: I would if it looked like you were even from planet earth, Maybe if your breath didn't smell like the bottom of your shoe, etc....the girls laughed and laughed and laughed. That's what dads are for.

The master of evasion and her sleeping sister.