My how time flies . . . it seems like just yesterday we were the proud parents of a tiny bouncing baby boy, the bouncing should have given us a clue, but we were just too proud to notice. Now some four + years later we have discovered that “Taz”, a nick-name we decided on because “Attila” was already being used, has a propensity for wrecking havoc in a somewhat grand scale. We’ve already resigned ourselves to the fact that we will most likely have a reserved parking space at his elementary school, but it has only become apparent to us recently that as he begins Kindergarten classes we should probably be a little proactive and explain a few terms and/or behavior that may seem a bit odd to the unsuspecting teachers and staff. This might save us several trips and a possible stroke or two among the faint of heart.

Naugh – We are hoping this doesn’t come up much at Kindergarten, but you should be prepared just in case. When Taz was very little (not the big boy he is now), we (his Mother and I) used to demonstrate what a kiss was by putting out lips together and making a drawn out “umm-naugh” sound because we thought it was really funny when he gave us a kiss and made the same sound. Now this may, in and of itself, make a good case for having a test to see if people should be parents (or even reproduce regardless of the relationship), but it was just something, sort of a phase, we thought we were going through. Taz, it seems, just doesn’t do phases and will not let go of phrases he hears. And, to compound the problem, just like adults he gravitates toward shortening or coming up with an abbreviated form of the term. Somewhere along the line he just decided to drop the “Umm” part and now tells complete strangers that he wants a “naugh”, few if any understand this and it just crushes his little heart, so for heaven’s sake when he says ‘naah?’ pucker up!

Nemo – Now on the surface one would think this is just a reference to a cartoon character. One would be way, way off in that assumption. What Taz wants when he makes reference to ‘Nemo’ is cereal and he has a real hard time understanding how dumb people must be to not understand that. This all came about because when he first made a connection between a cartoon character and a food item it was Nemo cereal and therefore all cereal to the day he dies will be referred to as Nemo regardless of what it is (i.e. chocolate Nemo, Nemo with marshmallows, or Daddy’s Nemo – meaning whatever I’m eating in a bowl with milk). I suggest that you save your self a lot of time and just go with this one, he won’t budge.

Yong – This is just a good idea at the time gone wrong and there is not much I can do about it. When we began potty training I knew we were going to have to talk about certain parts of the body and I just have this thing for Yiddish terms, well, because I think they are funny and can be used to mask more morbid descriptive’s, so I introduced the Yiddish term Schlang to cover any discussions of his penis and the act of urinating (see what I mean about morbid terms?). What I didn’t grasp is the fact that he simple didn’t or couldn’t pronounce the leading ‘S’ in words at this point in his life so when he said it, it came out “Yong” as in, “I don’t know Mommy, my yong won’t point in the right direction” (explaining how he managed to totally miss the big boy toilet in an attempt to pee like Daddy).

So, if you think he needs a potty break and he tells you that there isn’t any pee in his yong he is probably alright, if he says he has to go like a grown horse (I’m sure it was his Mother that taught him that), just get out of the way. Oh, and by the way . . . he will most likely drop trou right on the spot and run naked from his desk/pad, or wherever he is to the bathroom, we have just never gotten him to wait until he is in there until he takes his clothes off (Hey, we can’t do everything).

Muck – Okay, for starters this is not nearly as dangerous as it sounds. Having apparently learned nothing from the Schlang experience and in an attempt to find an alternative for words like “stupid” and “idiot”, etc., I again turned to a Yiddish term to defuse ruddiness and came up with Schmuck (apparently not a favorite of the Jewish community, but then again, we don’t live in a Jewish community). Well, as you probably have already guessed, the lack of a leading ‘S’ caused Taz to muck up one side of the house and muck down the other side. I put him to bed before he thinks I should, I get a kiss and a hug and then as I leave the room I hear the muffled sound come from under the covers . . . “muck”. That’s my boy . . .

You may want to run copies of this to hand out to parents who come into the classes wanting to know what Taz meant when he called their child a “muck”.

Wamp – Wamp – Some things just defy logic and wamp-wamp is a mighty fine example of missing logic by about as far as you can miss anything. Here I’m going to take credit for having used the term in describing something once in his little lifetime and it just seems it stuck. If you want Taz to draw a line or point to something left or right, or up and down he is going to confirm what you want by gesturing with his hand in the direction he thinks you are talking about and go . . . “You mean, wamp – wamp like this”? Just agree and save everyone the headache of him explaining what he means, please.

Nose Poop - Here I have to tell you that we are a “pee” and “poop” house. I was raised in a “tee-tee” and “BM” house and when I found out that BM meant, bowel movement, I didn’t have one for a month, so I really didn’t want to go that way. I also had friends that were raised in a “number 1” and “number 2” house and they tell me that math was just never the same after that, so we just went down the pee and poop path and took our chance at being called bad parents. Now, here is where Taz simply used logic to decide that if poop came out of one orifice than it must come out of all orifices, hence “Nose Poop” and “Ear Poop”. Hey, it was his logic, what do you want from me?

Nanny, Nanny, Noo, Noo – I am sure that this simply could not have come from my side of the family, but when you hear, “nanny, nanny, noo, noo”, it is most likely too late as he has already turned around, bent over and is shacking his rear-end at you, sans pants if the mood strikes him. This is simply his way of letting you know he has absolutely no intention of doing whatever you have asked him to do (It just never occurred to him to just walk away quietly and not do what you asked him to do, he seems to have this need, akin to a death wish, to overtly tell you he is not going to do what you asked of him and you can kiss . . . well, you get the idea).

Before you ask . . . corporal punishment has done nothing to stop this particular activity and Time Out just gets you a muffled . . .“muck!”

I have to warn you that this is just the tip of the iceberg as Taz spends the hour he sleeps at night dreaming up new and even stranger terms and actions that he can inflect upon unsuspecting family members and/or complete strangers if the mood strikes. Given the level of out of control we have achieved at this stage in his life, we don’t hold out a lot of hope that this is going to get any better.

Good luck and if you can not reach us at home I suggest you try Barney’s Beef & Brew, we’ve been waiting for almost five years, and as you will soon learn, that is a long time to deal with Taz sober.

Taz’s Parents (names withheld for insurance reasons)

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