Resident Robot-Loving Grandma

“it’s a good thing that the minecraft movie isn’t about the intense loneliness of minecraft’s world and finding growth and hope in a post-apocalyptic society because it’s for children” Have You Ever Spoken To A Child

children deserve deep and profound media as well and i’m tired of pretending that something is allowed to suck and be a cheap cash-grab on the account of it “being made for kids”

Another fun thing I do with customers - specifically parents of very small children who don’t know they’re alive yet - is directly imply I think the coffee is for the baby, not the parent. and lemme tell you, like 70% of parents eat that shit up. They immediately go along with the bit and start discussing it with their newborn child, while the baby just stares at us like 😮

Level of respect a class of teens I have to teach art to have for me when I walk in: 0%

Level of respect after I draw sasuke from memory on the whiteboard: beyond anything you could possibly imagine

the true reason i rarely teach classes is to keep my ego at bay

A little girl and her mom were looking at me at the coffee shop this morning and I heard her mom say “go on, it’s ok!” and the little girl shuffled up to me and said “ex-cuse me please, do you have to put on your tattoos by yourself every DAY or does your mom help you?” I am d y i n g

My niece was in the bathroom when I was in the tub and she asked if my tattoos would wash off. I told her they won’t, I’ll have them my whole life.

She asked, “Even when you die?”

I said, “Yes”

She looked me dead in the eye and said, “When you’re space dust your tattoos will be stars”

I was standing in line at the store and the person in front of me had a little kid who was staring hard until he randomly said “you’re not supposed to draw on your body, you’re supposed to draw on paper” then he turned around as if he’d properly reprimanded me for my tattoos drawing on myself 😂

Watching my toddler figure out how to language is fascinating. Yesterday we were stumped when he kept insisting there was a “Lego winner” behind his bookshelf - it turned out to be a little Lego trophy cup. Not knowing the word for “trophy”, he’d extrapolated a word for “thing you can win”. And then, just now, he held up his empty milk container and said, “Mummy? It’s not rubbish. It’s allowed to be a bottle.” - meaning, effectively, “I want this. Don’t throw it away.” But to an adult ear, there’s something quite lovely about “it’s allowed to be a bottle,” as if we’re acknowledging that the object is entitled to keep its title even in the absence of the original function.

Another good post to read for those writing small human characters. 

My son was about three when he came to me in the middle of the day and said, “Mommy, there’s a knight behind the bush.” I thought he meant a toy knight or something. So I follow him outside and he goes, “Listen. Do you hear it? It’s night behind the bush.” It was a cricket. A cricket was standing in the little patch of shade under the bush, chirping. So, my son saw this dark area with accompanying nighttime sounds and decided, okay, well, that is a night right there. Their brains are incredible.

My little bean knows she’s two, constantly saying proudly ‘I’m two!’ And the other day she saw this very frail old lady who looked one foot in the grave, pulled a face and said ‘oh shiiiit. She’s three.’ I almost screamed.

I live in Korea and have a lot of international friends, and the same is true with language barriers in adults. 

*Looking at a bowl of pears* “Can you please pass me the… apple’s friend?” 

my little cousin confidently declared that mother nature had a counterpart named daddy electric and i feel like this concept needs to be explored

Daddy Electric and Mother Nature sounds like a cute 70s act

my mom didn’t believe in lying to children so when I first asked about santa claus as a small child she was like “oh santa claus is another name for a man named saint nicholas who lived a long time ago. he was a very kind and generous man and he loved giving people presents and he would do things like put presents in people’s stockings when they were hung up to dry by the fire, so they would find them and be surprised. so now when we give presents at christmas it’s fun to pretend saint nicholas or ‘santa claus’ brings them. and we hang up stockings by the fire and when we get up in the morning there are presents in them, just like if saint nicholas was still alive to bring them!”

so that thanksgiving one of my uncles said jovially “so mac, are you being good for santa claus?” and little (not quite three year old) mac looked up and raised an eyebrow and said witheringly “he’s dead.”

professors who have only interacted with other academics for years: “what do you MEAN you don’t know multi-variable calculus yet??”

professors with small kids: “thank you for not putting the lab equipment in your mouths when I turn my back”

Bringing this back to share that one time I slept through part of a zoom meeting with my PhD advisor (who has a toddler) and he told me it was fine, that just meant I was a good sleeper

Professors who work with graduate students: if you finish the multivariate calculus work this week you can put one (1) piece of lab equipment in your mouth

Once had a professor whose previous career was giving educational zoo tours to children, so he’d say stuff like, “now let’s meet our friend, acidic keratin!”

in high school I was in the child development class where we ran the preschool. Class ended and I moved onto the next class, an art class. Sit down next to my friend who was working on a serious piece and casually asked for my thoughts on it, looking for serious critique.

Preschool mode had not turned off so I looked at it, clapped my hands and said “WOW Really great work! Amazing!”, in that same kind of voice you’d say to a toddler who presented you with a random scribble on a piece of paper.

Friend loved the reaction at least lmao.

hey i saw these tags and i think i’m about to kiss you on the mouth rn

lord give me strength

Hannah talking to a young Dream fan during their Fortnite matches 

kids are so fucking funny. we made pride flags with the elementary schoolers and a fifth grader added a gray stripe to the progress pride flag and when i asked him what it was for he said “for the emos”

wake up new pride flag just dropped

not to oversimplify an extremely complex discipline but if i had to pick one tip to give people on how to have more productive interactions with children, especially in an instructive sense, its that teaching a kid well is a lot more like improv than it is like error correction and you should always work on minimizing the amount of ‘no, wrong’ and maximizing the amount of ‘yes, and?’ for example: we have a species of fish at the aquarium that looks a lot like a tiny pufferfish. children are constantly either asking us if that’s what they are, or confidently telling us that’s what they are. if you rush to correct them, you risk completely severing their interest in the situation, because 1. kids don’t like to engage with adults who make them feel bad and 2. they were excited because pufferfish are interesting, and you have not given them any reason to be invested in non-pufferfish. Instead, if you say something like “It looks a LOT like a tiny pufferfish, you’re right. But these guys are even funnier. Wanna know what they’re called?” you have primed them perfectly for the delightful truth of the Pacific Spiny Lumpsucker

me: i wish i could turn off certain mobs. i’d love to play more survival mode but the spiders really upset me :(

my dad, the most stoic person in existence, LEAPING out of his chair with great concern: I AM NOW OBSESSED WITH THIS PROBLEM. I WILL PROCEED TO SPEND THE NEXT MONTH SCOURING THE INTERNET FOR NICHE MODS OR CONSOLE COMMANDS IN HOPES I CAN BRING YOU AND THE ENTIRE MINECRAFT PLAYERBASE PEACE.

my dad, a week later, more distraught than i’ve ever seen: brittany it’s awful. i’ve been googling around for solutions to your spider problem and lots of little kids have asked for help on the same issue and people online were Mean to them. i cannot type fast enough to stop all of them. this is a crisis right now

today at work this kid (ill call him Kid 1) was having snack w his friend (Kid 2) and kid2 had a kitkat bar. kid1 asked if he could have half and kid2 said no to which kid1 responded verbatim “Kid1 Has Banned Kid2 From Entering Heaven” and it startled me so badly i nearly started crying laughing

kids are the funniest people in the world when i worked at an elementary school during lunch one day the class unprompted started talking abt what they wanted to be when they grew up and this kid beckoned me over and was like

kid: when i grow up i want to be a cristopoper

me: a what?

kid: a cristopoper

me: i don’t think i know what that is!

kid: it’s a person who comes up with the names for different careers

me: oh, that—

kid: yeah, i just started my career. just now

me: oh my god

like he fucking got me. thats genius. thats a well constructed bit. he was 8

a few weeks ago a little girl told me she was going to her friend’s house and i asked what they were going to do and she said she didn’t know yet and i said they’d probably figure it out and have fun no matter what and she said “yeah. (pause) life is really a big mystery.” and i was like that is so true

gregory

mom, sing-song: Happy birthday!!!!

5 year old, in the most exasperated yet giggly tone on earth: ....for the love of god