Monday, June 8, 2009

Knock, Knock! Who's There?

Well, it finally happened. LR's two weeks' shy of turning four and he's discovered Knock, Knock jokes. We had a Knock, Knock scare about six or eight months ago, but it never really went anywhere. At the time, he didn't really understand what he was doing and all we got was the punchline: "Knock, Knock!" "Who's There?" "Orange you glad I didn't say banana?" He would then giggle a lot and walk away. Okay, we could live with that; at least he wasn't making us go through that particularly endless joke. (For anyone not familiar with this joke, just consider yourself lucky and move on with your life).

Now, he still doesn't entirely understand what he's doing, but he knows that it's supposed to follow a specific formula and that it's supposed to be funny. The problem, of course, is that he still has a four-year-old's sense of what is, and is not, funny. Now, I absolutely appreciate the fact that he's actually making these jokes (and I use the term loosely) up on his own and I applaud his creativity. I do. But I also have to sit through them. So far, they are all variations on a single theme and he's repeating them endlessly with all the tirelessness that you'd expect from any preschooler who's discovered a new interest.

"Knock, Knock!" "Who's there?" "Daddy." "Daddy who?" "Daddy YOU!" [followed by hysterical giggling].
"Knock, Knock!" "Who's there?" "Mommy." "[Sigh]Mommy who?" "Mommy YOU!" [more hysterical giggling].
[Repeat the above ad nauseum.]

It's going to be a very long year.

4 comments:

  1. And to think that I can't wait for DeerDotter to start to talk...

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  2. Yeah, I remember those days. I have a fair amount of nostalgia for them, too. (If you still don't understand why, just check out my son's comments, and attitude, in my post on his first invisible friend).

    In all honesty, I'm incredibly proud of him and his verbal abilities. However, I am now dreading the day he enters his teens.

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  3. We went through knock-knock hell forever... it seemed that the time. My son (now 31 years old) was diagnosed with Aspergers a few years ago and we rejoiced to have answers and all those "ah ah" moments where things finally made sense.

    He's a Navy vet, now in college full time, has been married and held down jobs: all made so challenging by being an Aspie. I share this for the days there seem to be no hope of a relatively "normal" life.

    It has had its challenges and sorrows, but life with a loving, intelligent oddball has been mostly a joy.

    L

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  4. my daughter loves repetition. (she's 3)
    she likes for me to say the same thing over and over and she laughs and laughs and finally i say, "okay, i don't want to say it anymore" haha.

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