Monday, December 5, 2011

A Case of the No Ways

Today was a "No way!" day.  As in... every. single. thing. I said to Hazel was met with a hearty "NO WAY!"

Not "No."

Not "No, thank you."

Not even a "Nope."

Just "No. Way!"

To everything.

Hazel, would you like yogurt for breakfast?  No way!
Hazel, would you like to cudder?  No way!
Do you want to go play with your friends?  No way!
Would you like ice cream for dinner? No way!
How about a puppy?  Do you want a puppy?  No way!
Would you like Mommy to stick this fork directly into her eye and swirl it?  *Silence*

It's just out of control... the no way's. And it's killing me.  Because I'm pretty sure that the "No" part of "No way" is the default setting for all 2-year-olds.  (At least that's what I'm telling myself.)(If you have different information, please keep it to yourself.) But the "Way" part of "No way"... apparently, that's all me.

When she first started saying "No way!" two weeks ago as we were driving to Prescott for Thanksgiving, Benny and I thought it was cute.  And we quickly determined that it must be something she'd picked up at day care.  Then, as we were looking for a city park to stop at for The Bird and The Bean to stretch their legs, I looked on the Boulder City website which said a particular park was the most popular playground in the city, with a nice view of Lake Mead in the background.  It further went on to claim that sometimes, big horned sheep would come down off the mountain and graze on the grass next to the playground.  And when I mentioned this little factoid to Benny, we both rolled our eyes and said,

"Yea.  Right.  There's big horned sheep on the playground.  Sure."

And then we pulled up to the playground and I'll be damned if there wasn't 10 of them right there.  Grazing.  As if they hadn't a care in the world.  As if they were unaware that I was about to unbuckle a toddler who was going to RUIN THEIR LUNCH. 



"No. Way!", I exclaimed as I looked through the window out to the playground.  "No way, no way, no way!!!"

Yep... she definitely must have picked it up at day care... and now I've picked it up.  A lot like a common cold.

But if you start to listen to how people talk these days - and with a 2-year-old mimic clutching my leg while screaming "No way!" and "SHUT THA DOH!", I pay close attention to what she's exposed to - a lot of people say "No way."  Obviously, no one says it with as much passion and mind-numbing repetition as The Bird, but holy geez!

So, naturally, to defend myself from being not only the one to teach The Bird her first naughty word, but also a phrase that has been permanently tattooed on my cerebrum, I started pointing out to family members whenever they said "No way!" during the Thanksgiving holiday.  (Or the Thanksgiving  Nowayiday.)

Which means that not only did we have turkey, potatoes and asparagus for Thanksgiving, we also had a little bit of jerkface.  That jerkface being the mother who was trying desperately to prove that she's not the (only) one who taught her daughter the most annoying catchphrase on earth.

3 comments:

momo said...

if no way is the worst thing that the bird picks up and says, then i say you're doing a just fine job with them.

Carrie said...

No way is pretty cute. When she says "no way", repeat "no thank you" until she repeats it...no matter how long or how many times it takes you saying "no thank you" to correct her and then praise her for saying "no thank you". It'll catch on as quickly as "no way". Let her know when it is an appropriate response though (i.e. you: "pick up your toys, please", her: "no thank you" you: "it wasn't a question, now pick up your toys.")

Someone, somewhere, taught D "what the?" and it seemed like it took forever to break him of it.

greyhound said...

My brother's son took it to the next level:

"No-way-JOSE."

I can teach the Bird if you like. No need to thank me. I'm just here to help.