A Two-Foot-Tall Ted Kennedy Lives In My House

As an attorney, I pride myself on my linguistic skills and proper grammar. (I have to; I'm paid to write well. Trust me, it's not a burning personal desire to rework Strunk & White's or be the next Bryan Garner, although I appreciate the work he's done.) In that vein, I constantly correct Jack's grammar and speech when I hear things that are not necessarily correct. He frequently confuses verb tense or conjugations. For example, Jack will say, "Daddy, today mommy and I droved to Target and boughted some clothes for Sam" to which I respond, in my best impression of ajunior high grammar teacher, "Fantastic! You DROVE to Target and BOUGHT some clothes for Sam. WONDERFUL!"

One thing that is currently uncorrectable, however, is Jack's frequent transposition of "-uh" for "-er." As I referenced on the sidebar, Jack calls our IMac the "pew-tuh." I have tried to correct this to "com-pu-ter" (slowly saying each syllable with great emphasis) to no avail. So we live with it. And, frankly, it yields some pretty humorous conversations. His inability (or choice, we haven't figured out which yet) to change all words that end in and "-er" to "-uh" makes him sound like member of the Kennedy household on a tear. "Daddy, why you workin' on the pew-tuh?" "Well, Jack, because I can't get my caaaaa out of the garaaaaaage. Go Red Sawcks!"