Tuesday 9 May 2017

No More Birthdays Any More!


The 5 Year Old has been in a thoughtful rather than talkative mood recently, but today she has a new idea playing on her mind.

"What if everyone in the world had to cancel their birthday?" she asks.

"Why would they do that?" I ask.

"Because no-one will come to their party!" Obviously.

"No-one will come to anyone's party? That seems a bit unlikely..."

"But what if everyone in the world gets chicken pox?" she asks, with a big gesture.

"What, at once?" I cry.

"People do all get ill at once sometimes!"

"That would be some epidemic," I shrug. "Chicken pox only lasts about a week, though. Everyone doesn't have a birthday on the same day, though, some parties could go ahead."

"No!" she insists. "This chicken pox will last a year!"

Well, no arguing with that.

"Well, in the unlikely event that a chicken pox epidemic overtook the entire world at the same time, even the people who had already had it, and lasted an entire year, then I imagine that lots of birthday parties would be cancelled, yes."

"That would be sad," she nods glumly.

"On the bright side, it would be great news for all the chiggy-wigs!" I chip in.

"Why's THAT?" she asks.

"Well," I say, in a vaguely post-modern nod to this blog I read called The Philosophy of a 5 Year Old, "chiggy-wigs eat chicken pox, don't they?"

"That is ridiculous," she snorts, having spent a half term studying insects since our prior conversation, "they are called woodlice, and they eat leaves!"

Darn you, education. Gosh darn you all to heck!

No comments:

Post a Comment