Thank You, Turtle Man

As I was driving B to pre-school this morning, I was trying to ignore the fact that we were late, and instead focus on how well he was doing in school.

We were late because, for the third night in a row, both boys woke up in the middle of the night. This time, B had a nightmare that the fish in his fake aquarium "got really, really big and turned into sharks". As I was sitting on the side of his bed at 3 AM, listening to tales of giant imaginary fake aquarium fish, O woke up and said "Mom, I had a nightmare, too. B was driving a car".

Well, yeah, that is a pretty scary thought.

 I finally got back to sleep at five thirty this morning, and slept right through the alarm an hour and a half later, so I opted to drive N to school rather than rush to make the bus (and miss it anyway). As we all finally piled in the car, I noticed my tire pressure sensor flashing "EXTREMELY LOW TIRE PRESSURE", so after driving N to school on a mostly flat tire, I stopped to get air in it before taking B to school.

So there I was, thinking that at least he wasn't fighting me about going to school, and that at least he loved it, and wasn't having any trouble, and seemed to be following all of the rules--well, except for that one about needing to stop running before he reaches the gym wall--or, more precisely, before his head reaches the gym wall--but he's working on that one.

And, at that moment, as I was thinking about how well he was doing at his preschool, which just happens to be run by a Baptist Church, he said,

"Mom? What's an evil bastard?"

I forced myself to put on my stepford wife mommy voice and said " What did you say, B?"

Because surely, I heard him wrong.

" I said an evil bastard, mom! What's an evil bastard?"

Huh. No, I'm pretty sure I heard him right.

Now, I could point out that I worked last night, and I could also point out that if I was the type to document the times and dates of when these types of words come out of my sweet boy's mouth, they would almost always come out of his mouth after I have been working.

When he was home with his father.

But I won't point any of that out.

"MOM! Please tell me! WHAT is an evil bastard?"

I rack my brain trying to think of where he could have heard this. It had to be on TV--I'm pretty sure we don't know anyone who uses words like "evil" and "bastard" together in the same phrase.

Admittedly, I have gotten lax about letting the boys watch N's TV shows with her. I would prefer that they all watch Sesame Street until they're twelve, but I'm reluctantly accepting that N is past that point, and sometimes she wins the TV coin toss. But has it gotten that bad? Is Evil Bastard now an acceptable term on the Disney Channel?

I never really liked that Phineas and Ferb. I don't like their language. And more than once, I've had to say that just because Phineas and Ferb say something doesn't mean that we say it.

But evil bastard?

B is drawling a blank when I ever so sweetly ask where he thinks he may have heard those words, which by the way, aren't very nice, and we probably shouldn't be saying them.

Especially not in preschool, which we are arriving at as we speak.

I am still trying to figure out where he heard it. Though I haven't watched much of them, I heard that the presidential debates were getting pretty intense. Maybe B saw some of it with Jimmy last night. Are they now calling each other evil bastards?

I dropped B off in his classroom, with a hug and a kiss, and a whispered reminder not to say those words we just talked about in the car, and as O and I drove away, it dawned on me.

Turtle Man.

Of course.

Since the Discovery Channel is one of the few allegedly "safe" channels we watch with the kids, Jimmy had let B watch a few minutes of Turtle Man's show with him before bed last night. Turtle Man is a little rough around the edges, but his antics are generally limited to diving into murky green swamps and coming up with a snapping turtle that has been tormenting some poor rural family, so we figured it was probably OK.

Except that Turtle Man has some colorful language sometimes.

And sometimes, apparently those turtles can be evil bastards.

Thanks, Turtle Man. One more thing that the kids can't watch.

I am happy, at least, that our presidential candidates aren't calling each other names like this.

Yet.