Drivel

I have trained (more or less) that from 8:55 a.m. to 9 a.m. there is to be no speaking while Writer's Almanac is on. For those five minutes I insist on absolute silence in the car (because inevitably we are on our way somewhere). I've had a bit of luck with this. The other 12 hours and 55 minutes of their waking hour is filled with chatter, specifically questions. Specifically questions from Doodles. Specifically inane questions that I attempt to answer accurately for about the first 37 minutes before giving in to the pat answers of "I don't know," "Why don't you ask your father?" and "What?!?"

Doodles has a question matrix. Basically, column A is a noun. Column B is a verb. Column C can be just about anything. Column A's nouns consist primarily of the following words, although others can be added at any time: volcanoes, dinosaurs, pharaohs, trees, babies, grown-ups. Column B includes: born, die, have, make. Column C is completely random. So for instance, today we had: Did pharaohs die in space? Do trees have bones? Do volcanoes have bones? Occasionally, he throws a real question in there ("Mommy, why did the dinosaurs die?"), just to keep me on my toes and to keep me tuning out completely. Of course, half the time I don't know the answer to the question, to which my pat answer is, "Let's call Peter" (who is Doodle and Pie's grandfather). Peter doesn't know everything, but he thinks he knows everything, and right now, that's good enough for me.

So let me ask you: Do pygmy warthogs like to eat dessert?