Wednesday, August 19, 2009

That Will Teach You

This story is related to yesterday's post regarding the sleep wars and Hubbie being out of town. There is nothing that qualifies me more for geek status than my weakness for sci-fi. When LittleBird was born, Spike TV had daily Star Trek Voyager episodes. For a new mom with a hard-to-please infant, it was a welcome respite to the trials of motherhood.

All through our days in Tahoe, LittleBird got her Janeway fix, and even talked about her in her sleep. I was proud, Hubbie kept his mouth shut.

Since our move last year, the kids have not really seen any Trek-related content. Until this week. With Hubbie gone, I sat down with LittleBird on the couch and watched the pilot episode. Since then, I have had the most bizarre and random conversations. Her frame of reference from a year ago is gone. Questions like Why are they trying to get to earth? Why did that rock fall on him? Which one is the alien? (Pick one, honey).

I feel like a nutjob trying to explain terms like temporal flux and warp core. My kid is not the kind to shut up and watch, and I am not the kind of parent to tell her to do so. That being said, she has mostly been impressed that Janeway's hair got messed up, and she fixed it all the while taking care of the ship.

Tonight, Hubbie called to say goodnight. I had not thought that watching the tail-end of two episodes of Voyager had made any kind of impression on my soon-to-be three year-old son. However, he took my phone and proceeded to tell his pappa about "Janeway" and "the other" on the "planet" but then "the other" went to the "other" and um, they "went back on the ship" and "it was very sad".

I could hear my husband blinking on the other end of the line.

When I got the phone back, I started to explain when Hubbie said he'd heard the Janeway part and had kind of pieced things together. My response? You are are out of town, and I am turning your children into Trek nerds. Serves you right.

At least he had the sense of humor to agree.

9 comments:

holly* said...

awesome!

i would not have made it through the first year with our son with out tng and voyager. then i got into stargate sg1 and atlantis. will it never end??!?!?!

as for the damaged i have caused? very minimal i believe. no phone conversations regarding anything trek related yet. but the child can identify between voyager and tng as easy as identifying between dora and spongebob. (no, i dont let him watch spongebob...)

Irrational Dad said...

The ONLY Star Trek I've ever seen is the movie (twice). LittleBird has seen more than I have :(

It's never too late to start, but I don't really have room to add another TV show to my lineup.

Il Duche said...

This is greatness!

Butter is on the whole "investigation show" kick right now. That's his tag, not mine. He will watch CSI and all sundry of cop shows. I'm sure he'll need therapy when this all comes to a head in his brain in 15 years, but right now, I'm all about it!

Krishanna Magic said...

There are WAY worse things to turn your kids into...but I'll refrain from preaching to the choir..;)

Patois42 said...

Even out of throttling reach, he agreed with you? Smart man. Smart man.

Not Afraid to Use It said...

@HollyStar: We don't let our kids watch SpongeBob either. I don't know that being able to describe the differences between the Klingons and Cardassians will get them into college, but you never know. :)

@Joe: I might need to send you another present, brother.

@IlDuche: Thank god for our DVR bc otherwise we'd never get to see our murder mystery shows.

@Krishanna: LOL Sometimes the choir likes to have that reinforcement.

@Patois: Yeah, but he knows that eventually he'll get to see Jeri Ryan and her gigantic rack squeezed into her unitard. His agreement was totally self-serving.

Anonymous said...

LOL That's awesome! I think you should get an award for that.

Coal Miner's Granddaughter said...

Hee hee! Leave her with us for a week and Ty will have her watching classic Trek. :) That's awesome, hon!

Gypsy said...

There are worse things they could be.