Is That Funny?!

Brianna has her own little toddler sense of humor. Making funny noises, silly faces, or having stuffed animals do a little dance...these are all hysterical to her. But, here lately she's been trying to figure out the finer nuances of what exactly is funny and why it's funny.

Take the whole "pokey fish" incident as I'll call it. Even though that was several days ago she's still been randomly getting upset about it. She'll walk into the room and suddenly say "Mommy, I'm sad." When I ask "Why, why are you sad baby?" She says, "Pokey fish, a pokey fish got me," at which point she either bursts into full blown tears and hysteria or then goes on to say "Silly fish! He got me! That's so funny!" (And no one better make any comments about how it's cause she's a girl! I will go so femi-Nazi on your chauvenist a** :) Ahem.)

Then there's this little argument Bree and I have been having lately... She'll come up to me and say "Hit Mommy, kick Mommy. Oh so funny, oh so funny. Is that funny?" Now, she doesn't actually hit or kick me but still, I didn't think that was something to just let go so I have been saying, "No. Hitting and kicking aren't funny. That hurts people. If you hurt Mommy you'll have a time-out." Bree responds to this by saying, "Hit Mommy, kick Mommy. Oh so funny, oh so funny. Is that funny?" Then I say, "NO. You don't hit or kick Mommy." And, round and round we'd go like that. But, since she hasn't actually followed up her big talk with any real hitting or kicking, the past few days I have decided she's just trying to get a rise out of me and I've ignored her on this subject. (The parenting books call it "selective ignoring" and yes, it's an actual discipline technique. Hmm...Feeling feisty tonight aren't I?) Ignoring actually seems to help on this one and I figure, she's just trying to work out the definition of humor. I mean, in cartoons it's "funny" if the main character gets hurt, right? (Darn that Mickey Mouse, such a bad influence!) Maybe she'll end up making humor a lifelong pursuit and become a stand-up comic, although, I don't think she'll be real popular if she just starts beating up her audience...