Ryan and I watched a movie one night a few weeks ago called Parenthood in which an eight-year-old boy was singing a song he’d made up about diarrhea. For some reason, Ryan brought it up during dinner, I think to rub in the fact that some day our little boy will be creating his own creative songs about bodily functions and waste.

“Diarrhea!” Paul laughed, since he could see it made us laugh too.

That would have been fine. OK, one day of a new word. Then suddenly, last night at dinner, two weeks later, in the middle of his bite of pizza, Paul called out very loudly, “Diarrhea!” Without any reminder, he suddenly remembered his new word!

Since he kept saying his new word very loudly, in a moment of brilliance insanity, Mommy decided to take the matter in her own hands and explain just why diarrhea isn’t a word we talk about at the dinner table. After all, Paul didn’t even know what it was! Surely he’d be disgusted to realize he’d been talking about poop.

Unfortunately, Mommy’s plan failed miserable, as you can probably figure out. The rest of dinner was filled with Paul’s conversation thus:

“DIARRHEA! Diarrhea is icky poop. Really icky poop. DIARRHEA! DIARRHEA! Icky poop. DIARRHEA!”

And then, of course, after dinner, Paul wanted the diarrhea to come out. He sat on the toilet for 10 minutes saying, “Diarrhea! Come out!” Hey, at least he’s back to sitting on the toilet!

Great. I thought I had a few years before Cub Scouts’ toilet talk. Apparently, it has begun.