Twenty Questions/I Spy

The boys like to play 20 Questions, especially in the car. So almost every day as we back out of the driveway to take Zach to school, Drew says, "Let's play Twenty Questions." Some days he says, "Let's play I Fy," which translates to I Spy. It's hard to say what the difference is between the two games for Drew. He does a pretty good job if he's trying to guess what Zach or I are thinking of in 20 Questions, but if it's his turn, it's pretty comical. Every single day, on Drew's first turn, he says, "I fy something red." Either Zach or I then say, "Lightning McQueen," or "You," (Drew has taken to calling himself Lightning McQueen), and then Drew always says in a most excited voice, "YES! I Lightning McQueen!" I would say 95% of the time we don't have any Lightning McQueen toys with us, so it's really more of a 20 Questions game than I Spy. After that first turn, you never know what Drew will come up with. Sometimes it's real things that he sees outside the car, and other times it's other cars from the Cars movie. It just cracks me up how each day he starts the same way. Today Zach said to him, "You might want to try something other than Lightning McQueen sometime, so that we have a harder time guessing." At least Zach still plays along and doesn't get too crabby about Drew always picking the same thing.

Zach's usually pretty good about 20 Questions, but he forgets a lot that he's only supposed to answer with yes or no. Lately there have been some really funny ones. I can't remember exactly how the questioning went, but a couple of weeks ago he and I were playing, and I was trying to guess what he was thinking of. I had somehow gotten to the point where I asked if it was a kind of food. He said yes, that it was food and he'd had 2 different kinds, one that he liked and one that he didn't like. So I'm trying to guess all these kinds of food, and eventually I somehow figure out he is thinking of Ricky Stanzi. What the heck kind of food is Ricky Stanzi you're thinking, right? No kind of food; Ricky Stanzi is the Hawkeye quarterback. In Zach's mind, though, it all fit together, because Ricky Stanzi plays for the Hawkeyes, and Zach has eaten popcorn twice this season while watching Hawkeye games on T.V. One time he had cheese popcorn (yuck!) with Mike while watching, and he didn't like that kind. Another time he had popcorn at Grandma and Grandpa's while watching Ricky Stanzi play, so that meant that when I asked if it was a food, it made perfect sense to say yes. I realize this story does not sound funny at all to anyone reading it, but it definitely made me laugh when it happened, because in Zach's 5 year-old brain it all made perfect sense, and it was weird to him that I didn't figure out Ricky Stanzi from the clues he was giving me.

The other funny incident with 20 Questions just occurred a couple of days ago. It was Zach's turn again, and he thought of something and Drew and I started asking questions. Here's a summary of how it went:

Me- Is it bigger than a person?

Zach- Yes, but people ride on these.

Me- Hmm. So is it alive?

Zach- Yes, but there aren't many alive now. There was a long time ago.

Me (feeling a little stumped)- Have we ever seen one?

Zach- Well, Drew and I have, but I don't know if you Dad and have.

Me (really stumped now)- Is it a dinosaur??

Zach- No! People didn't ride on dinosaurs!

Me- But you and Drew have seen it but not Dad and me?

Zach- Well, Drew and I have seen it with Grandma and Grandpa.

Me- Are you sure it's alive?

Zach- Well, I don't think there are many alive now.

Me- Is it a kind of animal?

Zach- No

Me- Is it an army tank?

Zach- Yes!

The big clue there was that he and Drew had seen it with Grandma and Grandpa, because I remember them seeing an army tank once with Kevin and Cynthia. Once again, though, it cracked me up that he said it was alive and that he said they aren't around anymore.

Another time Zach's clues were that the thing he was thinking about was very big and very far away- none near where we live. I guessed mountains, but that wasn't right, and then Drew guessed Colorado, which I thought was a pretty good guess for a 2 year-old. The answer was skyscrapers, which is funny, because there is one skyscraper here, and to a 5 year-old, some of the other buildings downtown probably would be considered skyscrapers, too.

So between Drew's obvious 20 Question/I Spy topics and Zach's cryptic answers, our rides to kindergarten every day are pretty interesting. As much as some days I just don't feel like playing, usually I get some good laughs.