Tonight at our family Thanksgiving dinner, Jared, Sarah1, Jenn and I were discussing the glory of The Little Scientist Stage.  Kate, niece #2, is entering into the stage where she’s constantly testing the world around her.  Babies in this stage learn about basic ideas that we take for granted like Gravity.  

“Yeah,” Jared said, “I read a study that said kids will crawl out on glass over great heights without fear, because they don’t understand that they could fall.”

We all nodded in agreement as he continued.

“Like if you put a baby in a glass bottom boat…” he paused, realizing that a glass bottom boat would not be a very effective example, since glass bottom boats are, in fact, in the water.  Then he finished the sentence, correcting the metaphor with a single prepositional phrase, “… in the sky.” 

A GLASS BOTTOM BOAT. YOU KNOW. THE KIND THAT FLY.

Sarah1, Jenn and I immediately hit the deck laughing.  A glass bottom boat in the sky, we asked?  IN THE SKY?  Jared immediately denied that he had said such a thing.  ”I DIDN’T SAY IN THE SKY,” he half-shouted at us over and over, and each time he said so, we would say back to him, “IN THE SSSKKKYYY!!!!”

Eventually, the ‘whether or not he said “in the sky”‘ issue was solved through a battle of the ages: a 5 person arm wrestling match.  I’m not sure how we jumped from making fun of Jared for his absurd comment to Sarah1, 2, and Jenn on one side of an arm wrestling match against Zack and Jared, but it totally happened.  

5 hands, if I do say so myself, might be too many to be involved in one arm wrestling match.  Zack and Jared together were able to beat the 3 of us girls.  But neither Zack nor Jared alone could handle our OVERWHELMING POWER.  I think the original deal was that if Zack and Jared could beat us collectively, that we would have to let the Glass Bottom Boat In The Sky comment sail into the great beyond.  What they didn’t realize, though, is that our power can not be stopped with a single arm wrestling match.  And I’m pretty sure they lifted their elbows, anyway. 

So that’s why I’m telling you, internet, about how Jared said that your toddlers won’t be afraid of Glass Bottom Boats. In the Sky.