I actually found Matt King to be a sympathetic character.

This past Saturday, we got back from spending Thanksgiving in DC.  It was a terrific holiday -- once again, my parents' house was packed to the rafters with me and my brothers and our families.  The kids had a great time hanging out with their grandparents and cousins and uncles and aunts, I enjoyed the fact that there were enough adults around to give me time to read two books in five days, because someone took the kids the park every day.  I got to go to the State Department to see my mom tape an interview panel on child adoption. I got to see my high school friend Lisa and my college friend Susan, who happen to know each other because their husbands are law partners.  We ran/walked/pushed strollers in the SOME Turkey Trot, a 5K run for charity that benefits DC's homeless.

The whole mishpacha

We had a delicious Thanksgiving dinner.  We went for walks by the Potomac River.  We had our annual Day After Thanksgiving Pie (DATP) gathering with my friend Ali. 

Mostly we just got to be together and enjoy each others' company.

But traveling with the kids is tiring, plus there's the time difference, so after getting home on Saturday, we got to enjoy Sunday as a lazy day.  At one point J took the kids somewhere and I had the house to myself, so I decided to watch The Descendants, which was on HBO.

Later we were all driving in the car and I was telling J about the movie (which I thought was great).  J asked me what it was about, and I said, "well, it's about this guy who's a, uh..."

I hesitated for a second as I tried to think of what I wanted to say.

And before I could finish my thought, Zeke -- who hasn't seen the movie and had no idea what we were talking about -- piped up from the back seat, "...a dick?"

Now, I'm pretty proud of the fact that though J and I both have potty-mouths, the kids do not know any of the bad swear words because we're really careful about the language we use in front of them.  When J and Zeke went camping with his friend Coleman and Coleman's dad, they had a running thing that because they were camping and it was a boy's weekend, everyone was allowed to swear.  So they encouraged the boys to say the worst words they could think of.

The words that the boys came up with?  Butt and fart.

In the grand scheme of things, "dick" isn't so bad, but obviously I'd prefer that Zeke not use it in public.  So in between wheezing with laughter, J and I tried to explain that "dick" isn't a nice word and we shouldn't call someone a dick.  (Unless they're a dick, I thought to myself).

I can't decide if this is a parenting fail or a parenting win.

Against my better judgment, I'm leaning towards "win."