The NEED to Know

SpikyBoy needs to know things.  and when he needs to know them, he needs to know Now! This Instant!

"Mummy, can I just ask you something?"  "Not now, Spikyboy, I am in the middle of negotiating a tricky roundabout/trying to avoid a blindly reversing old lady/trying to listen to the Satnav patiently explaining where I went wrong.  I will listen to you in a minute, ok?"

Exactly 60 seconds later.

"Mummy? Mummy? What's petrol made of?"

I remember this conversation very clearly, as it totally flummoxed me.  I was driving somewhere new, Spikyboy was two and the Little sister only a teeny tiny baby.  Up to this point, I had keenly enjoyed his inquisitive nature and enthusiastically answered his early questions like "Why is it called a Bus?"

But, petrol?  My mind went totally blank.  And in a horrible sinking moment, I realised that no, I was not going to be supermum and no, I was not going to be a Font of All Knowledge.  There would be questions I just could not answer. Not without Google, anyway.  And until someone invents a Heads Up display for my windscreen, complete with Auto Google, I am not going to be able to answer most questions in the car.  And Spikyboy reserves most of his questions for the car.  I think he wants to use up the otherwise dead time.

Spikyboy focusses his interest on one or two subjects at a time.  He remains interested in past obsessions, and will happily read books on his chosen subjects at any point, but all he talks about is his current obsession.  So in the past we have had Trains, then Lego, then Rocks and Fossils with Volcanos hot on their heels.  This was followed by Crystals (specifically diamonds and how much he could sell them for!).

Now we have ...Rollercoasters.  How fast, how high, how many loop de loops, how many inversions?  He is spouting terms like "Beyond Vertical Drop" and I have no idea what he is talking about.  A lot of the time, I confess, I just smile and nod.