For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for November 23, 2022

of course… elephants’ flat feet

April now says, “It’s ’nowing” but Elly corrects to “It’s snowing.” How do those sound different? How does Elly know she needs to correct this pronunciation?

I am not sure what elephants have to do with anything.

Shows that some parents aren’t all knowing. Technically where I live, the month of November doesn’t fall into the Winter season. (Although there is an urban legend going around that Canada has only 2 seasons. Two months of summer and 10 months of winter.)

A smart parent can get back to the origin of the universe in 4 “Why?”

I have flat feet. And I’ll feel like an elephant by the end of the holidays.

Love the explanation – reminds me of an old elephant joke:Why do ducks have webbed feet? To stamp out forest fires…

Why do elephants have big feet? To stamp out flaming ducks…!

But… elephants still have flat feet in the summer!

Parents are the smartest people in the world until they suddenly are the stupidest.

I KNEW that..

Mums? I didn’t know that was Canadian, I thought only British, maybe Australian…

Smart Mom after several kids. Totally changed the subject – that throws them off ;-)

" Elephants and Eskimos

Are the sort of inventions

___________Kenneth Patchen

Sooo… April can only articulate words like a toddler… but her thoughts are more like a 10 year old… Interesting.

Sweet!

Great way to stop the chain of “why”. Toddlers really want to know, but they can be sooooo annoying.

Sounds like a strip where Michael was about five years old and home with Elly.

Michael: Where is Daddy?

Elly: He is not home.

Michael: Why not?

Elly: He had to go out.

Michael: Where did he go?

Elly{frustrated}: HE WENT TO BRAZIL IN A BEETLE CAT!

Michael stops asking questions. Later, the telephone rings

Michael: Hello?

Caller: May I speak to your father, please?

Michael: Sorry, sir. My father is not home right now. He sailed away to Brazil.

Elly’s eyes bug out

I hear elephants are fun in the snow, too.

A long-ago conversation between my then three-year-old child and me:

“Where’s that man going?” (A guy was walking past our house, heading east.)

“I have no idea.”

(In a shocked tone of voice) “Yes, you do!”

“No, not at all. I can’t even guess; I don’t even know who that is.”

“But you know everything!”

That idea was a heavy burden for a while, but, fortunately, died an early death. :-)

Lol. Love April’s final response, oh.

A few years later…April is at school and all the kids are laughing at her.

Miss Wormwood: April, where in the world did you get such an answer off by miles! The reason that it is colder this time of year is because our hemisphere is tilted away from the sun. not because elephants have flat feet! That is an F, I’m afraid!

Sometimes you just have to give a nonsensical answer to get them to stop answering.

When my son was three, he was always asking questions. Our fallback was, “Because that’s how Jesus wanted it.” When he became a dad, he tried that on his oldest. Kids have gotten a lot smarter.

BTW — did anyone else have trouble bringing this cartoon up the last four or five drays? I was surprised when it worked today.

I had a friend back in the day with whom I shared a PE class and daily elephant jokes. I hope she thrives today, and I hope the jokes live on.

Why do ducks have flat feet? To stomp out forest fires. Why do elephants have flat feet? To stomp out flaming ducks.

It snows when elephants with flat feet walk around when it gets cold and shake all the snow out of the trees. The End.

Well, well! An appearance of April where she’s swet and not a brat! Yay, April!