Buckaroo and His TV Troubles

Buckaroo watches TV with Nana Sandy

Buckaroo enjoys his television time a little bit too much, as far as I'm concerned. I can't seem to eliminate it from his life though, because his time in front of Kipper does give me a chance to catch my breath and start dinner in the afternoon-- well some days, like today, it's just an opportunity to finish a really good book-- but I do try to limit his time and content.

When we go a-visiting, Buckaroo likes to watch anything on the Noggin channel, and that's been fine. He's also been introduced, courtesy of Nana, to Finding Nemo, but that's the only movie he's seen, as far as I know. It's hard to resist Ellen DeGeneres.

Meanwhile, Buckaroo loves his books, and he especially loves books about cars and trucks, and he most especially loves books from the movie Cars. I may have neglected to mention to Buckaroo that his favorite Cars characters are in a motion picture. I've never seen the movie, and I don't have any particular desire to see it, and I sense it might be one of those movies Buckaroo will want to watch more than once.

So yesterday Buckaroo had is two-year medical check up (a few months late). He had blood drawn to test for lead and anemia, and it was a slow, miserable time. He didn't cry, just looked at me with a pained face as the nurse squeezed many, many drops from his little finger.

On our way out the door the nurse gave him stickers with McQueen and Mater on them, and I was buckling Buckaroo into his car seat I said, "Don't forget your stickers" and put them in his lap.

He held a sticker between one fat, cotton-bandaged finger and one good one, wrinkled his brow and said, "I think we're supposed to watch these guys on TV."

I paused. I've read that parents shouldn't give kids treats as rewards when they're hurting because it creates a life-long habit of comforting pain with food. Would Pixar fall into the same category as a cream puff?

I decided it would. Then I asked, "Would you like a popsicle when we get home?"


Uh, well. They're 100% juice.