Not a Dinosaur

I'm reading a bedtime story to the kids. There's a picture of a Pterosaur in one of the pages.

Vian: That is not even a dinosaur.

I am quite proud that he know that Pterosaurs are not Dinosaurs.

Me: Oh, what are they?

Vian: They're just grown-up chickens in the sky.

Sempi: Argh! They're called Pterosaur, Vian. Ugh!

Vian likes taunting his brother, so he repeats his flying chicken theory one more time for good measure.


Tricking a Couple of Kids

Both kids insisted that they want to get ready for bed last.

I told Vian (4yo) in secret that we're going to trick Sempi (8yo). He should floss and brush but not do MiPaste (a Fluoride paste). Then after I get Sempi ready we can do MiPaste, Vian would be the last to get ready.

Vian bought into the idea and he brushed first with a mischievous glee. The plan worked like a charm, Sempi was happy that he was brushing after Vian and Vian was happy that he didn't do his MiPaste until after Sempi brushed, thus he was the last to get ready for bed.

I emerged the victor. 

Computers and Memory

When Sempi and I go on walks, we occasionally discuss something we both find interesting. 

Today during our walk today, I told Sempi memory is a tricky thing. If we have to remember a sequence of numbers some of them are really easy but others are hard. 

For example, we can easily remember 1,2,3,4,5,6,7. We can also remember 7,6,5,4,3,2,1 but it is quite hard for us to remember a random sequence like 3,4,2,5,1,7,6. For a computer remembering 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 takes the same effort as remember a random sequence like 3,4,2,5,1,7,6.

His response was, if you write down the numbers on a paper, you won't have to remember them at all. That's what the computers do. They write them down in a file so they can retrieve it later. That's why it is the same effort for them to remember a random sequence as well as a regular sequence. 

I thought that was a pretty clever analogy. 

Orange?

Sempi declared that he found a word that rhymes with Orange, the color Orange. He thought they had different spelling, after I corrected him the following conversation ensued.

Me: The color orange and the fruit orange have the same spelling. The meaning differs based on the context. For example, when you say my car is orange it means the car's color is orange, it doesn't mean the car is a fruit.

Sempi: Oooh! You can say that my car is related to orange, because a car can be a lemon.

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