trust but verify

"Dad? How do you spell 'Golden Weasel'?" 

I spell it for him, then look over to see him squatting down, a tongue sticking out in concentration, as he rearranges Scrabble tiles. 

"Look!" he yells. "I spelled 'Hobbes'—H, O, B, E, E, S!" 

"Close," I say. "It's got two Bs and one E. H,O, B, B, E, S." 

He turns to look up at me, then back down at the tiles, then at me again, then runs off to get a Calvin & Hobbes collection to check. 

It's possible I should rethink my strategy of answering my spawn's questions with "humorous" replies quite so often.