Libby’s Aunt Lisa and Uncle Ned sent her this Leap Frog Alphabet caterpillar for her birthday (thanks guys!)
One of the greatest things about this is that it not only has a mode where pressing each leg makes the caterpillar say each letter (A, Bee, See) but also a mode where it will say each letter sound (ahh, buh, cuh). Which means you can use it as a simplistic speech synthesizer (cuh,ahh,tuh). Oh the mischief I shall wreck with this.
Or so I thought. My giddiness was short-lived as I went straight for the crown jewel of curse words. Fuh –uw—ha ha, that tickles. What the hell? I’m not trying to tickly you, I’m trying to make you make a c or k sound and thereby make an innocent child’s toy give me thirty seconds of juvenile pleasure.
Alas, ‘tis not to be. After hours of experimentation I discovered the parameters of Caterpillars no-cursing algorithm. I, at first, assumed that it simply had a list of words that it would cause the last letter to giggle rather than finish the word, thereby robbing me of a tiny pleasure. But it turns out that the algorithm is cleverer than that. Instead it just blocks two letter combinations. Not just the obvious ones either, like u-c or o-c but also phonetic ones like a-x.
So they went to a lot of trouble. Why exactly? I realize that I’m not the first person to make children’s toys like this try to do things they really shouldn’t. But really, who exactly am I (are we) hurting? Is a child really going to accidentally hit on a letter combination that comes up with a dirty word? And if so, what exactly is going to happen? Will there head explode? If so, I wholeheartedly support the blocking of said letter combinations. More than likely however, they won’t even realize they’ve made a word (it takes an adults imagination to really make works out of the sound combos). And if the Leap Frog Alphabet Caterpillar is still kicking around when Libby’s six or seven and starts thinking along these lines (too early? She’s really smart) then so be it. If you’re smart enough to make the caterpillar curse, have at it!
Here then is the definitive list of letter two-letter combinations (and one three letter) blocked by the Leap Frog Alphabet Caterpillar as well as examples of words that are banned and thus make my daughter cry (really,no honestly, she’s heartbroken every time she can’t make it say ‘clock’ ). Thanks a lot Leap Frog.
Ax; Ag; As; Ax; Fc; Fk; Fx; Sc; Oc; Ok; Sk; Sx; Tit; Xt; Uc; Uk; Wp
5 comments:
Ladies and gentlemen, my husband the (juvenile) geek.
Good morning. And all this in search of a curse word? I thought of some as I was reading this. But keep working. It must be there somewhere. Anyway Libby if you can wrestle the toy away from Daddy you learn a lot of other non-cursing words and let Daddy play with it when you have gone to bed. Libby your formative years are going to be something else. Love to everyone. Grandma and Grandpa Kennedy
It sure makes you sad for the days of the old Speak and Spell...on we made it say soooo many bad words...each time laughing away! It was sad Kerri never got to play with the toy!
Sounds like you are having fun!
Kim
I love that Grandma & Grandpa's comment is to keep trying--you'll get it to say SOMEthing dirty. Awesome!
That is highly, HIGHLY disturbing.
Post a Comment