The Device Which Shall Not Be Named

It's been another summer of Harry Potter in the Joy household.  First one was Mama's Harry Potter summer a couple of years ago, when I decided that I really needed to be able to tap into this cultural phenomenon -- and got totally sucked in, to the point of inhaling all seven books in something like six weeks.  This summer, it's Rose's turn, and I get to re-experience it.  She's been reading, I've been reading aloud to her, and we're halfway through the movies too.

For Joy, meanwhile, it's been another summer of the iPad.  She's been making great strides, mastering new apps and various parts of old apps that used to stymie her.  We've even been able to download Angry Birds again!  First time around, she insisted on catapulting the birds from right to left (i.e. off the screen in the wrong direction) and then getting very frustrated, to the point that we had to remove it from the iPad.  This time, she's flinging them correctly, and has even figured out that with some of the birds, you get the most out of them by tapping again in flight.

Joy loves her iPad so, she'd probably play with it all day if she could.  But not only won't it hold a charge that long, she needs to do other things as well!  So we try to distract her, get her thinking about different things, tell her the iPad is "resting" while it re-charges.  We need to be careful, though.  If she's been distracted, and we accidentally say "iPad" aloud, she'll be reminded and start anew her "I want my iPad please" campaign.  (Indeed, she does say that phrase, complete with "please" both verbal and ASL.  YES!)

So we've found alternate ways to not-say iPad.  "The device," we'll say.  Or, with a literary twist on "He who shall not be named" in the Harry Potter books, we'll call it "the Voldemort."

Ah, but Joy is a clever and motivated young lady when it comes to the device-which-shall-not-be-named.

Yesterday Rose and I were having a Harry Potter read-aloud session in Joy's presence, as she played with non-iPad toys.

And I read the following line:

"Voldemort!" said Harry furiously.

And Joy said:

iPad!