Elementary, My Dear

Conversation with my oldest son, Carter:

Carter spontaneously asks,"Mom, guess what?"

"What?"

He replies, "We get to do this totally cool project in science with the Periodic Table and research an element."

"Cool," although I am actually thinking - YUCK! Not something I would ever want to do.

"But," he continues, "I wanted to Krypton and I'm not allowed."

"Why not?"

Matter-of-fact Carter says, "Because it's a noble gas and we can't do noble gases because they won't let us mix them."

"Oh." I thought he was going to say, "because Superman lived on Krypton." Boy was I wrong.

So, here's want I want to know: when did my 11 year old get smarter than me and when did they start teaching stuff that I didn't learn until high school chemistry? I think there are some amazingly smart kids out there.