Oh, Man. (Or Woman.)

So breathe a sigh of relief: I'm back from yesterday's non-blogging void. You missed my presence in the blogosphere, didn't you?


... No?

*cricket, cricket*

Well anyway, you'll be happy to know that during my brief absence, I was out collecting new blog fodder: i.e., being totally embarrassed by my child. Oh, sense of social propriety ... where are you, and why have you COMPLETELY bypassed my four-year-old?

We try to teach Colin how to behave properly in public. Honestly, we do. And it's not so much the way he acts that mortifies me - it isn't that he's running around like a chihuahua on crack* (*except for that one time at Wal-Mart). It's the things he says. At the most inconvenient of times. Loudly.

Take, for example, our lunch at a local restaurant yesterday. It was supposed to be a good time. And it would have been - everyone was in a great mood, ready for a nice meal. We were seated, the boys were happily coloring on their kids' menus, ahhhh.

Then our lunch date took a turn for the worse. Enter our waitress (waiter?) - a very androgynous girl (guy?) with a short, boyish haircut, no makeup or pierced ears, a nondescript body shape, and a nametag that revealed no definite clues as to her (his?) sex: LENNY.

But whereas Curtis and I were only silently wondering about our server's gender, Colin took it upon himself to find out. Lenny asked him what he'd like to drink, and rather than his usual reply of "Chocolate milk, please!" he answered: "Are you a man?"

My eyes widened in horror, and I felt my face flush hot. I quickly diverted my eyes to Cameron, who was providing a distraction by coloring on the table - so I busied myself with guiding his crayon back to the paper. Across the table, Curtis nudged Colin sharply. "Son!" he said, in an admonishing tone. "She asked you what you'd like to drink."

"But are you a man?" Colin inquired of Lenny, louder this time.

I swear, it felt like someone was twisting a knife in my gut each time those words flew from his (socially inappropriate) mouth. But it was such a delicate situation: what do you do at a time such as this? I was desperate for a better diversion, so I tossed one out there.

"Look, it's Lenny, just like on 'Wonder Pets!'" I said brightly, referring to a guinea pig on one of their favorite shows (who, coincidentally, I also thought was a boy until one of the other characters referred to it as "she").

"Lenny, Tuck, and Ming-Ming too!" Cameron chimed in from his high chair, singing the "Wonder Pets" theme song.

"But is this Lenny a man?" Colin wanted to know.

At this point, we had a few options:

a.) Call even more attention to the question by telling Colin, in front of Lenny, that it wasn't appropriate to ask.

b.) Tell him Lenny was a girl (which we were ... like ... 85% sure of) and hope he left it alone; risk further embarrassing Lenny, in case Lenny was actually not a girl or was genuinely trying to pass as a dude.

c.) Try to ignore the question and press on with the drink orders.

d.) Something better, which we absolutely could not think of in our current state of humiliation.

We opted for choice c - ignoring the question as best we could (although it was like trying to ignore a chimpanzee standing in the middle of the table waving his hairy arms: impossible) and trying to get on with the order. Lenny, bless his or her soul, could have nipped this whole thing in the bud by answering the burning question right away. Instead, he or she just stood there as Colin asked repeatedly about her gender. Our attempt to ignore it went something like this:

Curtis: "He'll have chocolate milk. And I'll have iced tea, please."

Colin: "Daddy, is that a man?"

Me: "I'd also like a tea, please, and the baby will just drink out of ours."

Colin: "ARE YOU A MAN?"

Kids just don't get that an unanswered question means that you probably shouldn't ask it again, and especially not multiple times. Because despite our under-the-table pokes and stern "you'd-better-shut-your-mouth-right-this-minute" glances, Colin kept asking. I think he assumed Lenny couldn't hear him or something.

Finally, miraculously, Lenny answered. "Nope, I'm a girl," she said. "But I get that all the time." If she had only said that to begin with, we could have been spared the agonizing experience. It seriously seemed like the longest drink order we'd ever dictated.

Afterwards, in the car, we gave Colin a gentle-but-firm talking to about things he shouldn't ask people. I think he got it ... but just in case, if we ever get another androgynous waiter/waitress, I'm so requesting to sit in a different section.