Yesterday, The Big Youngster was on a riddle kick. It was one riddle after another for hours on end ... and he got me every single time. At the dinner table that evening, in an attempt to stump him, I smarmily challenged him with the following riddle:

A man and his son are in a car accident. The father dies on the scene, but the child is rushed to the hospital. When he arrives the surgeon says, "I can't operate on this boy, he is my son!" How can this be?

The Big Youngster looked at me like I was a complete idiot. Half-laughing and using the most condescending tone he answered, "The surgeon is the boy's mother." Then, to add insult to injury, he held his hands out and looked around the table as if to say "What the-?"

I was amazed. Not at how The Big Youngster had scoffed at my riddle, but how he had answered it without hesitation ... of course the surgeon was the boy's mother ... who else? You see, perhaps I am dating myself by saying this, but back in my day the thought that a woman would be the surgeon would not have entered the minds of most. I remember this riddle being quite a perplexing one.

Oh how times have changed! I was so happy that my son had shown no signs of male chauvinist piggyness, I overlooked how haughtily he had dismissed my riddle.