Evie has always been into reading books. The trouble with learning the English language from a book, is that you learn to phrase things in ways that people just don’t say. I have noticed Evie doing this quite a few times. For example, the other day Evie walked in and said:

“Something is queer in this room.”

Meaning strange of course. I wish I had more examples, she does this all the time. Anachronistic little turns of phrase that she picked up from a Little House book, an old fairy tale, etc. This is especially worrisome because we just finished reading Pollyanna.

Pollyanna seems to be some kind of endurance test to see how many synonyms for the word “said” can be used in a single piece of literature. Nobody ever says anything; they always exclaim or sigh, retort or rejoin.

“You are the most extraordinary girl!” ejaculated Aunt Polly.

Ejaculated? Seriously??

Yes, seriously. At least a dozen times, someone ejaculates in that book. So far I haven’t heard Evie use that one in conversation, but I’ve been holding my breath a while now.