A Simple Plan..

We are reading 3 letter words. Nischal is finding it less boring since he gets to draw the words on the iPad. In parallel, the older brother is being quizzed on types of houses, and factors that influence their design.
With Nischal - 'M's sometimes are written as 'W's the first time, but we make some progress.Answers to 'PAT' , 'PAN' , 'RAT', 'RAN' start coming pretty fast. So, I get a little ambitious and have him write 'PLAN'
'Pu' 'Lu' 'A' 'eN' - gets pronounced a few times, but 'PLAN' doesn't get pronounced identifiably because of trailing vowel sounds especially with the consecutive consonants.
No sooner than I give up and blurt out 'PLAN', comes the question; "What does PLAN mean? "

"Plan.. " I stumble " ...means something you decide first before you actually do it"
" like , like .. you decide to scare me each time I come home, get behind there ( I point) and yell 'boo' at me "
(Yes, each evening when I get home,  I get 'scared' when the big monkey jumps out. And I get even more surprised and let out a bigger yell when the smaller, louder monkey jumps out a couple of seconds later - Every evening.) 
Nischal gives it a moment's thought before he starts with his objections. Before I can hear them, the older brother starts blurting out his Nth wrong answer to "How can one keep snakes & rats out of the house?"
He's already rejected Dad's options of "Sit outside and blow a snake charmer's bean", and "Sing 'snake snake, go away; Come again another day.."  with a couple of short derisive laughs.
 
Nischal finally gets back my attention with his persistent 'but's.
"But we don't decide before" he says, "we hear the sound at the door and just get in here.  Is that a plan ? "
"No" I concede quickly. But it turns out to be too quick coz the older guy points out "So what if it was decided just before? It's still a plan, right? "
I deflect that one by "If you 'block' the drainage like you just said, can you imagine what else will get blocked ? "

While the big one is pondering that, Nischal has decided we're done- "We're done now, right ? " to which I nod almost eagerly.
As he tries to leap off my lap, I manage to catch him in a hug. But soon as my precious few hair strands get into trouble, I offer to let him go soon as he counts to 30. I don't bother correcting him when he goes over to 40 after 29, but fervently object whenever he tries to put 30 after 49, 59, 69..etc. I finally take pity and accept it after 109 and loosen my hold.

As he leaps on to the floor, he offers a scholarly nugget that he picked up at the sand pit. "Papa, did you know you were naked when you were born?" And finds it exceedingly funny.
As his laughter dies down, I ask mockingly "So, weren't you also naked when you were born ? "

He smiles, and says with an I-can't-believe-you-don't-know-this voice "No Papa. I was born with a T Shirt."  And saunters out without looking back.