Max wows Yale with Intellect

Our friends Christina and Rob visited us for dinner last night, which was a rare treat.  Christina is currently living in New Haven because she had to go take some stupid graduate program at Yale.  Anyway, she was back for her birthday, which gave Max the perfect opportunity to make his first move on his path to Yale.  He was a charmer all evening, flashing big smiles and displaying his impressive vocabulary ("light, light, light, fan, light, light").  But it was on our walk that he really blew Christina away with his brilliance.

Christina (to me): I'm convinced your child is a genius.

Greta: Yes I am too.  What convinced you?

Christina:  While he was just ramming the chariot into that construction fence over and over again and repeating "open"  which I thought was pretty stupid, but then I noticed there was actually a small hole in the fence...maybe 2 or 3 inches wide.  Isn't that smart?

Now, all in all, I would say I tend to cut Max a fair bit of slack when it comes to my judgements.  He is only one, after all, so  I overlooked it when the dogs learned sign language faster than he did (in spite of their lack of hands) and I don't judge him too harshly when he points to himself in the mirror and declares "Anne!"  But it is a stretch, even for me, to consider this most recent fence display as evidence of his genius.

Greta: Christina....he is trying to fit an object that is 3 feet wide into a 3 inch hole....  Which part did you think was smart exactly?

Gus (impersonating Max):  Now if I just line this up....there we go.  Hunh.... well maybe if I just... push... a... little harder.    I don't understand...it lines up perfectly on this side....

I'm not sure what they're teaching them these days at Yale, but if this fence episode reflects badly on Max's intellect, I'm really not sure what it does for Christina's!