The Circle of Liiiiiiiife!

I think it's well acknowledged that I let Calder watch too much TV. I am working on it. The fact that our living room TV recently crapped out is helping as well. I am also even considering the idea of ditching the Dish altogether once we receive our Netflix disc for the wii. When Calder does watch. I try to limit the amount of commercials he is exposed to and attempt to keep it age-appropriate and educational. Like, NickJr. nee Noggin and documentary stuff like Planet Earth and the newest Oprah-fest, Life. Calder looooooves these animal shows.  He does not care that Oprah is not now, nor will she ever be, as awesome as David Attenborough. He just cares about watching hippos fight and frogs thwapping at bugs with their tongues in slow motion. I don't blame him. It's pretty friggin' cool.

Calder doesn't even seem to mind all that big animals sometimes eat little animals stuff that goes down. He likes to talk about animals and what they eat. He knows that dinosaurs and lions eat meat, bunnies eat plants and lizards eat bugs. Sharks, for some inexplicable reason however, eat noodles. We, I at least, even make an effort for Calder to associate his own food with actual animals and not just some sanitized version of the food industry. While I am not yet at the point of taking him on jaunts to the local slaughterhouse, I do point out to him what animal his food is coming from and even let him go look at the pig and lamb heads that our local market has on display. He seems to like that. A little too much maybe? As long as he doesn't expect me to cook a pig head, I guess it's ok.

So anyways, back to Life. Last Sunday featured an episode called "Hunters & Hunted". I should have known what was going to happen going in but sometimes I can be quite willfully oblivious. In general, when Life gets to the cheetahs killing ostriches parts, they manage to capture the moment without a whole lot of blood and violence. Calder barely seems to notice the killing and instead says things like, "Dragon eat cow?" Yes, the dragons are going to eat the cow. But then, THEN, this scene comes on. I am very sorry I can't embed it but it's probably for the best. This is not a clip for those who are fans of adorable fuzzy things. 

This is pretty how much our viewing went down:
Look honey, baby weasels!

TV: Stoat

Fine, smartass. Look, baby stoats!

FYI: A stoat is sort of a weasel. You can learn more about them here.


Oooh, idyllic English countryside, lousy with rabbits. Hopping. Hopping. Nibble. Nibble.

Grown up stoat!

Stoats chase rabbits?

Wow, grown up stoats are fast.


Run, bunny, run!!!!

Squeaky bunny death noise



Calder: Bunny crying?


Me: No, honey, he's laughing, they're playing


Me (inside): Holy shit, that weasel just killed a bunny!!!!


Let me just say that Calder totally accepted my explanation and is totally fine about it all. He still loves his animal show. I, however, am totally and completely scarred. If there is anything to be learned from all this, it is that you should never, EVER trust Oprah.