Bubby's "cared" face.Bubby has learned a new word. More importantly, he's learned how to use that word to identify an emotion -- which is pretty high-level stuff, if you ask me ... even though it was the low-level "Yo Gabba Gabba" that initiated his intellectual leap.

Here's the story, according to Megan: Bubby and his friend Ro-Ro were recently watching the Nick Jr. show "Yo Gabba Gabba," something Bubby hadn't seen much of but Ro-Ro was a dedicated fan. At one point, Ro-Ro pointed out to Bubby how scary one of the characters is. "Scare, scare" he said again and again to Bubby, using his vocabulary that's nearly as limited as Bubby's to make it perfectly clear the character wasn't one he or Bubby should ever want to share their Teddy Grahams with.

Fast forward to naptime the next day. Bubby slept for a bit, then Megan heard him singing and playing and happily entertaining himself in his crib afterward. Being the psycho playful mommy she is, Megan decided to surprise Bubby by quickly swinging open his bedroom door to enthusiastically welcome him back to the land of the awake.

Instead, she scared the hell out of the poor kid. And he now, thanks to Ro-Ro and "Yo Gabba Gabba," knew how to express his fear with something more than a scream. Wide-eyed and staring at his crazy mommy, Bubby sadly uttered, "care ... care, Mommy." He was scared -- and he knew how to use the word "scare" to identify that.

Of course Megan felt awful and apologized again and again to her frightened little boy. But he was more than frightened -- he was empathetic to Megan's discomfort at startling her baby so he sweetly smiled at her as if to say "It's okay, Mommy." Then he held out his little arms and said, "keeze," which in the Bubby household means "squeeze," the condensed version of "let's hug and make everything all better."

Sounds like a simple exchange between mommy and son, but it speaks volumes about Bubby's development.

My only question: Why in the world is there such a creepy character on a kids' show that it teaches them how to identify their feelings of fright? Or is that just how kids learn such things nowadays?

I guess learning from creepy TV characters is better than being able to do nothing more than scream and cry when Psycho Mommy bursts into your bedroom unannounced.

Today's question:

What television show do you remember being scared by as a kid?

My answer: "The Twilight Zone" (the original one) -- specifically the episode where the main character keeps seeing changes in a painting on the wall, where a grave is being dug deeper, and deeper and deeper. Scary stuff!