All I needed to know, I learned from Disney films

Sometimes I wonder just what my nine year daughter is learning in school. She's been struggling with basic spelling and simple math and I find it frustrating that she can recall movie lines and scenes from plays but can't tell me what nine times six is.

Case in point:

The other night while dining with some relatives from Texas, she said, "You know, Arizona, New Mexico, and California were once part of Mexico, just like Texas." Our relatives were very impressed that Darian knew that, being a Northwest baby and all that.

Later while doing the dishes I asked her if she had learned that in school, because, by gosh! She's finally retaining historical information she's learned there! I should be proud, not worrisome!

"Mommy, they said it in the Zorro movie!"

Last night we were eating dinner at a restaurant that had a grand fish tank as the center focal point of the dining room. We were discussing with friends how hard it must be clean such a large tank, and keep all the sea anemone alive that populated it. Darian then said the anemone were home to the clown fish because they protected the fish from the predators of the sea. My friend asked if she was studying the sea in school and Darian said, "No, I learned that from Finding Nemo."

Later I started to tell everyone at the table about my plantar fasciitis because talking about feet is only proper dinner manners when out with good friends. Of course, all this foot talk then led to questions of warts to which I posed, "Oh, a verruca?!!"

"Huh? Like Verruca Salt from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?" asked my girlfriend.

"Yeah. A verruca is a foot wart. You know all those podiatrists I work with? I sell them a lot of Verruca-Freeze."

Darian then cut in, "Yeah, you know that line from the movie when she says, 'My name is Verruca Salt' and Johnny Depp says, 'Oh, I thought a verruca was a wart you got on the bottom of your foot.'? Well, that's a verruca."

We then realized: if Johnny Depp made a movie about math, our daughter would be going to MIT.