If you read my posts from my trip to Alabama last week, then you’ll remember that I offered my 9 year old niece, Kinsley, $100 to eat a vomit noodle (a perfectly retained bit of spaghetti that Lauryn threw-up on me). Now, Kinsley is like most 9 year olds---she figures that she knows *everything* and that everyone else is both semi-retarded and wrong.

While we stayed at their house, Kinsley was fascinated by my whole blogging thing (I mean, seriously, can you blame her? Here I was, sitting in her very home blogging away, what’s NOT to be fascinated by?) so she was watching me put up my post on Remoticus and looking at the (admittedly) lame quality of photos taken from my lady-phone’s camera. So she asks me how many mega-pixels my phone has. I tell her that I think one, (but I’m secretly thinking that my phone is SO lame, that the true number is probably more like .75 megapixels).

Armed with this information, Kinsley proudly proclaims that HER daddy’s phone has TWENTY mega-pixels.

I explain, that no, there is NO phone (well, maybe the new iPhone that Gizmodo found/bought/stole whatever wil lbe, but no mortal phone of man today) has a 20 mega-pixel camera.

“Oh yes it does,” she says.

Now, I’m 40, a grown man by nearly every standard. And you *might* think that I would be above being baited into a technology debate by a 9 year old. And if that’s the case, well then you’ve really not gotten to know me at all through this blog. This is technology. She has challenged me. Now she must be crushed and humbled. (Need another example of my inability to just ignore Kenny Roger’s advice to “walk away from trouble when you can” or that “you don’t have to fight to be a man”? Look here.

So, naturally I say, “OK. There is NO WAY your dad’s phone has a 20 megapixel camera. NO phone has a 20 megapixel camera. In fact, very few professional cameras costing *thousands* of dollars have a 20 megapixels.”

Then in the confidence that can be delivered only by blissful ignorance or a hyper-confident 9 year old, she says, "Well, my daddy’s phone does.”

Ass switch flipped! I know that Kinsley has been saving up her money for a while with the goal of getting to $100. I also know that she currently has $43. So, when she continued to challenge me on this, I had no recourse but to teach her a lesson. A $43 lesson to be exact. So, of course, my next response was, “OK. I’ll bet you $43 dollars that it doesn’t!” At least, that's how I remember it over the pounding of the vein in my temple.

This causes Dana to shout, “JOHN!” as in “John! You know better than to bet with a 9 year old” and “John! Justwhen I think you’ve matured even a little you go and surprise me!”

When blood cools and dander recedes, Kinsley goes and gets the phone and proudly shoves it in my face. “See! I told you!” I take one look, hand it back and say, “Look closer.”

She missed the “.” between the 2 and the 0. The $43 dot. MY $43. Of course, I take little pleasure in besting a 9year old. (Ha! That even made me laugh. OF COURSE I take pleasure in besting a 9 year old! Suck it, Kinsley!) In my best isn’t-Uncle-John-grand-and-merciful-and-wise voice, I say, “Kinsley, now don’t you think it’s possible that maybe I would know a little more about technology than you? Hmmm?"

Her response was an indifferent shoulder shrug. The shoulder shrug of a crushed and humbled spirit! At least that’s how I saw it. Then I bought her an ice cream.