Sins of My Father

I have visual and audio proof of my young daughter's Tom Waits impression.

Scene:
Mom and dad were getting eyes checked. Gert and Matilda were looking for things to do. Matilda sat playing her Game Boy. Gert had no such device, so she looked to Daddy. Daddy sent her off with his phone cam to take pictures of weird things and he'd guess what they were. That was fun. For a few minutes. But she needed more. She we started making phone cam videos.

"Hey Gert," I said, "sing 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star' in your Tom Waits voice."

So she did.

I know what you're thinking. How could we allow a nearly five-year-old to listen to Tom Waits? Well, it's not like I let her listen to "I'm Your Late Evening Prostitute" or "Pasties and a G-String." There are plenty fantastic Tom Waits songs she loves to listen to. Hell, Matilda has a song I don't even have on a soundtrack to a movie. So there.

But mostly she likes to sing like Tom Waits.

Notice Matilda in the background completely oblivious to all the strange things we were doing.