mauphesis!

A few weeks ago, Elian woke up from his nap crying, clearly disturbed as if he had had a bad nightmare. I asked him if he was thinking about something scary and he said, yes, "Mauphesis. Crib."

Generally I can understand about 89% of what the boy says. But this Mauphesis, I had no idea. So throughout the day I probed. "Buddy, what is Mauphesis?" I just wanted to rule out that there were mice scurrying around in his crib with him. The more I asked, the sillier looks and responses I got. He would point at anything and say, "Mauphesis."

Fast forward to a few days ago. He wakes up from his nap. I go in his room to find him seated holding his two Targets he fell asleep with. As I approached the crib, he tossed both Targets into the air and yelled, "MAUPHESIS!!!!!" and began laughing very hard.

Whatever mauphesis is, it is no longer scary. It has since become a big part of his comic routine.