DinDin's Universe

It all started with a Dow-and-Darrow.

What??! ... you might ask, and rightly so. It is something likely unheard of, before Gaius's stories.

He started talking one night about how a Dow-and-Darrow is so, so much stronger than a Bow-and-Arrow. We tried to tease out details - is it a crossbow? a longbow? does it even shoot out arrows? (no, it doesn't, it shoots out Darrows, thanks for asking). But it's strong... so much stronger than all other weapons you could think of, except maybe Najinatas which still retain their sweet spot in Gaius's heart. Though you'd use them for different tasks; Dow-and-Darrows are still much better at a distance.

Gaius's portrait of DinDin (3.5yo)

As far as we can tell a Dow-and-Darrow is sort of like a rifle.

Weeks passed, with us hearing a consistent repeat of this theme of Dow-and-Darrows, without us emphasizing it much or drawing it out. Others likely dismissed it as a speech quirk by a 3-year-old.

Until DinDin came along.

DinDin is quite a unique character. He can one-up everything you would possibly bring up.

You think you're fast in the carpool lane? DinDin's car flies over all of the other cars in the carpool lane.

Your dad is strong and can lift the large luggage bag? DinDin can lift eighteen (the largest number right now) large luggage bags at the same time!!!

Spiderman is fast? DinDin is as fast as a lightning bolt! In fact, he travels by lightning bolts and often will surprisingly pop out of one and into any story, whether or not there was a storm going on, or even any atmosphere at all to accommodate/foster lightning bolts in the first place.

This is not an imaginary friend, as apparently some kids create; Gaius doesn't talk to DinDin, or pretend he is in the room. He's actually never around, only his fame & stories are. And he is, indeed, quite an outstanding character. It all started right around when Gaius turned 3.

Here's some sample exchanges.

DinDin Biography / Fun Facts

• While we were reading a book [it had a house in it]:
• Gaius: DinDin's house is in space.
• Elena: ...... [sometimes, being quiet about it may let our attention go back to the book]
• Gaius, undeterred and even more excited: It's actually in the middle of the Moon!
• Elena: Oh. How did he get inside?
• Gaius: He broke the top open with an Axe! He has lots of axes... But he left the axe outside and it fell in space and then it landed in the space ship that he had used to get to the moon.
• On progeny, completely out of the blue:
• Gaius: When I grow up, I will name a child DinDin.
• On Din Din's family:
• Gaius: DinDin can go faster than any car or person without wings. He had Eighteen children! and Eighteen parents! and all of them had wings!
• Gaius: DinDin's children are green and their mom is orange. DinDin is red. 
• On DinDin's superpowers (Greg chose to introduce X-Men on one of our bedtime stories because Gaius wanted to hear about superheroes):
• Greg: Nightcrawler can teleport.
• Gaius: DinDin can teleport like Nightcrawler.
• Greg: Wolverine can heal really fast.
• Gaius: DinDin can heal faster than Wolverine.
• Greg: Jean Gray can do telekenesis.
• Gaius: DinDin does not need telekinesis since his arms can extend really far.
• Gaius: (out of the blue, knows nothing about the Avenger character and is talking about the spider) DinDin could cut off the fangs of the black widow with his knife!
• DinDin's other houses:
• DinDin is living in space, the buttons are shields. He brings the shields with him on trips so he won't get lost. (This last part is likely an echo of some version of Hansel & Gretel leaving crumbs in the forest to find their way back home; we've read some of those books.)
• DinDin's potty is bigger than our house!
• Origin story and habits, told on 2018-06-29:
• He was born on Milkus (this accurate fact was consistently reported to both Greg and Gaius's teacher Amy two days later) and has a costume to cover his skin and his eyes. It's also very cold where he is from.
• He's faster than a Jedi and can jump higher than them. And he has gray hair. And wears black shoes.
• At night DinDin goes outside to search and find the animals. And he also fights them. He also got Apolodor's friends.
• He uses a barrel for a drum, and then just kicks the barrel over. Then it went on the other side and he played it and kicked it.
• Cuisine:
• What is his favorite food? Gaius: Aaaaaaaaaaal of the foods! ...
• DinDin eats cars. And has car cakes.
• On DinDin's attire:
• He is black and has black wings and they have no feathers ... (oooh maybe he means Batman!) ... and are made of lightning screws! (Nope, not Batman). They [the wings] are made of Eighteen Million things!... 
• He has boots that you put your feet in and he has a skate that are wind up.
• On DinDin's transportation:
• DinDin's car went backwards when it was driving. In a safe way.
• He also pilots a space ship that is bigger than planet Endor. (We had been reading a children's Star Wars book the previous night) and turned into Lighth Vader! (yes, that's appropriately spelled; not Light but Lighth, he was quite specific when we tried to tease that out). DinDin was friends with Darth Vader even when he was a bad guy.
• If a hurricane comes DinDin's house flies up and away and comes back after the hurricane.

Here is a video of Gaius telling us what DinDin's house is made of.

Deledopter!

Gaius loves legos! He's so passionate and focused about it that he will spend 80% of his free time in a whole weekend patiently working on finishing a lego project. 

In one of the September weekends, it was a helicopter set. Once we finished it, he decided it is very impressive, in fact so impressive that he got extra excited, exclaiming with wide eyes:

• Do you know what's even faster than a helicopter? A Deledopter!!

It went waaay beyond that for the subsequent 40min or so, in a passionate discussion... It even went one layer deeper: a Kafelephopter is remotely controlled by a Deledopter, and doesn't have a person in it. The Deledopter can control the Kafelephopter and it can fly so, so fast!

But it turns out a Kafelephopter is such a hard name that Gaius started forgetting it mid-story and would stop and prompt me to remind him every few sentences whenever it came up:

• Gaius: And then the Deledopter and the ... what was it called, Mommy?
• Me: A Kafelephopter.
• Gaius: ... and then the Kafelephopter fleeeeeew up high over the mountains [etc.]

The Deledopter still reliably pops up into stories - including a drawing he made as a gift for his friend Robert at school - but the Kafelephopter has gone extinct after just two days.

The letter D

You may have noticed a pattern in all of the above; well, the ones that show up consistently throughout the past six months: Dow-and-Darrow; DinDin; Deledopter.

And I've also mentioned Gaius's passion with Legos. We've built cars, and houses, and a police station with an awesome working garage door, and a castle with a working Drawbridge and catapult!

Well this week, while we were building this modular house set, Gaius noticed the lego pieces that looked like actual bricks!!!

Gaius: Do you know what's even Stronger than Bricks?

Hint: It rhymes with bricks, starts with a D and it's not dricks.