A reoccurring trend I have happened upon with my son is his ability to turn a negative into a positive or, if you like, wrap a scornful father around his little finger. An apt example springs to mind. Christmas 2006 Euan at 18 months had prematurely reached the terrible two’s. In one of his destructive sorties he discovered a newly positioned and fully decorated Christmas tree. With pathological haste he proceeded to undress our perfectly attired tree. I called out his name at a socially unacceptable decibel. He stopped for a moment but started again with renewed vigour, seeming to remember the “bark worse than the bite” theory he had recently embraced. I tried again but this time I called his name in a low drawn out voice accompanied with my index finger performing the generic ‘come here’ gesture. This was new, I had his attention. He tried to copy me but managed to move all the fingers except the index finger in the correct way. The index finger stood frozen. He laughed at his own inability to imitate me and then focused again on my finger and I could see the cogs turning as he figured out the instruction I was trying to relay. He got it and laughed his odd socks off as he came running and launched himself into my arms. The tree wasn’t interfered with again that night but thereafter he kept approaching it and pausing before he touched it to wait for the initial finger instruction, once received, he would give a cheeky look and feint touching the tree anyway. This was my cue to sound angry and intensify the finger wagging to which he would crumble and come running meekly for a cuddle. Who was pulling whose strings? He got the fingers wrong but I was well and truly wrapped around them nonetheless, fait accompli I would suggest.