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Ziad is experimenting with joke writing. It's been a while since his debut effort, the fairly predictable

Q: What does a wizard say when he falls of a cliff?
A: Abracadabraaaaaaaaaaa!

He kept with it, though, and a recent electronics class inspired

Q: What is a volmeter for?
A: You use it when you're parking your volts.

I think that one's my personal favorite -- it still makes me laugh.

I guess he's been reading more Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys than I realized, because recently he tried out

Q: What do you call a short mystery?
A: A briefcase.

Leading up to a recent breakfast table conversation.

Ziad: What's black and red all over?

Maya: A zebra with a sunburn.

Ziad: No, that's black and WHITE and red all over.

Maya: Well, the sunburn covered the white part.

Ziad: Well, anyway, that's not right.

Maya: OK, what?

Ziad: A burned newspaper.

Maya: But you can't READ a burned newspaper.

Ziad: Well, they read it before it was burned.

Maya: Then what they read is not what you asked.

Score one for Maya, I think.

But Ziad never gives up. Just the other day, when his guitar teacher mentioned something about a general rule in music, Ziad asked him, "Well, then what's a soldier rule?" Sometimes it's hard to get anything done with a boy who views any spoken utterance as setup for a pun. I think he gets it from his grandfather.