Amazing & amusing math story

DH told me an amusing story on our drive up to his parents’ house. He said that Brendan’s cousin Joseph (slightly older than Bren) came up to Brendan and asked him how old he is. Brendan replied “6”. Then he asked him what grade he’s in. Bren said “2nd”. Joseph thought for a minute and told him he couldn’t possibly be 6 and in 2nd grade. Brendan said “I am.” Joseph told him he must be really smart or something. Brendan said “Yup.” (groan) So Joseph asked him what 2 x 2 is. Brendan said “4”. Joseph said, “Nuh uh, it must be like 142 or something.” So he turns to Darrell and asks him what the answer is… and Darrell says, “Well… it IS 4.” Of course, he was thinking 2+2… but Joseph didn’t know this. Darrell and I had a good laugh.
Then I explained to Brendan that 2×2 is counting by 2s, 2 times. He understood immediately. So I asked what 2×3 is and he got it right. The I explained that he could count by 2s, 3 times or he could do it backwards and count by 3s, 2 times. I asked a few more problems I knew he could answer… this x 5, that x 10, etc. Then I got a glint in my eye and asked him what 422 x 0 was. He thought for a second and then said 0. Bowled us over!!! He quickly figured out anything x 0 is 0 and anything x 1 was the same number without any teaching at all… just thinking about it. Brendan has so far formally learned to count by 2s, 5s and 10s but with further discussion we quickly found out he could count by 3s, 4s, 20s and 25s as well. Within less than an hour Brendan could tell us most any multiplication fact dealing with 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 20 or 25!!!
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14w2d. Tired but otherwise okay. OB appt yesterday. Heartbeat in the 160s. Blood pressure a bit high. Down 2 pounds. Bloodwork came back normal, I guess. It was all written in my little folder but not discussed. 3 hour GTT tomorrow morning. Yuck. I hate that test!!