Barbies to Bratz

OK. Yes. This is my third post tonight. It's pathetic. I know. But...I couldn't help myself.

My tween girls just informed me that I need a cameraphone.

"No, I just need batteries for my camera." I replied.

"No, you need a cameraphone instead of your dino-phone." Where do they get this stuff? "My teacher told me she used to have a phone this big with an antenna attached to it."

"Well, yeah. Everyone had a phone like that. I used to have a phone like that." I replied.

They looked at me like I had just become the UNcoolest mom eh-ver. "Why?" they asked, incredulously.

"That was the thing to have. Just like today everyone has a cameraphone." Except me, that is. "Some day your kids will make fun of our phones. They'll have better phones...or something."

Katie thought a moment and said, "Just like Barbies to Bratz."

"What?" I asked.

"Kids used to play with Barbies. Now they play with Bratz. You know. Bratz. They have big heads and lots of eye shadow. You know, normal stuff like that."

I'll admit, Barbie was hardly "normal." But Bratz???

And, by the way, we have never owned a single Bratz doll here. Never. But evidently the neighbor girl loaned us one because Hailey hurried to the bedroom to bring out one of each, as if I was completely ignorant. "See, this is Barbie," she said, showing me a naked, freakishly-shaped doll who obviously had plastic surgery early in life. "And, this is a Bratz," Hailey said, thrusting another naked doll towards me who obviously suffered from hydrocephalus and a massive hair weave.

"Bratz don't have feet," Hailey explained as she showed me the Bratz' amputated-looking feet. "They have different shoes to put on them."

Bratz still have breasts, but they are more well-proportioned...except for the huge heads. Are the toy manufacturers trying to impress the importance of having big brains...and big hair...and plenty of eye shadow?

Who knows. Barbies to Bratz. What's next?