Are you listening?

Most people with toddlers know, getting them to listen is next to impossible. As they mature and become preschoolers, the hearing skills improve slightly. Though they are not unlike the 1980 Ford Econoline van my Dad used to drive; not so reliable.
Last night Brian and I were hanging with Charlie in his room playing with his vast assortment of cars and trucks. Gregory was asleep and Charlie was enjoying time with both Mommy and Daddy. I think maybe he was even feeling a little heady from all the attention.
Brian was reading 'The Jelly Bean Book' on the floor when Charlie looked at him and said, "That book is going to go into a TIME OUT if you cannot be behaving." He of course raises his voice when he says TIME OUT with the exact intonations I use.
Brian was a little surprised but amused at this outburst.
"But what did I do?", he asked.
"That's it, The Jelly Bean Book is going into a time out. You need to think about being behaving and when you can be behaving, you can have the book back."
I'm in hysterics as Brian is left wondering what just happened.
This is a page straight out of Mommy's How to be a Disciplinarian 101 manual. Either the toy he's playing with gets a time out, or Charlie gets sent to his room to read a book and he can decide to come out when he's ready to behave or be nice to his brother or not act like a psychopath. Though in Charlie's manual they must have left out the part where you need just cause to issue the TIME OUT.
Maybe Charlie is sending us a message that he thinks our penal system and accompanying manual suck. He decided to turn the tables, issuing a time out KGB style - no warning or insight into the infraction, just straight up punishment.
I guess that's how he sees things, without cause or reason, just us being unfair. I can't wait for him to publish this century's version of Mommy Dearest. I haven't even unleashed my wire hanger shit on his ass. Just wait.
I do take some comfort in knowing that he is listening to me. Unless of course if he thinks reading a book in his room is not 'be behaving' I'm in trouble and the whole penal systems does need to be overhauled.