Last week I talked a little about the last days of school being upon us. Up in Polo, Missouri, where I visited yesterday, they've been out of school for about a week but have jumped right into summer school. Everyone was wonderful with great questions and comments. In addition to a t-shirt and other goodies, I left town with a jar of principal-produced prized Polo Panther Pickles! One girl, the school secretary's daughter, said she was already a little bored with summer so she came to work with her mom. I can't help but think that, after seeing my presentation, her summer has nowhere to go but up in the excitement department. Thanks to all the friendly folks at Polo Summer School!

As for my kids, yesterday was it. They celebrated in a variety of ways: one played sand volleyball. He apparently had a good time since he brought home much of the court in his shoes, hair, ears and clothes. His room now resembles a giant litter box and he has taken to calling himself Garfield. I hope that is the extent of his cat-like behavior...although he could take care of a few mouse problems. (Like the old joke: "Doctor, my brother thinks he's a chicken...we'd tell him otherwise, but we need the eggs.") The other high-schooler went from school to a friend's house for a video-game extravaganza. They also walked over to a store for some so-called lunch...assuming the food pyramid has been redesigned to encourage as much sweet, salty and carbonated intake as humanly possible. The youngest two met mom for an after-school dip before coming home to see me...another after-school dip.

Before meeting the kids at the pool, my wife acknowledged the end of school by shopping for summer-time clothes. Every year she has to replenish our flip-flop supply...you know those little plastic or foam sandal-type things that you wear to a pool. For whatever reason, with six people in the household, that's 12 total feet , by the end of summer, we have six flip-flops left...all of them for the left foot. Once, on vacation, we walked into a little bakery. I slipped and one of the flip-flops...the right one, naturally...went flying through the air. It landed squarely in the pastry dough being worked on behind the counter. Yes, we left that baker with a thong in his tart. (A long way to go for that sorry punch-line.)

On her shopping trip, she also found some shirts for the boys. They are not particularly choosy since everything ends up wadded in a ball on the floor of their closet and they wear the same ensemble everyday, anyway. Our daughter is a bit more of a challenge as we, the parents, are convinced she is still five while she insists she is 13. Such a liar! I also got a couple casual shirts guaranteed to make me look like a tourist no matter where I go...that way I feel like I am on vacation without the expense. I just wish my wife would quit reminding me that check-out time is 11:00 a.m. (Am I missing some hidden message, there?)

Once the kids were home, it was time for the ceremonial dumping of the backpacks. All kinds of things come rolling out. Papers, pencils, folders, empty containers...I am pretty sure the cow on the Elmer's Glue bottle was teary-eyed. (When I was a kid, we used more paste than glue, and it was always gone by the end of school. A kid that sat next to me loved paste...especially with chunks of eraser sprinkled liberally throughout...like little red croutons. Interestingly, he never actually ate his real lunch on days we were working with paste. I think he is a chef in some high-class eatery, today.) Often we will find brown, paper bags holding what was once a lunch. Yesterday, I swear, an old cheese and bologna sandwich had mutated into a self-sustaining organism. At least, that's what he told me as he walked out of the back-pack on his newly sprouted hind-legs.

My youngest son always seems to end the year with a bigger, better box of crayons than he started with. I figured it was just a mistake of grabbing them out of the wrong desk or cubbyhole, but it may be more serious than that: yesterday he also had the keys to a brand new Lexus.

The pile of left-overs and hidden treasures will now sit in the middle of their bedroom floors until they are sorted out...about the second week of August. Just in time for it to start all over again.