Forget the calendar. It is definitely summer. I know because of the nocturnal activity in my house. As I mentioned in a previous blog, I get up around 2:00 a.m. and, during the school year, my early morning is a solitary time. The quiet and solitude is rare in a house full of kids and dogs. About the only interaction I have with a living creature, most mornings, is when our ancient dog opens one eye as I leave...she chuckles as I open the door. Yes, she chuckles and, if she had one of those little comic strip bubbles over her head, it would say "What a sap! There he goes...middle of the night...off to work while I continue my usual routine of 23 hours of sleep interrupted only long enough to eat."

Well, that's what happens during the school year, but that was over as of Wednesday. Now, with no early wake-up call, my children have taken their usual starring roles in the summer-time production of Night of the Living Dad. They are up and stirring around all the time. Like having giant mice scurrying from room to room...if mice carried cell phones, channel changers and Game-boys. Now, to be fair, my daughter was sound asleep...true, her head was resting on a half-eaten bowl of pop-corn...but she was asleep. Probably dreaming of eating a huge kernel of pop-corn...if her pillow is missing when she wakes up, we'll know what happened. My youngest son was, truth be told, asleep but not in his bed. He was on the sofa downstairs, snoring...one hand on the remote and the other still playing a video game.

It was the older boys...the teenagers...who were still totally awake. One had just taken a shower. I know because the light in the bathroom was still on, steam billowing out into the hall and I had to use waders to approach the door. Fortunately, I got in a little trout fishing before work...at least, I hope they were trout. The newly-cleaned one was sitting in the kitchen eating cereal...Snap, Crackle and "Hi Pop!" Not all of the cereal made the bowl so the floor made it seem like walking on baby bubble-wrap. Apparently, the cereal was just one course, as I also saw cheesy whales flopping around...the breakfast of champions.

Meanwhile, in the basement, the oldest boy was fiddling with his new cell phone. He just got one, after years of asking. He claimed to be setting up his voice mail and familiarizing himself with the unit...at two in the morning. Of course, earlier in the day I found him text messaging all his friends telling them he wasn't allowed to use text messaging. Just about everybody signing his yearbook included a version of the following: "Get yourself a cell-phone!" So, I suspect he has a lot of catching up to do. When I was his age...about 1976 B.C., that is Before Cells...one family in town actually had a separate phone line for their kids. They were our version of the Rockefellers. They owned the hardware store. Now, individual kids have their own numbers. Parents consider it a safety issue. But, for my son, it is all about independence. Let's see if he's as enthusiastic about being his own man, when I hand him his share of the monthly mobile phone bill. He'll probably refer me to his voice mail...that he was setting up this morning.

Needless to say, the two older nightcrawlers will be sawing logs when I get home from work. But, I think there are some chores to do...time to get up, boys, and get moving...wakey-wakey, eggs and bakey...rise and shine...good moooorrrrning, Kansas City. When I was growing up there was an orange juice called "Beep." I don't know why it had that name, but, to gently wake us up, my mom would stand at the foot of the stairs and almost sing "Beep...Beep....Beep." My mother the car. Well, big boys...up all night...acting cool...turning the bathroom into the Everglades and kitchen into a Rice Krispie Treat on steroids...racking up charges on the cell phone like you are actually related to the "Can you hear me now" guy...covering the channel changer with sleep drool (wait, that was me, never mind)... forcing me to converse at 2:00 a.m...."BEEP! BEEP!"