Gentlemen, start your burners!

Come on, boys, let's hit it!

Holy Mambajamba, it's MEAT!

It's the last hurrah, the big roundup, the final hours, the end of the line, the last rodeo, the last picture show, the stop sign, the red light, roadblock, bridge out ahead. Labor Day Weekend! Summer's almost gone! EAT MEAT!

I love my grill, but it's not a big grill like the one pictured above. And I'm just fine with that. You know, it's not what you got, it's what you do with it. I'm perfectly comfortable with my small, yet potent, grill. Yes, I can say I've never had a complaint about... well, actually I have had complaints about my cooking. And my, uh, meat.

Forget all that. The real issue here is that summer is supposed to be over. Why? Because the kids are back in school? Like parents consider that a bad thing? Every parent I know has been playing taxi driver all summer. It'll actually be easier to have the kids in school.

Because it's cooler? But we still have three weeks or so until the autumnal equinox.

Because vacation season is over? But most people I know couldn't afford to go anywhere anyhow.

And yet it feels like it's all crashing down.

Still, seasons always end before they end. Fall ends when Santa shows up at Macy's, even though fall continues until around December 21. Whether March comes in like a lamb or a lion, it's supposed to come in with spring, although it's mostly winter. And June is the first month of summer, even though it's actually the third month of spring. It just feels like an extra ripoff this year, with Labor Day landing as early as it possibly can.

I guess it's too much to expect me to fight the zeitgeist by myself with my little gas grill. But if we all keep the BBQ fires burning, maybe we can push the summer needle a little past Labor Day weekend for a change.