Paging Dr. Luke

Unlike his father, my 8-year-old son, Luke, has never expressed interest in the medical profession. He actually hopes to be a pilot in the Air Force someday.

But over spring break, Luke performed his first operation, leading me to wonder what, exactly, the future holds for my boy.

"Mom," he told me Monday morning, "I'm going to do an operation today."

"Wow," I said as I helped him make his bed, "What kind?"

He held up his recently-acquired blue duck. While at his end-of-the-season basketball party at the local pizza joint, Luke won (and I use that word loosely) a stuffed animal from the claw-grabber game in the arcade. A blue duck:

Obviously winning a toy meant for a 3-year-old girl in front of a flock third grade boys does not do much for an ego. And Luke aimed to remedy the situation as easily as possible while still maintaining his prize.

"I'm turning the duck into a boy," Luke declared.

My boy was about to perform our home's first sex-change operation using nothing but a pair of fingernail scissors.

"I'm going to name him Todd when I'm done," he added.

Not wanting to break his confidence, I offered to assist. He took me up on it, and within minutes Todd was a new man - er - duck:

This little procedure beat out trekking to Oklahoma in a the snow to watch the Jayhawks go down in the 2nd round of the NCAA Tourney as the most unexpected thing to occur over spring break. And certainly far less painful.

(Patient is recovering well and is fully-integrated as a male duck with Luke's menagerie of animals that occupy space on his closet floor.]