Can I borrow your kids tonight?

I was pretty excited yesterday when we were putting together today's paper and I saw a picture of Elmo holding a sign with today's date on it.

"Elmo's coming to town!" was my first thought.

My second thought took me back to the days of being a little kid when I lived in Ohio and Sesame Street would come visit once a year and my mom would always take us.

My next thought was, "I want to go see Elmo, how do I get in?" Since I'm far too old to to justify going by myself without feeling like a huge dork (and my editor said I couldn't cover it nor get paid to go), I'm looking to borrow some kids tonight.

So, if you have one to two kids aged somewhere between 3-7 that are pretty well behaved, quite and most importantly, potty trained, and you'd like to have the night off, give me a call here at the office at 587-3331.

However, if you're in the military yourself, you should probably take your kids yourself as the program is part of the military's outreach program to help young children handle the stress of a parent's deployment.

I've believed for a long time that deployments, for the most part, are far harder on the family then the deploying soldier or airman. And as someone pointed out to me last night, adults decide to join the military, another adult decides to marry into it, but kids, kids are never asked if they want to be part of the military life style. Just like every other military person, they jut do what's asked of them.

The show's at 3 and 6: 30 p.m. at the base theater and it's a free show. I'm pretty sure it used to cost my mom a whole lot more than free to take us to see Elmo back in the day. And best of all, the deployment discussion is an important discussion every service member should have with their family, this show will help to open up that dialog and teach kids important lessons and they won't even notice. They'll just think they're having fun, because, really, who can't have fun with Elmo around?