Spring is in the air, but this week I guarantee a kid's thoughts shift from snow and overcoats to hollow, chocolate bunnies and dyed eggs.

Easter is a great time for a kid, even if the religious meaning is often lost amid a sugar high.

I have no idea how many jelly beans, Cadbury eggs, Peeps and whatever else gets thrown in the Easter basket I consumed before my teens, but it was more than a few stomachfuls.

Easter Sunday really started after church for me (sorry, pastor!) and most of the kids I grew up with. Sure, we dressed up in our best duds and headed off to see how many lilies adorned the pulpit, and there was usually a treat or two during Sunday School, but, even though I was a good Christian kid, the main event was always waiting at home.

Us kids already had our coats off before we made it inside the house. Tummy ready, mouth watering for something sweet and/or chocolatey, we hurried to the usual place where the Easter baskets were always displayed.

The chocolate bunny was always the centerpiece, but many times the supporting cast was equally, if not more, delectable than the hollow, brown mold that more often than not had a stale flavor. Not that we ever wasted a bite - you kidding?

I am sure I've also consumed more than a few strands of plastic Easter grass along the way. You know - collateral damage.

Now, to get the kids out of the house after a good portion of the basket's contents have been scarfed down, some enterprising older soul had no doubt hidden a few dozen eggs around the yard, or - egad - inside the house.

I never supported the hiding of eggs in the house, simply because then you had kids scavenging the premises, no doubt breaking a few things trying to find their share of the booty.

No, no - do the business outside. That way the kids can motor around, burning those excess calories and the older, more fragile people can stay indoors and maybe get a few moments of peace and quiet before the ham makes its entrance.

I'm on the fence about the modern-day, plastic two-piece eggs. Sure, they are much more user friendly, they don't stink up the yard (or - egad - the house) if one happens to elude the search party.

But the new eggs only give instant rewards. You find one, you open it, and you're the instant owner of whatever booty is inside - and no doubt it's consumed immediately.

Back in the day, I participated in quite a few egg hunts, with the old-fashioned dyed chicken eggs. The one caveat - if you returned with a broken egg, that is what you ended up with. More often than not, an intact egg entitled the owner to a prize. That prize might be picked by the lucky finder, or a parent or whoever was unlucky (ER, privileged enough) to be in charge.

Again, you spent the afternoon going through your cache of sugar, and, if you weren't sick by then, you enjoyed a little time with friends and relatives and maybe had a little appetite left for something that was actually offered at the dinner table.

It was always a badge of honor, to be able to inhale your whole bounty of Easter delights before the sun went down.

Now that I look back, it was a more impressive badge of honor to keep it all down until morning.

Jerry Hitchcock is a copy editor for The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2017, or via email at [email protected]