I'm sitting at the dining room table, lusting after the models in the new magazine that arrived in the mail.

"Dad!" says my 12 year old son, pointing at the page. "Aren't those huge?"

My wife just shakes her head. "Can't you look at that somewhere else?"

"Yes, Son. Those are huge. Sometimes I wonder why those models don't implode under their own weight."

Lego kits have been getting bigger each and every year. This time the Millennium Falcon is about a billion pieces and takes up the better part of a football field.

Ok, not that big.

But we get to thinking. How many bricks would it take to make a life size model of the Falcon? Could you do it with plastic or would you have to go with some carbon-fiber composites? We banter this back and forth a bit, then decide we should really build a Death Star.

It couldn't be as big as the "real" one, but wouldn't it be funny to wake up one morning and see that famous shape with the Super-Laser up near the moon?

We quickly decide that Lego's wouldn't work very well. "How about a balloon?"

Yes! A giant mylar balloon painted to look like the Death Star! Anchor it to the moon and it will cross the heavens, looking all menacing and evil. But how much material would you need?

So we talk about material and shipping costs and couldn't we put real lasers on it for show? How about we make it explode after a while?

"No way," I say. "This thing will cost twenty million dollars - at least! There's no way I'm blowing it up. We should leave it up there to scare away any alien invaders. They'll pop out of hyperspace, see that big space station and say "Whoa! These guys are more advanced than we thought. RUN AWAY!"

"Alien Invaders." Melissa laughs at us.

"Hey, don't laugh. We're more likely to be invaded by aliens than we are to actually build a giant balloon Death Star. Who asked you, anyway?"

"Well, you just better hope that no space-junk gets in the way of your balloon, or POP!" says she.

"That and any speck of dust moving at any sort of velocity."

All through the conversation The Boy is having difficulty not only focusing on finishing his dinner but also on not laughing milk out his nose. He's never done that before but he seems close tonight.

Also, the Little Guy is sitting next to me, imitating my words and hand motions. He's not helping the serious tone of our discussion.

So I continue to argue about the merits of various balloon materials while keeping an eye on my Mini-Me, making sure he finishes his dinner, too.  When not mimicking me he's asking "what you talking about?" and "what so funny?"

The Girl, all this time, is wolfing down her food. Usually last by nearly an hour, she finishes first tonight in record time. Also, she jumps to the kitchen sink and begins washing dishes - a chore that always seems to take forever. Not tonight. She's got things to do. She listens in but doesn't join the conversation.

Do you know how big a canister you'd need in order to fold up five square kilometers of Mylar? Neither do I but I imagine it would be pretty big. A balloon that size would still be impressive and I think it would provide the desired effect.

With dinner finished we retire to the another room. Little Guy and I drive our Hotwheels around the couch so much I begin to feel dizzy. Hanging up my racing stripes, I kick The Girl off the computer and start looking up Lego videos on Youtube. There are a lot of boring ones but some interesting Mindstorms NXT constructions.

Kids go to bed and Melissa and I soon follow.

Just another typical evening in our house.