By the time you read this, Election Day will have come and gone. But as I write this Election Day is still a full week away.

I’m not counting down the days, but my 8-year-old son is. Not because he is excited. Not because he is championing for one candidate over another, but because he is absolutely sick and tired of seeing the television advertisements, hearing the radio fodder, the incessant phone calls and counting yard signs.

It’s become kind of a joke around our house (not the election, but the fact that our third-grader is fed up). Every piece of mail we get touting one candidate or another, we give to our son, “Hey! You got mail today!”

He just rolls his eyes and groans.

Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schulz – and his character Linus - said, “There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people… Religion, Politics, and The Great Pumpkin.”

Despite the fact that we, too, try to avoid discussing politics, our kids have still picked up on the jokes, complaints, debates and political terms everyone is spewing.

My sons don’t fully understand how government works (or doesn’t work) yet, but they are definitely catching on.

How do I know this? Because I got an email from my first-grade son’s teacher. Again.

She wasn’t complimenting me on my wonderful ability to teach my child about government and social studies (because to be honest, my lesson on taxes stemmed from a game of Wheel of Fortune); nor was she writing to tell me our son is most definitely afflicted with Middle Child Syndrome.

Like past messages, this one commented on my child’s ability to be “funny.” (Can you see me shaking my head?)

My son who informs his class that “eating yellow snow is not good for you” and tries to reimburse his teacher for supplies with pesos can also make paying taxes funny.

The conversation at school this time was about Trunk-Or-Treat (trick-or-treating from car-to-car). Some participants at Trunk-or-Treat events decorate their car and people vote for the best car costume. Why do some people choose not to decorate their car for a chance to win a surely fabulous prize?

“Because they will just have to pay taxes on it anyways!”

Or perhaps he means they will be taxed on the free candy being passed out?

Either way, he’s processing my attempted government lesson (yay!), but then while he was on his Mr. Know-it-all rant, he also informed his teacher that the picture on her desk of her smooching her hubby on the cheek was, “Inappropriate! Just inappropriate!”

I wonder if he realizes the people responsible for taxes are the same ones kissing babies on the cheek? Because that would be highly inappropriate.