When our kids were small, raking the leaves was a blast; piling them, jumping in them and so on. Now the kids are older, well, raking the leaves just ain't what it used to be.

So, here are my top 5 ways of getting out of raking the leaves:

5) "Honey, I'm too stuffed and tired from that big turkey dinner and I can't even roll off the couch, let alone rake the leaves."

4) Use the leaf blower/sucker instead of a rake. The only problem with this one is that I can never seem to gain control of the damn thing and I end up blowing the leaves all over the neighbourhood.

3) Don't do anything--just leave them there on the lawn until next spring then mulch them up and put them in the garden. Indeed, some people say they've done this and their lawn was the greenest in the neibourhood.

2) It's more fun running them over with the lawn mower.

and...1) Wait for all of them to come down, then just let the wind blow them on to the neighbours' lawn!!