Every family has traditions.

For instance, on Christmas Eve, my family moves dinner tables to polka music to clear the room for the rest of the night’s festivities, which include a live reenactment of the nativity, complete with costumes and props.

On Easter, we buy a half-pound of butter that has been sculpted into the shape of a lamb and no one is allowed to eat it.

And on the 4th of July, we pair up and have a “sudden death egg toss” competition in the parking lot across the street from my aunt’s house.

“Eggs!?” my friends always say. “Why can’t you just throw water balloons?”

Um, because we don’t have time for filling up balloons. We have mock bocce courts to set up with picnic table benches and 2x4’s in the neighbor’s yard. And there are at least 30 boxes of sparklers to use before it gets dark. And at some point, someone - usually an adult - has to spill something on me.

These things take time. Civilization and water balloons, take note.

Plus, we’re busy enjoying each other’s company – as evidenced by this real conversation I had with my cousin at the egg toss line two years ago:

My cousin: So are you seeing any hot guys?
Me: No, not so much.
My cousin: Oh. I just met the hottest guy the other night. He was like, "Hey Sexy, you want to feed me one of those gravy fries and put a little sugar on the side for me?"

At the time, I was just glad she was speaking to me because a few minutes before she heard my mother and me laughing and shouted at the back of my head, "Hello to you too! Don't think I can't hear you two laughing! I have ears like a hawk!"

To which my mother responded under her breath, "Doesn't she know it's 'eyes like a hawk'? At least doesn't she know hawks don't have ears?"

I don’t know if hawks have ears or not, but we laughed again, this time actually at my cousin’s expense and she didn’t seem to notice, so I don’t think the hawk-like ears assertion was accurate.

Perhaps the United Egg Producers would be interested in taking on these issues. It seems they have time on their hands since they recently issued a press release with the headline “Are Free Range Birds Happier? Maybe Not!”

While the pressures of free range hens vs. modern caged hens and the measurement of “corticosterone, a hormone produced in response to stress or fear,” in eggs must certainly be an enthralling topic, I think an anthropological field trip to my family’s picnic next July would yield much more interesting results.

For instance, they could measure my stress level as my cousin approaches, especially while holding an egg.

It would be like their existing study, but with people. And the eggs would be thrown.

It would be fun.

Then again, “Maybe Not!”