Ah, spring, when thoughts turn feverishly to clocks and big pillows

On TV, Martha Stewart is making popovers on a kitchen island that is nearly as big as her substantial rear end. When the popovers are done, she scoops in butter and strawberry jam.

She’s a handsome woman, Martha Stewart, but her girth is beginning to frighten me. She is one popover away from not needing a mattress or a bed.

“Like she needs another popover,” I mumble.

“Like you do?” says someone on the other side of the couch.

Spring break. Spring forward.

“On every clock, there should be two extra buttons,” the little girl says. “One would say ‘spring forward.’ The other would say ‘fall back.’ ”

“That’s a good idea,” I say.

“Thanks,” she says.

“You’re a thinker, just like me.”

“No, I’m just lazy,” she says.

“Like I said, just like me.”

Just like me, the little girl has all the symptoms of spring fever. A little congestion. A nagging cough. An unchecked imagination.

My worst symptom? This idea I had for overstuffed pillows shaped like actresses and rock stars. Ballerinas. Tennis phenoms. Maybe a warm hunting dog, always at your side.

Between relationships, you could be sleeping with a life-sized pillow shaped like your favorite fantasy. Quarterbacks for women. Cheerleaders for men. Nothing X-rated. Just a pillow.

Not the perfect solution, but you’d never have to listen to all the bodily sounds that kill so many relationships. The noises we make after a night of beer and pizza, well, there go a lot of romances right there.

“That’s a good idea, that pillow,” the boy says.

“Thanks.”

“Not,” he chides.

Then I had another idea I can’t remember much about, except that it came to me a couple of weeks ago, then vanished.

“Was it sexual?” my wife asks.

“Probably,” I say.

So I force myself to think sexual thoughts for a few minutes, in hopes of recapturing this idea. The sun quickly warms my forehead. Then my forehead warms the sun. Against the garage, there’s a rake that looks like Paris Hilton.

“Was it that built-in Christmas tree stand?” my wife asks.

Last December, I was asking why architects don’t build Christmas tree stands into homes. A guy should be able to pull up a floor board, and there would be his Christmas stand, wedged solidly between floor joists, with a tiny water supply and a drain for later.

“That was a pretty good idea,” she says.

“I’ve got a million of ‘em,” I say.

Plus the one that got away.

It’s spring, and there are even more signs that an American suburb is a hotbed of good and evil. Lust and gossip. Idle time and obsession.

All around, you see it. In the way the wives study the UPS man. In the dreamy way kids stir their cereal.

“Things to do today,” a list on the kitchen counter says. “No. 1, take over the world.”

The lovely and patient older daughter is back from college, and she’s not one to waste a day. Her plans are written on a slip of paper, big as a dollar bill.

No. 2. Make my brother wear a meat suit.

No. 3. Dress up like Carrot Top and buy carrots.

No 4. Buy latte from Starbucks.

No. 5. Swim in chocolate pudding; start a Jell-O zoo.

Kids today. You hear about how brilliant they are. From all over the country, they are getting their acceptance letters from the better colleges. God, they’re smart. Gives you hope for the future.

“A meat suit?” I ask my teenage daughter.

“That was my boyfriend’s idea,” she says proudly.

Spring is in the air, not to mention that soda-pop cologne the high schoolers wear, mixing with the scent of baby talc. Or is that cherry pie?

On the radio, Vin Scully is already in midseason form, the kid from the Bronx sounding better every year.

They are almost too good, these spring things. Still, we dream of a better world. That’s spring for you.

“Why can’t a daffodil taste like cheese?” I ask, the way Leonardo Da Vinci once did.

“Because they’re not milk-based?” the older daughter answers.

“I’m in no mood for excuses,” I say.

“Whatever, Dad,” she says, and pulls another load of dirty college laundry from the car.

Ah, spring.

Chris Erskine’s column is published Wednesdays. He can be reached at chris.erskine@latimes.com.