use Time::Piece::MySQL;
use Date::Parse;
__PACKAGE__->has_a(
    date    => 'Time::Piece',
    inflate => sub {
            Time::Piece->new(Date::Parse::str2time(shift));       
    },
    deflate => 'mysql_datetime',
);

##</code><code>##

package MyTime;

use strict;
use Time::Piece;

package Time::Piece;

use overload '""' => sub { shift->dmy("/"); },
             'cmp' => \&str_compare,
             'fallback' => undef;

1;

##</code><code>##

package MyDBI::Table;

use base 'Class::DBI';
use Time::Piece::MySQL;
use MyTime;
use Date::Parse;

__PACKAGE__->has_a(
    date    => 'Time::Piece',
    inflate => sub {
            Time::Piece->new(Date::Parse::str2time(shift));
    },
    deflate => 'mysql_datetime',
);

##</code><code>##

my $t = MyDBI::Table->retrieve(1);
print $t->date, "\n";
$t->date('2003-07-08');
print $t->date, "\n";
$t->date('07/08/2003'); # read as MM/DD/YYYY
print $t->date, "\n";