Dinner Party

Hello World, It's official! The summer solstice pranced in right on schedule, early Monday morning, and officially ushered in the summer season all over the northern hemisphere. As in, "YAY!" Now that we're officially in those lazy-hazy-crazy-days-of-summer, it's perfectly okay to tuck into all the lemonade, watermelon, ice cream and S'mores that you can possibly get your hands on, and don't spare the hammocks, my good man! I know that in many places, the school year isn't technically over just yet, especially where they may have had a lot of snow days or other reasons they had to be closed at certain times, but pretty soon it will be nothing but fun-fun-fun in the sun-sun-sun for everyone, and plenty of it. Speaking of sun, thanks to Bill's rigorous ministrations in our yard - not only keeping the rampant alien mutant poison ivy at bay in the front, but even in the free-wheeling backyard, where the false chrysanthemum and pokeweed can easily reach gargantuan proportions and choke out everything in a wide radius - I was able to spot the fledgling yellow flowers that come up every year against the back fence, and a welcome sight indeed. Alert readers may recall these were given to us as a gift from one of our previous neighbors, and although my faulty memory insists that she referred to them as "Texas Sunbonnets," I have never been able to uncover any independent corroboration of this hypothesis. But I was certainly delighted to see them, whatever they're called, despite the ravages of time and marauding weeds afflicting them on every side. This may not be Texas, pardner, but those yellow beauties surely seem equal to whatever the great outdoors may throw at them, by golly. Well, what hasn't been happening in the wide world of sports lately, I ask you that. It's certainly been one for the books, and no time to take up gambling on sports as a career, especially not for the faint-hearted, that's for sure. It all began with the Belmont Stakes on the 11th, where as we all know, the evil spirit of Affirmed got off to an early start by dashing any hopes of a Triple Crown repeat, when fan favorite Nyquist won the Derby, but Exaggerator ran off with the Preakness handily. That turned the Belmont Stakes into basically a rematch between the two front-runners, and interesting to see which one would win 2 out of 3, and salvage at least a (hypothetical) "Double Crown" from the ashes of the Triple Crown wreckage, so to speak. Not so fast! The brain trust behind Nyquist elected to keep the pony out of the Belmont altogether, disappointing eager spectators looking for a final showdown between the two, and clearing the way for Exaggerator to run rough-shod over the field of remaining hopefuls, practically at will. Once again, not so fast! Instead, it turned out to be one of those years where a different horse wins each of the 3 races (and poor Exaggerator was never a factor, finishing a woeful 11th out of 13) while the hard-charging Destin was nipped at the wire by Creator, a virtual unknown and picked by nobody, who essentially came out of nowhere to pull out the unlikeliest of upsets. In the final analysis, it was only Exaggerator and the unsung Lani who raced in all 3 Triple Crown events, while about half of the field from the Belmont had also raced in the Derby but skipped the Preakness in the middle. Interestingly (well, for us persnickety nitpickers and curmudgeons, anyway) since 1960, 4 horses have won the Triple Crown, while 31 horses won two out of the three - but there were only 22 times in that same period where the 3 races were won by 3 different horses. So congratulations to Nyquist, Exaggerator, and Creator, who combined to accomplish something that is even more difficult to achieve than the fictitious "Double Crown," and that's not just a lot of horsefeathers, believe me. Meanwhile, on the hardwood, the defending champion Golden State Warriors had a commanding lead in the finals, but let it slip through their fingers, and in the decisive seventh game, it was the Cavaliers who brought the trophy home to Cleveland for the first time in franchise history - and in fact, the first world championship in any sport for the town since 1964. It's no wonder that the parade and festivities celebrating the occasion seemed to attract all 3 million citizens of the city on Wednesday the 22nd, and for all I know, could still be going on even now, and who could blame them. On the frozen front, the Pittsburgh Penguins hoisted Lord Stanley's Cup for the 4th time since 1991, beating the San Jose Sharks in 6 games, and in an interesting coincidence, denying fans at the Shark Tank (ya gotta love it!) what would have been their first dance with The Cup since the franchise was founded, also in 1991. And so, with horses, hoops, and hockey out of the way, it will be nothing but baseball from now on - although I admit that I have been seeing stories in the Sports section about NFL mini-camps, so it's obvious that it takes more than the dog days of summer to discourage those football-starved fans of everything gridiron, I dare say. In fact, they've already started playing not only Canadian football in the Great White North, but also Arena Football in 9 widely dispersed cities from Portland, Oregon to Tampa Bay, Florida, which will have to do until the real thing comes along. They tell me this is their 29th AFL season, believe it or not, in spite of having no teams in such sports mainstays as Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis, Dallas, Boston, Cincinnati, Kansas City, Houston, New Orleans, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Denver, and of course, The Town So Nice, They Named It Twice. (No, not Walla Walla.) Everywhere else, people will have to find other ways to entertain themselves, and for anyone who figured on taking a spin on an off-season Zamboni, may I present the following disclaimer from the NHL official website, and they're obviously not taking this lightly by any means: "The Zamboni word mark and configuration of the Zamboni ice resurfacing machine are registered trademarks of Frank J. Zamboni & Co., Inc. © Frank J. Zamboni & Co., Inc. 2016. All Rights Reserved." Of course, Monday was June 20th, which must have seemed like a perfect time for our friends at Positive Promotions to send out, yes, their selections for 2017 calendars, and thanks so much not. They assure me that their variety of E-Z 2 Stick Calendars feature both magnetic and adhesive strips on the back, and the custom imprint will keep your company's name in view all year long - regardless of being 7 months ahead of schedule. Speaking of keeping things in view for a long time, it reminds me that there are some things that are better left unseen, and often painfully so, I don't mind saying. In my travels lately, I found myself behind a vehicle from the nice folks at Magenta, Inc., whose giant truck was elaborately painted with what they described as "RUBISH REMOVAL" - and which I can only surmise is when they come and take away a bunch of rubes and yokels from where they're not wanted. Then I was stopped in front of a deli with one of those changeable lighted signs, where they invited me in for what they referred to as "HOT BREAKFEAT," which in no way enticed me to come inside and sample this mysterious warm option, whatever it might be. On the local front, you're welcome to go visit the helpful people at Direct Mattress & Furniture on North Avenue in our fair city, but if you happen to espy one of their trucks out on the road, you can't help but notice that it is very brightly emblazoned with the words: "DIRECT MATTRESES" instead, for all the world to see. Now, I have always been of the opinion that when a store or truck sign is misprinted, I blame the sign company and not the customer, since at least the sign company should know better - and certainly nobody should be saddled with a screaming typo on a sign or truck anymore, in this day and age of rampant auto-correct at everyone's fingertips. Not to mention, someone who doesn't understand the difference between "stationary" and "stationery" shouldn't be in the sign business to start with, for heaven's sake, even if the spell-checker is not going to help you on that one. Honestly, between the rubish, mattreses, and breakfeat, it's enough to give anyone a pounding headache. Fortunately, modern healthcare is at the ready to spring into action at a moment's notice whenever called upon, so no worries on that score. Last year, Bill had occasion to sample the care at one of the premier medical establishments in our region, and found much to his liking, in spite of it all. We found out later that every year, they also toss quite the shindig as a expression of patient appreciation, which includes a nice dinner, speakers, and breakout sessions, all at the amazing price of zip, zero, nada, zilch, and 100% on the house, thank you very much. We decided to take advantage of this opportunity, and recently found ourselves hobnobbing with over 300 doctors, administrators, patients, and guests at the well-appointed DoubleTree by Hilton in the sprawling countryside of Tarrytown. The dinner was very nice indeed (including individual cheesecakes for dessert that were simply divine, heaven knows) with peppy music and congenial company, and even the speakers were not nearly as long-winded and boring as the old Secretary's Day luncheons that we used to suffer through on behalf of the Chamber of Commerce all of those long years ago. My one quibble might be that the lack of valet parking rendered the enormous campus much more of a disadvantage than otherwise, and I personally would have voted for a shuttle bus to ferry us back and forth to the parking lot, and glad of it. But everything else was lovely, not to mention, informative, entertaining, and innovative, or even all three at the same time. It was almost like having Nyquist, Exaggerator, and Creator all show up together, but with the added benefit that I didn't have to share my cheesecake with anyone. Now that's what I call a dinner that's definitely on the right track! Elle