Every Other Inch A Lady

Hello World, Feliz Cinco de Mayo! [Please insert Mariachi band playing "The Mexican Hat Dance" here.] Hard on the heels of "Star Wars Day" ("May the Fourth be with you!") I hope that everyone out there in the wide world handed the Napoleonic forces their collective hats, and showed them the proverbial door, in honor of this muy excellente opportunity to party mucho - and that goes double for the tequila, amigo mio. I don't know if they have The Holiday Police in Mexico, trying vainly to maintain the sanctity of the proper traditions for the Battle of the Puebla observances, but around here, it's any old excuse is good enough reason for a party, and the heck with the details. As far as I'm concerned, there's no wrong way to celebrate, from the palest gringo to the swarthiest hombre, and everything in between, and don't spare the maracas, muchachos. Senorita, more tequila, por favor! Around the old homestead, we've been delighted at the timely blooming of our lilac, and because we have a mismatched pair of them on either side of an arbor in the backyard, walking between them and inhaling their exquisite fragrance may be as close to heaven as we'll ever get. It didn't take much encouragement for the English wood hyacinths to spring up all over the yard, and even the columbine and cranesbill have started to pop open, although it seems way too early for that. Our azaleas are just starting to get underway, and the lavender cascades of wisteria will soon be a vision of loveliness from our second floor windows, and twice as welcome at that. In an effort to create space for our new hydrangea, Bill took on the Herculean task of chopping back the sprawling wild rosebush along the collapsed retaining wall, unfortunately with regrets to the Department of Justice that we have still uncovered no sign of either Jimmy Hoffa or Judge Crater - although the errant herd of Thomson's gazelles cavorting in there will be glad to be returned to their rightful place on the African plains, I'm sure. Our neighbor's snowball bush is looking very jolly indeed, and for anybody who worried that our onion grass suffered from the ravages of winter weather, you'll be relieved to hear that it's already standing tall in sturdy clumps everywhere, giving the lawn the bedraggled look of an unkempt relative whose personal grooming leaves much to be desired. It can be more than a handful to keep ahead of the property in the fullness of its springtime revival, and now we'll have to do it without even the gazelles, alas. Also on the local seen (that's a pun) the laser treatment on my right eye continues to pay dividends, and making slow but steady progress in the right direction. At my appointment last week, I was actually reading the eye chart at the 20/30 line (without glasses) and almost 20/25 - which is endlessly astounding to me when I consider that I had been using corrective lenses for distance for more than 50 years previously. Of course, now at my age, I have fallen victim to the common ailment on the other side of the coin, which is that my close vision has been completely shot to blazes, and while I revel in the novelty of being able to see far away for the first time in my life, anything that's within arm's length of me is nothing but a blur at this point. I travel around with a vast array of magnifying spectacles (my sister always used to joke that her Indian name was "Woman of Many Glasses") each one of which seems to only work for one particular purpose - such as reading the newspaper, using the computer, or playing games on the phone - but are absolutely not interchangeable for any other task. Between losing them and breaking them, I have the feeling that I'm keeping the eyewear industry afloat entirely by myself, and if I ever found one pair of glasses that would do everything I need it to do, the optical manufacturers would go out of business overnight. You're welcome. The playoff picture is shaping up in interesting ways, as is often the case. The perhaps overmatched Rangers clawed their way over Montreal into the second round, and then promptly lost the first two games to Ottawa right out of the chute, thanks not, before righting the ship and winning the next two on home ice. Meanwhile, the runaway favorite Capitals (with their league-leading 118 points and all) are on the short end of a 3-1 hole against the Penguins, and on the verge of being knocked out of the picture completely. Anaheim and Edmonton, like the Rangers, are all knotted up at 2 apiece, while unsung Nashville, like Pittsburgh, has a commanding lead over St. Louis, and may take them out in 5 games as well. In the NBA, Boston, Cleveland, and Golden State have already won 2 games, and only Houston and San Antonio are still tied at one game each. In other current sports, after a full month outside on the grass, it's the Yankees and Astros, well, maybe not exactly running away with it in the AL, but certainly trotting away with it at this early juncture, with the Nationals and Rockies doing the same on the NL side of things. The Mets are struggling to keep pace at 3 games under .500, but unfortunate injuries have already taken their toll, especially among their pitching staff. Of course, things can always be worse, like the opening round of the PGA Tour's Wells Fargo Championship at Eagle Point Golf Club in Wilmington, North Carolina, where 2 golfers were eaten by alligators, but they were several strokes off the lead, so nobody really took any notice. Okay, that didn't actually happen, but I still say they're just asking for trouble as long as the alligators have free rein to wander the courses at will, and I for one would not count on the gators' good manners, I dare say. On the modern technology front, alert readers may recall a few weeks ago, when I mentioned that I had inadvertently cobbled together two colloquial expressions into one sentence (and to the detriment of both, I don't mind saying) and ended up with a sodden ink-stained mess for my troubles, which was no improvement to the English language, by any means. Now thanks to our friends and friendly strangers at Facebook, I realize that I am not the only one afflicted with the mixed metaphor syndrome, as the following comments will attest: =============================== "You can take one man's trash to another man's treasure, but you can't make it drink" "Now you're up a creek and barking at the wrong tree" "You've opened this can of worms, now lie in it" "You can't spill milk on a dead horse" (Fun fact: the blending of idioms or cliches is called a malaphor) My personal favorite is "We'll burn that bridge when we get to it" (I'm rather fond of "It's not rocket surgery," and "not the sharpest egg in the attic,") but my all-time favourite is " ... until the cows freeze over." ================================= Well, if that's not the bee's knees in the cat's pajamas, then I guess I just don't know what is, by golly. Anyway, we've certainly gone all the way around Robin Hood's barn since we started, put all of our eggs in one basket, and that basket seems to be well on its way to the nether regions even as we speak, so we'd all better look before we leap, or Devil take the hind-most. After all, this isn't rocket surgery. Elle