Mother’s Day and Ranger Blue

It was a perfect ending to Mother’s Day for me and the mother of my two children. Jane was on the couch and I was in the leather chair and we were screaming at the TV watching the Rangers desperately hang on to beat the Capitals and force a 7th and deciding game in their Stanley Cup Playoff series.

We also screamed at one another during the 2 ½ hour game. You see my wife is just becoming a Rangers fan, a serious one, who does not want to miss games and will even plan our day a bit around them. This should make me very happy and it does but she is clearly a “glass is half-empty” fan, always expecting the worst to happen to her and our team.

She really started enjoying hockey a couple of years ago when I took her to Madison Square Garden for a game and her fandom ramped up last year when the Blueshirts reached the Stanley Cup Finals. But this spring she has taken it to a different level and it’s nice that we can watch the games together even if she does at times ask strange questions.

Last night it was why the Rangers don’t pull their goalie after the Capitals took there’s out late in the game to try and score the game-tying goal. I admit that I need to show a little more patience because hopefully this season won’t end until sometime in June which means many more nights of shouting at the TV and not one another.

Truthfully we did have a terrific Mother’s Day as 12 of us got to spend it together enjoying brunch and one another at the Crabs’s Claw Inn in Lavallette. My kids came home and we were joined by my mom, mother-in-law, my sister and her son, brother and his girlfriend and her parents. We had a great time and when we were done eating the women did some local shopping while the rest of us just sat outside and enjoyed a beautiful spring afternoon.

I did have a conversation with one of the workers on the Route 35 road construction project who insisted that things will be better this summer than many originally feared and the loss of three weeks during the bitter winter was a real set back. Let’s hope he’s correct because the business community from South Seaside Park to Bay Head really can’t afford too many more blows.

Hey Jane. Wednesday is date night. Rangers-Caps, game 7 showdown as the puck drops at 7:30. See you there. That is see you in front of the TV.