Yes, this could indeed become a habit. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves or jump the gun.

 

Take a rain check. A lovely expression I guessed meant to check the weather before confirming an appointment. In fact it means “a ticket given for later use when a sporting fixture or other outdoor event is interrupted or postponed by rain.”

 

Take a rain check — politely decline an offer, with the implication that one may take it up at a later date.

 

However, this is not a postponement. It is a writing offline with the intention of putting it online by clicking on a button called “publish” but with no expectation anyone will read it. Years ago, when I started this blog, I had some kind of expectation of a reader stumbling on it randomly and I did, in fact, find such a reader once (or more precisely, she found me, or she found y prose) and she very much appreciated a tiny impro on the theme of a phrase from Shakespeare. Today my friend is bringing dessert from a well-known frozen food chain and calls it “Monsieur Picard” and I think why does she assume it was Monsieur who started the company and not Madame? The can of worms does not shrink just because we try to ignore it. There is a difference between men and women and it makes me think.