If only there were a way for America’s Got Talent to allow a two-hour act on land and in the water to compete. Say, what? Unfortunate, also, is the fact that their recent search for talent and the auditions are over.

My recommendation for an outstanding talent to feature would be juggler, Joe Salter, 31, from Pensacola, Florida, who completed a triathlon. That is, he swam a quarter of a mile, biked 16.2 miles and ran four miles – all while juggling three balls the entire time!

Salter finished in a respectable one hour, 57 minutes, concentrating more on what’s designated as ”swuggling,” “buggling,” and “joggling,” rather than going for the jugular and trying to defeat the top-seeded competitors.

 No word mentioned as to whether or not Salter carried a water jug with him during the race.

The French held elections over the weekend and chose Francois Hollande as their new President to replace Nicholas Sarkozy. Hollande formerly served as Mayor of Tulle, France.

This city gives its name – tulle – to the stiffened silk, rayon or nylon net used chiefly for veils or ballet costumes, according to Merriam-Webster.

Until machinery was invented to manufacture tulle (the fabric), and lace as well, the tool used to weave these fabrics by hand was a needle.

A third related homophone is tule, which is a word for a rush-like, spikey grass found in wetlands.

As a take-off from what they used to say at Stanley Tools, I hope this blog post “helps you spell things right!”

I just finished a great mystery novel, Death on the Aegean Queen, by Maria Hudgins, which I doubly enjoyed because we had sailed on a cruise to the Greek Isles several years ago, and could readily relate to the locations and the everyday characters.

During the course of the novel, the security and entertainment crews on the Aegean Queen become entangled in the mysterious disappearance of a passenger and the shocking murder of the ship’s photographer. Looking for a fun beach read? I highly recommend this book.

In other news of interest in thriller novels, you’ll never guess who has been chosen to play the role in the first movie about Lee Child’s Jack Reacher, the 6’5″, 250 pound, ex-Army MP Major, hero of 16 (soon-to-be 17) best-sellers.

Would you believe…Tom Cruise will star in One Shot, due out on December 21, 2012?

The Atlanta sports pages brought up a rare homophone when catcher, Brian McCann, pulled his intercostal muscle the other day running out a ground ball. Intercostal derives from the Latin words for rib (costa) and “inter-” meaning “between” or “among.” That is to say, this is the muscle between the ribs and it lies above the oblique muscle.

The prefix “intra-” pertains to an area “within.” Thus, the Intracoastal Waterway, which “runs for most of the length of the Eastern Seaboard within the boundaries of the U.S. mainland and barrier islands, consists of several natural inlets, salt-water rivers, bays, sounds and artificial canals. The result is that the Intracoastal Waterway is able to provide a navigable route without many of the hazards of travel on the open Atlantic.

In other inside baseball news, the high-flying Orioles from Baltimore are tied for first place in the American League East Division. It’s still only April 30th, however, so the Yankees and the Red Sox aren’t panicking.

Years ago, when trying to teach my wife, who, at the time was not a baseball fan, the nicknames of all of the teams, she was always able to correctly associate the Baltimore team by calling them the “Oreos.” Congratulations, by the way, to Kraft Foods (although the Oreos were originally developed by the National Biscuit Company) on the one hundred year anniversary of everyone’s favorite cookie with a very important “inside” treat of white cream filling: 70 million are sold every day!

Paul Bunyan, erstwhile lumberjack of yore and lore, had he lived in Maui or elsewhere in the Pacific or southeast Asia, might have met his match had he come across a banyan tree. This type of giant tree is a ficus plant, distinguished by its aerial roots. The tree’s seeds germinate and send shoots downward into the ground.They eventually grow into thick woody trunks which, with age (oldest in the world is 250 years old), can become indistinguishable from the main trunk.

Recently I had the opportunity to see the banyan tree in the town of Lahaina in Maui, planted in 1873, to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of Christian missionary work there. “The tree was imported from India and was only 8 feet tall. It now stands over 60 feet high, has 12 major trunks in addition to a huge core. It stretches over a 200-foot area and shades 2/3 of an acre. Caring members of the community carefully maintain the symmetrical shape of the Banyan Tree. It is one of the largest Indian Banyan trees in the world.”

Returning back to the giant lumberjack, perhaps Bunyan may have “retired” because his boots were too tight, causing a deformity of his big toe, the condition of which is known medically as a bunion.

Had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to travel to the Pacific last week for a vacation and was rewarded with a fabulous meal at Mama’s Fish House located in Pa’ia, on the island of Maui, Hawaii.

As phenomenal as the lunch was for the appetite, what inspires the soul is the ever-beckoning, open-air panorama from the dining area to the rocky cove reflecting various aqua-blue tones about a hundred feet away from the restaurant, nestled in a coconut grove. To be more specific, this restaurant site epitomizes a tropical island setting, plus it offers a dazzling view of colorful wind surfers darting across the surf and each other at speeds of up to 40 miles per hour.

Once you pay the bill, however, you’ll feel like a serf, financially speaking. Given a one-time chance, it’s worth it.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it, again. It’s a known fact that even the best journalists and editors make mistakes.

Today, while reading an article in the Wall Street Journal, I noticed that the word “it’s“ was used as a possessive pronoun, when “it’s“ is actually a contraction meaning “it is.”

Remember, SpellCheck may know how to spell, but it does not always know its grammar in the context of what a person is intending to write.

April 3rd marks the 80th anniversary since 1942 when  the Japanese infantry staged a major offensive against Allied troops in Bataan, the peninsula guarding Manila Bay of the Philippine Islands. The U.S. Army was forced to surrender the largest number of troops in our history in the course of that battle.

The Japanese army then force marched 78,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war 80 miles, imparting physical abuse, starvation and extremely unhygienic conditions on them. Approximately 5,000–10,000 Filipino and 600–650 American prisoners died in the Bataan Death March from these war crimes.  

General Douglas MacArthur, who, like General George Patton, often appeared with a baton, or “swagger stick” in hand, was the Commander of U.S. Army Forces in the Far East at the time. A baton, also sometimes referred to as a riding crop, has been used as an implement to conduct drills and maneuvers ever since the days of Caesar and the Roman army.

MacArthur had been forced earlier to retreat from Bataan to Australia. Two years later, MacArthur fulfilled his famous promise (“I shall return”) when he led Allied forces, personally wading ashore on Leyte island in the Philippines. This invasion is considered the turning point of the war in the Pacific Theatre of Operations.

After World War II, it was MacArthur, he of the baton in hand, who, fittingly, was instrumental in the prosecution of Japanese war criminals, who were held responsible for the Bataan Death March.

This week the U.S. Supreme Court Justices are listening to oral arguments spoken by attorneys regarding the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare. Prior to these oral arguments each side submitted a written legal brief outlining each side’s points of law, which the Justices have already read.

Normally, audio recordings of oral arguments are made available to the public at the end of the particualr argument week. In this major case, however, the Court allowed for immediate release of the proceedings, so that the words spoken from the attorneys’ mouths, i.e., oral, reach the public, who use their aural (relating to the ear) sense of hearing in order to follow this historic case.

This week, the Court, with crowds, pro and con, inside and outside, has an aura (or distinctive atmosphere) of suspense and tension surrounding it. 

Recently, a good friend and long-time neighbor was driving by and stopped to apprise me of the fact that he and his wife were going to sell their home and take an early retirement. They plan to move to The Villages, an active retirement town located in sunny central Florida.

So, the other day, the “For Sale” sign went up on their front lawn. While they seem to be asking a hefty price for their home, complete with swimming pool, I hope they can get it for the benefit of all of the houses in our community.

The bottom line, however, is whether or not the house will appraise at that value. If it does, I’ll be one of the first to praise them when it sells.