Although my birthdays have varied over the years (a different celebration for each self, I guess), this year it was an exercise in celebratory simplicity: dinner for two, including steak on the grill, roasted asparagus, salad, and alcoholic milkshakes that I promise I will tell you about someday. And thanks partly to the New Mexico post, there was also the surprise arrival of a cast-iron tortilla press, which was really all that I was secretly hoping for, yet not at all expecting. Consider this alone a testament to birthday magic.

Normally, the day after a birthday can be a letdown–largely because the clock is officially ticking again–but this year it felt somewhat different. May 17, May 16, beyond a change of clothes and Indian food rather than steak for dinner, there were few, if any, palpable differences. The sun continued to beat down for most of the day, which made it hot, fabulously hot, and a welcome change from the rather chilly and wet turn spring had taken a few weeks ago. I was still sneezy and stuffy, cursing the pollen that has left thick traces on all the glass. The beagle was running around the yard, hoping against hope that somebody would throw water from the porch, and the Greek, who had arrived home a sweaty mess from biking for four miles in the heat, felt that cocktails were in order. And not just any cocktails, but, thanks to the strawberries in the fridge and a fresh bag of limes, Strawberry-Lime Rickeys.

If you’re wondering what a rickey is, you are not alone; this, in fact, is not the only thing I learned yesterday (did you know that the phrase to dine “al fresco,” while acceptable in English, in Italian is actually used to indicate spending time in jail, or, more colloquially, “in the cooler?”), although it is perhaps the most interesting of the bunch. The rickey, named for Colonel Joe Rickey, a famous and influential nineteenth-century Democrat, is supposed to be the most refreshing and simple of cocktails. Comprised of only gin (originally whiskey), lime juice and seltzer on the rocks (they are similar to gimlets, but remember that gimlets require only gin (or vodka), sweetened lime juice and ice), the rickey is said to be the ideal cocktail to sip during a heatwave. Like most cocktails, however, the rickey has evolved and, although you will always find naysaying purists, some rickeys will include a small amount of simple syrup, while others, like the recipe we found in Tipsy Texan, one of our favorite cocktail books and one the Greek picked up for me on a trip to the Lonestar State several years ago, will even call for the addition of fresh fruit–for both flavor and color. It may not be the drink that Colonel Joe would have ordered in a DC bar in 1883, but that’s okay. This rickey is wonderfully light, tangy, and not at all cloying in its sweetness, the kind of drink that can help you to usher in not just summer, but a whole new year in which anything (but hopefully just the pressing of a whole lot of torillas) could happen.