Birthday

Today is my birthday!

I like celebrating my birthday, not because of gifts or birthday cake, but because its still a relatively 'new' thing for me. Having grown up as a Jehovah's Witness until I was 29, we were prohibited from celebrating birthdays. So it wasn't until I left the JW religion that I began celebrating mine and others' birthdays, almost 14 years ago.

Probably another reason why I like celebrating my birthday is because I don't look my age. Whenever strangers learn my age they are always surprised, usually guessing me to be 8-12 years younger than I am. Not that I can claim any credit for that; I always chalk it up to good genes and clean livin'.

I got several funny birthday cards in the mail this week, as well as some very clever e-cards via email. It is so nice when friends remember your birthday!

In typical Thurs fashion, I went to Joe's mom's house to pick her up for dinner. She had a card and a box for me, and wished me 'happy birthday' as she kissed me on the cheek. I opened the box to find a navy plaid shirt. That will be great since I wear blue jeans so often.

Then we went to Outback Steakhouse where we met Kerry, Hugh, George, Kelly, and Alex. They had cards and gifts for me too! (I was only expecting dinner and wonderful companionship.) Kerry & Hugh gave me a Christmas tree ornament in the shape of a miniature mug with a Washington DC scene on it. So cute! George gave me a gift card for Target, a store I frequent regularly. Kelly gave me a set of retro measuring cups, identical to the ones I'd admired at Kerry's house. How thoughtful!

We talked and enjoyed a terrific dinner, followed by yummy desserts and coffee. Kelly & I shared a 'Chocolate Thunder from Down Under'. Even half was too much for me to finish!

But perhaps the most unexpected birthday 'gift' I received today was the call from our realtor, indicating we have a renter for our house! Its not final yet, as they had not yet signed the application but Betsy said they'd made up their mind they wanted our house. The one 'wrinkle' is that they've asked if they can take possession during the week between Christmas and New Years, which is barely 3 weeks from now. I will talk to Betsy again tomorrow about this, but I don't think we can be ready to move out that quickly. We'll want to make an offer on a house in DE and go to settlement (as quickly as possible) so that we only have to pay the movers to move us once - from this house to the new one. I called our DE realtor and she was a little skeptical of such a quick turn around so I will ask Betsy tomorrow to approach the potential tenants with a month's time from when they sign the application. Hopefully they will understand and be able to work with that.

I'm off work tomorrow so I'm heading to the beach sometime before noon. Joe will be at work so there's no need for me to rush to get there. Not having been there for almost a month, I miss it! On Sat we're going to George & Steve's tree trimming party in the afternoon, and then to an artist's open house with Rick & Nick in the evening. On Sun we're meeting with our DE realtor to work on writing up some offers. I'll be back Sun night.

Drag Queen name of the day: Bunny Hopp