Birthday

Such a great day yesterday, but I've got another busy one coming up, so will mostly just outline:
Called Betty at 7:00 and we wished each other happy birthday. Got a phone, then Skype call, from Mike and girls in Lake Tahoe. He had sent a wonderful rosemary tree, which arrived on Tuesday night and is now residing on my patio.
Rushed out to Michael's as soon as the store opened to get sparkly alphabet letters. Spent the rest of the morning finishing the "name verse" cards for my four friends. I was about to put them in the envelopes when I was horrified to see there was a typo on Nancy's--AAGH! I had written "she's" in a place that should have had "she." The damn thing was all finished and I considered symbolically marking it "stet" (old newspaper lingo for "let it stand"), but I dismantled, then laboriously did it over. Filled the four cookie tins with cookies from the exchange; happily, there was exactly the right amount, so I didn't have to use the extra foil-wrapped chocolate I had bought.
Stowed the stuff in the fridge, had a quick lunch, jumped in the shower, and was dressed and ready by the time I was picked up. We went over to El's and had a fine time trimming the tree. Well, they trimmed the tree and I watched. El had bought the absolutely best useless device ever: an electric thing that projects beautiful little red and green moving lights onto the walls, the floor, the furniture and any other object--think old-time ballroom device. We all thought it was absolutely magical and took pictures with it, too. I opened my "preliminary gifts" (according to the girls) of chocolate and a slow cooker recipe box, plus those from Tokyo. These proved to be a delightful card, the picture of me drawn by the three-year-old, marked "Nana's face" (blob, with random lines); a small tile of an eggplant (he picked it out); and a lovely framed picture of the family holding photos of the recent-diseased Rolly. I loved them all, of course.
About 6:00, we went to dinner at Lure restaurant in town. It was jammed, but we got seated right away and were served good seafood dinners (swordfish for me). The kiddies had secretly bought four red velvet cupcakes from Royal Bakery in town and asked the waiter to bring them at dessert time. He did, they lit candles, sang the HB song, and we each had one.
After a leisurely meal and much talk, laughter, and plans for later (El suggested we have a big turkey dinner at her place on Christmas Eve; I'll make another pumpkin pie and bring that), we adjourned for home. The others escorted me to my door and we said goodnight.
Hey, being eighty didn't hurt at all!