“My” month is over. Funny how post-birthday blahs and some chilly weather can break the spell prematurely. It was a good birthday, though, and a good month. And more beautiful than I anticipated. Now, on to May — with summer just beyond!
Back on April 11 I challenged myself to write a post about April (or [...]
Archive for April, 2008
Goodbye, April
Posted in Just Rattling On, tagged April, post-birthday blues, sluggish blogging on April 30, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
My Grossest Birthday Gift Ever
Posted in Birthdays, Holidays & Celebrations, Uncategorized, tagged frosting moustache, Got Milk, milk moustache, soup moustache on April 26, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
In this post I described the birthday cake that was inflicted upon me this past week. As I was writing that, I remembered the only other birthday on which I was truly and totally grossed out.
It was about eleven years ago. We were in the dining room of Mom and Virgil’s old place near Harrison. [...]
Black, blue, and orange frosting
Posted in Birthdays, Holidays & Celebrations, The Hooligan Chronicles, Uncategorized, tagged birthday cake, Darth Vader birthday cake, sickening frosting colors, Star Wars, Star Wars birthday cake on April 25, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
I had a very nice birthday today. I arrived at work to find a signed card from my editorial teammates and a Busken donut, a great way to start the day. The drive to work was gorgeous; the rain had let up but the wetness gave everything a watercolor effect in the soft morning light [...]
Party hats and nut cups
Posted in Birthdays, Holidays & Celebrations, Looking Back, tagged 1950s party favors; kids' birthday parties; vintage par on April 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
I asked my mother if she remembered when Grandma Martha first bought the nursery rhyme party hats and plastic nut cups we used for every kid’s birthday for years when I was little. Mom wasn’t sure; we both knew the tradition had started by 1960, when my youngest brother was born. We both remembered how [...]
When Birthdays Had Themes
Posted in Birthdays, Holidays & Celebrations, Just Rattling On, tagged 40th birthday celebration, birthday surprises, birthday themes, Gettysburg, mystery trip, theme parties on April 22, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
For several years back in the 1990s, Diamondqueen insisted that our birthday celebrations have “themes.” Fortunately this only applied to me, Mom, and Diamondqueen, not the entire family. We had some creative themes, though. And those celebrations took a lot of work and planning.
I celebrated some really interesting themed birthdays during those years. There was [...]
The Vacant Chairs
Posted in Looking Back, Uncategorized, tagged 1995, April 19, Field of Chairs, Gates of Time, Murrah Federal Building, National Federation of State Poetry Societies Convetion, NFSPS 2007 Conventon, Oklahoma City bombing, Oklahoma City National Memorial, The Vacant Chair on April 19, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
“We shall meet but we shall miss him.
There will be one vacant chair.
We shall linger to caress him,
while we breathe our ev’ning prayer.”
(“The Vacant Chair,” a Civil War song; words by Henry Washburn, melody by George F. Root.)
There are 168 vacant chairs at the Oklahoma City National Memorial. Vacant of human presence, that is; the [...]
Midwest Earthquake
Posted in Just Rattling On, Uncategorized, tagged earth tremors in Midwest, earthquake, earthquakes in Cincinnati, San Francisco earthquake on April 18, 2008 | 1 Comment »
I slept through the earthquake this morning (i.e., tremor; the epicenter of the actual earthquake was considerably farther west). My apartment is a combined ground floor/basement unit (I have to go down steps to reach it, but it opens out onto a patio and a wide lawn), so maybe that prevented me from being awakened by [...]
