Aww, thank you all so much!
Really, it means a lot to me that you thought to wish me a happy birthday. :^.^:
My youngest brother and our cat Sasquatch are the only members of my family at home right now, and my brother had a summer art class that would keep him away for the morning, so I spent the first half of the day at the local aquarium, where I volunteer as an exhibit interpreter, where I could both enjoy myself sharing facts about the animals on exhibit, and receive birthday greetings from my friends on the aquarium staff. Oh, and in honor of the occasion and the setting, I spent the whole time wearing a lobster on my head
(a plush hat I had bought as a souvenir in Boston once), which was in turn wearing a dinosaur party hat I had dug out of a cupboard (an unused leftover from a dinosaur-themed party our family had held years ago). I received a great many amused grins and strange looks from visitors, and the aquarium staff loved it. Upon telling my supervisor my plans for the day, and informing her that I had not yet decided which local restaurant to visit for my birthday sunch (supper/lunch), she made the perfect recommendation: Red Lobster. I was, of course, bamboozled that I had not thought of that myself (especially after one or two other staff members later made the same suggestion). So after my brother came to meet up with me after finishing his class, that's where we went, the lobster hat (and its hat) still on my head. We had an excellent meal, made even better by the fact that literally everyone we met who was working at the restaurant that day completely loved the hat. My brother and I had planned to hit the nearby movie theater to (re)watch
How To Train Your Dragon 2, but our lunch ran a bit long, so we just headed straight home, where we baked a triple-layer dark chocolate fudge cake with chocolate frosting and toasted marshmallow inter-layer filling (modified from a recipe I had found online). Due to the complexity of the recipe and the fact that I took a nap that afternoon due to being incredibly tired, we didn't get around to lighting candles and eating the cake until about 9 PM. Our mom and sister (each of whom had also called earlier to wish me a happy birthday) joined us via speakerphone to sing "Happy Birthday" (the most off-key rendition I think ever heard in our family,
due to all three participating singers being in separate parts of the U.S. and thus having difficulty keeping their voices synchronized). The cake was very tasty, though I don't think the chocolate was quite rich enough to match the sweetness of the marshmallow filling. Afterwards, my brother gave me a spectacular hand-drawn birthday card, and I responded to e-mails sent from the respective iPhones of my dad and older younger brother (both of whom are in China right now and could therefore not communicate by other means).
Again, thank you, rhombus, bushwhacked, Ducky123, Kor, Chiletrek, Iris, jansenov, Malte, vonboy, and Chronicler, for the star day greetings. I really appreciate it.
