Grass and Sky

Thank you, all my lovely friends, for the kind and thoughtful birthday wishes. I've had a lovely day so far.

My dad called me first thing this morning, actually getting my birthday day right for the first time in years. He's had a lot of health problems this past year or so but he sounded a lot better than he has in a while, and it was only a little awkward talking to him.

Some friends treated me to a delightful brunch this morning. We went to a little place called Coca Cafe, which has the feel of a coffee house, but the kitchen of a restaurant. They open at 10, we got there at 10:05 and they already had a forty minute wait for a table! So after putting our names on the list, we wandered a block or two down the street to Espresso a Mano for some coffee and a warm place to wait.

As soon as we walked in the door, I could tell this was a place that takes their coffee seriously. I ordered a latte and discovered that I was right.



It also tasted really good.

We hung out with our coffees until a table opened up and then wandered back down the street to eat. I'd never been to Coca Cafe before, but I can definitely recommend it. I ordered the Almond French Toast, which came with strawberries and lemon cream sauce.



Since I was taking pictures, Friend D wanted to take a pic of me with my food. Good thing I made an effort to be presentable this morning!



The thing about today that I was not expecting was the inch of snow on the ground when I woke up, and the persistent snowfall that has continued all day, despite the fact that weather.com assured me this morning that it was raining. It's only just barely freezing, and the snow is sticking to every single little leaf, twig and branch. Very pretty in a rather bleak, monochromatic way.

( Coming up: pictures of a walk on a snowy day )

And now, the sky is all pink with sunset, I'm in my snuggly Life is Good pjs, I'm getting ready to heat up some left over chicken vindaloo, I have dark chocolate to eat for dessert, and movies to pop into the dvd player. I declare this birthday a rousing success!

Friend D and her family are heading to Australia for a month, tomorrow. So last night they had me over for dinner. D was very apologetic about having ordered in Chinese for the evening. She likes to cook and they were planning to grill something but the meat they had was bad. I didn't mind, since it's not about the food anyway. I enjoy hanging out with them and I got to spend a couple hours playing with the baby.

Baby S is now six months old and really hitting that fun baby age. He's been under the weather for several days but was still in a very pleasant mood. I got in a lot of baby holding time, which is always awesome. And then when he got tired and hungry, I was able to turn him over to mom, which was also awesome. We kept the little guy up a bit later than he's used to and D tried to put him to sleep before driving me home. He screamed and fought, absolutely refusing to go to sleep. Apparently he's never done that before, but I'm just too fun and he didn't want to sleep while I was still there. As soon as they gave up and let him be awake, he was all smiles and flirty eyes again. That boy is gonna be a heart breaker some day.

Today was 'help with B's yard sale' day. Once again, my actual usefulness was limited. Today I bought people coffee, twice. I also floated around the house, engaging in negotiations on some prices and lamely deferring to B on others. By two or two-thirty, it was pretty much all over, just in time for the hockey.

The hockey was fun. The Pens wiped the floor with the Flyers, shutting them out 6-0. It was pretty clear right from the beginning that the Pens were going to dominate, but the Flyers refused to give in, continuing to fight for every possibility. We were all really hoping for a good knock down, drag out fight, but all we got was a little scuffle with Hatcher and someone (maybe Malone?). But the point is, the Penguins are going to the Stanley Cup finals for the first time since 1992. W00t! I say.