Blog Archives - Ailantha

Walking Half A Mile In My Shoes

10/30/2023

Available on Amazon:
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   "Hail Mary"    https://www.amzn.com/1684334888
"Tropical Depression" https://www.amzn.com/1685131832

Walking Half A Mile In My Shoes

By last week my broken left foot was feeling quite a bit better and, theoretically, on the mend (see post from 8/19/1013, www.ailantha.comelblog/i-invalid-part-one-four-insults-and-an-injury). However, now I found myself in the somewhat embarrassing position of feeling pain in my right foot. Kind of all over my right foot. And, for that matter, in some new spots on my left foot.
I schlepped sheepishly back to the podiatrist, wondering if he'd lock my heels for somehow giving myself another break, or else tell me the problem wasn't in my feet but in my head.
However, an x-ray of both feet revealed neither of the above but that, in the words of the doctor, both of my feet were "eaten up by arthritis."
This sounded pretty dismal until he explained that this was merely a flair-up and likely to calm down and leave me alone, at least for a while, when treated with a course of steroids and, that most elusive of remedies, "taking it easy for a while." Which I thought I'd been doing. But, oh well.
I told the doctor that I had already cut back my pre-fractured-metatarsal two miles a day walk to one mile.
"Make it half a mile for now," he said.
And so half a mile a morning it's been.
This morning it was rainy, and yet after I'd walked a little ways I was struck by how colorful and kind of expressionistic the neighborhood landscape looked in the rain. So I used up some of my precious allotted steps to walk back home, grab my camera, and look through the lens for what might be worth capturing within a half mile:

By the time I arrived back in my own front yard,

... both the sting in my foot and my trip tracker advised me that I'd slightly overdone it.

Sometimes you can't help overdoing it.

Making The World Go Away On A Rainy Friday Afternoon

10/28/2023

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   "Hail Mary"    https://www.amzn.com/1684334888
"Tropical Depression" https://www.amzn.com/1685131832

Making The World Go Away On A Rainy Friday Afternoon

Yesterday it was a drizzly day in the neighborhood and too wet to go outside and rake the leaves,

...or do any of the other seasonal yardwork waiting to be done.

Meanwhile the news was too dreadful to sit around inside and catch up reading the papers.

Around noon I said to Tom, "Let's just ditch the remaines of this dreary day and go catch a movie."
My mate agreed that this was a capital idea, and so we drove over to the AMC at Easton. our local mall,

...from where we had a nice variety of flicks to choose from, from the faith-based,

...to the inspirational,

...to the super-scary.

We decided to go with "Dicks: The Musical,"

...which turned out to be a faith-based film. Of sorts. It was also pretty absurd. But thought-provoking, all the same. However if you're not down with every other word being a a rank obscenity, it might not be your cup of tea. (The gent sitting next to us left after about fifteen minutes. Good he did, it got way raunchier).
However it was a bright, bouncy, colorful sing-along musical with a small but terrific cast with the singing, dancing and acting chops to pull it all off. Provided one wasn't too easily offended. Let's just say that "Dicks: The Musical," made "The Book of Mormon" look G-rated. Maybe pre-G-rated.

Anyway, the story line of "Dicks: The Musical" centers around a pair of self-absorbed, successful, macho, Alpha Male womanizing twins, played by Aaron Jackson and Josh Sharp,

...who were separated at birth. Trying to out-compete each other while slaving away for their Alpha Female boss, played by a show-stopping Megan Thee Stallion,

...the twins discover each other and come to the realization that what they've been craving in life is the real family that they missed out on in their childhood.
They go on a quest to bring back together their long-separated parents. But their father, played by Nathan Lane on his Broadway crooning and hoofing game,

...cares far more about his two horrible pets than his own sons.
Megan Mullilly plays their equally weird mother,

...who claims that her vagina keeps escaping, so she keeps it in her purse.
Watching over the family drama is God, played hilariously by Saturday Night Live comic Bowen Yang.

In truth, though "Dicks: The Musical" was more outrageous than clever, it did have its moments as well as messages about greed, kindness, family, religion, tolerance, equality, the Gospel and, above all, love, all told in the vulgarest of the vulgate.
Still, Tom and I liked the movie and afterwards we stopped to talk about it from time to time while we strolled around the mall.

We then decided to go out for an early dinner in hopes of beating the usual Friday night restaurant crowds.
Inspired by the photos of the delicious-looking food that our daughter, who's visiting Mexico with her friend, has been sending us,

...we decided to go to our favorite Mexican restaurant, Chuy's, with its cheerful interior,

...where we split an order of our standard Chuy's favorite, the oh-so-tender beef fajitas

After dinner we were craving some dessert, so our next stop was Meijer's bakery where we figured we'd find something yummy. We settled on a small cake.

When we got home we decided to just pull out a couple of utensils and fork it.

We made it about halfway through.

After we finished our cake the night was still relatively young, so we watched one more movie, "Blackberry," which rounded out the evening nicely.
The next day the world, the rain, and the news would be back. But was nice to get away for a little while.

Might as well face it, House Republicans are addicted to voting.

10/25/2023

Might as well face it, House Republicans are addicted to voting.

I like voting myself (see previous post, https://www.ailantha.com/blog/ivoting),

...but nothing like the Republican members of the United States House of Representatives do.
See, like most of my fellow Americans, I like voting for a desired outcome. For the House Republicans, the outcome they desire from voting is apparently to be able to vote again. And again. And again. It's pretty clear from their inability to elect a Speaker in a timely fashion that the Republicans Reps don't just like voting for a Speaker; they love it, they can't get enough of it, it's all they to like to do anymore. Might as well face it, they're addicted to voting.
In retrospect, there were warning signs from the start, that is, from back in January after the Republicans won the House from the Democrats in the November 2022 elections. Normally, before rolling up their sleeves and getting down to the work of legislating, the members of a newly elected Congressional majority have one quick round of social voting, one round on the House as it were, just a kind of a toast vote to officially install into office their new Speaker, who's been chosen in advance, normally.
But in this case responsible voting went out the window when the pre-ordained,

...was un-ordained by a handful of hardcore vote abusers, and one round of voting turned into another round, then another then another, until after a fifteen-round bender the Republican Congress hit strung-out rock bottom and knew they had to quit voting cold turkey and elect Kevin McCarthy. Which they did, but only on the condition that a single one of their members could at any time call for another round of Speaker-voting anytime they wanted it. Or needed it.
The Republicans stayed clean and Speaker-vote free for nine months, though there was always an undercurrent suggesting that, one false move by Speaker McCarthy and they'd fall off the group wagon. Which they finally did on October 4, when Matt Gaetz, the crude, loud-mouthed playboy womanizer - or rather, young girlanizer - from Florida,

...got the voting party started to oust McCarthy on the grounds that he had the...the...the...the noive to negotiate with Democrats to keep the United States government opened. To the hardcore right-wing faction of the Congressional Republicans, the worst sin their Speaker can commit is reaching across the aisle to work with Democrats. So they voted him out.
Or else they were just jonesing for another voting binge, which they've been on since then, having among themselves voted in then out first choice Steve Scalise,

...then voted in then out (thank the Lord!) Jim Jordan.

Next choice Tom Emmer dropped out,

...when the Republican's head vote dealer and leader of the Republican vote cartel,

...against whose benefit the hapless Mr. Emmer voted for the certification of Joe Biden's election, came to call and mete out his revenge, making it clear that any member of the Republican Party who wanted access to his supply of Trump candy better not vote for Tom Emmer. And so Emmer, who might well have been the best choice of the bunch, crashed and burned.
Said Donald Trump of the demise of Tom Emmer's possible Speakership:
"It's done. It's over. I killed him."

(Mayhaps Tom Emmer was wise to drop out to make sure that didn't happen to him for reals).
So just this afternoon the Republican side of the House of Representatives, likely once again exhausted and voting dopesick from this three week binge, unanimously elected Mike Johnson of Louisiana,

...a fundamentalist member of the Christian right faction of the Republican party who is a devoted Trump supporter who worked to try and overthrow the 2020 election, who supports a nationwide abortion ban and a ban on LGBTQ marriage and who was once called by fellow Republican Baton Rouge Metro Councilman John Delgado,

...a "despicable bigot of the highest order"
However, all that being said, when it comes to funding the government, Mike Johnson is in favor of something called single subject spending bills, which means that instead of putting together an omnibus package of all the money that needs to be appropriated to keep the country running, voting on a small separate bill for each department that needs to be funded. Said Johnson of this modus operandi, "It takes more time. It's a messier process. But in the end, I think it'll be good for the American people."
Right. What it'll do is take more time to get the government funded. It'll take, like, forever with all the voting that will be required. No wonder the House Republicans elected Mike Johnson. Never mind running the country; gotta keep feeding that voting addiction.

References:
https://nrb.org/with-shutdown-looming-single-subject-spending-bills-edge-ahead-of-cr/

https://www.ktbs.com/news/congressman-mike-johnson-speaks-on-government-shutdown/article_e119fb56-5e73-11ee-8d4c-efa129e5b15d.html

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/10/24/i-killed-him-how-trump-torpedoed-tom-emmers-speaker-bid-00123329

https://news.yahoo.com/mike-johnson-may-win-speakership-043002517.html?fr=sycsrp_catchall

I❤️Voting

10/23/2023

I❤️Voting

This past Friday afternoon I early voted for the issues on the ballot of the upcoming Ohio November election. I've read that around 36% of Ohioans vote in general non-Presidential elections. In Presidential elections closer to 66% of us vote. I don't get why so many folks don't vote. I always vote in every election. And not just because I'm a good citizen who cares about the issues. I mean, I'm probably an okay citizen as citizens go, and I do generally care about the issues, though some issues more than others.
The two state-wide issues on the ballot this time around are Issue 1, which would guarantee abortion rights in the Ohio constitution, and Issue 2, which would legalize marijuana in our state. I care more about Issue 1 than Issue 2, though I don't mind sharing how I voted on both: I voted yes on Issue 1, no on Issue 2.
As to why I voted as I did on Issue 1, I suppose I could break down my reasoning into all its moral, philosophical and practical constituent parts; or else I could just agree with Jay and Silent Bob, those two addle-brained but good-hearted stoners who in the movie "Dogma" were standing outside a Planned Parenthood clinic in hopes of meeting loose women:

And I voted no on Issue 2 because I think there's way too much drug use in this country.

But besides all that, the thing is, I really like voting. I mean, I like the voting process, especially the early voting process.
I like traveling to the Franklin County Board of Elections, a fifteen minute drive from my house, to whence one from my locale must travel to vote early.

I like all the hustle and bustle there, the political signs lining the street and the parking lot,

...all the people coming and going,

...all the activity outside and inside of the building,

...so much more than one finds at the church that is the voting site for my ward, and where I would go to vote if I waited until election day,

...which I seldom do any more. Me, I wanna be where the people are.
And the Franklin County board of elections was they were last Friday afternoon.

I like the feeling of gemütlichkeit that I've always found to be pervasive inside the Board of Elections building. The roster judges who sign us in are friendly and helpful,

...as are the election judges who escort us to and assist us at the ballot printing machines and the ballot counting machines.

(To read about my experience as an election day machine judge, see post from 8/10/2023, https://www.ailantha.com/blog/i-machine-judge).
Even when there's a line, the voters always seem in a good mood. Or mayhaps I just project my good mood onto everybody around me. But the thing is, it does feel good to vote, to go up to that ballot printing machine and make one's choice, making one's voice heard, so to speak, on paper.
It's then so gratifying to slip one's ballot into the counting machine, and after I've inserted my ballot I like watching the ballot counter screen go round and round until the picture of the flag pops up. Because then I know my vote has been counted and added to the tally. It makes me feel that I'm part of something important. That I belong.

The thing is, voting gives you a good feeling. I can't understand why anyone would deny themselves the pleasure.

The Fog Of War

10/20/2023

The Fog Of War

For all the time I spend reading about the tragedy that continues to unfold in Israel and Gaza, I'm starting to find that the more I read about it the more I think about it, and the more I think about it the less clear my thinking becomes, except that it's all so heart-wrenching and terrible, and gets worse with every new picture,

...and every new story.

There's been too much suffering of innocent people on both sides for me to understand how, whatever one's stand on Israel was before October 7, one could not be horrified by the cold-blooded brutality of Hamas on that day and feel no empathy for Israeli victims of the violence and kidnappings, or however horrified one was by the Hamas attack on Israel, one could not be heart-sick over the plight of the Gazans who are the victims of the harsh retaliation by the Israeli military.
How does all that suffering not cloud one's thinking, trouble one's pre-October 7 notions and opinions about Israel and Gaza? Especially for those of us who watch the war unroll on the news in comfort and safety 6,000 miles away?
A little while ago I was talking with one of my children-in-law, who made the perceptive point that the only aspect of all this that's easy to talk about is Hamas,

...the terrorist group that set off the war that's accomplishing nothing except to bring down mass carnage on both Israelis and Gazans. But, ruling out Hamas, how does one take a side in this war?
In fact, in the post-October 7 context, how does one not take the side of both the Israelis and Gazans?
I can't figure that out, either.

A Tower Of Sorrowful Babble

10/13/2023

Yesterday morning I called my friend with the intention of rejoicing with her over the birth of her first grandchild. Rejoice together we did, but before too long the conversation somehow devolved into the heartbreaking events over the past week in Israel,

...and Gaza.

In the afternoon I was in CVS picking out a baby card when I ran into another friend. We spent a moment chatting about babies and baby cards before we fell into talking about Israel and Gaza. We stood amidst the cheerful baby cards for a good twenty minutes venting our sorrow, our outrage, and ultimately our helplessness to do any thing about it.
Over dinner my husband and I read the papers,

...talked about how heart-wrenching it all was, and tried, the same as we'd tried during breakfast and lunch, to figure out between us the answer to ending this terrible conflict.

That night at 9:44pm my son called. He was down-hearted about all the suffering in Israel and Gaza. We talked about it until 10:45pm. At 10:54pm my daughter called from Los Angeles. She was also upset about Israel and Gaza. We talked until past midnight.
First thing this morning my husband and I started off the day by talking about it some more.
In the middle of the morning my daughter from Los Angeles called again. She was still feeling sad about Israel and Gaza and wanted to talk about it on her way to work.
As soon as my daughter hung up my sister called from Oregon. I was talked out about the Israel/Gaza war. I didn't want to talk about it any more. My sister didn't want to talk about it, either. We talked about it for half an hour.
This afternoon I called my son-in-law, who's down with COVID, to see how he was feeling. He said he was feeling better, except for being distressed about Israel and Gaza and he wanted to talk about it.
It was after I hung up with my son-in-law that it occurred to me: Israel has always had a massive presence on the geopolitical globe, this last week more than ever in recent years.
And yet look at Israel's actual size:

And within Israel, the size of Gaza:

And though Israel and Gaza are 6,000 miles away from Columbus, Ohio, they’re right here in the front yard of my mind and the minds of my loved ones. It's all we can talk about.
If only thinking about and caring about and talking about it could end the suffering and bring peace to this small, turbulent patch of the planet.

Blood Money

10/12/2023

Awful as the daily news seemed to be last week,

...little did any of us dream the nightmare that was coming.

And now the attack on Israel by Hamas, the militant Islamic group that controls the Palestinian Gaza strip, is all my family and friends can talk about. And the words we say don't always even match up with how horrified we are, they're just the words that, in our shocked disbelief, happen to fall from our mouths.
"Those missiles that Hamas used to bomb Israel are expensive, they cost millions," said my husband Tom shortly after we head the news of the bombing. "Why the hell didn't Hamas spend the money on things that would have helped the Palestinian people? Schools, roads, housing, hospitals...why damn missiles?"
But, of course, Tom's question was a heart-breakingly rhetorical one: if, in fact, it was Hamas who paid for their own missiles, the missiles weren’t bought and fired on Israel to in any way help the Palestinian people, any more than was kidnapping 150 Israelis, Including babies, children, and the elderly.
Or murdering them in cold blood.

Helping Palestinians isn't what Hamas has ever done.
In 2005 Israel withdrew its forces and settlers from the Gaza strip, erected a blockade between Gaza and Israel, and left the Palestinian Authority in charge of Gaza and the West Bank.

However, in 2006 the Palestinians voted Hamas into a majority of parliamentary seats. Then in a 2007 civil war Hamas overthrew the Palestinian Authority government in Gaza and took took control of the area, while the West Bank remained under control of the more moderate Palestinian Authority. Hamas renewed its denial of Israel's right to exist, and since then there has never been another democratic election in Gaza.
During the time that Hamas has ruled Gaza, billions of dollars in foreign aid have poured into Gaza for the intended purpose of alleviating the crushing poverty of this tiny area - 25 miles long, 3.5 miles wide at its narrowest, 7.5 miles at its widest - where almost 2 million people live packed closely together. And where many thousands will likely now die.
As for all the billions that were sent to Hamas to sustain the Gaza Palestinians and build up their economy and infrastructure, the pictures say it all.

Reference:
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/conflict-between-israel-palestinians-gaza-2023-10-07/

  https://apnews.com/article/business-middle-east-israel-foreign-aid-gaza-strip-611b2b90c3a211f21185d59f4fae6a90

Farewell, My Yoga

10/7/2023

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   "Hail Mary"    https://www.amzn.com/1684334888
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Farewell, My Yoga

Several days ago I returned to the doctor for an x-ray to determine how far along my fractured foot was in the healing process (see post from 8/19/2023, https://www.ailantha.com/blog/i-invalid-part-one-four-insults-and-an-injury).
After examining the x-ray and my foot, the doctor pronounced that, while my foot wasn't yet one hundred percent healed, I had turned a corner and it was now time to get up and start walking and otherwise moving around. "But take it easy for the next month," he said, "and don't overdo it."
Now, if he had told me to stay off my foot altogether, I would have understood what he meant; or if he'd said to go back to doing everything I'd normally do pre-broken foot, that likewise would have been pretty clear. But take it easy and don't overdo it? Exactly what, I wondered, did that mean? How easy was I supposed to take it? How close could I approach a normal day's activity without the risk of re-cracking my metatarsal?
I posed these questions to my doctor. He thought a moment then said, "Okay, tell me what a normal day is like for you."
"Well," I said, "I would normally wake up, do fifteen minutes or so of yoga, then go out and walk around the neighborhood for a couple of miles, and then some more yoga, and then...wait a minute!"
A light bulb flashed in my brain.
For the past two months that I'd been laid up I'd been tumbling around in my head the question of exactly what might have precipitated the web of cracks in my foot bone. Too much walking? Too much gardening? Too much housework? (Nah, probably wasn't too much housework). But the one thing that had never occurred to me was too much...yoga.
"Do you think the yoga could have caused a stress fracture?" I suggested.
"Oh, yes," the doctor quickly replied. He admitted he wasn't a fan of yoga. Too much torking of the toes, by which he meant the sort of bend that occurs when you stand on your tiptoes.

He asked if I did poses that involved torking of the toes or putting stress on the feet. I thought a minute.
Well, there was Chaturanga,

...Cow,

...Camel,

...and Wild Thing, among others,

...and then any number of poses that put all the weight on one foot, such as:
Tree,

...Dancer,

...and Eagle,

...all of which I normally did.
"That could well be what caused your stress fracture," said the doctor. "I wouldn't do any more yoga that torks the toes or stresses the feet." He was kind enough not to add, "After all, you're 72 years old."
It's not easy giving up something that's been life-giving for so many years. And yet, as that famous verse tells us, for everything there is a season and a time for every activity under heaven.
Good-bye, yoga,

...hello, ukulele.

A Tale Of Three Cakes

10/4/2023

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"Equal And Opposite Reactions"   http://amzn.to/2xvcgRa
   "Hail Mary"    https://www.amzn.com/1684334888
"Tropical Depression" https://www.amzn.com/1685131832

A Tale Of Three Cakes

The day before yesterday I turned 72. That sounds really old. But then, after you say it a couple of times - I'm 72 - you kind of start getting used to it, then you figure, eh, might as well get on with it, such as it is.

Now, what with me still being footbound, housebound, and mostly chairbound (see post from 8/19/2023, https://www.ailantha.com/blog/i-invalid-part-one-four-insults-and-an-injury), celebratory options were still pretty limited. I therefore invited my son Tommy and daughter-in-law Emily,

...to come over on Sunday, the day before my birthday, for lunch. And to bring a couple of pizzas with them.
My daughter Theresa's friend Mayren would be there, too.

On Saturday evening I sent my mate Tom out to Giant Eagle to pick up a birthday cake. I instructed him to make sure and get a white cake, not chocolate (me being one of those rarest of creatures, a chocophobe), with vanilla icing.
"White cake, vanilla icing," said I. "Got it?"
"Got it," said he.
He picked out from the Giant Eagle bakery a suitably zippy cake for the occasion.

There'd been no one present in the bakery department to write "Happy Birthday" on the cake, but I was fine with it, considering the generous border of icing stars and the over-sized globes of icing balloons; for everyone familiar with my biodata knows that all I ever really want for my birthday is a store-bought cake smothered in that thick, dense, hyper-sweet store-bought vanilla icing, ideally on top of which may sit more icing frills. I don't mind if the frills are dyed red, yellow and blue, or, for that matter, any color on the spectrum, and the "Happy Birthday" script is strictly optional.
And so, pizza, cake, and loved ones for my birthday it would be.
Or so I'd planned.
The following morning my daughter Theresa woke up feeling wretched.
"I've got the worst sinus infection," she said.
Uh-oh, thought I. "Take a COVID test," I said.
"I'm pretty sure it's just a sinus infection," she said.
"Take a COVID test," I said.
So she took a COVID test, and:

So that was that.
I called my son and daughter-in-law to let them know that lunch - which they were going to provide - was, sadly, called off.
But they said they would drop pizza off at the house for us anyway, suggesting that we could still all celebrate my birthday with pizza, just not together.
I decided that when they handed us off the pizza, I would hand them off part of my birthday cake because, together or apart, what's a birthday celebration without some cake?
When I proceeded to remove the plastic dome of the cake so that I could cut it I made a terrible discovery:

This was not a vanilla cake; it was an almond cake!
My mate, never before having been in charge of procuring a birthday cake, assumed that white icing meant vanilla icing. Checking cake labels was not within his realm of experience. But even so, I doubt that in the 46 years we've been married I ever happened to mention that I hate the taste of almond extract flavoring with the heat of many suns.
Tom, of course, felt terrible about buying me the wrong birthday cake, and though I assured him that it was fine, that he didn't need to rush out to buy me another cake, he nonetheless rushed out to buy me another cake.
Meanwhile, Tommy and Emily arrived laden with pizza, salad...

...and birthday cake!

That is to say, a dozen beautiful mini-bundt cakes, which they intended as a collective birthday cake.
I asked them if I could give them in exchange some almond extract birthday cake. They took a hard pass.
As soon as they left I tried to call Tom in hopes that I'd catch him in time to let him know that he now didn't need to buy me a cake after all, but I was too late. He'd gone to Meijer's this time, where he found the most gorgeous, rose-bedecked cake, and there was even a baker on duty to write the message.

So now I had three birthday cakes.

But what to do with them all? As Theresa was dealing with Paxlovid mouth and so had no interest, there was only Tom and me to eat them. Much as the two of us love our sweets, even we couldn't pound that much sugar.
We came up with a plan: We'd freeze the beautiful cake until some time in the future when we could have more people over to share it. Tom would take the almond extract cake as a nosh for his church group the following morning. That left us with the very manageable dozen mini-bundts, which we got to work on after eating our delicious pizza and salad.

Our mini-bundt cakes were over-the-top delectable. This one was topped with a yummy cream cheesy frosting.

Later in the day Mayren came over for an across-the-room visit with Theresa, and when she left we had her take along some pizza and a couple of mini-bundt cakes.
The following morning, my birthday, a delivery arrived on the front porch.

The boxes were warm, and the fragrance donut-y and heavenly. Inside the boxes were a dozen donuts, still warm, the toppings still beautifully gooey.

They were a gift from my sister Romaine,

...who had them Doordashed from Dragon Donuts, a popular local donutery,

...where the donuts are made to order; that is to say, you order your donut and the baker pours a portion of batter into the donut-making machine, which then drops a circle of batter into the fryer, and a few moments later you have a fresh donut, which will then be dunked into the frostings and toppings of your choice.
My sister did not know that Dragon Donuts were my favorites. It was simply kismet that she happened to Doordash from this place.
Delighted with my birthday donuts, I wondered if one of my friends might be free to come over for a donut or two (or three) and a cup of coffee. But then (sigh) I remembered: we had COVID here!
So Tom and I, wanting to take advantage of these Dragon Donuts in their prime, took a birthday donut break then and there.

Our Dragon Donuts were sublime: ever so slightly crispy on the outside, soft on the inside, and the the icing was perfection.
Since my friend couldn't come over to my den of COVID iniquity, I sent Tom over to her house, where he left a couple of donuts and a couple of mini-bundt cakes on her front porch.
Later that afternoon another friend swung by with a card and and I sent her away with a couple of donuts and mini-bundts as well. She tongue-in-cheekily pondered whether it was right that she brought me a birthday card then came back with a present. "It's karma," I replied.
But, in truth, having friends and family to share my birthday cakes and donuts with - even if we had to be in separate pods - was the best gift I could have asked for.