#MicroblogMondays: Birthday odds & ends

• Yesterday was my birthday.  (I turned -- big gulp -- 59!)  The weather called for heavy rain turning to freezing rain &/or snow over Saturday night/Sunday, and the restaurant I wanted to eat at isn't open Sundays (private parties only), so we went out for a birthday dinner on Saturday night. 
• I had a huge plate of pasta (with oil, garlic, rapini & parmesan) & brought almost half of it home with me. (Saved room for a gigantic slice of tiramisu, which I shared with dh.) I'll be having the rest for dinner tonight! 
• We wound up sitting next to an older woman & younger woman and couldn't help overhearing their conversation with the waitress...!  The older woman was the younger woman's future mother-in-law (!);  her son (the groom) was on his bachelor party weekend in Niagara Falls. The bride-to-be looked pretty young, but she already has THREE children, and is pregnant with a FOURTH.  Her MIL-to-be was praising her to the waitress and saying what a good mom she is. All I could think was, "I have to listen to this on my birthday??"  Oh well....
• Sunday afternoon, we went to see the movie "1917." Not as gory as you might expect, but VERY intense. Beautifully, beautifully filmed (visually stunning) and acted. It won some Golden Globes and has been (deservedly) nominated for 10 Oscars.  
• I said to dh, "Next year, the beach!"  Seems like I am always saying that -- but next year I am going to try to make that happen. ;)  Having an early/mid-January birthday sucks sometimes, because it is so overshadowed by Christmas. (Also, my mother's birthday is also in early January, about a week before mine.)  It's like November through December is all about Christmas -- and then Christmas ends & suddenly it's January and, oh yeah, it's my birthday, and there's no time left (not always the money either...!) to plan anything too out of the ordinary. (Plus anytime I do try to do something, it seems like the weather doesn't co-operate...!) 
• I didn't realize it at the time I hit "publish," but my "Holiday reading" post was post #1600 on this blog!  That's a lot of posting, even when spread out over 12 years!  (On average, 133 posts per year! -- not bad!) 
• Last March, I posted that I'd heard that a "Mad About You" sequel was in the works. The reboot finally showed up on Canadian TV (CTV's Comedy Channel) last week (the first two episodes, back to back), after showing on Spectrum Originals in the U.S. last fall. 
• I was a big fan of the original show, which ran from 1992 to 1999, and wrote about it and the parallels to my own life in this 2011 post. 
• In this latest version, baby Mabel is all grown up and off to college and living in a dorm -- specifically at NYU, a few blocks away from home.  Nevertheless, her parents -- and Jamie especially -- are suffering a lot of angst over their empty nest.   
• I had mixed feelings. It was fun to see the old characters and listen to the witty banter and drool over their lovely apartment again.  I did laugh at some of the aging jokes... I could relate!  But the helicopter parenting/empty nest stuff? -- not so much. I hear enough of that in real life!  
• On a slightly related note, I saw on Facebook that a reboot/sequel to "thirtysomething" is now in the works. "thirtysomething" ran from 1987 to 1991. I was a fairly recent newlywed then, in my mid-20s/turning 30 myself, with hopes of someday having a little girl as adorable as Hope & Michael's baby Janie.  
• No doubt I will be watching...! But seriously, though -- has Hollywood run completely out of original programming ideas??  Sometimes it seems that way...

You can find more of this week's #MicroblogMondays posts here.