61

I was born in 1961 -- and my 61st birthday is today. (Shouldn't I get some kind of award or special present for that??)  

I ventured out of the house/condo unit this morning for the first time since we returned from Christmas vacation on Jan. 3rd, for the best of reasons -- to go see Little Great-Nephew at his grandmother's house/SIL's!  There is no one else I'd rather share my birthday with. SIL told us she still isn't feeling 100%, although she's better than she has been. I thought she'd fully recovered and I wish I'd known that before we went into the house. Oh well, what's done is done. She tested negative, but that was just one rapid test, taken a week ago Monday. It's possible she might have tested positive if she'd done another test a day or two later. She reeled off a long list of family members (hers & BIL/dh's) who tested positive/were sick over the holidays, between Christmas & New Year's. It might be easier listing who *didn't* get sick (and I suspect more people may have been sick but just aren't talking/posting on social media about it). Yikes!! 

As for LGN, he still has the odd cough (his doctor told his parents that if they both had covid and he wasn't well, he probably had it too), but he is back to his old self and was delighted to see us, which was a huge ego boost for us, of course! I even got to take a few selfies with him, as he mugged for the camera. I texted a few to his mom and said, "You've taught him well!"  lol  

This is my second pandemic birthday. In normal/"before" times, a birthday would probably entail, at minimum, a visit to the bookstore and dinner out (often at the Keg, a local steakhouse chain). In my dreams, I'm on a tropical beach somewhere, instead of chilly, grey southern Ontario.  

Instead, I'm downloading a couple of new titles to my Kobo e-reader (including Carl Bernstein's new memoir). Dh picked up a couple of cupcakes for dessert, on our way back from SIL's, and we're ordering our favourite takeout pizza for dinner. We got several bottles of wine as Christmas gifts and may pop one of those open too ;)  I'm still trying to watch what I eat (because gallstones), but I used the "all things in moderation" approach while we were visiting my parents, and for the most part, that worked.  

As we've been doing for almost two full years now (hey, as we've been doing for 20+ years now, since loss, infertility and permanent childlessness entered our lives...!), we're just muddling along and trying to make the best of things. And as my grandma used to say about aging (and as I've written here before) -- it sure beats the alternative.  ;)