My brother's 52nd birthday was today. Somewhat anticlimactic after yesterday's web conversation for Dad's 75th birthday. It must have been hard having a birthday next to another birthday in the family. My nieces share a birthday because they are twins, and their day is equally celebrated but on the same day. When a family member's birthday is the day before or the day after, however, I wonder if some of the enthusiasm wanes due to the back-to-back nature of the event.

A relatively uneventful day at work today, I thought I would come home and relax a bit...maybe even go shopping since there are a more than a few things on the list underneath a refrigerator magnet. I do not enjoy grocery shopping right after work because the store I typically shop at (the one closest to my house) is in a shopping center complex rift with restaurants, coffee shops, banks, and other mall-type businesses, in the midst of an industrial area and so right after work the seemingly entire community stops there for meals or socialization or simply a quick grocery store run...which, at that time of day is never quick.

So, while I stared at the shopping list stuck there on the refrigerator, on the upper right-hand corner of that same refrigerator, where we have a perpetual calendar that we write in our monthly appointments, are two tickets to the hockey game. Tonight's hockey game. YIKES!! I almost forgot! I have tickets to the game. I am so used to not being able to go or do anything in the evening that I completely forgot that I had tickets to the Sharks game.

I am outta here!!!