The ships or their passing, the fog or its drifting

[sovay]

Aside from the rather significant action of voting, yesterday was chiefly marked by a supermassive headache, which is why it is much nicer that today was chiefly marked by celebrating my birthday with the rest of my family. First thing, I raked a giant pile of dead leaves in my parents' side yard so that my niece could run and jump into it with a cry of "CHAAARGE!" and then paddle around as if in a crunchy maple-curling wading pool. After that, my brother cooked steaks for dinner and my father made them a sauce with shallots and brandy and for dessert my mother had baked an almond-flour cake with mandarin oranges and whipped cream and candy corn and pumpkins, the latter of which I was completely not expecting. I am now in possession of paperback copies of Forrest Reid's Denis Bracknel (1947), Rodney Garland's The Heart in Exile (1953), Barbara Hambly's Dead and Buried (2010)—for which I had been unsuccessfully scouring used book stores for four years straight—and a CD of Anna & Elizabeth's The Invisible Comes to Us (2018). Also a fabulous red-and-gold-and-black dragon T-shirt that my niece heroically did not steal. She was scrupulous about making sure that I took home my birthday balloon—she clipped it carefully to my computer bag. sholio has written me wonderful autumnal, everybody gets rained on Torchwood team fic for my birthday: "Stormwrack." As for National Coming Out Day, if people have not noticed by now that I'm queer, I don't know what else I could do, put it on my business cards? I'd have to get business cards. My brother took a picture of me with the cake.



It has been, actually, a really nice birthday weekend.

Comments

[davidgillon]

Must admit I looked at the pic, and as soon as the cake scrolled into view I went "Oooh!"

And now I want cake.

[nineweaving]

What a splendid birthday! What a glorious cake! You are very much loved.

Nine

[selkie]

Someday you will have to explain the leaf thing.

Look at that CAKE! It’s absolutely 1976-ly unironically glorious and celebratory and festooned with MELLOCREME PUMPKINS!

Birthday-weekend love.

[wpadmirer]

I'm sorry you had a headache on your birthday. It sounds like it was good anyway.

[sartorias]

Very glad you had an excellent birthday weekend!

I was thinking this morning how grateful I am that there can even be a thing like National Coming Out Day. It seemed so impossible when I was a kid--back when one had to heavily code one's writing, and even then, for years and years there was that awful sense of "They will never publish this."

[sara]

As for National Coming Out Day, if people have not noticed by now that I'm queer, I don't know what else I could do, put it on my business cards?

Kind of how I've felt about it for a while now. I mean, that doesn't mean that people always connect the dots, but at this point I don't know that I feel like that's on me to address.

[gwynnega]

That cake is magnificent. What a lovely birthday celebration and gifts!

I was just reminiscing with my mom about how I used to jump in piles of ginkgo leaves when I was little.

[sorcyress]

I mean, my friend Maia is a professional lesbian, and has the business cards to prove it, so making "YO I'M QUEER" business cards is not actually as unreasonable as you may think ;)

[pameladean]

It is SO NICE to see you and your cake. Your theory expressed above that your niece had a hand in the decoration makes a lot of sense. It's glorious, however collaborative or not it is. I'm sure it was really tasty, too.

P.

[thawrecka]

Happy birthday weekend! That really is a marvellous looking cake.

[thisbluespirit]

Aw, I'm glad! ♥

[cmcmck]

You do have a lovely smile you know! :o)

[sandrylene]

Fantastic! I'm glad your birthday weekend was enjoyable. The cake does indeed look excellent. :)

[pengwern]

what a beautifully autumnal cake！ ( ´▽` )ﾉ

[oracne]

Happy Birthday!

Woo, DEAD AND BURIED!

[starlady]

Slightly belated, but happy birthday!

[asakiyume]

Woman with Beautiful Cake--I like this photo!

Jumping in huge piles of leaves is the number one pleasure of autumn from my childhood. Hurray for the giant leaf pile!

[aurumcalendula]

I'm glad you had a good birthday weekend! That's a lovely photo! (and the cake looks really good)

[ashlyme]

Cake and leaves are Excellent Things, and it's good to see you happy. *hugs*

*if people have not noticed by now that I'm queer, I don't know what else I could do, put it on my business cards?*

Yeah. I took the line of "well, there are screaming queens; I'm the mumuring bisexual."