Journeyed out to my folks house on Sunday night for the Super Bowl and birthday dinner for myself. My elder sister has been living there basically sitting shiva for her former life in NYC. She's been there since the first of November and is still waiting for a miracle to be delivered unto her, which in this economy ain't happening. So, she has been delving into a project here or there, turns out my birthday dinner has been one. I wish I knew what to do, but when the three of them decided that none of us need cake, my inner 12 year old wanted to yell, "But I would like some." Instead, I shut up and ate my strawberries and watched Pete Townshend at halftime.

At work, they've had a tradition of birthday lunches which forever getting tweaked and people were peeved that I was the only February birthday and there were four in June. This discussion happened last thursday and it made me dread monday as we sat in Kostas with at least three out of the nine people muttering about the birthday stuff and two guys who said the hell with it. My colonoscopy was more entertaining. One of my great colleagues made cake so I blotted out the idiocy for a few. Things picked up when I made it to my former house for a really nice dinner with my kids and their mom. We were able to laugh a lot. Told my boss that given how people are behaving, I'm taking the day off next year to avoid the b.s. If I wanted a stress laden day, I can always go to my folks house.

One of my dad's contacts at Roswell gave him seats for Tuesday night's Sabres game, which was fun. We repaired to Fat Bob's for a quick dinner before and spent most of the time vented about the shadow that my sister is casting over their house.

Went to my church board meeting and got yelled at by a factually challenged old codger, so that was fun.

Went out a little bit ago to run errands for an event we have tonight and on the way to my second stop, the car in front of me has its reverse lights on and the driver is lost in conversation. We're close enough to my Tops stop on Maple so I snuck in the driveway, just as the light changed and she barrels into the guy who was behind me. I picked up my stuff rather shakily and check to make sure that guy isn't looking for me and head back down Transit, where I get into the traffic jam caused by the 3407 walkers. It was worth the 75 cents on the thruway to get back into the city where it is safe.

Got tickets for the suites for tomorrow nights Sabres game. Beer should flow, especially on their tab. Guess I no longer sound like a grumpy old man, since I'm now closer to being one.