Dessert Shrapnel

Birthday number 33 is in the can. The otherwise normal Tuesday was brightened by kind greetings that came in via text message, phone, email and Facebook comments. Even as an adult person with a job and responsibilities, I still carry a hint of that little kid excitement all day when it's my birthday and people are making a fuss.

Noticeably unfussy were the people at work. The department's admin assistant is usually good about getting a card and passing it around for signatures, but I've only been at this job six weeks ... so perhaps I just didn't make it on the calendar. Or perhaps like insurance and vacation time, birthday recognition is a fringe benefit accrued over time.

The day was capped over drinks with Brooke (the girlfriend) and some friends, Andrew and Melissa. Brooke made me a hat that said "Birthday Crab," a name I self-applied following a difficult morning. Afterwards, the four of us dined outside on this evening which can only be described as a perfect climate vacuum: no heat, no cool, no breeze. Like Goldilocks sampling ursine oatmeal, it was just right.

There was one distraction from the perfect evening when a well-to-do (and probably well-liquored) older man on the sidewalk got into a heated shouting match with a woman who was panhandling. He accused her of blocking his path and berated her for bothering people near the building where he owned a condo unit. I think most of our fellow diners were rooting for the old guy until he loudly announced "You don't belong here!" which, considering the fact he was white and she wasn't, put an uncomfortably fine point on the encounter. Especially for our friend at the table Andrew, a black guy from London.

Just as the drama was subsiding, the waitress asked "Is there anything else I can get you?" and Andrew replied "A word with that guy if you don't mind."