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Less than an hour left
Dec. 13th, 2021 08:21 pmIn just 24 hours and 45 minutes, or so, I will no longer be 71 years old. My birth certificate says I was born at 10:54 pm EST on December 14, 1949 in Detroit. The clocks here are CST, so as of 9:54 pm tomorrow, I'll be 72. (And still getting asked for my birthdate when I buy wine at Walmart, for what that's worth. Not much, I suspect.)
I don't make a big deal out of birthdays any more. Well, I never did, actually. Even the big 21, which was a huge deal on my college campus when I was an undergraduate, became a nothing. That's because the state changed the legal drinking age to 18 when I was 20. So all the perks that my peers got at 21 (like 21 free silver dollar pancakes at IHOP for instance) I missed out on. No big deal, actually.
Age 65 might have been big because I could retire and claim my pension benefits then, but Congress messed that one up by changing the "full retirement" age to 66 at right about that time. I retired at 65-1/2 anyway. The difference in social security benefits was very small. I couldn't retire at 65 for a more important reason. Illinois did not officially allow my partner and I to be legally married until we were both 64. We took advantage of that immediately, having been together for 32 years already. However, my private pension funds required that we be legally married for a full year before they would recognize our marriage and that was important for inheritance reasons should I die first. So I waited until that was settled. Red tape is so much fun.
Anyway, I remain in reasonably good health and have no intention of kicking the proverbial bucket any time soon. As for buying the farm, we already did that way back in 1998. So here we are.
BTW, husband is baking a birthday cake right now and we expect to share it with friends tomorrow. It's one of his famous recipes, a double chocolate bundt cake with Guinness in both the cake itself AND the chocolate glaze. I'm not a real serious chocolate fan, but this one is definitely good.
I don't make a big deal out of birthdays any more. Well, I never did, actually. Even the big 21, which was a huge deal on my college campus when I was an undergraduate, became a nothing. That's because the state changed the legal drinking age to 18 when I was 20. So all the perks that my peers got at 21 (like 21 free silver dollar pancakes at IHOP for instance) I missed out on. No big deal, actually.
Age 65 might have been big because I could retire and claim my pension benefits then, but Congress messed that one up by changing the "full retirement" age to 66 at right about that time. I retired at 65-1/2 anyway. The difference in social security benefits was very small. I couldn't retire at 65 for a more important reason. Illinois did not officially allow my partner and I to be legally married until we were both 64. We took advantage of that immediately, having been together for 32 years already. However, my private pension funds required that we be legally married for a full year before they would recognize our marriage and that was important for inheritance reasons should I die first. So I waited until that was settled. Red tape is so much fun.
Anyway, I remain in reasonably good health and have no intention of kicking the proverbial bucket any time soon. As for buying the farm, we already did that way back in 1998. So here we are.
BTW, husband is baking a birthday cake right now and we expect to share it with friends tomorrow. It's one of his famous recipes, a double chocolate bundt cake with Guinness in both the cake itself AND the chocolate glaze. I'm not a real serious chocolate fan, but this one is definitely good.
It's an artist's horse "manikin" (or should that be "ponikin"?) Made of polished wood with all the right adjustable joints, a flexible neck and graceful tail, it can be posed appropriately for practice drawing. I just think it's a really cool piece of art in itself. I also received a tiny plush horsie and a book on drawing horses with some art supplies and a sketchpad.
