B
by Saskia
Birthday bonanza
Who knew that turning 31 would be so much fun? I had zero expectations for this birthday – it’s a prime number, which I dislike, and it’s in the middle of the working week at the end of a very long month budget-wise (I do miss getting paid on the 25th of the month!) and really, whoopdee-bloody-doo, whatever. But then my friends at home proved themselves to be the best and nicest friends ever, getting together to send me a huge padded envelope stuffed with cards and little gifts from each of them. Such a lovely surprise!
I walked into the office on my birthday with no expectations other than the usual card that had done the rounds and going out for lunch with Team Sub. But then I noticed that there was a mini bottle of bubbly on my desk along with some champagne truffles from my “line manager”, and when I turned around another colleague was marching towards me with a carrot cake that she had baked herself (and she doesn’t usually bake and doesn’t even like carrot cake, but knew it was my favourite). The whole day was full of great things to eat and drink and nice surprises, not just limited to the special birthday dinner I’d requested.
And today the festivities continued when my mates trekked to London to go to the Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition at the NHM with us, followed by a proper Sunday roast at the pub near us. Really glad we booked our tickets online, though, as the queue to get into the museum was massive, but the online ticket meant we could skip it and go straight to the exhibition. It was a really good exhibition, as usual – strong focus on the Arctic this year. And as always my favourite photo wasn’t available in magnet form. These museum shops continue to thwart my magnet collecting! Despite the magnet situation it was a really good day, chatted a lot of nonsense and laughed a lot, the way you only can do with people you’ve known for years.
Anyway, moral of the story is that my friends back home and here are all pretty damn fabulous and that they’ve made this year start off on a really high note (does that work in English?).
Happy (late) birthday! Am very jealous of your carrot cake, it looks delicious. Also, thanks for the heads up about booking for the Wildlife Photographer exhibition, I really want to see that but I hate queueing for tickets.
Thanks very much! It was a brilliant cake, even the carrot-cake-haters amongst us enjoyed it. There wasn’t actually a queue inside the NHM for tickets, so I think if you avoid the main entrance you’ll be all right. But I did enjoy brandishing my online ticket and being waved past the mahoosive queue outside the entrance like I’m some kind of VIP.