humble birthday bash
Yesterday was Paul’s birthday. I didn’t have a gift or card — and spending money on anything extraneous is really out of the question now that I am officially living off my unemployment benefits: $405/week. But I figured I could find an inexpensive box of chocolates at the Butcher Block, my local Irish grocery store. I needed to head down there anyway, having eaten through all the Taytos during my insomnial episode earlier this week. The trip paid off: the stock boy was swapping out the boxed chocolates regularly featured in the front of the store near the cash registers with the incoming Easter chocolates. The BB always has great deals when they want to move inventory and I was able to pick up two Cadbury Flake “Moments” for $5 — they normally retail for $9/each.
Birthday dinner consisted of lasagne and a home-made apple pie (well, the pie-crust was left-over from the bag of frozen crusts I bought last week. I didn’t mind the frozen crust as much with the apple pie as I did when I used one for the spinach quiche). I splurged and bought a quart of vanilla ice cream to go with the pie and we did have a lovely birthday dinner. Also celebrating R Jr’s acceptance to Queens University of Charlotte. I asked him how he felt about maybe going there, but he says he can’t really say until he sees the schools in Rome.
It turns out that R Jr. will be spending a full two weeks in Rome. His school planned a last-minute, one-week exchange with a Roman high school that falls the week after our trip. Originally, we were planning on having him join us in Ireland on our way back to the U.S., but now we’ll just extend the apartment rental so that he and his sister can have a mini Roman holiday before his classmates arrive.
