Friday Cannon Fodder: birthdays

Good morning TSF! I have fully snapped the wristband on yesterday’s match. Flushed it down the drain. Memory-holed it. As I wrote, Arsenal fell victim to a bad call on the penalty kick and things spiraled out of control from there. The only real takeaways are experience gained on big matches and hostile atmospheres and probably a bit of a lesson / teachable moment on what not to do when things start to snowball against you.

Also helping me move beyond the match is that today is my birthday! We’re big on birthdays in my family, not in terms of making them into a massive production, just that we make it a point that the birthday person has a great day. I’m looking forward to a relaxing one, a nice long workout, a pepperoni pizza and some beer, some playoff hockey, and maybe a video game or two. I’m a simple man.

We don’t have any strange birthday traditions, but my family does make a point of ensuring the birthday person has balloons. Because if there weren’t balloons, was there even a party?

And speaking of parties, I had some great ones growing up. Laser tag, mini-golf and roller-skating, sleepovers, your typical stuff. I don’t remember anything particularly wild happening, but my parties are all happy memories.

What about you — any family birthday traditions? Any special birthday memories — either from when you were a kid or from one of those big, round number ones as an adult?