I decided not to throw myself a full birthday party this year. With everything I’ve been doing, I just felt like chilling this weekend and watching the football playoffs rather than putting in the effort to host a party. (Maybe when it gets warmer I’ll throw a “just for the heck of it” party.)
However, since my birthday fell on Wednesday this year, last night a bunch of us gathered at Subrata and Susan’s house for gaming night, and Debbi went by the Prolific Oven and picked up a couple of my favorite cakes, as well as ice cream. Chad’s wife Camille brought some homemade ice cream as well. Ten people showed up and we polished off most of the cake.
I bought a copy of Blokus a week ago, having enjoyed playing it on New Year’s, and I brought that along and we played a round before cake. Despite having not played it before, Chad ended up running away with the game, making some excellent blocking moves. (I came in third, not being helped by the fact that the other three players all seemed to make blocking me out a priority. I do well at seeing available moves, but I don’t have the blocking part of the game down.)
After cake we played a game of Union Pacific, which I often term “The best game I own that Subrata doesn’t also own.” I somehow managed to pick up the majority stake in the Union Pacific “super-railroad”, which ended up being enough to claim overall victory despite Chad making a late run and nearly catching me. The final scoring-round card ended up being on the very bottom of the deck, probably making this the longest UP game we’ve played. Nonetheless it’s still a nifty game in that it only took 2 hours for us to finish (maybe less).
Susan also gave me a birthday present: A print of a painting in a series by Sarah Clemens, who is doing a series (and writing a book) about a couple raising a cat and a dragon together. (Specifically, they gave me a copy of Shaking Hands. They have a copy of Joyride themselves.) I’ll have to frame it and put it up.
This was just the sort of birthday party I wanted this year, something low-key and simple with my friends. I’ve thanked Debbi repeatedly for putting it together. I really appreciated it.