Happy Birthday, Hunny!

The big Four Six. He wasn't crazy that I reminded him that it's really the ACCOMPLISHMENT of 46 that he's celebrating. He upped the ante by reminding me that you're in the womb for almost a year before that, so it's really more like 47. Ug. Good thing I'm still only 29.

An occasion such as this merited a multi-day trip up north to visit his until-quite-recently-estranged brother and sister in law at their B & B slash vineyard slash winery. We were greeted with warm welcome and homecoming, fed like kings, wined with their fanciest reserves, and treated to a day trip where we stopped to admire a pair of bald eagles as they fished the Kings river. The blossoms on the fruit and nut trees in the central valley bloomed in competition with the abundant wildflowers. Of my 42, er, 29 years of living here in California, I've never seen such a show. We drove home leisurely along back roads stopping at cheese factories, nut houses, another place where we bought some hot-sauce from hell and a really cool birdhouse, and the Tehachipi Loop where we admired one of the 7 marvels of the engineering world (but missed the train by about 5 minutes).

Returning from this trip brought us only to Satuday, and we still had Sunday off. So we mowed, grocery shopped, tidied up and called a few of his best buddies to come over and join us for barbeque, beers, bonfire and banter to help ring in year number 46.

So I planned to make a special birthday dinner for him to come home to tonite and asked what he wanted. His answer? Griller cheesers. God I love this man!

Happy Birthday, Paul!