Celina's birthday and a lost cell phone

Happy Belated Birthday, Celina! Hope you had a splendiferous day on Monday!

I know: we are bad, bad friends. Our card will be late once again. I had written down the date as the 22nd, yet somehow my faulty memory convinced me I was aiming for the 26th.

My excuse is really quite simple: I am aging rapidly.

As an example, today I lost our cell phone. I carried it with me, tucked safely in my purse all day. I always ensure the ring tone is muted, because I do not want to receive glares such as the ones I dole out to students whose cell phones play Human League's "Don't You Want Me, Baby?" halfway through a lecture. I'm kidding. They're more likely to have "You Spin Me Round" (The Chipmunks version) or the voice of Stewie from Family Guy.

After work, James agreed to meet me at the Quizno's at Fallowfield for takeout. At home, I couldn't for the life of me figure out what had happened to the phone. I remembered checking it for the correct time at about 6:30pm, before entering the resto. I couldn't find it in my coat pockets, my purse, the canvas bag containing my dress shoes, or my backpack. I even called to Quizno's to ask them to check the counters, but not a phone was in sight. Fearing that some hoodlum might have picked it up, downloaded Lady Gaga's "Paparazzi" as the new ringtone, and text-messaged each of his 563 Facebook friends, I called Telus to suspend services.

I was feeling low. I mean, I generally do not lose things. I try to return items to the exact same location I took them from and kinda give heck to those who don't. It was all the same to James: our contract was up, so he was meaning to pick out a new handset anyway.

Less than an hour after I spoke with Erika at the call centre, James discovered the cell on the dresser in our room. Ooops.

I recall reading articles (I just don't recall where, exactly) that suggest one should regularly do puzzles like crosswords to exercise the leetle grey cells. I'm already scrambling to do a Sudoku a day; guess I'll have to up it to two.

Maybe our new phone will come with a Sudoku app. Maybe I should look for one that comes with a birthday reminder app, too.

don't kiss me: i'm not Irish

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

'twas a gorgeous day out here, perfect for all the leprechauns to ditch work and part with their pots of gold while acquiring pots of ale.

Ontario primary and secondary school kids are on Spring Break this week: a good time to steer clear of the malls. I didn't take my own advice. The afternoon class I usually work was cancelled today, so I strolled over to the ByWard Market and down Sparks Street via Rideau Centre, noting that at least 90% of the population had donned their greenery for today. All the Irish pubs (and even the non-Irish ones) were overflowing with patrons on patios. Personally, I figured it was a little premature for the flipflops, shorts, and miniskirt/thigh-high boots/white legs sans pantyhose combos; on second thought, remembering last summer...

With so many residents claiming Irish ancestry, it's surprising that St. Paddy's isn't a municipal holiday. They might as well make it one: employees were bailing early this afternoon, and my guess is a number of people will be calling in sick tomorrow.

Who wouldn't want a holiday honoring a man who piped the rats out of Ireland, then celebrated by buying rounds of green Guinness, Starbucks green tea lattes, and shamrock shakes (grimace) for his friends, eh?

In parting, let me share a choice expression from this site: "May the Lord keep you in his hand / and never close his fist too tight."