In which I wish myself a belated happy birthday...

I am way behind in posting. The Mentos massacre at Maker Faire was the coup de grace for my pain levels, and I couldn't deal with sitting at the computer to edit (thousands of) photos or type entries (which is probably a good thing, because they would have been even more curmudgeonly than usual had I managed it...) So given my gimpyness, my birthday went by with little fanfare, which is how I like it now that I am ancient (or at least feel that way). We did spend the weekend down by the river, which is about my favorite place in the world. It was cool and quiet, and we enjoyed the local critters and the peaceful panorama. Mother Nature gave me a wonderful gift: a great blue heron flew right by us and perched nearby. We got to watch him fishing near the pier. And he seemed like a polite and dignified birthday guest. My sweet quirky kid made me paper polyhedrons and a birthday card with a mama and baby triceratops (my favorite dinosaur) on it, and then drew me a picture of microorganisms on the back. I have to post the video of him talking about these gifts. I will as soon as I can persuade my computer to convert it to a readable file format. But for now, here are some photos from down by the river...