MUCH ADO ABOUT AGING !

I should say we take a lot of fuzz in celebrating our birthdays. And last saturday's N's birthday party was not an exception. For one week, we cleaned the house - top to bottom. And on the day itself, we hired a professional cleaner to make sure everything noticeable is dirt and dust free. For one week - I found time to go get more groceries, re-arrange and tidy up rooms, and marinated stuff for the barbeque (thanks to Isay and Grace who gave me instant tips on how to prepare BBQ pinoy style). And of course made sure we invited friends and family. I bought the birthday cake from Myers (mind you, it was a Baci Cake), which I should not have placed overnight on the fridge to stop this from turning into a stiffy hard mud cake as it was on the night itself. Luckily, I also ordered a couple of Brazo de mercedes from a friend who bakes really beautiful birthday cakes - to compesate this fiasco. There was no remarkable or unifying theme for the party though we tried to invite people to come in their best 70's attire. I guess there were only four or five who came in 70'ish costume, although most of our guests were born before 70's. I also tried to build a nice table with blue theme (can u imagine) - so I got all these blue or bluish materials like candles, blue stones, blue napkins, and even blue irish flowers on the table. Crazy me. Guests : Around 25 people Drinks : Tropical Punch, the usual beer, white and red wine Foodwise : Springrolls (Thai, Fil), pansit bihon (w sundried tomato), friend rice Barbeque pork and chicken, kebab, Fruit bowl salad, spring vegetable salad, Buko salad Some friends brought some food as well - - springrolls, fish-kinilaw, menudo, cakes. Overall I would say, it was a good party (you could never have a perfect party in our present condition) - a good mix (gay couples & straight couples, singles, Fil, Viet, Malaysian, German, Anglo, Scot) - came and enjoyed the karaoke afterwards. Lowdowns - it is hard to hold a big party in our house because we do not have a big entertainment area - where everyone should just congregate. We have a very small kitchen, small dining, a relatively big lounge room but located on the second floor far from the kitchen, a small garden barbeque area. And these areas are divided from each other with long narrow hallways. Imagine the constant running up and down the whole house to make sure people are fed and had their drinks filled! That's why I hate unrenovated old Victorian houses - they are not entertaiment friendly! We have not thought about this when we bought the house. Anywayz, we know now what we want in our next house - just plain and simple open plan living with modern gadgets to make life easy ! And parking in our area was horrible especially that it was the final match of the year's footie season! Reason enough for other invitees not turning up. So the party is over and done with - looking forward for next year's. Whew! Most important thing was that - we celebrated the event and the celebrant was quite happy, as you can see !!!