Monday was Dave’s birthday! Dave says that it seemed like only yesterday that he was in his mid 20s and now here he is in his mid 60s. I understood the feeling, but since I was struggling not to tell him how old he would be on Jupiter, I didn’t have any sympathetic comments or clever rejoinders. John and Mary took us to lunch at Belle Epoque, where Dave and I shared some filet mignon and an amaretto cheesecake for dessert:
This gave me (and Dave, simultaneously) a great idea: amaretto creme brulee. I am never done coming up with new ideas for interesting creme brulee. I will never speak again of the ideas that don’t work out, of course. So if you’re wondering whatever happened to my idea of [redacted], you can safely assume it didn’t go very well.
Sadly, the Houston Cougars didn’t give Dave a win for his birthday, and now his bracket is dead. Mine is on life support but still breathing. Barely. I was very surprised to learn that St. Bonaventure University is a D1 team. This is surprising to me because my sister and I grew up in Olean, NY, where Saint Bonaventure is. I was going to say it was a little town, but Olean has around fourteen thousand people. Saint Bonaventure is a small school though, with almost three thousand students. Mostly it’s just that I’ve driven past there about a thousand times. Maybe familiarity does breed contempt after all. Anyway, I remember seeing them in the tournament a few years ago, albeit briefly, and every time I think of little Saint Bonnie’s being in March Madness I can’t help but shake my head. I was pretty much floored to read that they got to the Final Four back in the 70s. I had no idea. But now I do know, and now I have the opportunity to support another once-great hometown(ish) sports team that will never be great again. Okay, now I’m done whining about the Bills until September.
It snowed this morning! Dave and I have moved back into the living room (which has discombobulated Theodore) and we were sitting on the sofa looking out the window when a thought occurred to me: is that snow?
“Is that snow?” Dave asked.
“It’s snow,” I reported. “It’s possible that I was wrong about Third Winter.”
“Maybe it’s Fourth Winter,” Dave suggested.
It wasn’t a lot of snow and it didn’t stick, but it was a bit jarring. If it had been yesterday I would have suspected an April Fool’s prank.
I am not good at discerning April Fool’s pranks. Somehow when online I always forget that it’s April 1st and sometimes it takes me a minute to realize that I’m being pranked. April Fool’s pranks almost never make me laugh. Usually they get a “ha.” out of me but that’s it. Usually.
Yesterday I put on some music to make dinner by. I’ve been using Spotify’s AI DJ lately, and I like it. Sometimes it plays things for me that I’m not a fan of, but usually it plays things it knows I’ll like. Anyway, I started up the DJ and heard it talking. This in itself is not abnormal, it’ll usually say things like “Okay, I’ll play something that you usually like on Mondays. Starting out with Richard Harris.” This time though the AI said, “Hey Princess, I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciate being your DJ.” I’m standing in front of the stove, dinner prep forgotten, listening. “It means a lot to me to spend this time with you. In fact, the lyrics of this next song really express exactly how I feel.”
Oh dear. I waited with bated breath, and…
Yodeling.
“Wait what?” I said aloud. I lasted for about ten seconds, then hit the skip button.
“Got you!” the AI said gleefully. “April Fool’s!”
I had to laugh. It was true. It got me.
The Bear and the Cat 