h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I want to wish you a happy birthday and many good years ahead! and good fortune!

Thank you everyone.

My family threw me a surprise party!

Here's a synopsis:

The plans for my 60th birthday - which I thought was going to be low-key with Ian and a special couple owing to the family wedding the weekend prior - seemed to be progressing nicely with some odd behaviour I had noticed, but passed off as not really commentable (my best friend Lynda using a mobile phone???) but suffice to say when we arrived at the venue and I pushed open the door, the huge "SURPRISE!!!" that was shouted almost knocked me sideways. I saw the cameras flash but it still didn't register that everyone was there for me, travellers from Manchester, Sheffield and Nottingham, I was very touched that people would bother and I was very moved. My family means the world to me and I forgive them all for the fibs I was told!!! It's so rare when there's a big gathering, to have two on consecutive weekends was awesome. As well as Mum being there - there was 2 of my siblings (Yvonne & Keith - Robert was cheering on the Mariners), 3 of my children (Laura, Helen and Allan), daughter-in-law and (adopted) daughter Rachel, plus all 3 of my grandsons Harrison, Jaxon and Liam with his lovely girlfriend Hannah. Along with my 3 lovely nieces, all the partners and 2 of my best friends with their husbands, the room was full, there must have been about 30 people there. I raised my glass and said thank you and toasted absent friends. We all sat down for a lush starter (I had prawn cocktail) then a Sunday roast (I had the roast beef) nom nom! :P Afters was cup cakes with constellation art on the icing (I was able to identify them to the amusement of those gathered around) and I was still opening gifts when the waitresses were clearing tables! I have a bucketfull of memories and a heart full of love for all the effort that was put in to make my landmark birthday special, I already felt blessed with my awesome family and friends anyway and I never expected anything like this. I love all the gifts and cards, it would be unfair to single out individual things but a lot of effort had gone into some of the choices and I appreciate that very much, I will treasure them. I am so sorry that Ian's daughter Caroline put in so much effort but was unable to attend although being in Egypt was a great excuse!

Cool old Guy under a bowl of
"Happy to hear you are so happy with the present party.

I can imagine you studying the cake constellations "

that's brilliant - I was rather hoping that they'd do something like that and they didn't let me down!

That sounded like an AWESOME party, Galaxy Babe! Glad you enjoyed yourself. I especially like the constellation cupcakes.

That was a lovely surprise.

Obviously a lot of thought went into it, especially the cupcake design. How much could your Mum follow and enjoy what was going on?

The best thing about constellation cakes is that you get 88 of them

Not including former constellations

But they would probably be stale by now anyway

That's what they call the Big Crunch.

There wasn't all 88, only about 3 dozen.

Mum watched everything and said the next day that there were people coming up to her and saying hello Grandma and she thought to herself "Who the hell are you?" and laughed... I'm glad she didn't say thatit would have been my older brother's two daughters who haven't visited her in a long while, and they brought their partners whom she'd never met before.

Mum wasn't let in on the secret in case she forgot it was a secret and started talking to me about it in advance. The first she knew was when Yvonne picked her up on the Sunday.

Wow, this was a really secret operation---like distracting the Germans from the exact landing point of the invasion. You know some fairly wily people there, are you sure they aren't in MI5 or MI6?

Wow!

"My family threw me a surprise party"

ok! so who cleaned up all the s s s chucked about, the place must be a mess

one bloody great memory eh GB