It was a fun and memorable day (back on November 20th). I have some fun little stories involving Root Beer Energy drink, busting the belt on my pants, making a graphic that maps out how many days I have left in life, and climbing on my roof twenty times.
Unintentional creative acts on birthday eve
It seems every year on the day before my birthday, I end up doing some sort of art project or creative project. I don’t plan this out. It just happens. And now, I’m aware that this happens, so it makes for a sort of surreal knowing that something will happen. But trying not to force it.
This year’s creative project isn’t really an art project per se, but a new tradition. You might have seen me post this flag story on Facebook (if we aren’t connected on Facebook, send me a connection). If you have heard this story already, you can skip to the next section. I put in some nice little headers to organize things.
Why is the neighborhood flying American flags for my birthday?
Today, while walking Evelyn to school, we noticed a lot of American flags on people’s houses. Perhaps they are left over from Veterans Day?
I texted my twin brother. He thought maybe people are flying their flags in honor of Joe Biden’s birthday tomorrow. (Joe Biden’s birthday shares a birthday with my brother and me). I would be incredibly impressed if people actually knew his birthday. And people took the effort to fly a flag for him. He seems to be like a forgotten president. Sandwiched between Trump terms.
Or perhaps they know it’s Erik’s and my birthday tomorrow, so they are flying their flags for us!
If you know someone turning 50, fly your American flag
I put out my flag that day, because we turned 50, and there are 50 stars on the flag.
Now, whenever someone I know is turning 50, I will fly my American flag.
Have you ever counted the stars on your American flag to make sure there are 50?
Today, I took a photo of my flag, specifically for my post about the flag having 50 stars. I figured I’d count them. Lo and behold, the image showed just 49 (one star was hiding in a fold). Here’s the 49-star image.
My across-the-street neighbors were backing into their driveway as I was photographing it. I was standing on top of one of our garden lights, leaning back, pulling the flag with one hand, while photographing the flag with my other hand with a toy camera.
Must have been an amusing sight. I saw them and waved. They are nice retired neighbors who sit out on their front lawn sometimes. The wife is a member of the DuPage Art League, so they can appreciate weird, creative things.
Celebrating the day before your birthday
On that same day—yes, we are still on the day before my 50th birthday. Which, by the way, I love celebrating the day before a birthday. Normally, all the focus is on the birthday itself. But the day before your birthday is the last day you are that particular age. That day is a day to savor the last day. Especially when you turn another decade the following day. In my case, this would be my last day of my 40s!
When flying your American flag means something else
Ok, so later that day, I’m picking up my 1st grader from school. While we are walking home, I notice the flag in front of the school is flying at half-mast. Huh. What’s that for? I pull out my poco (I call my phone ‘poco’, short for ‘pocket computer’) and I ask what the half-mast flags are for today. It told me in honor of Dick Cheney, the former Vice President, who passed away recently.
Oh boy. Ok, well, I normally don’t get into politics here. But I’m generally a bit liberal and vote Democratic (it mostly stems to that I want to be a giving person). I don’t agree with everything the Democrats stand for. But I can’t find myself going with the stinginess of Republicans. Sorry! And back when Cheney was VP, I didn’t agree with America invading Iraq. We had no proof they had weapons of mass destruction. Yeah, Saddam Hussein was a very bad dictator. But you can’t just go invading countries. I wanted America to wait for the United Nations to weigh in first. But nope, we forged ahead. Go America (sarcasm).
Anyhow, so I don’t stand for Dick Cheney, really. And now I have my flag flying, which makes it look like I do support him. Guh. What a quandary. Do I continue to fly my flag looking like I’m some far-right household? But I want to fly my flag for my 50th birthday. Well, I stand behind my creative projects. I don’t cower away. That’s my general approach to life. Don’t be ashamed. I love this new tradition of flying a flag when someone I know turns 50 or 13. I’m sticking with it!
And besides, I’m also a fan of reaching across the aisle. Supporting all our countries’ leaders, even if we disagree with them. It’s especially hard in these times with what’s happening. But I really think we need more compromise and teamwork from both sides. So yeah, I’ll continue to fly my flag even if it looks like I’m in support of Cheney.
Setting wacky out-of-office messages
I took the day off work for my birthday. I do this every year. I suppose that doesn’t need explanation. I just like having the day off. I had no plans. Except to buy an outdoor digital antenna and install it on our house.
I set up my out-of-office. If you don’t know already, I like to make wacky out-of-office messages based on whatever the national holiday is for that day.
Since I take off on my birthday every year, I already have an out-of-office message ready. I pulled the one I used from 10 years ago in 2015.
Greetings, thank you for your email.
Happy National Peanut Butter Fudge Day! I am currently out of the office today celebrating this fine peanut holiday on Thursday, November 20, 2025. Did you know?: By law, any product labeled “peanut butter” in the United States must be at least 90 percent peanuts.
I’ll roll back into the office on Friday, November 21, 2025, likely with a stomach full of peanut butter fudge and zero regrets.
If your message needs attention before then, please contact [email protected]. They’re basically the peanut butter fudge first responders—quick, calm, and totally crumb-free.
Selfies on birthday eve and on birthday morning
I came up with another new, fun tradition.
Make the last picture you take before your birthday be a selfie with someone important to you. At 11pm, it was just one hour before my 50th birthday. I sat on the couch with my wife. With my Kodak Charmera toy camera in hand, I asked her to take a selfie with me. The last picture of me in my 40s with my wonderful wife.
Taking a selfie with the Charmera is tricky, because there’s no screen to see yourself. You just blindly point the camera at yourself and hope the picture turns out okay. Which, really, is a much more fun way to take a selfie. There’s no trying to get the right angle or prepping how you look. Just take the pic.
In the morning, when you wake up, take the first photo of yourself at your new age with another person who is important to you.
When I woke up, I asked my two daughters to take a selfie with me. That would be my first photo at age 50. My girls with me.
I like the meaning behind both images. The last photo at 49 is with my wife. Having her in this photo represents all the times we’ve gone through together. The first photo is at 50, with my children. It represents the future.
Facebook birthday wishes
Before leaving the house to buy the digital antenna at Menards, I checked the birthday wishes on my Facebook wall. I enjoy replying to every single wish. I’m not the best at always giving birthday wishes throughout the year. I usually get too wrapped up in doing some fancy post, like looking up the TV listings in the newspaper for the exact day the person was ten years old. Or making an audio recording of myself saying “Happy birthday” in another language. So then, for many people, they don’t get a birthday greeting from me. I guess I’m weird like that.
When someone takes the time to give me a birthday greeting, I make the effort to reply in kind with a comment.
One of my good friends, Tom Saaristo, made an interesting post on my wall.
That sounds fancy. I don’t know what Beaujolais Nouveau is. I looked it up, and replied to Tom:
I learned Beaujolais Nouveau is a very young red wine from the Beaujolais region in France, made from the Gamay grape. And the wine is officially released for sale on the third Thursday of November each year. THAT WOULD BE TODAY!
Let’s toast both my 50th and the arrival of the new vintage! I might have to go to the liquor store and pick up something interesting today.
That part about “pick up something interesting today”. Keep that part in mind.
Celebrating your 50th birthday at Menards
Lately, I’ve been more of a Menards guy than Home Depot. Menards has more stuff, and it’s more fun to visit.
Does Home Depot have a toy aisle? No, they do not. Although during this trip, I didn’t buy any toys. But I did buy something else unexpected.
The digital tv antenna market is a lemon market
I got the digital antenna as planned. Which by the way, digital antennas a completely wacky market. Manufacturers use this completely inaccurate method of measuring miles to gauge how strong an antenna is. Really? Miles? That doesn’t account for so many variables. Like nearby obstacles. The weather. How strong the source signal is. Miles is crap. They know it’s crap, so they use it because they don’t have to stand behind what type of antenna they are selling.
The real metric would be dBi gain. But even that can be wacky. If a manufacturer lists a dBi rating, it might be the artificially boosted dBi. If your signal reception is crap, boosting it won’t do anything. It’ll just give you more crap.
How to decide what to get? Well, generally, I’d get the largest, most giant antenna you can find. You’d think that would give you the best reception, right? Nope! We’ll get to that later.
I pick up a mid-sized outdoor antenna. The other larger ones are tempting, but I know my wife doesn’t want a giant antenna on our roof. I need our antenna to be more discreet.
Celebrating Beaujolais Nouveau Day
With the digital antenna box in hand, I’m craving a Whachamacallit bar. Halloween was three weeks ago. Whatchamacallits came up in conversation, because that is one of the few chocolate candy bars that nobody handed out. Mostly because there is no fun size for Whachamacallits. Only full size.
With all the candy in the house, and no Whachamacallits, that’s what I want now. A Whachamacallit. How often can I say Whachamacallit?
I figured Menards wouldn’t sell Whachamacallit bars because it is the kind of place that sells things in bulk. Not individual bars. But I head to the food section anyway, because I like a good mission.
Indeed, there are no Whachamacallit bars. But I did go down the drink aisle, because I was thinking of Tom’s message about Beaujolais Nouveau Day. Maybe I’ll pick up a nice exotic beverage from Menards. LOL. You heard that right. I did say “Menards” and “exotic beverage” in the same breath.
What caught my eye was Sprechers’ root beer selection. Their logo looks internationally-looking with its German eagle. I passed on the low-calorie root beer. But there was “Energy Root Beer Soda.” At first I thought, meh, I don’t need that. I just want regular root beer. But all they had was lo-cal root beer or Energy Root Beer Soda.
It is impossible for root beer to be an energy drink
I picked up the Energy Root Beer Soda to examine the packaging. This isn’t some sort of energy drink, is it? I don’t want an energy drink. My body can barely handle a cup of coffee anymore. I get severe vertigo where everything spins around, and I start puking. Yeah, for real.
The bottle doesn’t mention any crazy energy ingredients. It does say “contains caffeine”. But I figure they just say that because root beer normally doesn’t have caffeine. So who would bother putting A LOT of caffeine into root beer? It’s just root beer with a little caffeine. That’s the logical conclusion.
I pick up a four-pack with one hand, while carrying a digital antenna with the other. What a strange combination. All this on my 50th birthday.
While checking out, I was tempted to tell the cashier that today is my 50th birthday. But I wasn’t catching the vibes that the older cashier wanted to chit-chat. So I kept the secret to myself. I walked out humming the “Save Big Money at Menards” song. Workers there must get annoyed by that song. Actually, they probably just tune it out. But I bet they can’t tune it out when someone sings the song in off-key—which is what I was doing.
Later in the evening, when Sarah got home, I told her about the root beer in the fridge. And she was like, “ooook. Be careful with that. It’s an energy drink.”
And I’m like, this isn’t an energy drink. They were just being cute with the name. This can’t have a lot of caffeine. It’s root beer. I mean, really!
There’s a QR code on the bottle for more information.
It has 93 milligrams of caffeine.
Don’t worry. I didn’t get vertigo at all. But I did get the caffeine kick. More on that later.
Embracing suburban car life
Since Menards didn’t carry Whatchamacallit bars, I went to Walgreens. They just so happened to have them on sale two for $2.50. Therefore, I HAD to get two.
Whenever I go to Walgreens, I always check out their toys. In the past, I’ve scored a Hot Wheels Star Wars Landspeeder.
You never know what will be on their pegs. I didn’t get anything, but man, those handheld video games look so tempting. As a kid, we had a good collection of handheld video games. I loved those things. We played them so much.
I thought when I get home, I’m going to have to add handheld video games to my Christmas wish list.
Checking out with my two Whatchamacallit bars, I was tempted once again to tell the cashier about today being my 50th birthday. But again, I relented.
I got back to the car with two Whatchamacallit bars in hand. I planned on having one for myself. The other bar would split for my two girls.
I never eat in the car. In fact, I don’t like using the car for anything. I’ll drive it. But that’s pretty much it. Cars are not my thing. I love public transit, bicycling, and walking. I prefer going into restaurants instead of drive-thrus. I’d much rather eat inside a restaurant than eat inside my car.
But today I figured it’s my 50th. I’m gonna eat this candy bar INSIDE THE CAR. WHILE I’M DRIVING. Like, I’m some sort of wacko car-obsessed suburbanite. My goodness, what has happened to me?
Menards: the used product store
I arrive at home and immediately start installing the digital antenna. This is the type you have to assemble. Upon opening the box, it was clear that this was a returned antenna. But you have to really expect that, because everyone buys a digital antenna, tries it out, is disappointed, and then returns it. It’s the nature of the product. (ESPECIALLY WHEN THERE IS NO TRUE METRIC FOR MEASURING THE STRENGTH OF THE PRODUCT cough cough)
And… I’ve also come to find that Menards isn’t the place to buy new products. Menards is the place to buy used products. Only you don’t know they are used when you pull them off the shelf.
Last month I went to Menards to buy a jig saw. I figured I would go with the middle-range model. Not the dirt-cheap $13 model. And not the $150 model. But one that costs $50. That’s gotta be alright, right? Besides, I was really only using it for one project. I don’t need a contractor-grade jig saw. I just need something to cut up some spindles easily, and pack away nicely.
Only two boxes for the mid-range jig saw are sitting on the shelf. I pull one box and see that it’s already been opened. I take a look at the jig saw inside, and it has sawdust all over it! What the freak. Someone bought it. USED THE THING. And returned it. Really. And they didn’t even bother brushing off the sawdust. Clearly, something was wrong with this jig saw.
I put that back and pull the other box. That’s also been opened. I take the jig saw out, AND THERE IS CAT HAIR ALL OVER IT. No joke. How in the world do you get cat hair on a jig saw? Did some cat purchase the jig saw, use it, and not like it? Freak. If a cat didn’t like this jig saw, I’m certainly not going to like it.
I put that back and bought the $13 model. Can you believe there is a jig saw for $13? Yeah, it doesn’t really cut straight. But I’m kinda thinking most jig saws don’t cut straight either. It’s what a jig saw is for to cut curvey stuff. Whatever.
Oh, that was all to the point that Menards sells used stuff. So yeah, my digital antenna is used. But the antenna doesn’t really do anything mechanically. It’s just a bunch of metal.
So assemble it and give it a whirl. At least all the parts are still in the box.
Digital antenna installation
We recently canceled our cable TV. It was costing us $85 a month. Can you believe that? For something you get free over the airwaves. Each month was more than what an antenna would cost. It blows my mind.
But these antennas. They are so fickle with how you position them.
Now, everyone probably knows you need to point your antenna in the direction of where the TV station network antennas are. That’s easy for us. All of Chicago’s antennas are on skyscrapers downtown. Which is due east of us. Like exactly east. There are super cool maps that you can look up to see how the reception is for each channel in your area.
We get channel 7 with all five bars.
But Channel 5 is really bad. It looks greener in our area. Channel 5 is the station we use for TV.
Myself, I watch zero television. Like, zero. I never turn it on. The only TV I watch is when the Cubs are in the playoffs. And the Super Bowl. That’s it.
I’m doing all this digital antenna stuff for my wife. She enjoys watching the local news at night for the weather. Specifically, the NBC5 news. After that, she’ll leave the TV on for Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. I’m not a fan of paying $85/month for the weather forecast. I’m determined to get the antenna working.
I figured out a way of easily climbing onto our roof. But back up a section. My roof isn’t all that bad. We live in a bungalow, so our roof is not intimidating at all. But when we had new shingles installed a few years ago, I went up on our roof. My wife held the ladder while I climbed up. Certainly, this can’t be too bad. I painted houses in college. I was on ladders all the time. The ladder was much, much taller than the one on our house.
I was so scared out of my mind on our roof. I had the constant feeling that I was going to slide off. I laid my body flat against the roof so the friction of my entire body would prevent me from sliding down. Every movement I made on that roof felt like I was going to end my life with my wife witnessing the horrific event. I vowed never to go onto our roof again in my life.
Saving $85/month changed my mind. I’m going on the roof.
I found an easier way that involved getting onto a smaller flat roof behind the house. I was just barely able to lift myself up.
Now getting down is trickier. I have to dangle myself off the edge of the roof, and feel for the ladder blindly with one foot, while the other foot is still on the roof. It all sounds crazy. But really it’s not. Or maybe it is. I dunno.
I learned that when you are adjusting an antenna for a TV, it’s really a two-person job. You need one person on the roof adjusting the antenna’s position. And another person inside by the TV, seeing how the reception changes.
But I really wanted to get this done. So I would climb on the roof, adjust the antenna, climb down, and look at the TV. To be methodical about it, I checked out channels 2, 5, 7, 9, 11, and 32. I wrote down on a clipboard how many bars each channel got. Then I would climb back up and take a photograph of the clipboard and the antenna. Thus, I had a record of how each antenna position did. I did this about twenty times.
Yeah, I climbed on my roof twenty times on my 50th birthday. That’s what I did. When someone asks me what I did on my 50th birthday. That’s the one-line answer I give.
And all this time I didn’t know that I was jacked up on an Energy Drink.
I picked up Evelyn and came home. My sister pulls up in the driveway, and we chatted for a bit. Nothing crazy there. I told her about why we were flying our flag, and the awkwardness behind the Dick Cheney connection. Being my sister, she’s very well aware of our family’s tendency to do wacky projects, so this was all normal to her.
Deep dish is giant ravioli
In our house, the birthday person gets to pick what we have for dinner. Every year I pick deep dish pizza. It’s pretty much the only time of the year we have it. Other than the times when one of the girls picks it for their birthday dinner, too. The girls get so excited about the potential of having deep dish. Makes me feel like I’m raising some good Chicagoan women.
This time we ate at the restaurant. In the past, we’ve always had it delivered. As I mentioned earlier, I’m always a fan of eating INSIDE the restaurant.
Whenever we go out to eat, I like taking a photo of my wife and kids at the table once their food arrives. Sometimes I’ll shoot a panoramic to make sure everyone is in the photo. This time, I shot a vertical pano to make the pizza really big in the foreground.
While eating the deep dish, our first grader made the realization that deep dish pizza is like ravioli. Indeed! Deep dish is JUST LIKE RAVIOLI. All the layers of pasta and cheese. Deep dish is ravioli, but on a crust.
I find all that amusing when you watch videos like Jon Stewart making fun of Chicago deep dish, calling it a casserole. Sure! Let it be a casserole. I love casserole. Now people can make fun of deep dish, saying it’s giant ravioli.
The handheld video game I’ve wanted
After Sarah got home, we opened up my presents. It’s hard to pick a favorite, because they were all so good. But I really enjoyed seeing the handheld Pac-Man video game. Just like what I saw at Walgreens! And now I have one!
What makes this especially hilarious is that they call it a “keychain video game”. Sure enough it has a keychain on it. But the game is, um, rather large for a keychain.
For fun, I’ll put it on my keychain for a while.
It does look good next to my Kodak Charmera keychain camera.
Driving with my lights off at night
Once we opened presents, we had cake. After finishing the delicious cake, I discovered that I had consumed 93 mg of caffeine that day. Oh. Yipes. Now I’m feeling hyper and jittery.
It’s funny that when I didn’t know I had caffeine, I felt fine. But once I knew… oh man, my mind was racing all over.
Sarah ordered something at Target for our 4th grader’s pajama day. The PJ day was the following day, so we needed to pick it up that night. It was already 9pm at this point, and the store closes at 10pm. I offered to go pick it up.
I really had to stay focused while driving. It felt like all the little things were shiny and distracting.
I safely arrived at Target. Picked up the pajamas. I can never pull myself away from the allure of the dollar section in Target. C’mon, a 3-inch SpongeBob SquarePants eraser in a snowglobe for one dollar. On my 50th birthday. I got it.
On the way home, I’m driving along, all happy. Still feeling a caffeine high, I’m staying focused. But then I make a wrong turn. I turned too early. How did I do that? I drive this route all the time. Now I’m going down some side streets in my neighborhood. They seem exceptionally dark.
I think to myself, “Man, the suburbs have such poor lighting.” I think that all the time in the suburbs. They really don’t have many street lights. I grew up in Chicago with street lights every four houses.
So then I figure I’d turn on my brights. Even though I’m in my neighborhood, and I know the way, I still like to bust out an occasional bright. Well, that’s when I realized I had been driving all the time home in the dark WITH NO LIGHTS. Oops. The caffeine.
When I got out of the car, I stuck the SpongeBob in my coat pocket. Arriving at the house, I handed my wife the bag containing the pajamas.
Facing the mortality of life
As my first day of 50 winds down, it’s now about 10pm. I figured I’d sit down and check out the unread birthday wishes on my Facebook wall. That seems kinda fitting to do.
My graphic design professor from college wished me a good year.
That got me thinking about how to visualize what next year looks like. And I realized I already have something like that.
About 20 years ago, I wrote a program that makes a grid of 173 × 173 squares. That’s 29,929 squares. The average human life expectancy is 30,000. Each square represents one day. The program uses your birthday to mark today’s exact square on your life grid. I never published the program. It remained unseen in beta for twenty years.
To reply to my college professor, I wanted to have a screenshot of what the next 365 days look like. I picked up that dusty code and added more functionality. I colored the past days yellow. The upcoming 365 days are in green.
At this point, it’s riding up to 11pm. I’m still riding that caffeine high from the Energy Root Beer Soda.
The program could use more features (like saying exactly how many days old you are). I’ve been holding it back long enough. It’s good enough to release. Especially given the poetic timing of releasing a visualization about the mortality of our lives, right on the day I turn 50.
Check out your own chart: spudart.org/30000days
And now it’s time to rest.
Busting my belt
The following morning. I’m officially in my 50s now. My first regular day. The day after your birthday also feels rather weird. When your age changes, there’s all this celebration on the day off. You get special privileges. “Oh, it’s his birthday, he can request that.”
But the following day. Now it’s back to the routine, now as a slightly different person.
My belt was already cracking—a cheap belt from Ross’s. But I didn’t realize it was cracking that much. It was one of those reversible belts. Black on one side, brown on the other. In the past, I’ve had bad luck with the buckle. The screws would start popping out.
These dual belts are made of two thin pieces of “leather”—one black, the other brown. And they are glued together. For months, the end of the belt was splitting apart. About a week ago, the middle of the belt was starting to crack.
While walking my first-grader to school, my belt felt loose. I thought, “Oh, that’s cool. I must have lost weight. Which is impossible with all the Halloween candy in the house.” So I went to tighten my belt while we were walking along the sidewalk. And the entire belt comes off!
I suppose I wasn’t losing weight, but it almost looks the opposite, that I busted my belt off!
Measuring trees with your own belt
I stuck the belt in my coat pocket, because Evelyn was embarrassed to have me carry it around to school. We somehow got to school much earlier today. With the extra time we had standing around by the entrance, and a belt in my pocket, I wanted to see if my belt would fit around the ginkgo tree trunk we were standing by.
She was too embarrassed. I’m trying to convince the kids to have confidence and not be worried about what other people think. The kid trying to pull you back is more embarrassing than the parent just doing something.
So I put my belt around the ginkgo trunk. I felt better as the ginkgo tree truck is wider than my waist by a good eight inches.
The bell rang, and my first-grader went into school.
At the school, I saw one of my good friends from Tribune, who drops her daughter off at the same door we use. She was amused by my belt story. She also noticed that we weren’t at the Girl Scout Gingerbread Decorating event last night.
I explained that we were out to dinner for my birthday. I do really miss the gingerbread event. I went last year with one of my daughters, and it was so much fun. The creativity of making the gingerbread house. All the sugary treats! So many sugary treats! The entire gym smells of sugar when you walk in.
It’s probably a good thing we didn’t go there. With the combination of the energy drink, plus all the sugar from that candy, I would have probably died right then and there on the exact day that I turned 50. That wouldn’t be cool. Oh wow, that really sounds dark. Um… Ok, back to the story! hehe.
Getting to know the trees in your neighborhood
On the walk home, I wanted to put my belt around other trees to see if there is any that is an exact match. But that’s a bit much when it’s a tree in someone’s parkway. A tree on school property. Ok, that’s public land. But not on someone’s parkway. But now I’m so curious: which tree matches my belt size?
I might just use a measuring tape instead. So it looks more normal than slapping a human belt around a tree. That way I can keep a record of the tree sizes in our neighborhood. Which sounds really weird on the surface. But walking my first-grader to school every day, you get to know the trees. Especially in the autumn with the leaves on the ground.
A couple of years ago, I thought it would be fun to try to recognize all the trees based solely on their branches when you look at the shape of the tree in the sky.
You could take a walk around the neighborhood with your head looking ONLY at the sky. NEVER at the ground or at houses. And know exactly where you are based on recognizing the trees.
so this trunk measurement would be another way of getting to know the trees in the neighborhood.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve gotta go seal up the coax cable connection to our digital antenna. I don’t want the exposed metal connection to get wet in the rain. I’m going to use a bicycle inner tube that I have lying around from when I repaired my daughter’s flat tire a month ago. Once I repaired that tire, I had this cool, rubbery material left over from the punctured inner tube. I knew that material would come in handy for something, so I saved it. Now I’m going to slice off a piece and wrap it around the coax connection. Plus, it gives me an excuse to climb my roof again. 50-year-olds do that, right?
What about that National Peanut Butter Fudge Day?
Oh, and one of my coworkers asked me this morning if I had any peanut butter fudge. He got my out-of-office message. Guilty as charged! I’ll often write that I’m doing something completely off the wall for my day out of the office. But then I’m not actually doing the thing. Like International Crossword Day. I didn’t do any crosswords that day. It’s just fun to say that I’m doing something goofy on my day off.
This time, yeah, I didn’t have any peanut butter fudge. Well, not exactly. I did have a Whachamacall it bar. And you know what? Here’s the official description:
In 1978, The Hershey Company introduced WHATCHAMACALLIT Bars made of peanut butter crisp coated in a thin layer of chocolate. In 1987, candy chemists modified the formula to include caramel, peanut-flavored crisp and great chocolate taste
Ending or the beginning?
So yeah, there is peanut butter and chocolate in a Whatchamacallit. Which means technically, I did celebrate National Peanut Butter Fudge Day. Just like I technically climbed on my roof twenty times. And technically busted my belt the morning after turning 50. And technically drank an energy drink without knowing it. Fifty is turning out to be full of technicalities. I’m looking forward to what the next 365 green squares bring.