Happy Birthday To You!

it is 3;00 p.m. in the holy city of zefat. i am downstairs with the grandkids blogging on my son's machine. my computer is kaplutz. every day one of the kids has a meltdown before we enter the house. it is usually over who got the key to open the door. sometimes it's a kid who didn't get carried home. 0ccassionally, it's both kids freaking out together. i usually ignore them and risk the dirty looks form the other parents. it is unheard of here to let a kid cry. today is my son's jewish birthday. we don't go by the gregorian calendar. he was actually born on the 6th of january,28 years ago. since borh kids are working late i decided to throw a small party for him last night. i didn't have to babysit or cook on friday so i went out to get a present for him. i was asked to make a potato kugel so i set out for the big supermarket. i got a lift with a neighbor. the supermarket was under reconstruction and it was a huge balagon to find anything. i found the vegetables, which were in a totally different section of the store. it was a huge mess. why they were open under those conditions on a friday before shabbat, is uncomprehensible. i left the store without buying a birthday cake. i decided not to make a birthday cake from scratch. my track record hasn't been too good for cakes lately. i went next store to the pharmacy to buy a cologne for him. he had requested a certain one. it was over $100 and i passed on it. there were some half priced colognes but i had no idea which ones he liked. i had no desire to start testing perfumes. those days are over. i looked all over the store for gift ideas. i wanted some momento of his favorite soccer team but there wasn't a thing. i ended up buying some socks, underware, deoderant and body gel. i spent about $30 and about 2 hours of my time. i felt a bit cheap. i went back to the supermarket to try and find a cake. i finally found one and spent another $20. i was too tired to bus it home so i came home in a taxi. i didn't buy enough potatoes to make a large kugel so i ended up making a potato loaf and a noodle zucchini loaf. i also made a cheesecake. yes folks, i made yet another cheesecake. it cost over $10 to make. when i came home i explained my dilemna at both the supermarket and the pharmacy to the daughter-in-law. at least the lady at the perfume counter wtapped up all of the items to make a nice looking package. the daughter-in-law approved. i, of course, showed her the cake. she thought it was a bit pricey. she ended up buying the cologne for half price and a soccer play station game for my son, her husband. i offered to pay for half of the cologne but she declined. i offered to pick up the kids while she shopped so she wouldn't have that added pressure. i had to make the kugels and cheesecake while the kids were upstairs with me. i also made some jello. she came back and i didn't have to shower the kids. it was pretty close to candle kighting by then. i went downstairs while she picked up my son from work. the little kids told their father all about the gifts, cake and party before shabbat. my son got to wear his new cologne. another young couple with a small son and new born came for shabbat. the boy was sick and the baby was fussy. the food was pretty good. they brought baked salmon and salads and the daughter-in-law made soup and stir fry wraps. i provided the jello and store bought cookies. we also had two bottles of wine. i drank a large amount of sweet muscat white wine and had a huge headache later that night. i ate way too much, too. i went to sleep rather late that night. we usually all go to bed around 8:00 p.m. on friday night. the kids stayed up until 1:00 a.m. and i went to bed with my grandson at 11:30 p.m. he was way, overtired. i got up at 7:30 a.m. and my grandson got up shortly after he wet the bed. we were the only ones to be up. my son got up to go ro the synagogue at close to 10:00 a.m. the other young farher was very busy with his son who had soiled himself. my son was in a really awful nood. perhaps it was also a wine hangover. we ended up eating at around 12:00 p.m. everyone was in pajamas. the little boy was really crabby. no one took an afternoon nap. we usually all go to sleep at around 1:00 p.m. as soon as shabbat ended, i went upstairs to defrost the birthday cake. the young women did the dishes and the floors. the little kids were watching television. my son was in a horrible mood. we had had words in the afternoon. i didn't like how he was handling the kids. he let me know that i had been a lousy mother, once again. he asked me if i wanted to be the kids' mother. i was really ticked off at him. i didn't feel like coming back downstairs. i did so for the grandkids and not for my own son. although he had seemed impressed that i had bought him the latest deoderant for men, he didn't show any appreciation for my efforts to celebrate his birthday. the wife and the little kids were frantically blowing up balloons for him. he wanted to go out on the town with his wife and couldn't sit still for a cople of moments with his friends,kids and me. i told him that i wasn't going to sit for him. i didn't like his attitude at all. my gransdon came upstairs at 10:00 p.m. to ask me to put him to sleep. wile i told him betime stories, his young parents went out for the night. my son called a little while ago to thank me for all my efforts and to apologize for being such a downer. apparently, he doesn't do well on birthdays. go know! i am happy that the computer is working. i hope it makes paragraphs. i know how hard it is to read my blog without them.