Back in March I retold the first "annual" celebration of Mercury's birthday. (Yes, that's Mercury the planet and, no, this is not a pagan ritual as far as I know.) My son Frederick, always in search of birthdays since they tend to come with cake and ice cream, decided to celebrate Mercury's birthday. Conveniently, Mercury orbits the sun every 88 days and, thus, requires more birthday celebrations than the rest of us.
Our first celebration of Mercury's birthday found us secretly ribbing Postmaster Dean using the community's "Burma Shave signs," signs usually dedicated to announcing events such as a community dinner. We flew remote control airplanes at the local school and ended our day at a cowboy bar eating dollar tacos and telling the cowboys about our birthday celebration. It may have been the first time I have seen my father embarrassed.
On the schedule for the second annual celebration is an ice cream give-away at the post office at about 11:30 tomorrow (Friday). Everyone in the community picks up their mail and loiters around at that time. It is the perfect opportunity to spread the word about the birthday celebration. Word spreads pretty easily up here, by the way. To let everyone know you're pregnant, you can either post something on the Burma Shave signs (which frankly I hadn't considered and now I find myself a bit disappointed that I missed an opportunity) or just tell someone at a local bar.
All of this is to say that if you don't do something fun and quirky this week in honor of Mercury's birthday, you are missing out.
