We were still locked down here in the state of Ohio on Mother’s Day, May 10th, in the USA.

My younger son Jason had been planning to visit me on Mother’s Day, with appropriate social distancing and masks, but both he and I didn’t feel well that day. As they say, “Discretion is the better part of valor.” So we talked on the phone instead.

But my son Nick and his girlfriend Summer, who are expecting their first child (and my first grandchild, see I’m going to be a grandmother! ) still managed to send me flowers and a cake to celebrate the occasion.

For some mysterious reason, the cake and flowers were delivered a day early, on Saturday, May 9th. The cake is delicious, although way too much for one person to eat. The flowers are gorgeous and fragrant. Here’s how they look today, on May 13th.

 

Mother's Day flowers from Nick and Summer

In the lower right-hand corner you can see a bit of the hilarious Viking birthday card that I received in late December from my friend Johnpaul, who I met in the 70’s when I was in law school at the Ohio State University in Columbus.

Johnpaul owned a great music store, the Guitar Shoppe, which was located across the street from the law school building. I bought a couple of vintage Gibson guitars there, as well as a small Farfisa stage organ and a Fender Vibro Champ amp.

I hung out there a lot, and Johnpaul and I became good friends, a friendship that has lasted to this day, even though he now lives in Arizona, in the Southwest, USA.  He is great for sending cards for the holidays. ❤

I had to show this Viking birthday card around to my SCA friends, who got a chuckle out of the Viking smashing a birthday cake with his sword, as well as the fact that the Viking is pictured wearing a helmet with horns. 🙂

Horned Viking helmets have no basis in history, but might have sprung up in the popular imagination from their use in costumes for Richard Wagner’s 19th century operas, The Ring Cycle. Wagner used the Icelandic and Norse sagas, as well as the German Nibelungenlied, for inspiration for the four-opera cycle.