So I had many hopes and dreams for my 55th birthday.  The original plan was to do a McMenamin’s tour of Oregon.  I had made reservations at Gearhart for Thursday, Hotel Oregon for Friday, Grand Lodge for Saturday, and Edgefield for today.  Each of these reservation included special reservations so we could bring Steve along.  I had dreams of walking on the beach, drinking on a roof top bar, seeing the Strange Tones in Portland, and fine dining.  Our tax return was going to pay for it, and we were going to make great progress on our McMenamins passports.

But earlier this month when the community spread of SARS-CoV-2 virus evident, Tom and I decided to cancel these reservations.  I had briefly thought about going to a favorite place of mine, Iron Springs Resort.  They have cabins with kitchens so we could cook our own food, they are on the ocean beach and allow dogs.  But we fairly quickly decided that was not a good idea either, well before the governor’s Stay Home- Stay Healthy proclamation.

So then we thought about staying home and going out to a nice restaurant for dinner.  Again plans squashed by the pandemic.

Then we thought about going on a motorcycle ride and then soaking in our hot tub.  My knee and the weather has squashed both of these ideas.

So now the plan is to mostly stay home, relax, eat home cooked Downton Abbey food (more on that in tomorrow’s post), get take out greek style baby back ribs from Five Columns, one of our favorite restaurants, and watching IHEART LIVING ROOM CONCERT FOR AMERICA,” Hosted by Elton John.  Otherwise I will be taking it easy for my knee on the couch, binge watching This Farming Life, facebooking and knitting, just like I have been.  This is certainly not the 55th birthday I had wanted, but we are making the best of the circumstances.

Here are photos of my birthday cake from 5 years ago at Iron Springs.