Today is my birthday; I’m 28 years old, and counting.

We celebrated it yesterday with lunch at my favorite Japanese seafood buffet, and afterwards we fed the ducks at the wildlife/wetlands preserve. Children were running all over the place, squawking at the pigeons and seagulls, and playing scarecrow to all the geese — which meant that I had to throw the bread as though I were a baseball pitcher, just to get it in range of the somewhat spooked and already overfed ducks. With the wind blowing in from the sea and the angle of the waterline on the land, this meant a lot of effort with not a lot of effect.

So I woke up this morning with sore muscles and the realization that I’m completely out of shape. The soreness was enough for me to complain about; it ran along my back, up to my right shoulder and arm, and even a little across the front. I complained to the wrong person though; I got irreverence instead of sympathy, on my birthday no less.

“Wow, even my right boob hurts,” I said.

“That’s a relief,” he replied. “At least it’s not the wrong boob.”

I gave him my deadliest, most lethal look. He merely laughed.

“Come on,” I pouted. “I’m in pain here.”

“Well,” he said, “the next time we feed the ducks, just keep the bread in one place and throw the ducks at it instead.”

For five full minutes after that image, I forgot that I was sore at all.

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