Feeling my age and loving it

I should have blogged about being 40 before now, but somehow things have been a little crazy since I crossed the line.  And as in the last six years, I have little time to recover before I tackle the next challenge, namely Titus' birthday cake.  Now you may remember the mountain cake with cable car from last year.  Well, he requested the same again, but I had to decline, mindful of the hours I spent sculpturing green marzipan and white royal icing onto lumps of lemon sponge cake.  Not to mention the cable car wires.  His only other suggestion was the Titanic (what else) but, as that is really beyond my powers, I have privately settled for a volcano, based on the mountain principle but using melted chocolate and poppyseeds for the covering instead.   I haven't yet worked out how to do the molten lava dripping down the sides, but I do have an idea for the smoke.  Watch this space. (As I wrote then, the space is now filled with above photo.)

So back to my new decade.  It feels just fine, actually.  I think it helps that I live in a country where people always talk up their ages - they'll happily say they are already 59 in January, even though their actual birthday is in August.  This means that most people around me who are aware of my year of birth will already have written me off as 40 way back in the spring.  October 1st is thus merely a formality.  Anyway, I was lovingly spoiled and treated like a queen and all the things that one should feel when happy, I did.  When else will I be in an expensive clothes shop with CG, see an amazingly beautiful pair of exorbitantly priced trousers, sigh, oh my, aren't they lovely, to hear the words - try them on!  I'll buy you them.  I rushed to the changing room before he could change his mind.  They fit like a glove - or should I say a sock, as I don't have enough legs for a glove - and I am now the proud owner thereof.  I spared a thought for all those hard done-by wives, who have to make do with a new ironing board or vacuum cleaner, as I skipped out of the shop.