Thanks everyone!!
first... *gasp* at the beautiful Kenshin picture. Wow. Make me all starry eyed or whot?

This from the guy who was kind enough to refrain from reminding everyone that after all these years, I still can't count!! (Cross-thread reference here: I've known him since 1993, which does *not* add up to either 6 or 11. See how sick I was?)
That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.
And everyone... you know I just love you all to bits. You're the best! I intend to have a nice, quiet, low-key day, hopefully relatively free of lung-wrenching coughs... and then when I *actually* turn 49 (10:06
p.m. eastern time

) I'll.... I'lll.... Go to bed and sleep some more!!
Thanks for all the get-well wishes too. My OLD body takes a lot longer to shed stuff than it used to, and I've been prone to bronchial infections for the entire run of years.

It'll go away... just not as quickly as I'd like.
Now... I need to fire up the scanner so I can show you the birthday card I got yesterday
EDIT: don't be countin' down on me yet, peeps

I have just under 12 hours of goodness left!

"The permanent temptation of life is to confuse dreams with reality. The permanent defeat of life comes when dreams are surrendered to reality."
James A. Michener, The Drifters