Who Indeed?

As you can imagine, I was more than a little surprised to see the grinning Happy Birthday balloon adorning the camry when I returned home from tutoring yesterday evening. Clearly someone had taken it upon themselves to recognize my birthday publicly. But who could it possibly have been?

After the initial pleasant shock wore off, I pondered which of my local friends both knew of my birthday and would choose to celebrate it in this manner. Certainly not Messrs rLog or zLog, for they are not big on birthdays. Senor kLog is not in the vicinity. Andrea can always be counted on for a birthday call; but the balloon lacks her sense of subtlety. Hmmmmmm...who else?

I started to scan my mental list of friends, and in that moment it became obvious that it was a conspiracy. Clearly this balloon installation was the nefarious product of a covert operation carefully planned and enacted by a handful of my tennis students.

I confronted the likely culprits at the beginning of tennis practice today; and tough they giggled at the thought of my first encounter with the balloon, none of them admitted to placing a new art installation on my surplus vehicle. Of course, in addition to being terribly cute and well meaning, they are awful at harboring secrets with straight faces.

After practice the balloon bandits surprised me with a full pan of cupcakes decorated as tennis balls, accompanied by a rather cacophonous rendition of Happy Birthday. Despite the sad sound of that old American birthday standard, I couldn't help but reflect that sometimes my job is very rewarding.