Happy Birthday to → Mark

On Sunday, the 9th, blogger Mark of Exsurge Domine celebrated his 21st birthday.

To commemorate this occasion, Mark had invited a group of friends and family for a barbecue. It had been raining in the evenings for the past few days. Thankfully, we were spared the rain during the procession for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, the patronal feast of our parish (more on that to come, but since I don't have all the photos yet, we are having this digression). And again, during the barbecue, we were spared the rain. I came after the Sunday evening Mass (the Mass for the Immaculate Conception does not fulfil the obligation of attending Mass for the 2nd Sunday of Advent. No 2 for 1 deal here.)

Upon my arrival, I was greeted by several aspiring cooks trying to get the fire going. Of course having lit the fire for incense every week, one would expect a certain level of efficiency from these folks.

While that was going on, food was being gobbled up by the attendees. The turnout was quite healthy.

Soon, the fire was ready and it was the turn of your humble scribe to work some culinary magic =) Beef, chicken, sausages and burger patties all deftly avoided cremation under these hands (which still smell of smoke. I think the smokes must have seeped in my pores).

As I laboured, a crowd gathered and began to eye the food ... and the chef, hungrily. I was rather alarmed.

Soon, however, it was the time we had all been waiting for, the cutting of the cake. Various expressions can be seen above, some eyeing the cake hungrily while other were less enthusiastic.

To summarize, candles were lit, songs were sung, candles were blown out and much cake was cut and eaten. A jolly good night, if I don't say so myself. Anyway, here's wishing Mark a Happy Birthday. Ad multos annos.