Adventures with Meps 'n' Barry » Birthday Limericks

Look what the stork brought

meps — Thu, 01 May 2014 16:08:57 +0000

Way back in 1964,
The stork dropped me at the front door.
Now that I’ve turned fifty,
I think that it’s nifty,
That Mom said, “Please bring me one more!”

I don’t have any pictures of the stork that brought me. But Mom looks pretty happy with the results. My sister Julie just looks shocked.

Vintage 1913: Here’s to Loraine!

meps — Tue, 23 Jul 2013 23:34:11 +0000

“Now, I really don’t want to complain,”
Said the birthday girl known as Loraine,
“But that powerful twist
Of the cap in your fist,
Was a gift that upstaged the champagne!”
~
Although she asked for no gifts on her 100th birthday, I couldn’t resist giving Barry’s Grandma some champagne with custom labels celebrating the big day. After we admired them, I put them in her refrigerator. The next day, before we left for the airport, I asked if she’d like Barry to open one of them for her to enjoy later. “Oh, yes, yes, yes!” she said, delighted. It’s not that she can’t buy her own champagne, she just doesn’t have the hand strength to open it once she gets it home.

Two years ago, when she was only 98, I wrote about Loraine in a piece entitled, The Life of the Party. She is the inspiration for the infamous toast started by the late Bill Brown, “Here’s to Loraine,” which we have used all over the world whenever we drink something festive.

The Champagne de Loraine label: Vintage 1913

Meps and Grandma, with the Champagne de Loraine bottle

Three generations celebrating the big day

Grandma’s party. The critical grandson, who opened the champagne bottle, is Barry, second from the left!

He’s got my number

meps — Thu, 03 May 2012 14:35:17 +0000

A mysterious text message showed up on my cellphone yesterday:

There once was a gal named Meps
Who passed the awesomeness test
She has a birthday
And all I can say
May it be one of the best!

I have a “dumbphone” with no keyboard, but I laboriously typed this response:

Hey, your limerick-writing is slick,
And you thought you would play a fun trick.
An anonymous rhyme,
To my cell phone, this time:
But I figured it out: It was NICK!

He won’t be able to fool me again. I saved his number in my list of contacts under “Limerick Nick.”

Making a birthday wish

meps — Sun, 01 May 2011 15:28:30 +0000

On my birthday, I’d like to believe,
That my brother, the one known as Steve,
Will call from Above,
And say, “Hey, I love
you, and I’m coming back there, on leave!”

Jolly young Jill

meps — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 03:21:07 +0000

I am sorry to hear, Smiling Jill,
That your birthday’s no longer a thrill,
All your friends think you’re great,
And should still celebrate —
You’re not old, you’re just over the hill.

Happy Birthday, Jill! These two friends are looking forward to celebrating with you!

Popular Paablo

meps — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 04:32:05 +0000

If your five hundred friends each could count,
As one-tenth of your life, the amount,
Is your age: FIFTY years!
Dump some friends now, poor dears,
Do the math — it’s an old-age “discount.”

In other words, if you only had 490 friends, you’d be 49 again.
(I know, I know, I’d be the first one off the list!)

What do you hear under the boat?

meps — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 16:35:14 +0000

There once was a lady named Jacqui,
And her taste in small boats was not wacky.
She knows quick as a jig,
With her fine Freedom rig,
She can rotate the wheel and yell “Tackie!”

It’s her birthday today, and I wish,
That the day brings some cake in a dish,
And a stroll down the dock,
Where she hears, to her shock:
“Happy Birthday To You!” sung by fish.

There is a fish I call Harvey who hangs out under our boat and makes funny “groink” noises. We suspect he is a “croaker” or a “grunt,” as his ability to hold a tune is limited.

In other news, we heard some strange noises in our dinghy this morning, and I thought it was just the wave pattern. A few hours later, as we went to row ashore, Barry discovered a beautiful 12-inch fish in the bottom of the dinghy! If we’d realized that was the source of the earlier noise, we could have had fresh fish for breakfast.

Happy Birthday, Kiddo!

meps — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 04:18:19 +0000

The term “elderly” isn’t the word,
For Da’oud, no, that’s much too absurd.
Though his birthday’s today,
If you asked, he would say,
The word “youngster” is greatly preferred.

This one is for my jeweler-artist friend, currently hanging his shingle at the Arizona Renaissance Festival. The twinkle in his eyes makes him look like a little kid with prematurely gray hair.

His name was so much fun to play with, I wrote a second limerick the next day:

A fellow I knew named Da’oud
Refused to eat all birthday food
He said, “I’ve been told,
…Eating cake makes you old.
And I’m an extremely young dude!”

It’s (not) my party

meps — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 03:20:22 +0000

There once was a lady named Donna
Who said to her friends, “I’m not gonna
Eat your candy and cake,
I refuse to partake.
Blow those candles yourself — I don’t wanna!”

Happy Birthday, Donna! If they put one candle on your cake for each year, you could heat the whole house!

Which is the younger sister?

meps — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 21:06:16 +0000

Betcha can’t tell from the photos below. Happy Birthday to my favorite young woman in the whole world — you look awesome in that sweater!

I’ve a beautiful sis, Julie S.
And she’s older than me, I confess.
But my friends, they all say,
“She’s not fifty, NO WAY!”
It’s her wonderful life — free of stress.

Here are a couple of oldie-but-goodie photos of Julie from 1960. One is with Mom and one’s with her big sister, Daisy.