I have just passed a lovely 38th birthday, the first in the company of both my wife and my daughter, now eight weeks old. I received telephone calls from my in-laws, my sister, my parents, my best friend in Alabama, and my brother. Gayle and Rachel gave me a burr coffee grinder -- which grinds to eighteen different grades -- and a new coffee maker with a thermos rather than a hot plate, so that the coffee stays hot but does not burn. Gayle cooked a shrimp and sausage pasta salad for dinner, and we had marble cake and chocolate chip ice cream. The three of us watched the Chieftains, complete with step dancers, a musical salute to composer John Williams, and Dolly Parton on television, and then we stepped into the street in front of our house to see the Wheaton fireworks.