Okay, for once I did it right.

Ordered the roses days in advance, so the florist was able to get the right kind. None of those traditional red or pink things, but the cream-yellow ones with the orange trim on the petals.

Same as she had in her wedding bouquet.

Got in early this week and placed an announcement with the newspaper. Four inches high, two columns wide. A great picture of the wife on the boardwalks at Old Faithful.

Left the placement up to the newspaper people. She got page two, midway down the page on the outer margin.

I suspect it helps to know the publisher.

I also got two cards bought and signed. Shoulda remembered to do that before youngest son went back to college. Then I wouldn't have had to forge his signature.

But he called to give her his best wishes this evening, without even being prompted, which was cool. 'Course, he also needed more money already, but I'm sure that was a coincidence.

Got all the presents wrapped well in advance, in old Sunday comics. Five in all, but she knew what three of them were (and no, I didn't wrap the washer and dryer).

She likes the finger armor, which was one of the two surprises.

Checked on cakes at the bakery on Tuesday, and they had a great assortment, plenty of chocolate choices. Knew I'd be okay to wait to buy one.

Today, they had almost none. All white or "almond poppy seed". Took me over ten minutes to finally concede defeat and buy the one chocolate with sugar frosting, instead of whipped. It was either that or one of the dinky oreo cookie ones, with no space to write anything on it.

Bakery gal snickered when she saw what I wanted written on my selection.

Check-out gal looked at the final product and said, "She's going to throw that at you."

(Just for the record, she didn't.)

The funny part?

Wife figured I would forget about getting a cake. So she stopped by the bakery on the way home, and got her own.

We got a dinky oreo cake in the freezer, now.

And tonight we learned the masked heeler is just as tempted by sugary frosting as she is by the whipped kind.