“Look how lovely the room looks!”

Mrs. Flowers humphed. “I just want cake and go back to my Lord of the Rings reading.”

Sandy, the perky senior aide, giggled. “Well we all need some social time! Can’t stay in your hobbit house forever!”

Mrs. Flowers was wheeled into the activity room and the other residents clapped. She was the oldest resident. A tiresome job.

How she wished she could just slip on a magic ring and disappear!

There was a nice lunch and balloons at each table. A few rounds of bingo.

“You don’t look a day over 90,” quipped her next door neighbor, John, as he dabbed at his bingo card.

“I feel a day over 200,” she groused. Never won this game.

Finally, time for cake. The local news reporter took her picture as she blew out the candles. Just a few, not all 99. Didn’t want to set fire to the place.

“What did you wish for?” Sandy asked.

“To go back to the Shire,” Mrs. Flowers answered.

She had taken her second bite of the yellow cake with vanilla icing when her other neighbor, Cynthia, fainted, her face smashing into the cake.

Nurses and EMTs rushed to Cynthia’s side.

“Well, that’s one way to ruin a party,” John observed.

“Nah, it’s ok,” Mrs. Flowers said. “At least it wasn’t me. I’ll call that a birthday win.”