Birthday Fun Facts

How People Feel About Bdays: Totally Reliable Birthday Statistics

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flat lay photography of desserts
Photo by Karley Saagi on Pexels.com

Years ago I was surprised by the lack of scientific rigor (or would it be mathematical rigor) that went into some of the research I was finding about birthdays. Now, I changed my major in college to avoid taking statistics (no joke). But, I still can recognize a small sample size or faulty reasoning. So, at the time, I decided to make my own contribution to birthday science by posting a survey on this biggest of days online. I invited my readers to respond, so I could generate some birthday statistics. They did. What surprises me now, though? People are still responding.

Apparently there are people who go on Surveymonkey and just fill out random surveys. Weirdly, I’ve had a bump in responses to the survey since November of 2020. So maybe COVID-19 lockdown had something to do with it? 

Or maybe Surveymonkey itself has people do it so that I’ll be driven to pay the fee to “go pro” and see all the answers. As it is, I can only see 40 people’s answers and the rest are deleted if left too long. Since I don’t want to pay $25 a month (or more!) for what was a lark anyway, I can’t tell you how many responses I’ve lost since opening the survey in 2016. However, I do know I don’t want the kindness of strangers who have taken the time to answer to go unappreciated. 

Thus, forthwith, and with great fanfare, I will now share my highly reliable, uber-scientific/mathematic, rigorously tested answers to pressing questions about birthdays.

Completely Reliable Birthday Statistics

To my initial surprise, 9 of my 40 friendly respondents (or 23.08%) said they do not “actively celebrate” their own birthdays. What an opportunity missed, I say! But at least it makes my birthday statistics more credible.

However, the majority of respondents do make the biggest deal about their own birthday (41.03%) with a “family member’s birthday (not furry)” coming second (23.08%) and a friend’s birthday a close third (20.51%).

Parties and cake were tied for top way to celebrate, but dinner with family or friends was a really close second (the difference between 22 responses and 21). No one in the survey went for spending their birthday in “quiet introspection.” But those who picked other and shared their ideas suggested they would want to celebrate with:

  • A fake ID
  • Sleepover with friends
  • Get money
  • Gifts
  • A drive-by sweet 16 (obviously a COVID response, unless they really meant that they wanted a car to drive!)

When asked to rank what they’d prefer to receive, gifts were no. 1 with phone calls and a surprise party next on the list. Social media greetings was fourth…so that tells me you should just pick up the phone and share some birthday love next time around!

The birthday statistic that made me happiest? The vast majority (61.54%) said the time to stop celebrating birthdays was “never!” I couldn’t agree more. 

Next time I write, I’ll share what people responded when asked what their best birthday gifts were!

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Birthday Expenses and 50 Presents Each!

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This week I went to two different birthday events. First was a surprise party for a 40-year-old. My husband, at the adult party, shared a vent with the milestone birthday man about December birthdays and how they only get “half” the presents/attention. 

The next night we went to a gathering at a pizza place on a kids’ night for a 10-year-old who “didn’t want a party.” I wondered if his parents would be able to remind him later on (say, when’s he 40 and complaining about getting shafted) that he was the one to say “no” to an official party!

Not that his parents were complaining, I’m sure. Especially at this time of year, it was probably a treat to save some money. Research from Barclays in the U.K. recently found that “the average parent will spend nearly £5,000 on celebrating birthdays during the ages of four and 11. Typically, adults spend £433.39 on birthday parties and another £164.65 on presidents.” (Yeah, I had to direct quote that because I love the typo in presents. I would have thought presidents would cost more!).

The top five party expenses were:

  • Catering
  • Entertainment
  • Party bags
  • Activities 
  • Cake.

You’d think some money could be saved hosting the party at home. That may be true, but this was the survey’s “most stressful venue for a birthday party.”

But some parents also buy as many as 50 presents per birthday, the study revealed. 

Barclay’s, being a financial institution, took the opportunity in reporting on the study to remind people, “the money you spend on presents and parties adds up and ultimately can end up having quite an impact on the savings you might have otherwise put aside for your child’s future.” Clare Francis, savings and investments director at Barclays, said: “The sooner you start saving, the better your financial trajectory will be.”

Starting at Year One

A Pop Sugar columnist would likely argue to start saving that money at year one. After all, her article is entitled, “Why You Honestly Shouldn’t Even Bother Throwing a Big First Birthday Party.”

She described the relaxed approach to her second child’s first birthday party: “It was a no-muss, no-fuss kind of party, and I wouldn’t want it any other way.” But this was a far cry from the stress of the first child’s first birthday party with “an intricate fondant-covered cake, blanketing the house in expensive decorations, and spending most of the party bouncing around the house making sure everyone had everything they needed.”

Looking back, recognizing that neither child will remember the event, she suggests “throw the rules out the window and do your kid’s birthday the way YOU want to.”

That likely means 50 presents and hundreds of dollars for some and low-pomp but lots of family fun for others. 

Finally, while we’re talking about birthday expenses, I’ll also share this article from Bustle on how millennial women deal with splitting the bill at birthday dinners. The more you know, right?

Sharing A Birthday With Your Spouse

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share birthday

Image source: Globe and Mail

 

Here is something that would be a recipe for divorce at my house — sharing my birthday. I know I’m a little (OK, a lot) birthday crazed. But I can’t be the only person who would NOT want to share her birthday with her significant other. Ugh! Worse would be having to share with your child…then, you’d have to be the grown up about it and all that kind of stuff.

Canadian John Beattie recently provided a personal essay to The Globe and Mail with the title “What it’s like to share everything – even your birthday – with your wife.” Of course, this first person account read like a horror story to me.

Beattie and his wife Zuraidah on July 30th each year compare themselves to a Hollywood power couple that share the same birthday too. They “wake up asking each other ‘what would Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones do?’” Since Christo and Jean Claude, the artists that wrap buildings and parks also share a birthday, I’m not sure why they don’t ask about them (although perhaps the answer there is too obvious — wrap something).

Statistics for Sharing

Beattie guesses there are other couples that are not so famous that are also “birthday sharers” but comments there is no special word to describe this occurrence. Yet, he writes, “there really should be. There are at least seven billion people on Earth. If everyone’s birthdays are spread out evenly that would mean each of us shares a birthday with more than 19-million people. That merits a word.”

It would have to a romantic one, apparently, since “just about everyone who knows [Beattie and his wife] as a couple thinks it’s really romantic.”

But as you can already guess, I do not agree. There is no romance in having to spoil my significant other on the day I want to be spoiled. Even my husband, who already has had to endure a December 30th birthday all of his life, would probably stick with his winter doldrums bday over having to share the birthday spotlight with yours truly.

Nevertheless, at least those who share a birthday don’t have to worry about forgetting their spouse’s birthdays. Yes, apparently it’s an issue. One third of those in an evite poll of 2,000 had done so. Men were twice as likely to space, and 9/10 of them were in serious relationships when they did so. Unsurprisingly, 12% of their relationships hit the skids because of the birthday gaffe.

Help With Your Birthday Message

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Want to stand out from the others saying “Happy Birthday” or, if really creative, “Hope you have a Happy Birthday” on someone’s social media? You could add a birthday bitmoji! I personally prefer the unicorn one:

birthday greetings

If you don’t have that app, the Internet has your back. You can easily grab a birthday gif or meme from google. This is a fun one…

giphy.gif

Then there’s the need to draw attention to ourselves on our birthdays. But what is the perfect thing to say when posting our selfies? 

Seventeen magazine weighed in recently with a list of “35 Birthday Instagram Captions Perfect To Celebrate Your Big Day.” Some of my faves from the list included:

  • “Surround yourself with people who are more excited for your birthday than you are.”
  • “It’s not the years that count, it’s the memories you make over these years.”
  • “Hold on to your inner child as you grow older.”
  • “Live your life and forget your age.”
  • “This is my year of dreams coming true.”
  • “Birthdays are good for me. The more I have, the longer I live.”
  • “Of course, I don’t know how to act my age. I’ve never been this age before!”

To me, some of Seventeen’s suggestions work better as a social media post you’d share with someone celebrating their birthday:

  • “It’s your birthday you don’t have to do nothin’.” – Destiny’s Child, ‘Birthday’
  • “Birthdays are nature’s way of telling you to eat more cake.” — Jo Brand
  • “Growing old is mandatory, but growing up is optional.” — Walt Disney
  • “Today you are you, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is youer than you.” — Dr. Seuss

Still need some ideas? Try some birthday jokes. The ones I found on this site are pretty awful, but they sent me to this video with some funny ones:

birthday greetings

 

Birthdays Can’t Be A Problem!

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Growing up I remember enjoying logic puzzles. The kind where you would draw a grid of all of the people and one other attribute about them to, by process of elimination, determine the solution to the posed problem. Somehow, I am no longer any good at these puzzles. Or, they have become much more complicated (or maybe I don’t remember cheating?).

Recently though I came across a Birthday Problem in the Guardian:

“Ariel, Balthazar and Chastity are great mates, genius logicians and they always tell the truth. Neither Ariel nor Balthazar know the day or the month of Chastity’s birthday, so she decides to tell them in the following way:

First, she says out loud, so both Ariel and Balthazar can hear her: “The day (of the month) of my birthday is at most the number of the month of my birthday.”

Then she whispers the day to Ariel and the month to Balthazar

Ariel says “Balthazar cannot know Chastity’s birthday.”

Balthazar thinks a bit, then says: “Ariel also cannot know Chastity’s birthday.”

They carry on like this, each saying these exact same sentences in turn until Balthazar announces: “Both of us can now know what Chastity’s birthday is. Interestingly, that was the longest conversation like that we could have possibly had before both figuring it out.”

When is Chastity’s birthday?”

I read the first few lines and thought, “this one I can do.” She has to have been born by the 12th day of the December, right? Only that still leaves me with a whole lot of options and the remaining text of the clue did not help me at all!

How does their saying to one another that they “cannot know Chastity’s birthday” over and over again get us to the answer?! Argh. This is why my brother is the logician in the family (really, truly, he is) while I’m the one blogging about birthdays.

What about you? Did you figure it out? If not, the answer is provided here. Wish I could say it made me bang my head to my forehead and say “oh, of course! How could you miss that?!” But, no, I really must have been cheating to do well on these in the past.

This isn’t even the first birthday problem I’ve encountered. Seems wrong to me to make birthdays a skill-testing question.

 

Birthdays a Tradition, on the 13th no less.

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birthday luck

foter.com

OK, so there are many people out there who are superstitious about 13, and particularly Friday the 13th. It’s even got its own name — triskaidekaphobia. Now, that would get you a bunch of points in Words with Friends.

The term comes from Greek, where tris means three, kai means and, deka means ten and phobia means fear. A triskaidekaphobia info site — yes, you really can find anything online — tells us:

“The number 13 wasn’t always bad-famed, quite the contrary. In ancient China and Egypt, thirteen was considered a lucky number. It is unclear when exactly [13 did] become an unlucky number.

Some attribute it to the Bible, where the Last Supper was attended by 13 people, and some speculated that the 13th person at the table was Judas, who later betrayed Jesus. However, there is no reference to support this theory.

Another belief is that the phobia of number 13 is caused by it being an irrational number and 12 being the number of perfection.

There are 12 months in a year, 12 zodiacs, 12 hours in a clock and there were 12 tribes of Israel.”

Now, all that said, you’re wondering what this has to do with birthdays right?

Birthday Luck

Well, there is a family in Orange County, California that can only look at the 13th as a lucky day. After all, FOUR generations of the family celebrate their birthday on August 13th!
Sarah Peeler shares her birthday with her daughter Lori (which distracts me with the thought of having to go into labor on your birthday — ugh). But the day was special even before that.
Lori’s grandfather and great-grandmother also were born on the same birth date. And Lori’s parents didn’t even plan for the Aug. 13 delivery.
“Several weeks before, we just thought this won’t happen, for sure it won’t happen,” Sarah told ABC News. “Once we reached the week of, we both looked at each other and said ‘I think it’s going to happen, it’s fate!'”

Lori’s birth earned the family a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records, for “most generations born on the same day.“

birthday luck
Now Sarah’s husband Ryan, and Lori’s dad, only has one date to remember:
“I hadn’t really thought about it, before we celebrated this weekend, let’s have two back-to-back parties,” he said. “Trying to figure it out, I don’t know what the protocol is yet for something like this.”

The odds are estimated to be somewhere in the one in a million range, the family said.  But Ryan for one doesn’t need to push his luck, saying his daughter is: “Better than any lotto ticket.”

100th Birthday Brunch Becomes a Wedding Party

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birthday wedding

Source: NYT

On Labor Day 2018, Mannie Corman invited 160-plus people to celebrate his 100th birthday. He even wore a black shirt reading “Vintage 1918; Aged to perfection,” and a matching hat with the number 100 printed in white.

Guests who had flown in from California, Las Vegas and Texas with others from New York enjoyed a crooner singing, a roaming photo booth, and the enthusiastic welcome of Mr. Corman and his girlfriend of seven years, Judith Goldman, 76.

After awhile, the guests were invited to take their seats at the tables in Liberty Warehouse in Brooklyn. The centerpieces featured handmade wooden boxes depicting a specific year of Mr. Corman’s century. Before the buffet stations began serving though, a  closed black velvet curtain opened to reveal a flower girl and ring bearer.

Ms. Goldman, who’d added a veil to her white ensemble, and Mr. Corman, who’d added a black tux jacket, entered behind them while “Young at Heart” played in the background. A collapsible huppah appeared and was immediately erected for family members to hold the corners.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/06/fashion/weddings/a-100th-birthday-celebration-and-surprise-a-wedding-too.html

Source: NYT

Will You Marry Me?

Mr. Corman began asking Ms. Goldman to marry him in 2014. She refused, because she was unwilling to move to Brooklyn. He finally won her over, and they decided to marry. Initially they were going to do so after the birthday party. Then, realizing that they didn’t want to plan another big event, they decided to do both celebrations in one.

“When you go with a girl like Judy, you’re supposed to marry her. That’s the way it works,” Mr. Corman told the New York Times.

The guests were happy to part of the birthday/wedding event.

“I’ve known Mannie for more than 50 years, I never dreamed he would be having a wedding,” Steven Cohn told the New York Times. “It’s fabulous. It’s an inspiration for us. It’s never too late.”

Rabbi Joseph Potasnik, who married the couple and officiated at more than 1,000 weddings, said Mr. Corman is the oldest groom he has ever married.

“People like Mannie and Judith recognize the importance of each and every day,” he told the Times. “They don’t worry about tomorrow. They may think about yesterday, but they concentrate on today.”

What better mentality to bring to your birthday — whatever age you are turning?

There’s a Wrong Way to Cut a Circular Cake?

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I love cake, especially birthday cake. Really, I’m typically so focused on what kind of frosting was used (“please not fondant, please not fondant”) and what the inside is (“yeah chocolate!”) that cutting it correctly is the least of my concerns.

Yet I did recently come across an article suggesting I’ve been cutting circular cakes wrong all this time! Who knew?

Of course, it’s a mathematician who has chimed in with the best way to divide (or would it be bisect? That geometry term is springing up in my mind for some reason) a circular cake.

Going with small triangles is not the best plan, according to a YouTube video “The Scientific Way to Cut a Cake – Numberphile.” Drawing on a science magazine article from 1906, mathematician Alex Bellos suggests instead we should be cutting slabs directly down the middle to help preserve the cake longer.

So, you would start in the very middle of the cake and cut all the way through it from one edge to the other. Then you would do this again parallel to your first cut. Now, you have a slab from which to serve people.

You can then push the remaining sides of the cake back together with the exposed edges facing inwards for prolonged freshness.

There is even a suggestion of wrapping a rubber band around the cake. I don’t have the mental elasticity to see how this would work. Wouldn’t an elastic just cut into the cake itself? At least it would an iced cake rather than one enveloped in the aforementioned fondant (ugh).

The next time you cut into the cake you would repeat the two parallel slices across the cake’s center, then bring the now smaller cake back together again.

No matter the shape of the cake you’re sharing with humans, I’m guessing you will have an easier time of it than these pandas. Their birthday cakes are made of bamboo! Although, of course, they get to use their paws.

birthday cake

Birthday Hilarity among Celebs for Thor’s 35th

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Chris Hemsworth

Handsome Chris Hemsworth turned 35 last month. The celeb’s milestone birthday prompted a social media outpouring of reactions from other famous folk. On the heels of the last teeth-clenching blog on ICE arresting immigrants on their 18th birthdays, I thought I’d take a lighter approach to milestones this week. C’mon it even has the Rock singing!

So, Hemsworth, who is perhaps best known for Thor in the Marvel movies (aside from being famously gorgeous), celebrated his 35th at home with his family (wife, Elsa Pataky, and their three kids, India Rose, Tristan, and Sasha). He also considerately shared a family selfie around the cake, captioned with the note: ““Immediately after this shot was taken my son viciously attacked me from behind (due to his ninja training) and slammed my face into the flaming candles…I’ll now be playing Deadpool if @vancityreynolds pulls the pin.”

The equally handsome and hilarious (and Canadian too) Reynolds responded.

Chris Hemsworth

Ryan Reynolds

Image source

Happy Birthday Handsome

Keeping the hunk Happy Birthdays going, Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson sang and shared his customized version of the “Happy Birthday” song.

“Happy birthday to Thor,
You Australian man whore,
You’re the greatest Chris, that’s a fact,
After Evans, Pine, and Pratt.”

He also referred to Chris as an “Australian man whore” and dissed the handsome Aussie actor for eating birthday cake while the Rock was busy working out in his “iron paradise.”

Hemsworth took his ranking as fourth favorite Chris with good nature, noting he was glad to learn it from the Rock. He added: “Also my kids after seeing this said ‘dad are you friends with Jumanji!!!’. And now possibly think I’m cool. They expect you at each of their birthday parties in the coming years.”

Josh Brolin, Thor’s nemesis Thanos in the movies, also provided a song, but no word on whether he needs to be a birthday party performer in the future. Although Aquaman Jason Momoa commented on the tune, “U missed mine f***er.”

Hemsworth was also treated to a birthday ditty from Leon Bridges. I heard on Sirius Alt Nation that Avengers costar Tessa Thompson, a common friend of both Bridges and Hemsworth, arranged the ditty knowing that the American gospel and soul singer was a favorite artist.

Screen Shot 2018-08-30 at 3.53.57 PM.png

 

Hemsworth’s brothers also chimed in with birthday wishes and funny photos of their bro. Liam, of Hunger Games, reminisced: “Happy birthday @chrishemsworth I remember the first time I ever threw a knife at your head, there was this look of pure fear in your eyes. You’ve come a long way from that scared little kid…proud of you. You’re my hero. Love u heaps and heaps.”

Hemsworth tagged his original post #bestbirthdayever but with all the celebrity love and hijinks it’s easy to imagine this one really did take the cake — thus far at least.

Happy 18th Birthday — Have Some Handcuffs

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Turning 18 is a milestone in many cultures. Yet, there is nothing celebratory about the way the United States’ current Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are marking the occasion for unaccompanied minor immigrants.

ICE agents are shackling and relocating teens in shelters as soon as they turn 18, according to the Miami New Times. Since April, the report said, at least 14 teens had been taken from the Homestead Temporary Shelter for Unaccompanied Children on their birthdays — when they become legal adults.

“When they turn 18, it’s basically, ‘Happy birthday,’ and then they slap on handcuffs and take them off to adult detention centers,” Lisa Lehner, an attorney with the nonprofit Americans for Immigrant Justice, told the New Times.

The percentage of kids turning 18 in detention and being turned over to ICE has more than doubled since 2014, according to a report by news site Documented, cited on The Hill. In 2017, 2.4 percent of minor detainees “aged out” and were arrested by ICE, compared to 1 percent in 2014, according to Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) numbers quoted by Documented.

Americans for Immigrant Justice has filed suit, but Broward County isn’t the only site of these shelter arrests. Janet Gwilym, the managing attorney of Kids in Need of Defense, said ICE agents regularly show up at shelters at 11:30 p.m. on the eve of detainees’ 18th birthdays. At midnight, agents will shackle the now-adult detainees and take them to jail. 

“I believe it’s a psychological strategy they’re using to try to get them to just give up and go back back home, even if they know they’ll be killed if they go back,” Gwilym said.

There are dramatic differences between the environment in an adult facility and a temporary shelter such as Homestead, the activists noted in news articles. Plus, the government is obligated under what’s known as the Flores settlement to seek the least restrictive environment for minors, including alternate housing like placement with relatives or foster care — and to do it quickly. Instead, the new practice is handcuffs and quick shuttling to prison.

I never thought I’d be writing about immigration issues, but this is not the kind of birthday surprise we should keep quiet about.