January 26th is Wayne Gretzky’s birthday. Happy birthday, Wayne! If my memory were correct, it’s a big birthday year for you, 2021. Arguably, the greatest hockey player of all time, you are, not arguably, my favourite hockey player of all time. Yet, on your birthday, while I’m happy for you, I’m always a little wistful for me from a little chance incident back in my childhood as a nine year old refugee in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Birthday
Sing Happy Birthday to Your Facebook Friend Instead of Writing It
Recently, I realized that with my Facebook app, I could send 60 second voice messages to others rather than having to type out things. That’s quite convenient, actually, and I am learning to use it more. However, I also thought of another use for it, and that’s for birthday greetings!
I have started singing Happy Birthday to my friends (and family, which I’ll include in “friend”) using this feature to send to them for their birthdays, instead of simply writing Happy Birthday on their walls, maybe with a few other words.
Send a Music Video with Facebook Birthday Wishes
On Facebook, you get notices of your Facebook friends’ birthdays. Most people just write “happy birthday”. A few add the person’s name to the comment. The occasional one will add an additional sentence or two. For the most part, it is pretty superficial, seeming to be an automatic and generic action.
One way you can suddenly stand out in a lot of ways, without a lot of work, is just think of a song you’d like to send that person. Continue reading
Let’s Be Irrational for Pi Day! (March 14)
Pi Day is observed on March 14th each year, when the month and day (3.14) make up the first 3 digits of the mathematical constant π (pi). Popular ways to celebrate Pi Day include eating pie and discussing the importance of the number. But you know what? That’s SO boring and, well, predictable… and especially ironic considering Pi is an irrational number. That means Pi’s decimals digits are never repeating or “predictable”, since if it did ever repeat, it would become predictable as you had seen the pattern before!
I propose something a helluva lot funner… and harder, to truly celebrate Pi Day and give it its dues. BE IRRATIONAL ALL DAY ON PI DAY!
And how does one go about being irrational?
Wish Your Facebook Friend a Happy Birthday with a Song to Make It More Meaningful
On Facebook, you can opt to have your birthday show up as a notification on your Facebook friends’ Home Page on the day it is your birthday. Most people then just usually write something short, and frankly, a little meaningless from how generic it often is.
The person whose birthday it is, then, gets like a ton of notifications of these greetings. They may or may not go through them all, as most are the same old plain “Happy birthday!” variation. But what do you expect of mostly shallow “friendships” that come with most of most people’s Facebook “friends”?
However, some people go through all the comments so they don’t miss something they may want to respond to, or should acknowledge to avoid embarrassment of not having read it when someone took the time to write it… and asks about it later.
What I’m proposing is that if you want to be a little more genuine, and break the person’s routine scroll through all the relatively meaningless wishes a bit, add a little song link, like from YouTube. A lot of songs can be found there.
Digital Citizen 