were cliques...we had one woman who loved to cook and bake, and if you were in her clique (which I was, though I'm not sure how I got there), she organized fellow co-workers to make/bring something sweet for first break and then she herself would put on a pretty large lunch spread. So *some* people got, like, a half dozen different kinds of cookies or muffins or breads or brownies (and usually a mix of all of those) on the morning of their birthday (or if your birthday was on the weekend, the Monday after), and then at lunch, there'd be a main dish she knew you liked (I was partial to her taco salad), plus some bread and salad or some other side dishes. You did have to supply your own drink. And if you were part of her inner circle (again, I was, but I'm not sure how I got there), there'd be a dinner out after work some time around your birthday. Bff still teases me about how this woman would usually be the one selecting where we went for our birthday dinners...whether we liked the place or not. I can count on one hand the number of times I ate a birthday dinner at a place I actually wanted to go to <g>.
It's weird though, going from a place where you've been employed for a long time to a place you're the newbie. My first birthday at the next (and to date last) place I worked almost went by unacknowledged. There was a card signed by a few people and that was it. The next birthday, my immediate supervisor, who's an absolute sweetheart and a totally boss boss, insisted on buying me dinner. Unfortunately, I didn't really care for ANY of the restaurants that were a) nearby, b) would deliver and c) were open for dinner. But it was still a very kind gesture, and there was *one* dish at the restaurant across the street that everyone else is so fond of that I actually like, so he bought me that.
It's interesting to me...I can take or leave workplace birthday celebrations. I'm usually content to be the wind beneath everybody's wings for 364 days of the year and then want to be treated like a queen on my birthday, so I definitely enjoyed the attention at work but it wasn't something I would've been upset about if my special day wasn't acknowledged (though I'm pretty sure I would've been peeved if I worked somewhere where we're supposed to get our birthdays off and I didn't). OTOH, my aunt always disliked the places she worked and while she had a couple co-workers she liked, she didn't want ANY fuss for her birthday. She went so far as to get mad if her birthday was even mentioned, and you could forget about bringing in a cake or cupcakes or cookies. Now that she's retired, she volunteers at the local dog warden. She told her fellow volunteers on day one that there was to be NO celebration of the anniversary of the day she arrived on the planet and the few times someone forgot and brought her a treat or a small present, she actually got a bit snippy with the person.
