Buying your own Birthday Cake

I don't get it.....but I ignore my birthday. But.....on a totally different topic.....back in the early 80's when I ran a lot.....ran for Wycombe Phoenix.....I had come back from a trip to France and had purchased a case or two of cheap beer on the trip. The next week I ran a race somewhere down south and had taken the beer with me. After the race (10K on the track.....a bit horrible).....I offered (after I had take a couple....of course...) the beer to anybody who wanted some......I didn't have any trouble getting rid of it. The moral of the story....supply booze.

and little perfumed soaps from France

This was in the U.S. in an office of grumpy federal government employees.

Freedom soap

Weird - I've never heard of this! Asked my husband and he has, though. What about other Scotland folks - is this a thing here?

Certainly in my office the birthday person would bring in cakes (and 1 sausage roll for the guy who didn't eat cake)

I haven't experienced this yet. Now I'm quite glad I don't have to go through the awkwardness of it as I'm on holiday for my birthday next week!


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I used to work in an old school paint store in San Fracisco with the bitterest bunch of cranky old men you could imagine. 

Do you ever check and see if the paint shop is still there? I bet San Francisco has changed a lot since then.

Do you ever check and see if the paint shop is still there? I bet San Francisco has changed a lot since then.

Funny you should ask, just last summer we took the whole family to SF for a few days.  We drove up the highway past Daly City and saw the Dunn Edwards sign was still there.  Didn't stop because nobody in the family but me cared and we had limited time.

You are correct that SF has changed a lot in the last 20 years but so many important things are just the same.

Freedom soap

Ha!   Bringing in soap sounds like a great idea.  That's what everyone is going to get on my next birthday.

Didn't stop because nobody in the family but me cared and we had limited time.

When I was young, my dad was bad about stopping in places and catching up with people. He actually began using it to keep us in line, "If you two don't shut up back there, we'll stop in and visit Frank".

Ha!   Bringing in soap sounds like a great idea.  That's what everyone is going to get on my next birthday.

If you saw the state of the women's bathroom at this place, and how it was overflowing with scented lotions and soaps people had brought in from home, you  would see why I thought this was a good idea lol. Apparently they were very picky about their toiletries 

Like Son Of Sailor said, freedom can be a dirty business


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Weird - I've never heard of this! Asked my husband and he has, though. What about other Scotland folks - is this a thing here?

I've worked in both England and Scotland and bringing your own birthday cake is the way it's done, at least in an office-type workplace.

I totally agree with the points both SOS and KSand made about why it's a good thing.

I rarely bother with it, because... ffs, I'm not a child.  I don't need to be centre of attention or be made to feel like the special sparkly birthday princess.  But on the odd occasion I've done it, a Costco cake usually gets them beasted in... apart from the office vegan!  (I brought coconut chips for her.)
   

For myself, I'm not having any of that.  I just keep it a secret at work and trust my family to make me a nice cake.

I generally disguise my birthday with a trip abroad, so I just bring in sweets from the trip rather than faffing about with making and then transporting a cake (I commute >1 hr on public transport, so can't be bothered..). 
But that's a tradition we have in our office too -- whenever someone goes somewhere they have to bring some sweets or chocolate back for the rest of us.  Not sure how you feel on that one!

My office does the holiday sweets thing too.

Interesting. My team makes/brings in cakes for each other for birthdays.  Well, rather, some of the team is so organised they do it.   I'm of the "oops, forgot it was my turn to even buy milk/coffee let alone cake club", so luckily, it's not me having to do so, otherwise, no one gets anything!   

I sometimes bring sweets, sometimes not.  The team are suckers for York Peppermint patties, so if I'm in the US for work/pleasure, I try and pick up a bag or two.  I go to a place in Belgium that has the most.amazing.chocolate ever, so I will get shunned if I don't bring back chocolate from there on a work trip.  Sometimes, we try and bring back the most bogging sweets we can find.  This is always great.    I've  had a lot of fun trying/eating candied cicadas, chocolate covered worms and strange gummies and sweets coated with black pepper, etc.