From "The Great Gatsby" to "Out of Africa" in a year

We heard and saw RR interviewed one Parents' Weekend @ RIT

In one year my birthday has gone from one Robert Redford film to another ... from The Great Gatsby to Out of Africa.

A birthday dinner at Daniel ...

Last year Vince and I spent our mid-May birthdays in New York City. It was an especially celebratory time because after almost nine months of hard work, I was about to finally join Vince for good in our new home in South Africa. (Vince had moved to SA six months earlier and he had come back to the US to help with our final push east.) We took an entire week to celebrate our birthdays and bid a proper farewell to our life in New York.

... and another at the Waverly Inn ...

... and happy hour at Eataly's Birreria

Lunch at the Bryant Grill ...

... and brunch at La Mangeoire!

w/ spa treatments even Daisy Buchanan would love.

... and a fond farewell to the New York City Ballet and Broadway all in one night

.

Coincidentally, it was also the debut of The Great Gatsby in New York. In 3D. Not the Redford version but the Di Caprio version and New York - and I - had gone mad for all things Gatsby. Along with seeing the 3D version at the IMAX in Lincoln Center, I went to The Plaza Hotel ...









.. to see their exhibit of memorabilia and costumes  from the movie. (Besides both versions of The Great Gatsby, the Plaza was also prominently featured in another Redford film, The Way We Were. "Your girl is lovely, Hubbell." ... and Barefoot in the Park.)

I went to the Lady Chapel at Saint Patrick's Cathedral where, along with Vince and I in 1980,
















... Zelda and Scott were married 60 years earlier in 1920.

We went to an old speak-easy for cocktails ...













... the 21 Club.















And a new speakeasy on the LES  for dinner, Beauty & Essex.
















I ogled the windows at Tiffany's where they displayed the recreated art deco era jewels made especially for the movie.
















My reflection "tried on" this headpiece.
















Vince shopped at Brooks Brothers where they displayed costumes from the movie, including ones they designed.














We checked out Prada's Gatsby costume exhibit too.

poster for a new Great Gatsby opera

And it wasn't just New York that went Gatsby mad. I spent some time in Boston too last May and saw evidence there.

Gatsby window display at Harrods 

Even during my all day lay-over on the flight to Joburg, I found lots of evidence that London had caught Gatsby fever too.

And a ballet poster in the Underground

But that was last year.

HBD in the Kalahai!

For this year's birthday celebration, we are trading in New York and The Great Gatsby for South Africa and Out of Africa. Vince and I plan to observe meerkats in the Kalahari with our zoologist friend Katy as part of our month-long May birthdays celebration. It seems like just the kind of thing Karen Blixen might have done.