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I'm turning 58 on Saturday August 8, and I'd like to hear from all of you about your birthday ideas.
My parents always made a huge deal about our birthdays. Not so much parties or outings, but we got complete control over our lives on the day. We could choose anything we wanted to eat (and everyone else had to fall in line), do whatever we pleased for the day (we got to watch unlimited TV! which for an essentially screen-free family was a HUGE indulgence), and we didn't have to do our chores. (It's a farm. We had a lot of chores.)
I've carried that feeling of freedom with me ever since, but it gets harder once you're older.
And 58 isn't really a milestone birthday. When I turned 40, I took my parents and a few close friends out for dinner at my favorite restaurant, and they made us a cake and gave us a brilliant evening. At 50, I cooked dinner for friends and poured out some lovely wine and we spent the evening eating and talking. I'm already contemplating what I'll do for 60.
But what shall I do for 58? What would YOU do? What is your birthday tradition? I'd really like to know.
23 hours ago
I don't work on my birthday (if I can help it), laze around, and maybe go out for dinner. If I have a special dessert, it would be strawberry shortcake, but only if I make it (or my mother), as it's in May and that's a splendid seasonal dessert. This time of year? Peaches or ice cream would be my faves. Go somewhere fun! Shop for yarn or hit up Colonial Williamsburg or something.
I would arrange a piano recital and give the gifts(money) to the charity thst I respect and where need this the most. I hope it’s blessed whatever you do! 🙂
This year I had my kids help with a garden / yard project that’s beyond normal maintenance . It was a really enjoyable day , I had lists printed of tasks to accomplish final goal. Teens said it was a fun day ! A friend hosts a favorite things birthday . Each lady brings something wrapped around $20 that’s a current favorite, there has been accessories , spices, cook books, lotions, sunscreens, etc.. people draw numbers to choose a gift, then the person who brought it tells everyone why they love that item currently. It’s a fun insight into the other people’s lives too
My birthday is between Christmas and New Year’s and then my son’s birthday is a couple of days after that. Now that I’m a mom with all of the pressure of holiday prep and festivities I tend to choose to do nothing on my birthday. I put on my coziest clothes, and then I read or watch something, or talk on the phone to my best friend (who lives across the country from me). We eat something easy (often pizza, it may be chili tots this year), so I don’t have to cook or get dressed to go out. I have gone antiquing, which was fun, but right after Christmas I’m not really in the mood for more shopping. Sometimes a big to-do is the best celebration, and sometimes a day of rest is the best way to celebrate!
Most memorable? My husband is not the best at celebrations but for my 50th he surprised me with a ladies night out, dropped me off at a restaurant with my gal friends. Wonderful!! This past year celebrated my birthday late by using a certificate my son gave us for a night in a yurt on a platform in the redwoods and zip lining. The stay and food were luxurious, but the zip line was an adventure in overcoming my fear of heights!! Luckily my son was there to catch me at the end of each run. Proud of myself for doing it!!
Four broke homeschool mom's are planning a Birthday Poldark Themed Nampara Escape. We can't afford England, but we're going to pretend the coast or RI is the British Riviera, dine at a Tavern and mix up some Cornwall cocktails!
I was completely inspired by Barbara Kingsolvers 50th birthday she hosted on their Virginia farm and detailed in Animal Vegetable Miracle. Please do something like that for 60! I am turning 46 this month and dream of something like that on my property for my 50th.
Go solo camping!
This year, I took a one afternoon art class the weekend before, then a trip to Houston for one night to see a few museums including NASA.
Last year my friends and I collected a bunch of salad dressing recipes we had always wanted to try, brought over all the ingredients, formed teams of 2, and then taste-tested them. It was so fun. I wanted to do that again this year with sandwich recipes but it was too hot to think. Happy Birthday, dear Susan!
I try to pick something new that I've never done before. Start another year right with adventure!...so sometimes because of life it's simply trying a new recipe. Sometimes is exploring a new town or learning a new skill.
We don't make a big scene about birthdays. We keep it low key. 🥰 Just spend time together as a family.
If you like traveling, go on a trip. Go somewhere new that you have never been before. Go see Something that you have always wanted to see.
We do similar as your parents for our kids! My husband creates a Surprise Birthday Outing Day, including a couple meals out. We cant go out often yet, and i love surprises. So it is very special for me. ❤️
For her 60th my mum had surfing lessons. Super cool. Who cares that it's not a milestone birthday? It's still worth celebrating, YOU are worth celebrating. I love to visit a garden nursery and buy a hot drink on my birthday.
We’ve been huge fans of the Birthday person decide on everything as well on their birthday, and also reading our Birthday Psalm that coordinates with how old we are. (My husband turned 58 this year as well.) 🎈🎈Happy 58th!!🎈🎈
Have a Mad Hatter Tea Party
Happy birthday, Susan! I will be 58 this year as well. My husband is retiring, and my only daughter is off at college, so it will hopefully be a year of adventures. I love the idea of 60 new things in your 60th birthday year that one of your readers suggested. I may have to start planning that one.  This was the first birthday since my daughter was born that she wasn’t here to celebrate the day with me. I missed her, but was very blessed to spend the day with my mother shopping and having lunch. I can’t wait to hear what you decide. For me having someone plan something I love to do that I don’t have to think about planning myself would be a great gift.  The gift of being known. 
A good friend of mine is turning 60 this year, and has decided to do 60 new-to-her things this year. She took ideas via Facebook in January and people came up with some really neat suggestions! She has divided it up and tries to do 5 new things each month. Some are gimmies - a new restaurant for example, but most are actual new experiences. I know she went white water rafting for one, and for another went to see the butterfly exhibit at the Jewish Community Center here. It's been fun reading her report on these experiences each month on Facebook!
It’s my day to just go birding or curl up with a book, with no basic housework happening by me. I get dinner out with my husband and a good friend, and cake. If the boys are around, someone might offer to go hiking or birding with me. (That’s not as awkward as it sounds— my husband is not yet retired, one kid lives hundreds of miles away and works, one just finished college so he had classes in prior years, so they often just *can‘t*).
When kids were little my birthday was a no rules day. We’d Watch TV and eat popcorn and I didn’t feel too obliged to enforce the less significant rules. For a number of years a new tinker bell movie would come out on my bday so we watched that. I just made it the path of least resistance for myself. As kids got older (and I worked more hours) I started taking the day off work and opening the gift from my mom at breakfast. Kids and hubs make me a carrot cake. For my 40th we went to Disney and stayed at the animal kingdom lodge and dressed in Halloween costumes etc ( Oct bday). I wanted to do something fun but still have fun with my kids. For the kids we have a special breakfast and since we homeschooled they’d open gifts in the morning so they could play with them all day. Then of course dinner and cake of choice. I also have a 3x4 ft bulliten board in the kitchen and it gets filled with photos of the birthday kid. That’s actually my favorite tradition. My newly 19 year old son is currently featured.
58 is a great year.. I'm ahead of you by six! I think you should do a 1968 trivia night with your family& friends, and you should not have to make it! 😁 ... After a1968 dinner party (as easy as Big Mac, which debuted that year, or as elegant as beef Wellington! Lots of great late sixties meals!)
I turned 58 a couple weeks back, highly recommend. I usually want to get outdoors on my birthday - hike, kayak, sit at the lake and such
Well, I do a cartwheel on my birthday every year 😂. It really feels like an accomplishment each year. So yesterday I turned 60 and this was it. I wondered aloud if it should be my last. My 20yo son said yes, he thinks I'm playing with fire. HAHA! A couple of years ago I was practicing the week before, and no one was home (yes, neighbors must think I'm nuts). I imagined myself breaking my neck, and the kids coming home to find me dead in the front yard, days before my birthday!
I know you are a foodie and so I suggest dinner at a restaurant where you could have a special experience like a tasting menu with wine pairings or a chef’s table. But for my birthday I would choose exploring a city or town I’ve never been to before because I like to travel. If you like french cuisine, come to Columbus, Ohio (hear me out) and spend the day at our wonderful zoo since you like animals (maybe splurge on a behind the scenes experience). Then have a fabulous dinner at The Refectory. refectory.com/
I'm generously excerpting this piece for you because it's behind the paywall of a professional publishing journal, and because I think it reveals just what a fraught, uncertain, unregulated, dangerous place the work of writing and publishing has arrived at.
Full credit to Erin Somers, and link is here: lunch.publishersmarketplace.com/2026/07/seven-figure-book-deal-cancelled-over-ai-suspicions-raise...
**
Seven-Figure Book Deal Cancelled Over AI Suspicions Raises Questions About AI Guardrails
By Erin Somers
A debut thriller won by Minotaur in a seven-figure, two-book deal after a reported 14-way auction was withdrawn by its agents this week for suspected use of AI. The novel, whose title and author PL is withholding for the author's privacy, sold for an alleged $2.5 million or thereabouts. But rumors surfaced quickly from people who had read the manuscript that the book contained many of the hallmarks of AI, including negative parallelism, off-kilter metaphors, and a flat prose style. On Wednesday, the author's co-agents Marc Gerald and Ashley Coleman at Europa Content withdrew the book, after questioning the author about the validity of the rumors.
St. Martin's Publishing Group would not confirm the size of the deal, telling Publishers Lunch only, "Macmillan Publishers participated in an auction. The agent ultimately pulled the book."
Europa wrote in a statement that the author, "Produced an incredible manuscript that dazzled us and the top publishing professionals around the world."
[Inserts question: How did the off-kilter metaphors and flat prose style dazzle all those top publishing professionals? But I digress. The report continues:]
"Unfortunately, we are no longer able to authenticate how the manuscript fully evolved from origin to completion. During the submission process we vetted the manuscript... and felt trusting in [the author's] reassurance that it was written without utilizing AI as a resource in the writing or editorial process. We can no longer substantiate that, and we are withdrawing the book. This raises so many questions about authorship and what AI means for this industry but those are questions for another day. We regret that our enthusiasm led to this outcome and we apologize to our publishing partners."
Gerald further explained to PL that AI suspicions were first raised during the submission process by an editor who had read the manuscript: "We immediately had a very long, substantive call with [the author], about AI protocol and the consequences for both him and Europa if he was using it. We went through detailed sections of his book, where he shared with us that like many authors he used AI for research into chemistry which forms the background for much of the book. That said, he confirmed he wrote the book 100 percent himself. At no point did we run an AI detection on the MS; we had concerns that the software had lead to previous inaccuracies."
The author denied using AI to PL, writing, "The rumors are absurd." But this week, Gerald and Coleman spoke to the author again and told the Bookseller that "aspects of [the author’s] story changed."
Gerald wrote to PL: "On Wednesday, Ashley and I decided we had no choice but to pull the book after we weren’t able to confirm for ourselves that AI had only been used for light research, grammar checking and Americanizing the language. While we are not able to say authoritatively whether or not he used AI, we did have trouble validating how the work went from creation to polished draft. Ultimately, trust between an agent and client is everything - especially given the fact that AI detection software is still in its infancy."
An analysis by Pangram 4, the leading AI detection program, returned an assessment of 97% AI...But there has been a backlash to Pangram and competing programs, which some people dismiss as inaccurate. Reported individual tests of other material on previous versions have shown more idiosyncratic results and people have challenged the company's claims. Chakrabarty said, "There are little false positives here and there. And there is some acceptable margin of error. For instance if it says an article is 80-90% human you can assume that its predominantly human with some AI edits etc which is totally fine and not egregious. But when an 80K word + novel say it's 97% AI generated it's very hard to deny it." He added that AI hallmarks that editors can look for include: plot inconsistency, too many mixed metaphor cliches, too much negative parallelism, and rule of triad, or excessive groupings of three...
Some authors will use generative AI to "edit" rather than write, without necessarily realizing the extent to which the software will change text unless blocked by specific prompts. Chakrabarty notes, "It rewrites everything and changes a writer's voice. As Hemingway said, Writing is Rewriting. If ChatGPT does edit it's still AI writing."
Sources tell PL that more deals are being cancelled behind the scenes following the discovery or suspicion of AI -- one publisher noted that multiples imprint have had to cancel a book over this -- including books that originate in the self-publishing sphere and are then picked up by Big Five publishers. This usually happens quietly and under the public radar, and is only brought to light by fans online...
In addition to issues in traditional publishing, AI-generated books are now flooding the self-publishing market, cutting into the livelihoods of human authors. Chakrabarty recently led a study investigating the amount of AI in self-published KDP genre fiction, finding "our results bear directly on the market-effect question at the center of the fair use defense to copyright infringement."
...The authors concluded, "Generative AI can...reshape a creative market through scale rather than quality.... We call this dilution." They note, "Our findings reveal a market remade by scale. Books with substantial AI text enter the catalog far faster than the revenue available to absorb them, push down the return each title earns, and contest the top ranks, while the books with AI text that succeed draw most heavily on the distinctive language of existing books."
In their piece on the new research study, the NYT wrote, "The researchers used Pangram to analyze text from around 60,000 books sold on Amazon. From that sample, about 53 percent of the books published in 2025 contained A.I.-generated text, compared to 23 percent in 2023."
In another small but positive development, ChatGPT has stopped fulfilling prompts to generate text in the style of a specific writer. Ars Technica writes, "In refusing to directly copy the 'exact style' of various authors, ChatGPT offered instead to capture an overall 'feeling' by incorporating some of the common features found in those authors’ work."
Still, the vetting tools remain imperfect, and questions abound. The author of the withdrawn book told PL, "Writers are increasingly being made to second-guess ordinary stylistic choices because they might be labelled as signs of AI. Even em dashes are now treated with suspicion, which makes me wonder what people would say about Emily Dickinson’s writing today."
It's clear that this is a watershed moment in publishing and agents, editors, and authors will continue to flounder without firm procedures in place. The core problem remains: there is no way to tell for sure.
**
I don't have any wise words of summary, just a lingering sense of dread.
lunch.publishersmarketplace.com
A debut thriller won by Minotaur in a seven-figure, two-book deal after a reported 14-way auction was withdrawn by its agents this week for suspected use of AI. The novel, whose title and author PL is withholding for the author’s privacy, sold for an alleged $2.5 million or thereabouts. But rumors...3 days ago
And another question: how in the world is anybody getting a seven-figure book deal these days???
This sounds a bit like when they put the book Frankenstein through the AI detector and it said 97% AI...
It was only a matter of time before someone was bold enough to test the waters.
"[W]e had concerns that the software had lead to previous inaccuracies." Did Gerald, who is being quoted, make this error or did the author or is it AI?
one of my favorite "tells" for something written by ai is when a sentence says something like: "he answered in four words," and then gives you a sentence with more than 4 words. A lot of the "heartwarming stories" flooding FB these days are ai-slop. But to the article... I have no idea what negative parallelism is, nor the triad thing they mention. Possibly because I'm not strictly a fiction writer, or maybe because I didn't study writing in college? I've used em-dashes for over fifty years, and am not about to stop using them. But I was pondering recently how to prove I wrote something, if I were ever challenged, and realized there's probably no definitive way. I tend to write long-hand first, and then type it in, but I usually toss the written pages afterwards. Even if I kept them as proof, someone could say I had ai write it first, and then copied it in my own handwriting. My next (nonfiction) book has been in progress for over ten years, but would those old computer files be considered proof, or could someone say I faked the file dates? I'm with Susan - definitely a sense of dread.
Maybe I don’t understand the bidding process. Do the publishing companies not get to read at least part of the manuscript before they bid on it? Seems like this never should have made it to auction. 🤷♀️
I'm glad this is being brought to light. I love supporting independent authors, and it really bothers me knowing that some are using AI. My guess is this book is probably in the romantasy genre, which is why someone was so amped to snap it up. It's really popular right now.
I also will not give up my usage of the em dash.
ok but who is "Chakrabarty"? I'm looking for where they are named and identified, but they seem to just suddenly appear in the article?
When I write I avoid dashes and struggle when I come up with an excellent set of three in parallel. Three is still perfectly appealing to human sensibilities, but AI leans on it so heavily that it has become a tell. Alliteration and assonance, which are exceedingly fun for me, are now a worry. AI writing often takes the grammar dress-ups to an extreme, but if I come across a touch bland and maybe use too general language (dry) it can be completely dismissed with that accusation. What if I look too AI? How do we fight it? And how will writing change as authors find ways to avoid the symptoms that are common in AI writing? Will AI adjust to keep up? Will publishers continue trying to police it? Or are we seeing the end of that in fiction? Consider how many AI-written books are already being published. However poor they are, they still sell. I am horrified at the idea of AI writing nonfiction. We are giving up so much! But fiction? Shakespeare didn’t write Henry VIII alone. While we don’t allow the use of other writers’ works today in that way, AI isn’t a person. I think this will slide away the same as many machine-made items became more acceptable years after they replaced handmade as the cheapest option. It sounds like a brave new world… but not in Shakespeare’s sense.
I feel dread and sadness that I have to edit my own editing so as to avoid the appearance of AI. And I love em dashes. But I agree that there are a lot of “tells” in AI generated writing, and it shows up in the darndest places these days.
How were all these people dazzled by this manuscript to the point of paying that much money for it? I've read a fair bit of AI fiction this summer while we're off school just to see what it can do, and it's almost never good.
I'm not teaching in public school anymore, but I'm hearing more and more about students in high school and college trying to use AI for papers and school assignments. Good grief! A government official from this country at an international conference tried to pass off an AI map of Africa, with gross errors, as actual. It was mentioned in Heather Cox-Richardson's posting last night. The fact that people in positions of power think that use of AI is acceptable is crazy, and relying on AI for fact is outrageous.
Ooof. I hate this so much. As someone who published one teen novel with a small publisher and earned $58, I feel like I can't compete with the robots - or even prove I'm human.
Ugh
Here's my litmus test - did you enjoy it? Then stop complaining. Did you not enjoy it? Then you don't have to read it again.
The dread every honest student feels submitting an assignment these days...will it get flagged for AI, and have I done everything I can to sufficiently prove the work is my own? It's chaos out there.
Hi! We recently discovered your book and were truly impressed. We’re putting together our August Spotlight featuring standout titles and would love to include yours. If you’re interested in expanding your reach, feel free to send us a DM or reach out via the email on our Facebook page.
Soooo, no one in the larger publishing companies actually read the final manuscript? Nor did they run it through a basic AI detector like college professors do for assignments. Wild. I can see this happening for self-published books.
Finally got around to watching Disclosure Day, and that's 2 1/2 hours of my life that I'll never get back. What a turkey.
5 days ago
Oh really? Do you not care for sci-fi, or was it just poorly produced? I was thinking about seeing that one. I got talked into seeing The Backrooms because my teen son creates sci-fi horror animated stories. It was incredibly disturbing and my Fitbit showed my heart beat at 30 higher 🤣
DEFINITELY see Hadestown (film version out now). I'm not a person naturally inclined to Greek mythology, but this is the kind of presentation that converts people like me! The music/ acting/ dialogue/ costumes/ compelling story line were ON point!! Definitely best musical I've ever seen...
Is this the movie that is supposed to make people stop believing in God?
😂 You seen The Odessy yet?
I have been listening to your History of the World Series currently finishing up the Middle ages. It should be retitled royals behaving badly. The next book is about the Renaissance. After that how are you addressing the modern era
We laughed out loud at the dialogue and pacing and the very dramatic music. At the end…..I was really hoping for a certain other Spielberg character to be part of the big reveal, if you understand! 😂😂 would have been amazing. Two good things from this movie though: Emily Blunt’s acting and the trailer was actually a masterpiece. It really made me want to see it! 😝
That’s all I needed to read.
The only thing that made up for the time wasted was watching the hilarious roasting reviews we watched afterward. youtu.be/kebERTQzOng?si=O2-GwcZzlOi-5SS-
I don’t know, I enjoyed it. To each their own.
💯
When you find yourself laughing during scenes that aren't supposed to be funny, you know there's a problem. This movie appeared to be stuck in a very bad time warp.
Yep. The only good scenes are at the beginning with Emily Blunt and then it’s downhill from there lol
I thought EXACTLY the same thing.
We said the same thing 🙄
Me too- Emily Blunt was amazing- but such weird editing choices and super cheesy flat ending.
Exactly! It's definitely no ET or Close Encounters.
Well, Spielberg hasn’t made a good film for the past two decades so that’s not a surprise.
Susan, as one who has followed what's really going on behind the scenes with government disclosure, I can say that the movies main points are accurate. Spielberg's movie is part of a plan that has been said in motion ever since the Biden administration to bring gradual disclosure to the key facts. What has come out is that we are not alone. The US has engaged in a 70-year cover-up of a crash retrieval program and reverse engineering program of alien technology. The information and the programs connected to the legacy reverse engineering program do not come under direct control of the US Congress which is why Congress has gotten so involved in trying to bring disclosure over the last 3 years.. My question to you, given your opinion of the movie is, how much have you studied the subject, the phenomenon, what the government has already disclosed, and what the witnesses before Congress in open hearings and others have said? I am deeply concerned that Christians have their head in the sand on this issue rather than face the profound questions that disclosure forces upon us.
Sometimes the quiet spaces between moments hold more meaning than the moments themselves. Even a disappointing watch leaves room for softer light to fill the edges of the day.
Agreed! What a mess of a boring stinker.
