Hi all --
The folks I was thinking about when I started this thread have been in touch... called yesterday. My birthday is coming up and they want to 'do something'.
Mind, now, I've been on a ten week leave of absence and they could have 'done something' anytime during the last two months.
This has nothing to do with me, and I see that very clearly.
So I told them, no, I'm not celebrating my birthday [translation: I'm not inconveniencing myself so someone else can have a party that won't really be about me or my birthday for more than ten seconds, if that].
Then I said, if you want to do something, here are the names of two friends I work with who know (the male half of this pair) [because I introduced them all]. You guys set up a lunch some day at which they will also be present, and I'll be happy to show. That's all I want, and I don't want any presents.
This, I think, will involve sufficient work, and disallow sufficient self-indulgence, that it will never happen.
Oooowee, I bit a pickle today.

Sorry!
Added on edit: well, I'll be darned. I just recalled something very informative... when my noisy neighbors first moved in, I had a really baaaad feeling about them, and I remember telling these folks about that. You guessed it. Never having met, or even seen, these people, they defended THEM....
Jeez Louise. I don't need this. Thanks, everyone, for correcting my vision here!