Birthday Week

At 3pm today, my friends and I attempted to meet for my planned birthday celebration. The weather, however, didn't want to cooperate, having dumped a foot of fresh snow on the hiking trail we planned to go on yesterday. Not only that, but we were met with a fierce wind off the ocean as soon as we stepped out of the car. Having had my share of dealing with fierce winds on Thursday, I was not amused. We nixed the trail but did end walking around the Mackworth campus, which was far bigger and more interesting than I had realized. After about a 20 minute circuit, we were back at the car, and elected to go straight to Whole Foods, realizing that anywhere else in Portland would just be ten times as cold and windy.



I opened a gift that an online friend had sent me, which turned out to be maple candy. We played trivia and 20 Questions with famous people, with Rob getting all the math questions and Nate getting all the TV and movie questions. Besides eating them, we also did an experiment with the maple candies to see how long it would take one to dissolve one in water. It was not as quick as I thought...took about half an hour to be three quarters dissolved.


Some small balloons, which my stepmom had found and blown up during my birthday dinner with her and my dad last week, provided some more entertainment in the form of fun with static electricity - sticking them on each other and taking pictures. :) (My stepmom said that they would not last a week but apparently the laws of physics, or birthdays, defied her.)


Since we had an excess of maple candies after everyone had had their fill, I decided to try to give them out to the Whole Foods employees. Two of them seemed genuinely excited to have them, which made me happy; one agreed to try them; and the rest declined. I did feel slightly embarassed asking, but I am a firm proponent of the "random acts of kindness" theory and like to try to make people's days better when I can, which is not as often as I would like.

It was a very nice birthday, or belated birthday, as I felt very appreciated. This is the best part of having a birthday if done right! :) Rob paid for my dinner, Nate got me some Jodi Picoult books I wanted at Borders (yay!), Janine got me a gluten and dairy free brownie, and Amber gave me a lovely and very cute framed photo that she had done. She makes animals and different things out of vegetables and does it well. In this portrait, a dog is catching a frisbee, only the frisbee is a rice cracker! Ha! She knows me too well :)

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On Thursday, I went into town on the bus because I needed something for dinner, seeing as the Irish have taken all the brisket (for St Pattys day). This was my third time on the bus. It was sunny and warm on the walk to the bus stop; I had everything unzipped. The walk was quite pleasant. The bus was 15 minutes late, which seems to be the average. Tolerable in nice weather but not in bad weather, I am sure.

I was the only person on, but we picked up a few people at Shaw's and Walmart. A guy about my age with Tourette's came on about halfway through. Never having met someone with
Tourette's, I found this very interesting, and after thinking about it, I decided to start a conversation with him. I felt bad for him, thinking how often he must be treated badly and stared at, and wanted him to have a positive interaction with the public. I also just wanted to talk to him. He was very friendly, and had a nice smile. We talked about the weather and the library a bit.

The bus went okay, I did better than usual on it, knock on wood.

In Portland, it was freezing, as the wind was coming off the ocean and creating Artic conditions. So much for a nice day. I asked Ryan if he would cut my hair as I was a bit desperate, and he said yes. We found a bench by Tommy's Park in the Old Port and I told him to go at it, lol. We all think he did quite a good job, especially considering the circumstances, and since he had never cut hair before!

Fun with balloons and my lovely haircut!

On Facebook, I got 87 happy birthday wishes. 87! I did not know I knew 87 people that would take the time to wish me HB. :)

Last weekend, my parents invited me over for a birthday dinner, and we had tenderloin steak. My relatives Steve and Gail were there also, which was nice.

So all in all it has been a good birthday week, and it is nice to feel appreciated and connected to others!