You Say It's Your Birthday

Why hello there long lost readers! Today is my birthday! Most of you probably know that I like to extend my birthday celebration as long as humanly possible, so the festivities are FAR from over. But I did want to give you a little recap/rundown of what my first ACTUAL birthday in New York City entailed...

Starting with the day BEFORE my birthday!

MONDAY NIGHT, October 11

I met one of my oldest and bestest friends, Jungle M, in the Upper West Side for cupcakes with her and her papa, who was visiting for the weekend. I know New York City is the mecca of cupcakes, but in my opinion, there's really only one place to go.

(Source - Crumbs Bake Shop via Ready Set DC)

Yes, Crumbs Bake Shop, the love of my life, the bane of my diet. It was as delicious as ever, and the company was fabulous of COURSE. I got a Devil's Food Cupcake, which I sadly forgot to take a picture of. I did however capture my cupcake from the last visit, the Baba Booey (chocolate and peanut butter). I preferred the pb & chocolate one... shocking, I know.

Personal Photo of Pure Deliciousness

After delicious dessert, I headed to Trader Joe's to pick up a few things - and this time, I actually mean a FEW things. I wanted to spend less than $25 and I didn't want more than one TJ's sized reusable bag full of groceries. I hit my limit, both size and money, almost exactly. And the free coffee samples were the perfect temperature, which almost never happens. As always, the service was perfection. Strangely enough, I did not use my allotted once-per-visit TJ's impulse buy. Does that mean I can allow myself two next time?

I came home, finished some homework, watched some TV, relaxed... typical Monday night stuff. I also wrote a 5-page letter to my pen pal. Yes, I have a pen pal. I absolutely love it. It's so old school! She sent me a fabulous Halloween care package and it totally made my day. The handpainted bat she made me is hanging on my wall. And - honesty hour - I may not take it down after Halloween.

I stayed up a bit for some birthday wall posts, texts, and phone calls at midnight, and finally crashed, ready to teach early the next morning. What's funny is that I went to bed thinking that my actual birthday wasn't really going to be that special this year. I wasn't going to get to do anything touristy or outdoorsy. It was supposed to pour all day. I planned on going to the gym between teaching and taking class. I was going to cook myself lunch and dinner to save time and money. And I was okay with all of this, because life is about growing up, and that was just what I expected.

BIRTHDAY! TUESDAY, October 12

BOY was I wrong! First of all, a fun factoid. My whole life, Tuesday has been the busiest day of my week. I think it started back when I took dance; I had the bulk of my classes on Tuesday nights. Since then, it's just been the craziest day, always. So this month I was thinking that I can't recall my birthday ever being on a Tuesday. Then I saw this:

(Source - Learn Something Every Day via my fav Tumblrs, FYFT)

SO since this October has 5 full weekends, my birthday is on a Tuesday. Since this only happens every 823 years, this is the only time in my life my birthday has ever been on a Tuesday. Not really sure how this works, but it's kinda cool, huh?

Anyway! I woke up today, ready to teach a 3 hour long lecture on pronouns and family members. I threw on my my new purple Calvin Klein dress and headed out for Starbucks with Miss M before our class started. Class COULD NOT have gone better if I planned it! Our one student that we were concerned about (last week she kept getting frustrated and giving up) volunteered to fingerspell her name first because she wanted to show us how much she had practiced! Another one of our students said one of my favorite things ever: "Can you believe there's a whole set of people I can't communicate with? I talk way too much for that to be okay!" They are excellent. I adore them all.

After class, the three of us wandered to Tribeca to find a Thai restaurant that a friend had recommended. Apparently it was closed permanently, so we walked into the first nonsketchy Asian place we found. It was decent, but we waited far too long for our food. I didn't really care, since the company was good, and it's pretty hard to mess up Chicken Udon. We then headed back uptown to get gelato at Artopolis, one of my favorite local spots.

I did some organizing and went to class - obviously the gym didn't happen. What was I thinking? I had already blow dried and straightened my hair once today! Class was actually fun. I'm really loving the Deaf Ed first years, now that we've all had time to get to know each other! After class, I headed to the liquor store to pick up some tequila, since margaritas are an absolute birthday necessity. I ran into a current UF student there! It was crazy. Great Gator minds drink alike, I suppose. I grabbed some Chipotle for dinner (I refused to cook today, clearly), and headed home.

Oh man. My roommates are amazing. I walked in to a spread of chips, dips, snack mixes, candy, and something that was very clearly a not-so-well concealed cake. We carried everything, including the Cuervo and TJ's Pomegranate Limeade, up to the dorm lounge to watch Glee - which was EXCELLENT tonight, by the way. It was seriously amazing. Roomie S even baked me a red velvet cake with delicious cream cheese frosting! I never mentioned that it was my favorite, but I guess it just fit my personality!

More than anything, what really made today so very very wonderful was - IS - the constant flow of love I've been getting via email, phone, text, and Facebook. And it wasn't just simple "Happy Birthday!" posts that I typically send and receive... so many of these were thoughtful, even from people that I wouldn't anticipate thinking deeply of me. I had so many sorority sisters tell me that they miss me and wish I could be at initiation next week. I had so many ASL TAs tell me it's not the same without me. I had so many family members tell me how awesome our family is (like I need to be reminded!).

It sounds kinda silly and conceited, but all day all I could think was - wow, I mean so much to these people. And they mean so much to me. How lucky am I that I wound up with such kind and fun roommates? How lucky am I that I love both the people in my program? How lucky am I that the people in this city that is so far away have made it so easy for this to feel like home? How lucky am I that I have an amazing group of people loving me from across the country? How lucky am I that for the first time in my life, I really feel like whenever I reach out in any direction, there's someone right there reaching back at me.

So if you're reading this, if you've ever read this, if you've ever celebrated with me or just left a simple "Happy BDay!" message to me - thank you. Thank you for sticking with me through all or part of my 22 glorious years of life. Thank you for contributing to my life with your beauty and joy and love. My first birthday in the city was a million times better than I could have possibly dreamed - and I haven't even had a few of my celebrations yet! I can't wait to see what this year has in store.

(WOW this is long. I love you if you read this far. I mean I love you anyway, otherwise you wouldn't be reading this blog at all, but you know what I mean.)

I have been a very bad little blogger lately. I apologize. Here's another quick and dirty rundown of what's been going on in my life:

- I had a cold - very exciting. That's honestly been occupying the majority of my time since the last post. It's also the reason I watched the Kentucky game at home on Saturday instead of going to a Gator-watching bar. Never fear, I'm better now, with just a few traces of a cough left.

- School is consuming my life. I feel like every time I catch up on my reading, my to-do list triples in length while I'm not looking. Being sick did NOT help this.

- I tried to study at Hungarian Pastry Shop on a Saturday morning. I do not recommend this.

- I tried to study by the Central Park pool on a Saturday afternoon. I recommend this if you are less prone to distraction than I am. I was mostly focused on wanting to steal every puppy who walked by... or bask in the beauty of the day.

My view (personal photo)

- I won a happy hour at the Irish pub in Midtown where we went for Roomie S's friend's happy hour a few weeks ago. I went with a few friends last night, and it was probably the most fun I've had in a while.

- Before the happy hour, I met up with my mom's cousin and her husband for dessert at a swanky hotel restaurant, also in Midtown. They are some of my favorite people in the world to catch up with. It was absolutely lovely. And, I learned the proper terminology for our relationship: second cousins once removed. It sounds so formal and distant. I like knowing the phrase, but I probably won't ever use it.

- I found a delicious Cuban restaurant with fresh mojitos, skirt steak sandwiches, empanadas, and sweet potato fries - all to die for. It's a little pricier than most of the places I'd like to frequent, but the atmosphere just makes me feel like I'm back in Florida.

- I got paid to walk to the subway and back. I was scheduled to work for the University of Phoenix's "Learn Anywhere. Learn Everywhere." project, part of NBC's Education Nation week. But the sign language station was outside, and it was raining, so I had a feeling it would be cancelled. I got the "come on down anyway" call and headed to the subway - only to get to 125th & St Nick and learn that the lesson was cancelled due to the rain (SURPRISE), and I would be paid anyway. Sweet deal.

- Two days later, I got to go to the Education Nation lesson, but more as a student than a teacher. Basically, Miss M and I just sat and signed to each other for a few hours to attract attention. It was great.

- It is beautiful outside. Chilly, sunny, breezy. It's lovely.

- IT'S MY BIRTH MONTH! 10 days until I turn 22! Not sure what I'm doing for the big day... probably not much since it's a Tuesday. But I do have something up my sleeve for that weekend!

- The other two first years in my program and I were hired to teach a six-week continuing education ASL course to unemployed adults at a local community college. We start on Tuesday; I'm only TAing this week, but next week I'll be the lead teacher. I am nervous, excited, overwhelmed, terrified, and ready - all at the same time.

- I made the excursion to Trader Joe's. It was everything I hoped and dreamed it would be, minus the Chips With an Identity Crisis, which were sadly missing.

- I got trash talked by several Jets fans about the Miami Dolphins. I appreciate the effort, but I don't care about pro football, nor do I care about Florida-based pro-teams. Nice try though.

- I am not really living up to my promise of doing something fun and New York-y every day. I hope to remedy this soon.

That's all for now. I promise to try to be a better blogger this month. Happy October, everyone!