Author: Average Jane

Yesterday turned out to be a delightful birthday. I got to work early, knowing that I’d be eating lunch while I worked and would be able to leave early. My friend and co-worker, Mojokittycat, brought in one of the best German chocolate cakes I’ve ever had, thus giving me the opportunity to make sure everyone in the office knew it was my birthday, without my having to go around saying so.

I left work around 4:45 p.m. and headed to my favorite nail shop to get a birthday pedicure – my husband’s birthday gift to me (at my request). I chose a color called “I Love the Holidays,” which seemed appropriate to the festive spirit of my b-day. In the bottle it looked like a pearly red; on my toes it looks more hot pink, but that’s okay.

After that, my husband and I met up with my sister and her family and my dad and stepmother at a Japanese steakhouse. We had a giant, multi-course meal: soup, salad, grilled entree (I chose the filet mignon), vegetables, rice and finally some sherbet-laced ice cream. My sister got me the fifth season of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” on DVD (note to self: cross that one off Amazon wish list…) and my dad stuck with cold, hard cash (yay!). I’m planning to use the money to get my hair done, if the hairdresser ever calls me back…

While we were at the restaurant, I got a phone call that gave me the opportunity to swiftly and fairly painlessly get myself out of my obligation to do the club newsletter that I’m always complaining about. I promised to get the latest one to the printer by the end of the week (personal goal: tonight). After that, I’m off the hook. I can hardly express what an enormous relief it will be to have that particular project off my slate. That may have been the best birthday gift of all!

Last but not least, thank you to all my readers who posted birthday greetings yesterday. It made a lovely day even nicer.

Today is my birthday and I’m feeling a bit petulant about the number of meetings I have to attend at work. They run from late morning through early afternoon, which means no birthday lunch. This is, of course, completely unacceptable.

Even though I am now in my late thirties, I cannot foresee a day when I will cease to anticipate and enjoy my birthday. I can’t begin to identify with people who say, “Oh, I don’t even pay attention to my birthdays anymore.”

What? How could you not care about your birthday?!? It’s the one day of every year that’s all about you! Everyone honors the day you made your appearance on the earth, wishes you well, buys you meals and drinks (if you’re lucky), gives you nice gifts (if you’re really lucky) and generally acknowledges that the day is yours.

When my birthday is coming up, I make sure everyone knows it. I start the helpful Birthday Countdown for my family, friends and co-workers. “Hmm,” I’ll say thoughtfully, “It’s June 7th. This time next month, it’ll be my birthday.”

On my actual birthday, I’ll mention it in passing to everyone I encounter. “Thanks for the cafe mocha,” I’ll say, then remark casually, “What a great way to start my birthday! …A free blueberry scone? Oh, I couldn’t…well, I…okay!”

It’s the day I unleash my rampaging Birthday Girl id to shout, “Put ME out! I’M on fire!” It’s okay – my Older and Wiser Girl superego can make any necessary apologies in the morning.

It probably helps that I couldn’t care less what age I am. Sure, I notice the grey hairs and crows’ feet and the fact that I’m one of the oldest people in my office. Still, the number itself is pretty meaningless. Just keep the cake and ice cream coming and everything will be fine…

Yesterday turned out to be one of those fun, yet tiring, activity-packed days that often seem to crop up on the third day of a three-day weekend.

My sister, my niece and I headed to the zoo in the late morning and spent a good portion of the afternoon there. We’d packed a picnic lunch including turkey and ham sandwiches, chips, and strawberry shortcakes for dessert. Our zoo is large enough that it isn’t possible to see everything before complete exhaustion sets in, so we settled for one big loop around and a bird show before calling it quits.

After that, we dropped my niece off at home and my sister and I met my husband at the movie theater to see “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.” I enjoyed seeing it again and I stand by my assertion that it’s the best Harry Potter movie so far.

By the time the movie let out, it was dinnertime, so we retrieved my niece so my brother-in-law could go into work, and headed out to a restaurant for hamburgers.

There wasn’t a lot of excitement yesterday (well, until we had a huge lightning storm in the middle of the night), but it was a great way to end the holiday weekend.

Today: back to work. Tomorrow: it’s my birthday! (but I’ll be at work anyway…darn.)

No work today! Even though Independence Day fell on Sunday this year, we still have Monday off from work for some reason. Hooray!

My husband and I took it easy yesterday. We did a little shopping in the afternoon and returned home to do some rearranging of the beta tanks. Mine has been moved to the living room so we can keep an eye on both fish at once. This displaced more house plants from on top of the television; one particularly unhealthy-looking specimen is now outside getting some much-needed rain and sun. I added an item to my beta’s tank which had been labeled “Large Jaguar Skull.” It serves as a great cave in which the fish can hide, and it looks really cool, too. Next to the tiny fish, you can imagine it as a dragon’s skull. Well, I can anyway.

We considered trying to find a nearby fireworks display last night, but we both agreed that it wasn’t a high priority. It’s just not worth it to fight a huge crowd to find a spot in a bug-infested meadow to sit for 45 minutes with your neck craned at an unnatural angle to watch explosions in the sky. To be perfectly honest, ever since September 11, 2001, the trappings of July 4th make me a bit edgy. I’m not comfortable with the sound of random explosions in my neighborhood (and let’s not even talk about all the planes buzzing by on their way to various air shows).

Today the plan is to go to the zoo with my sister and my niece. We had a huge thunderstorm last night, but our local meterologists claim that the rain is pretty much over for the day. It’ll probably get chokingly humid as the temperature rises, but that’s par for the course. After that, we’re considering a trip to the movie theater, sans niece, to see the latest Harry Potter movie. My sister hasn’t seen it yet and my husband and I are eager to see it again.

Well, off I go to fix protein shakes for breakfast and make sure we’re still going to the zoo. Have a lovely Monday!

For about an eight-month stretch in late 1999 through early 2000, I had a wonderful dotcom job, made even more wonderful by a close-knit family of co-workers. We developed, maintained and promoted websites during the day and often socialized together in the evenings.

For a long time after the company moved/folded, the former employees continued to get together on the first Thursday of every month to keep in touch. It had been a while since our last event, so I sent out an Evite a couple of weeks ago to get a group together last night.

We met at a downtown restaurant and bar with a big patio and enjoyed a lovely evening outside. Eventually we had a group of about 13 people who stayed and chatted until it began to get dark. We caught up on all the new jobs and new babies and had an informal “where are they now?” roundtable regarding everyone who didn’t manage to join us this time. A lot has changed for all of us since we worked together, but the camaraderie remains.

Almost every year, my husband and I throw a big backyard party and invite pretty much everyone we know. Over the past few years, the guest list has grown to almost 200 people, and we ordinarily end up with at least 50 or 60 in attendance. We had considered skipping the party this year to economize, but I think we’ll go ahead with it in mid to late September and plan it as a potluck. Last night reminded me how rewarding it is to stay connected with my friends. Why pass up a chance to keep that going?

I got my car back from the mechanic yesterday! It had spent about two months in the shop – mostly waiting for the head to be rebuilt and shipped back from California – and I didn’t realize just how much I’d missed it until I got it back.

It was supposed to be ready after six o’clock, so my husband and I stopped by right at 6:30 p.m. only to learn that it would be ready in “about another half an hour.” I had company coming, so I left my husband there and headed home to make Spanish rice and Nicaraguan beans to complement the tamales I’d purchased after work.

Some of my guests had already arrived and the beans were nearly ready when I saw a red version of my car pull into the driveway. It turned out there was a problem getting my timing belt to remain at the proper tension, so my husband caught a ride home with one of our friends who happened to have stopped by the mechanic’s shop to visit.

Eight other women and I had a lovely party on the deck with the aforementioned food, some wine (including a weird Riesling that came in a pink, cat-shaped bottle), Coronas, and chocolate chip cookies and chocolate cake for dessert. I ate way too much, drank an incredible (for me) three Coronas in a row, and stayed up far too late.

At about 9 p.m., my husband popped outside to tell me that my car was ready! Our mechanic had stayed at the shop and worked doggedly on my car until it was finished. Hubby took my emergency backup car, left it at the auto shop and returned with my car. It was purring like a new car – the rebuilt engine sounds completely different than it ever has since we’ve owned the car. You’d never guess it was a 17-year-old vehicle.

Unfortunately, my husband didn’t know to retrieve the magnetic card that I need to get into my parking lot at work, so I’ll have to stop by and get it this morning. I don’t mind – it’ll give me a chance to take over a “thank you” gift for the extra effort our mechanic put into the job. I was going to bake a batch of blueberry scones, but I’m out of flour so I think I’ll just get a selection of pastries from a bakery.

Best of all, the engine rebuild and all the associated labor ended up being significantly cheaper than the original estimate. How’s that for good news?!

In a break with tradition, I thought I’d include a photo today to illustrate my story. Ever since we moved to this house, we’ve seen a ginger-colored rabbit in the yard every spring and summer. It might be a natural variation, but my guess is that someone “freed” a pet rabbit which managed to keep its bloodline going with the help of an accommodating wild bunny. I can’t say for sure how many of these rabbits we have around; this may be the first and only one, but it looks less time-ravaged than I remember. (Click the photo for a little bit closer look.)

I think it’s a testament to the relatively predator-free qualities of our area that such a noticeable bunny manages to survive. Even my cat, The Weasel, didn’t manage to wipe out the light-colored rabbits during her reign as Scourge of the Cottontails.

I tried to take a photo of this(?) rabbit a couple of mornings ago as it attempted to hide in the grass of our back yard. As eye-catching as it is, I spotted it right away but I had to give it points for effort. It was hunkered down pretty well, and even managed to mostly disappear – at least from my vantage point – after it stretched and flattened itself below the height of the grass.

The photo above was taken yesterday evening from about six feet away. As you might guess, these bunnies are not characterized by overreaction to the potential of danger.

All the domestic animals are doing pretty well except that The Possum has begun pulling out tufts of her fur again, so she’s probably due for a follow-up chiropractor appointment. The other cats are just doing what cats do in the summertime: sprawling on the cool floor all day long.

The new beta fish settled in nicely and spends a lot of time building bubble nests at one corner of the tank, only to see them drawn inexorably into the filter and destroyed. It doesn’t seem to faze him, though. Since he appears to be thriving, I suppose he can be officially named Phoenix now. I just hope that doesn’t jinx him.

I received another call yesterday from a financial planner who would love to help me take my vast riches and parlay them into a jewel-encrusted cave full of treasure chests. The only problem with that plan is my complete lack of vast riches, including the vast riches it takes to, say, pay more than the minimum on my bills.

Three years of inefficient self-employment left a big dent in my financial wherewithal, which I am now working valiantly to correct. I always thought that I lived pretty frugally to begin with, but now that all of my income is going directly to bills and food, I realize that I’d come to appreciate a few luxuries after all.

Rather than complain like the spoiled yuppie I am, my plan is to get together with my husband, finally make a spreadsheet to get a realistic budget put together, and see what we can actually do to get things put right. Even though my husband and I are the grasshopper and the ant, respectively, I think we can reach a compromise and at least take some of the mystery out of each other’s financial situation.

In the meantime, I’ll paint my own toenails ($25 savings, but no foot rub, darn it), put Flexall on my back when my muscles are sore ($80 savings over a deep-tissue massage, although much less therapeutic), find a cheaper hairdresser so I can stay blonde (I spent years in the nineties with a dark spot on the back of my head from dyeing my own hair – I’m not doing that again), and rely on Rodney Yee for exercise instruction each morning (at least until the VCR breaks). If all goes well, I’ll be back to wasting money on cafe mochas and unnecessary pairs of shoes in no time!

I recently skimmed back over a bunch of my old blog entries and discovered that I have a lot of misconceptions about my own habits. Take weekend naps, for instance.

Every time I mention that I took a nap on a Saturday or Sunday, I say it was “unusual” or “uncharacteristic.” Put five or six weeks’ worth of these mentions in a row and suddenly it ain’t such a big surprise when I nod off on a lazy Sunday afternoon! No, far from being unprecedented, my weekend naps are practically a standing appointment (and this weekend proved to be no exception).

I also learned that I eat fast food more often than I’d like to admit. That might explain why I’m having such a difficult time staying at my current jeans size.