happy birthday to me

Yes, that's right, it's the most important and exciting day of the year, my birthday. And though I am, in the common parlance, "turning 28", Dr. Nathan, PhD, correctly and astutely observed (in the comments section of yesterday's post) that I am actually beginning my 29th year of life, having finished my 28th (it's the same reason that the 1900s were the "20th century"). Of course, this observation, correct and insightful though it may be, just makes me feel older. Thanks a lot, Dr. Smartypants. =)

Actually, I'm not really stressed out about getting older. My 20s have been a long, difficult learning process (I'm not complaining; they've also been fabulous and fortunate), and you couldn't pay me to go back to being the 22-year-old moron that I was 6 years ago (no offense, E and H--I was much dumber than you guys when I was 22, trust me).

Speaking of E and H, they are currently my personal heroes, because not only did they take me out for a yummy thai dinner, they efficiently and correctly assembled my new Ikea full-sized loft bed while I watched, drank a glass of wine, and played a game of Scrabble on my computer. I even took some pictures of the construction process (view them carefully: the testosterone may literally fly off of the screen at you).

Doing something manly (and really loud, if I recall correctly) with a hammer.

If you look carefully, you can see my reflection in the mirror as I lounge in my papazan chair with my computer in my lap, idly snapping pictures of my almost-completed bed while E and H toiled away just out of camera range.

The bed came in three boxes and about 2 tons of plastic wrap. I almost got one bag of plastic stuck in the garbage chute.

So, the bed is fully assembled, and I slept in it last night without mishap. I will post some more pictures of the completed bed and the birds-eye view of my apartment that I now enjoy from it (as soon as I make the bed and tidy up the apartment a little). I discovered that the power and DSL cords of my laptop will reach up to the bed, so I can continue to check my email every thirty seconds and fall asleep to episodes of Law & Order that I've downloaded from iTunes. It is sort of interesting to have to climb a ladder to get to my bed, however; it makes things like having a glass of water in bed slightly more complicated.

Oh, and just for the record, I believe I have the mental and physical accuity to have put the bed together myself (although an extra pair of hands would have been almost certainly a necessity), but I just wasn't in the mood for this particular challenge, so I let E and H lend me their mental and physical strength as a birthday gift. I certainly don't mean to perpetuate the girls-can't-build-stuff stereotype. That is, after all, my hammer and my screwdriver they are using.

I have class in 5 hours, and prior to that I'm supposed to be going through our data to find out which borrowers we're missing information for (and now that I've finally watched all two months of Colbert Report clips online, I can finally move on to real work). So it's back to the grind for this birthday girl.