I've never enjoyed working on a birthday. Perhaps its a fault of parents everywhere who make a big deal of a child on his birthday, but for some reason I have always felt like my birthday was supposed to be something special and was supposed to be acknowledged (preferably by not going to work or school). In any event I went to work, and not one person wished me happy birthday (though I don't know how many ever knew in the first place, and I did not draw attention to myself). All was not lost for a good friend decorated our MUSH with a birthday banner, balloons, a pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey poster, and birthday popper things (for those confused souls out there our MUSH is just a text-based virtual world where my fiends and I gather to chat; its very geeky and you probably aren't missing much if you aren't already there).

Having thus summed up the majority of my birthday the rest should be easy enough to mention. Holly and I went out to Thompson's and dinned al fresco which in Salem is a rare thing. It was pleasant, and the food was as good as it usually is. Upon returning home we had a slice of cake and I unwrapped my final present, a U of O hat which I will be able to wear during he up-coming football season and cheer my team on! I did get my promised back rub, but instead of lulling me to sleep it has unkinked a few knots and I find myself a little more invigorated, so here I sit, spending the final minutes of my birthday writing it all down.

To measure one's birthday by one's gifts is too materialistic to be tolerated, however to reflect on the love of one's family and friends as evidenced by their tokens (in the form of gifts) is a different matter. Apart from the game and the hat I have a neat little collection of birthday cards on display in our parlour, and some kind souls have included gift certificates and other forms of currency. I have more than I expected, more than I could have hoped for, enough to make some of my smaller dreams come true, but not enough to make them all come true. It's a fun little exercise really, to examine my list of things which I have put off buying feeling they were far too self-indulgent, but now I can (and should I argue) purchase them on behalf of friends and family. (For those curious minds I'm debating between getting Descent: Journeys in the Dark, which I thought was far too expensive to ever own, or Mall of Horror and Mystery of the Abbey. It's a hard choice, and I need to figure out which will get played more, and which will be worth more to me to own.)

In truth my actual birthday was a quiet affair, mostly unrecognized by the world and those around me, and in some strange way I rather enjoyed that. I was celebrating my birthday surreptitiously, playing my own little game of cloak and dagger. Besides, I got to drag out my birthday across at least two days, and I have on friend to wants to help me celebrate even more later this week by indulging me in a game few will play with me. So far 29 isn't all that bad. So far.