Today I am 29. There are only 365 more days (364, if you don’t count today) until I am a grumpy old 30-year-old, so I’d better enjoy this fresh-faced youth while I have it. I’m already getting a little bit old and grumpy. It made me irritable yesterday when we were driving home from work and whippersnappers were throwing a football back and forth from opposite sides of the street. Stupid whippersnappers.

I’m all pumped up for a fun day, though. Denny woke me up this morning by singing Happy Birthday to me, and then he gave me my birthday prezzies. He gave me this really beautiful necklace; it’s hard to describe, but it’s small aquamarine-colored glass cubes strung on four vertical wires, so it makes kind of a square grid, about 3/4″ x 3/4″. It’s very unusual and cool. He also gave me a laser printer so I can finally achieve my dream of printing customized shopping lists (and, you know, other stuff like writing).

Denny and I are taking the afternoon off for some recreation and relaxation, including trying the lunch fare at Prairie Table. I’ll also assemble the almond cake I posted about a while back, which I baked last night. This afternoon my parents are coming over, and we’ll do more presenty fun (this is a belated celebration for Denny’s birthday, too), then go out to Mount Vernon for a delightful dinner. Then, assuming we have the energy, we’ll all go to No Shame. My parents haven’t been to No Shame in a while, but I think they’ll do ok. Frankly, it’s been pretty tame lately anyway. Unfortunately, two very solid writers are out of town tonight, so I’m afraid it won’t be a very good show. Oh well; I’m reasonably happy with the piece I wrote, so we’ll see.

Most exciting of all, tomorrow we’re going to Dubuque to see my cousin Debi’s new baby. She’s over three weeks old now, and I’ve never even seen her once (the baby, I mean; Debi’s older than that and I’ve seen her lots of times).