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A dozen roses! , originally uploaded by gina.banina.

I didn’t do the obligatory birthday blog post this year, but I absolutely should have at least mentioned this:

He got me a dozen roses!!!

I am a very, very lucky girl.

Day 160 – Make a wish!, originally uploaded by intanchly.

This weekend was the birthday of my one and only. For his birthday I made him from-scratch peanut butter cheesecake. The only cheesecake I’d ever made was a Jell-o brand cheesecake, so I was excited and nervous about this first-time endeavor. The birthday boy ate every morsel of his piece of cheesecake, so I guess I did pretty well. So far I can apparently do no wrong with my baking. :)

Being that both of us have injuries at present, the weekend was mostly spent inside and watching movies. We always watch movies I would never have picked on my own and most I have never heard of. I love it. This weekend, we watched a Bruce Campbell B-movie, a horror movie, and an odd, futuristic movie. It seems there’s little else to do when you’re both falling apart. Good thing we both love movies!

We did escape to the outdoors for a few hours Saturday evening. We spent time in nature, catching up with friends around bonfires and enjoying time with each other outside. Eventually my ankle began hurting quite a lot and we were exhausted, so we headed home. I am glad my one and only was able to get an outdoor escape this weekend.

So this coming weekend is my birthday. Plans are currently up in the air. All I know is that my guy and I will spend it together. I do have my birthday off from work. I took a vacation day. I hate working on my birthday and have done so for years now. I shall enjoy a three-day weekend, for sure… and we shall see what the weekend brings!

pretty pink tuesday, originally uploaded by patti | dearmissdoll.

“So is that what happens the closer we get to our birthdays? We fall apart?”

I asked my beloved this last night.   You see, my beloved’s birthday is coming up shortly and soon after it’ll be my own birthday. This week he developed a pinched nerve that makes it painful to sleep or walk. Yesterday it suddenly felt as if I’d sprained or twisted my ankle, but I’d done nothing to bring such pain on. Today his and my pain is worse.

Does this mean we’re getting old?

Over the past year I have connected with new friends and reconnected with old friends.  I have been in relationships and am now single again for the first time in 11 years.  I have developed an abundance of gratitude for the people in my life.

I was diagnosed with ADHD and epilepsy in February of this year and have had more doctor appointments than I can count.  I visited an ER once.  The 12th anniversary of my father’s death passed.

I have been to art shows and have been featured in an art show too.  I even won an award for one of my photographs (so I was informed this week!).  I have taken hundreds of shots this year and have become improved at composition and continue to work on other aspects of my photography. I did some modeling.

I went on a vacation to Cozumel, Mexico, and watched friends get married.  I visited friends in Detroit and DC and had a friend visit me.

The greatest Presidential campaign of my lifetime happened. I helped canvas for Obama and then watched history happen as he was named President-elect.  That will be a day I will never forget.

My 32nd year was a good one.  I can only imagine that my 33rd year will be a great one.  I couldn’t ask for more than art, friends, laughter, and peace, all of which I continue to be blessed with.

Here is my birthday countdown widget:

Born June 18, 1942, he continues to make beautiful music, speak for animal rights and vegetarianism, and live life to the fullest. Happy 66th, Paul!

Today would have been my father’s 60^th birthday had he survived cancer.  I keep trying to come up with words to explain what he meant to me, something to say that would adequately describe him, something to say at all.  Nothing comes out right, though.  All I can say now is that I love him, miss him like mad, and wish he was here to celebrate this birthday.

The first pair of Converse sneakers I owned was a pair of hunter green low-top’s.  I was 15 or 16 years old and more excited than a kid at Christmas to finally own a pair of Con’s.  I wasn’t a cool kid, but I knew what cool was and cool was definitely Converse sneakers.  I wore that pair for about five years, I think, until they were tattered, torn, and the sole was entirely worn through. The next par of Converse sneakers I owned was a pair of Navy low-top’s.  I purchased those in college.  I wore those too until they were so worn I could feel the concrete beneath my feet even as I wore the shoes.  I didn’t purchase a pair after that, though I continued (and continue) to love the shoes.

I learned about the Nike Corporation’s sweatshop practices (they purchased the Converse shoe entity) and decided to purchase the Black Spot sneaker instead.  My Blackspot sneakers have been worn out for some time and I thought I was unable to get the original Black Spot sneaker style and the newest Black Spot design, in my humble opinion, is hideous.  In honor of it being the Converse sneaker’s 123rd birthday, I will likely be purchasing at least one pair of Converse low-top sneakers with part of my tax refund – I have already filed my taxes! – but perhaps more than one pair, because there are many cute designs now.  Yes I am keeping in mind their awful sweatshop practices… Ugh… So I may also purchase a pair of the classic Black Spot sneaker too, to counterbalance my Converse purchase.

Happy 123rd birthday, Converse!

It’s the birthday of Carl Sagan, born in Brooklyn, New York in 1934, who did more to promote space exploration than almost any other single person. He died in 1996.

As a young astronomer advising NASA on a mission to send remote-controlled spacecrafts to Venus he learned that the spacecrafts would carry no cameras. Sagan couldn’t believe they would give up the chance to see an alien planet up close. It is largely thanks to him that cameras were used on later missions, giving us the first real photographs of planets.

Sagan also persuaded NASA engineers to turn the Voyager I spacecraft around on Valentine’s Day in 1990, so that it could take a picture of Earth from the very edge of our solar system, about 4 billion miles away. In the photograph, Earth appears as a tiny bluish speck. Sagan later titled one of his books “Pale Blue Dot,” impacted so greatly by this experience.

Carl Sagan, who created the TV show Cosmos, which is still the most popular science program every produced for television. He wrote a number of books, including “Pale Blue Dot,” “Contact”, and “Billions and Billions,” his last collection of essays, which came out in 1997, the year after he died.

My birthday is just 16 days from now! I love birthdays as much now as I did as a kid.  After all there are presents!!!