Birthday is Happy

If you ever wonder about what a blogger’s birthday was like in the year 2000 or year 4 B.F. (before Facebook), you’ve got to read the entries I posted between April 6 to April 8, 2000. That was the best birthday I ever had in the Bloggerville (that was before it became a Blogosphere). I really wish I still had all those voicemail messages. They were awesome!

My birthday in 2001 doesn’t sound like a very good one, though. But hey, the day after my birthday that year, I created a crappy PHP chatroom I called Quack-O-Matic, where Troy and I “talked” to each other for the very first time! Who knew that 4 years later we’d be husband and wife.

I guess my mum knew that she didn’t have much time left in this world because she really tried to make my birthday in 2002 the best one ever. She had a caterer cook all my favourite birthday food and made me feel so loved that even my dad couldn’t ruin the day for me.

You’ve gotta check out my birthday post from 2003! It’s got a picture of me and my mum when I was a baby! I forgot I had that one. Such an awesome picture. It also has a picture of me in 2003. I looked so tired. I probably was. My mum was already very sick by then. Bedridden and all. It wasn’t a very happy birthday. 2003 was such a horrible year. Oh, if you read the post and want to know the answer to the “what’s in the monkey’s mouth” question, it is in this entry.

I wrote a long birthday post conveying a wide range of emotions — from happy to sad, from hopeless to hopeful — in 2004. I wrote that “life might get better.” And it did! I’m a frickin’ clairvoyant! 😉 The trip I was talking about was the trip to England, and then Canada, and then back to England, and then Indonesia. Troy and I met in person for the first time in May 28, 2004 at the airport in Toronto. I left Canada in September 2004 only to go back a month later.

I’ve always had a good birthday ever since I moved to Canada but man, my birthday posts from Canada are sooo boring! In 2005, I only talked about some stupid dream I had the night before my birthday. And it was my first Canadian birthday! It was also the day we told Troy’s parents that we were getting married in a month! I should’ve put more effort into it.

My birthday post from 2006 is a little better. I cared enough to write about the circumstances of my birth. My birthday in 2007 was probably the most eventful birthday I ever had in Canada. I even got a real birthday cake with my name on it! But I didn’t blog about it until, like, four days after my birthday. Slacker.

Worse still, in 2008, not only did I wait four days before posting about my birthday, I only wrote two paragraphs in the post, only one of which was about my birthday and it didn’t say anything other than the fact that it was a good one! Blasphemy! Now I really don’t remember what I got for my birthday last year! All I remember is that I had a whole birthday weekend plus Monday full of presents and culinary experience (read: dining out). It was an awesome birthday, dammit!

My birthday this year (i.e., today) has been pretty low-key. Troy wished me a happy birthday and gave me a couple of presents before he left for work in the morning: a book on soft toy-making and accessories for my current favourite board game, Agricola (so I’m a board game geek, sue me). I’m also supposed to be getting a bike from him but I still haven’t found a bike that I like. After checking out a bike store downtown, we went to a Chinese restaurant for my birthday dinner and after that, we bought a lottery ticket because I was feeling lucky. 🙂 I wouldn’t mind winning 9 million dollars.

Oh, one thing that I would want to remember in the coming years is that this is my first white birthday! The ground is covered with snow and it’s still snowing! I like snow and stuff but I don’t think I like it when it’s falling like crazy in April. It’s just not right!

Addendum: I started my attempt to germinate three avocado seeds today: two in water, one in soil. Will let you know if any of them sprouts. The avocado plant I started from seed two years ago is still alive but it could use a friend!