Birthday Remix and Other Scattered Recountings

Harry's birthday recap: I took him to Flea Street Cafe in Menlo Park where we had a delicious dinner. It's the most unassuming restaurant from the outside, but man! My second course had locally grown golden and dark red beets sliced paper thin with layers of goat cheese in between them in four little towers. It was better than any dessert I've ever had. I was-- (speechless).

Then we came home and Harry opened gifts. One of these gifts was a flier I created and emailed him, letting him know that we are going to take a flying trapeze class. Yes, this is real. Video footage of his reaction is below (please disregard the messy desk in the background-- it was finals week, and not a good week for "clean up your stuff on the desk!" demands):

 

 The sad part is that, because I've been saddled with a fever and cough to rival that of most chain smokers, we'll have to reschedule the Trapeze lesson. #epicbirthdayfail. Good thing I married a good sport.

On an unrelated note, I've gotten into a funny habit lately. I've actually been thinking about what life will be like when we no longer live in this apartment. Will we have a bathroom counter? A toilet with a tank? A dishwasher? A washer and drier? Enough counter space to accommodate a microwave (so that it doesn't have to sit on our dinner table)? Air conditioning? A (brace yourself) sofa that is three cushions long instead of two?

I think these things, and then my knee jerk reaction is: "Psh, no." I have this strange sense of acceptance. Acceptance of the fact that I just know that I will always live in 500 square feet, in this building, on the seventh floor, devoid of most modern day appliances. And, as Celine Dion warbled in the late 90's, "that's the way it is." Just like how Christian Bale will always be a Newsie to me, no matter how many Batman movies he makes. To this day, I look at him, and all I see is:

In other news, my cousin Becca and her main loving man Art have really done it. They have moved to Spain for the next year (ish) so Art can attend graduate school. This will make video chatting considerably more difficult since she is now perpetually eight hours ahead of me. The laws of Cousin-dom demand that I will probably have to go visit her at some point while they live there. And the laws of Cousin-dom are unflinchingly rigid.

What's funny about this is that Becca has lived in Spain before. In college, I went to London one winter, and the next winter, she went to Spain. And while she was in Spain, I went on my very first dates with Harry (about six months before we ever became an item). I emailed her about these dates with creepy and obsessive levels of detail. In fact, here is a choice tidbit. Written by me, to Becca, on February 20th, 2007 (necessary context: Harry had taken me to a little concert put on by some friends, and then we watched a movie back at his apartment with a few roommates. I also hadn't eaten dinner. Because I wasn't sure if we were going to be eating dinner together.):

 around 11 pm i started feeling hungry, and when i feel hungry my stomach is amazingly noisy and there's nothing i can do to stop it. so i prayed hard- we're talking feverish continuous prayers- that it would either be quiet or i'd find a way to eat something so that it would stay quiet. thank goodness his cousin joe offered me a reese's peanut butter cup and i ate it and seriously becca, the rest of the time i felt like my stomach was about to start growling but it NEVER DID!! i was so suprised and so so so grateful. the Church is true. 

 And while I'm making nonsensical segues, look at what is next on my list of things to sew!

All you need are two yards of knit fabric and some elastic thread (unless you own a serger, in which case, forget the elastic thread, and in which case, that is awesome). I plan to make one in every color and wear nothing else this summer.

And with that, I leave you. If you were sitting here next to me, you'd hear my rumbling and hacking cough and see my vacant, glazed eyes and say what my sister E said to me last night when I saw her via FaceTime: "Sarah, you look soooo sick." It's so true, I couldn't even summon the emotional energy to be miffed.

Off to slide some more Tylenol down the old gullet,
S.A.R.