It was my birthday on Sunday. Back in January, Katr asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday and since last year was so spectacular, I said to surprise me! AND SHE DID.
Firstly, she kicked off my birthday month with this blond beauty:
If you're not a knitter, you don't give a shit about this thing. But to turn a skein of yarn into a ball (which you must do before beginning to knit), you usually have to wind it by hand and it can take a LONG time. It once took me 3 hours to wind a particularly fractious ball of silk lace and by the time I'd finished, I was too tired and sore to start knitting. Come to think of it, I've NEVER knit anything with that silk lace. See? Trauma.
This combo of gadgets allowed me to wind a skein into a ball in about 2 minutes.
Jealous??
I'm in love. Hat tip to fellow knitter Jebr for suggesting this particular ball winder and swift to Katr! Heh heh...yeah. Balls.
Next, Katr nurtured my latest obsession by getting me a subscription to the most hilarious magazine ever created: Village D-Lights, the magazine for Department 56 crazy super fans.
It's like your grandma writes this magazine and her friend Phyllis takes the pictures. It is indeed a d-light and I can't get enough. Also, Katr got me a copy of Village D-Tails, a collector's guide, so that I can obsess over all the village pieces she'll now have to get for me on eBay. Score!
Then there was my birthday cake. Now, my ideal birthday cake is an ice cream cake from Baskin & Robbins. But there's no Baskin & Robbins here and Dairy Queen "cakes" are, frankly, ass. Finding a good reliable purveyor of cake here has been harder than it should be...but then, Katr discovered MANCAKES Bakery.
Here's what you need to know about MANCAKES:
- They are cupcakes made by men
- Those men will bring the cupcakes to your house
- The cupcakes are fucking delicious
- Okay, the Buffalo Wing flavour was a little weird, but the rest of them...AMAZING
Seriously, Vancouverites - MANCAKES Bakery. KNOW ABOUT THEM.
As for my actual birthday day - I thought it would be pretty hard for Katr to top last year. I could SAY I had no expectations, but that wouldn't be true - I sort of figured that after our glamourous downtown overnighter last year, she'd tone it down this year and maybe take me somewhere new for dinner.
And I figured she'd probably invite our friends Doai and Elai, because we often share birthday fun with them (not in a swinger way, YOU PERVS...just in a tasting menu/high tea kind of way). So I was kind of surprised and a little sad when they came by two days before my birthday to bring me a birthday gift because "they weren't going to see me on my birthday." Huh. Well, maybe they had other plans...or maybe Katr had something special planned for just the two of us! But WHAT?? Katr refused to divulge.
As my birthday dinnertime approached, we drove to Kitsilano (not to the Richmond IKEA, where Katr kept saying we were going for dinner) and pulled up in front of Hapa Izakaya, a Japanese restaurant we'd never been to. As we walked in, I saw that the place was full of lovely intimate booths for two and the hostess led us to our table...set for 12. WTF?
Well, it turns out that Katr had invited 10 of our friends to join us for dinner. And that all of those friends had known about this for MONTHS and hadn't said anything. And that Doai and Elai had brought me my present early simply to DEKE ME OUT so that I would be completely and totally surprised.
AND I WAS!!
HAHAHAHAAA!!
So basically, Katr is SUPER awesome and hilarious and sweet and wonderful and everyone who came and got Sunday drunk with us is also super awesome and sweet and wonderful and even though it was three days ago, I still feel a little drunk. Because I drank A LOT. 'Cause those Hello Kitties go down smooth. And now that I'm older, I hold my liquor even more poorly.
