GOGO BIRTHDAY UPDATE VERY LATE.

But real quick: HAPPY BIRTHDAY insomanywords, I love you!

My birthday was pretty rockin', man. Even though it was like, man, I'm only 20, that's nothing special, I had SUCH a good day and I really was excited. Plus I got to spend the weekend before at child_labor's AND I GOT TO SEE JAVY'S NIPPLES, MAN how much better can THAT get? what more could I ask for?

So, yeah, I definitely had to work on my birthday, which is why I never actually got to sit down and post anything of value. I actually enjoyed it for the most part, though -- it gave me something to do, and I had the NEXT day off, so it wasn't no big deal. I bought myself a cute pack of birthday stickers and stuck them on myself and instead of my nametag I put "It's my birthday! :D" on a sticker nametag -- which seemed to actually DETER guys from hitting on me, laughably enough. They don't seem to have a problem normally, but for some reason when they had to start their sentences with "Oh, hey, happy birthday," they fell out of the groove. Or something. I was smirking. How does a birthday mess up your game, man? I'll never know. It was a welcome relief, though.

Man but it sure doesn't stop the fucking redneck hicks hitting on me every other night.

The next day I had off was kind of a disappointment because derived_joy and I were supposed to decorate my cake together (it's tradition!) but with all the shit's that been going on in HIS life he missed out so after a bit of miscommunication we agreed to meet later in the week. Like. Friday.

.... 'cause I get to celebrate my birthday this Friday with insomanywords and company.

Thank you to everyone who e-mailed me, posted something on an internet medium I frequent (read as: Facebook for my college friends, Andrea, Aimee, Nakia, Martin, Cynthia) and yes squallfan I got your voicemail. ♥ And happy birthday to Rico who wished me a happy birthday as well, I miss you you fucking Latino. :(

Also, thank you to the Garden for making my birthday morning a wonderful experience: baronmind, spr0cket, randomcyn,bluespacething, Lopey, Gem, Maeldwyn, Double-LL, and everyone else.

Here's some pictures from my weekend with Lexi, hotlinked for your pleasure until I get off my ass and host them myself:


I was playing with Lexi's camera on the ride back from Baltimore. I COULDN'T RESIST.

( More utterly random scenic views +4 )

In an effort to do something together my mom opted to take the two of us to Amelia Island for a one hour guided ride along the beach. Amelia Island is only an island (to me) in the sense that it is actually surrounded on all four sides by water, but it's so connected to Northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia that you'd never know it wasn't actually attached somewhere. It, along with Little Talbot and Big Talbot Islands (who for all intents and purposes might as well not be considered islands even though by definition they are, either) is home to a state park, and also might as well be a state park in its entirety if you disregard the fact it's big enough to also have residency. Anyway. None of them are their own entities, anyway: it's all just referred to as Fernandina Beach. And isn't that far from my house. Maybe a thirty, forty minute drive at tops. It takes longer for me to get to Laura's house across town.

The scenery is really pretty, and I'm surprised I don't go more often. The last time I was there I must have been six or so -- we went to the Talbot Islands for some school fieldtrip.

I digress.

I have pictures. Not a lot, since most of our pictures were taken on a standard camera, but I did snatch a few at the stables with my digital of the horses. We weren't allowed to have cameras on the ride, but I do have two pictures from that (capitalism at its best, they offer pictures from the ride for you to purchase).



( Onward. )

The ride was highly enjoyable. It was very fuckin' bright outside but I endured, 'cause my sunglasses (my babies!) could block out a nuclear explosion. God, I love those things. And they were only like $15 at Target, very durable, and I've had them for a couple of years now. That's how much I love them.

My horse was named Ted, and he was an asshole. I say this because he only did things when he felt like doing them (actually reminds me a lot of my ex), and for the great majority of the ride pretended to ignore me. Within a few minutes of me being on his back we'd established our relationship quite well: he didn't like me, wasn't interested in me, and would rather I wasn't there, thank you. I told him he was an asshole and that if he didn't want my boots in his side he'd listen and we'd get along just fine from there. Needless to say by the second half of the ride we were actually getting along quite well.

I admit I was nervous about kicking him too hard -- I'm not used to riding horses that require a kick. Most of the horses I've ridden have been trained to go forward at a click and a squeeze of the knees -- I'm also used to guiding with my knees and only lightly with the reins -- while these horses had been trained only to go forward/pick up their pace with a good HARD kick (I seriously thought I was going to bruise him before I'd get him to pick up into a trot) and would only be led by the reins. ... oh, and the rein-leading? He totally would not agree with me on that. I pretty much let him go where he wanted because he amused me far too much; every time I laid the reins to the side to direct him he'd shake his head violently at me and snort.

So despite the fact we are very disagreeable with each other, it was an enjoyable ride. I'm not violent towards animals, so if they don't agree with me, I'm cool with it. I guess because of that Ted and I had a somewhat working relationship, all things considered. x)

It was a beautiful ride, too. There were cars and people allowed on the beach so we passed quite a few of those, but the dunes were pretty, and the beach was actually forest-lined, so one one side we had the ocean and on the other we had beachy woodlands. Still, I never suggest trotting on the beach. Not only is it the bumpiest gate normally, but the sand is mucho sink-like and makes the bounces quite abrupt and jarring. Of course, thanks to Ted, most of my ride /was/ spent trotting, simply because he kept letting himself fall behind in the line. I was last in line, which to me made it more enjoyable. I only had to worry about the people in front of me, no one in the back, so it was nice and leisurely, especially since there were only two guides (one leading the line, and another riding back and forth beside the rest of us) and the both pretty much stayed in the front for the duration of the ride. (Well, one of them had to.)

I couldn't sit down yesterday, thanks to Ted. :/ You bastard. I still hurt quite a bit -- I have never hurt this much from a horse ride period -- but it's going away. And besides, it was worth it.

I baked a cake today.

And what is cuter and more hilarious than Oliver discovering the wonderfulness of momma's yellow cake batter, and subsequently ending with it smeared all over her face? Watching her spend forever trying to lick it all off, and then nose the bowl for more, made me giggle very, very much.



Nothing, and that is a fact.

( More Oliver )

This is going to be an Oliver Update, Complete with Pictures, and I apologize for being such a horrible mommy as to not provide regular updates, or even regular pictures. This house has been kind of crazy the past few months and I think only the cats are the only ones who see it all as perfectly normal, or at least acceptable.

PS: By the way, if any of you are Jean's friends (or anyone who knows Oliver, for that matter!), don't be afraid to pop up and inquire about Oliver on here or other posts in my journal. I don't bite. ;3 And I don't mind in the least.

( But it's long so here's a cut. )

mood: awake ;p // music: daddy yankee - mami no me dejes solo

Oliver has settled in quite nicely! It only took a short time to coax him to play games with me, after I let him explore my room. He was zoom-zooming all over the place after his sparkly bell-toy, and even took to attempting to pounce his own tail from time to time when it unexpectedly showed up in the corner of his eye. It was like he went, "..! What's that! ::Pounce!::"

We played for an hour or two, and I got everything of his setup in various corners of the room, got his food and water, and got his little papasan-tent set up. We had a bit of an argument over that, as I had to lift the top of the papasan chair up to get the blanket spread out for the tent, and it's a pretty big piece, so he spent a good minute in the corner hissing at me for spooking him. It was okay, though, because five seconds after I finished getting the tent set up, he was playing with me again.

His favorite game seems to be gnawing on my hand, which was the exact way Katie was when she was little (she's still that way, in fact). He loves grabbing onto my hand with all four of his paws and rolling onto his back so he can chew on my fingertips.

He has a fascination with my ceiling fan -- or more appropriately, the switch-string for controlling the fanblades. If you've ever seen a picture of my room, you'd know that I have the length of it tripled by a decorative pull, and then a black ribbon tied to that and left to dangle. (Why? Because it makes it so much easier to reach in the middle of the night when I want the fan on/off. All I have to do is lean up and snag it.) Oliver hasn't -yet- tried to leap from the bed towards it to try and pounce it, but he's made several starts and I don't doubt he will eventually.

He slept in bed with me last night -- he loves jumping off just to climb back up the side again -- and we both got fairly good sleep. This morning, he was back to racing around a mile-a-minute, and insisted on waking me up. By chewing on my hand, of course. And then he fox-pounced all over my bed (I have a queen size, plenty of room), with his little back arched, fox-pouncing my arm, my legs, my feet (look, the toes wriggle!), and my head. Yes, my head. He seems to have taken an utter fascination with my hair and pounces my head whenever he can. He's such a goober.

So, in short, Oliver is doing very well, and has settled into his new home almost immediately. He likes peeking out from underneath my pillow when people open my door. ;p

EDIT: ( cuteness asplode )