It's My Birthday and I'll....if I Want to...

"There is still no cure for the common birthday." ~John Glenn

Today is my birthday.

My husband is on the beach in California.

My daughter is spending the night at a friend's house.

I had planned to sit on my lazy patoosh with a nice glass of wine, some expensive chocolate, and a bag of Fritos, watching Nacho Libre or the behind the scenes of the original King Kong.

But instead I force fed my cat. Surprisingly, this activity was not born out of a sadistic desire but of necessity...she has stopped eating. Apparently cats will do that and then they can't start up again. So, to save her life we take something that smells and looks disturbingly like liver pate and a syringe and squirt several plunger's full down her unhappy throat. The whole process has gotten easier, which I'm not sure is a good thing. She doesn't fight much, nor does she throw up any more...but she just sits there and takes it. Not even when I retrieve her from under the bed...she just sits, resigned to her fate, as though even thinking about the struggle is too much effort. I wish she'd struggle just a little for that is one of the hallmarks of a cat--they are loners, walking to their own beat, or at least purposefully not walking to yours. They do what they need to do ONLY when they're good and ready to do it. And they pity the fool who tries to force them...their little razor claws and lightning fast reflexes can shred skin faster than, well, lightning. Our little Peanut was once the best and the quickest and possibly one of the largest of her breed. While prowling out of doors, she would bring home little ex-chipmunks, voles, birds, and mice just to show she could... In the house, however, she became simply The Stalker. I have caught her staring intensely at the oven as though she was trying to will it to turn on. Perhaps she was trying to conjure up her x-ray vision so as to see through the appliance, or attempting to focus all of the ESP energy from her self and all of her cat sisters to lift the giant scrap of metal out of the way of her quarry. Over the past 3 years, she has caught only two mice in the house: one was proudly placed under the coffee table in time for my surprise birthday party last year (And let me tell you, nothing says "Happy Birthday" like a dead mouse in the middle of a house full of people!) and the other we eventually found under the pedestal of our dining room table in "full-ripe" condition, if you get my, sniff, drift.

But trying to make my cat live isn't the only thing I did to celebrate the beginning of my 46th year on Planet Earth.

I also tried to download software from the internet to my computer. I know what you're thinking; you're thinking, "You idiot! Not on your birthday! It's emotional suicide!" Well, I just have one thing to say to you doubters of my technical prowess: Sebastian The Tech-Type Help Guy from Bombay (now called Mumbai) and I are now BFFs--we've even exchanged passwords and interesting data (Did you know that the population of city Bombay (now called Mumbai) and the entire population of Australia are roughly the same? OK Bombay/Mumbai is larger, but only just.) 3 hours, 20 minutes of my birthday were spent trying to protect my computer from viruses and infections. Halfway through I wanted to buy it a condom and say, "Just say 'no' to everyone."

But God brought to my house a lovely 50ish-degree day, blustery and spring-like after several weeks of biting cold while Kevin is in L.A. in the cold rain, proof that, even with everything (big or little) else, I must be his favorite

, I'm going for a walk in my polar bear pj bottoms because no one is here to tell me I can't; I'm having a diet coke and a handful of M&M's with peanuts and a handful of Cheetos too, in order to properly celebrate the me-ness that is.

birthday warning #3

"The best way to remember your wife's birthday is to forget it once."
E. Joseph Cossman

Birthday hour: three days 18 hours and thirty minutes...and counting.

Continuing the list of "joy-full-ness" includes:

*Trying to save my daughter's cat who is dead-set on starving to death;

*My husband is going to the Pacific Ocean for my birthday which also includes 6 other days while I freeze my middle-aging patoosh off amidst the frozen (but sadly snowless) bluegrass;

*It remains cold and snowless which is about as wonderful as being married and sexless or poor and homeless.

*This uplifting announcement concerning the state in which I live (by "state in which I live" I mean "Kentucky" as opposed to, say "confusion" or "panic" or "boring drivel") by the medical world. Thank you, citizens of Kentucky for making my heart healthy future a virtual impossibility.

hand over those freetos at marcyjoybryan@gmail.com

Let's Get This Party Started

Potential wise saying of the day: "I ran three miles today. Finally I said, 'Lady take your purse.'" Emo Philips

It's February 1st - the beginning of my 46th year on Planet Earth.

So far in 2007:

I've got to go get checked out for Glaucoma.

My daughter's spine is twisting like a corkscrew.

Spent the equivalent of 15 bottles of medium-priced wine on matching my hair with my eyebrows.

Yesterday my Louis Vitton purse (it was a gift from a friend, obviously) was stolen.

The good news, some kind lady found my wallet minutes after some godless punk, I mean poor, misguided soul, tossed it out onto the middle of the street. We were all amazed at the fact that my credit cards, checkbook, bank card were there. Of course my cash, what precious little there was was gone along with my even more precious Starbucks gift cards - those pagans! And strangely enough my driver's license is also missing. Oh and did I mention that my new Louis Vitton purse is also gone.

Over and over we've thanked God that they only stole those few things. We were grateful in this manner because we are fashion morons. If we personally had known the value of the purse versus what the actual value of all of the cards in my wallet, we would have torn our clothes, screaming and writhing in rage. Had I understood what I was dragging around, kicking under bleachers, tossing it un-gently in the floorboard of my not-so-cleaned truck I would have, at the very least, chained the purse to my wrist the minute I unwrapped it. Or, more likely, stapled the thing to my thigh with a staple gun. Or perhaps, knowing my fashion moronicness, I would have simply put it into the closet in its little flannel bag and let it rot.

But no, I had to actually use the darn thing, blissfully ignorant that this flap of a cow's butt is worth more than my I make in 9 months as a radio personality...Ok so that's not saying so much about my salary...but still, you can gather that it's a boatload of cash.

But it's gone. Taken by someone who understood better than I the price a new Louis Vitton would bring on the street. I, to my credit, am wiser, albeit Vitton-less, person.

Happy Birthday to me.