Birthday(s?) in Bullet Points

[lethalpenguin]

My birthday officially began three hours ago as of this writing, but I've already had two days of great fun related to it. Highlights thus far include...

Friday:

• Hanging out with rivetpepsquad and meeting new and nice people at Friday night's "Palacio de Peligro" shindig at SF's... interesting Porn Palace venue. RPS and I got a really nifty photo booth pic that I've scanned and will share in my next b-day related post.
• Getting to witness (and partake in) apoundofflesh's bartending skills at said event.
  
• Potential drinks / dinner in the cards with a very sweet acquaintance of RPS and Z's who is OMG totally into Boingo / Burton / Nightmare , funny as hell, and who I seem to have hit it off very well with.

    Saturday:

• Going to Berkeley on a whim earlier today to check out the new, larger Anime V, with hopes of getting myself a little b-day gift. It turns out they had a Macross collectible I came incredibly close to buying when I was last in Tokyo and is in scarce supply on the web. So I ended up getting it, along with the complete series of Gungrave (excellent sci-fi crime syndicate action/drama from the artist who did Trigun), which I've been wanting for more than a year, for half of Amazon's price. Woot!
• Accompanying corpsefairy and our friend R.P. to see her boyfriend / my friend B.W. shredding with a metal cover band for a Cinco de Mayo party in the city. I'd been wanting to see / hear him perform for a long time, and it was worth the wait. He's an excellent guitarist and has awesome stage presence.
• Having a really tasty lunch at the restaurant the party was held at (La Barca).
• Shopping and Trader Joe's with R.P. and B.W.
• Coming back to my place with them to hang out... only to find that corpsefairy, her boyfriend S., and my friends A. and R. were lying in wait to spring a surprise party on me, complete with two amazing cakes, penguins, saw playing (!) by S., fire dancing by B.W. (!) in my backyard, food, wine, and a viewing of the Buffy movie. (egads -- I can't believe the series ever got green-lit after that, but I'm glad it did!)
• I know it was a group, er, "project," but corpsefairy did the lion's share of the planning. She's a truly incredible and very beloved friend.
  

I still have a little under 21 hours of my birthday left, so there's time for more... stuff? The only crappy thing that's happened this year (in keeping with "tradition" -- bah!) was that my glasses' frame broke while cleaning the lenses this morning. Looks like metal fatigue on the left hinge. I've had them less than a year, so I'm going to try and get them repaired at the optical shop next week. Luckily I have my old pair in the meantime, even though going back to my old prescription led to a couple of headaches.

Through all the fun, there has been a massive emptiness to it all where Kari should be. When everyone had gone home, I held her urn and cried for a good long while. She would have really loved tonight, and to have been in on planning it. I know she'd be thrilled at how happy it made me. But that still doesn't make her absence any less gut-wrenching. Every year, she would remind me that my birthday was her favorite day of the year, because it was the day I came into the world and led to me eventually coming into her life. I'm looking at the birthday card she gave me last year right here on my desk as I type this.

I miss her so much. Somehow, though, she's led me into the care and company of some very good friends indeed. I love you all.