the great birthday weekend of ‘06 started off with a visit to the parental’s house. had a nice enough time, avoided getting sung to and ate way too much. got some gift cards (best buy, barnes & noble and the ubiquitous sears), a cute pajama set with the Mutts characters on it, and an awesome, awesome new knife joined its brethren in my knife block.
came home and wrapped presents for a dear friend who also shares my birthday, then sat back as she opened stuff before we went to dinner at the Omega. got a bit weirded out with the Omega being on the road that leads back to a host of bad memories, but the food was delicious as always. mmmm. mushroom & swiss omlette with sweet potato fries!
got to bed pretty late, but oh well that was the way of things this weekend.
the next day was spent at the NY renaissance faire. we had a brilliant time looking at the swords. we watched the master swordmaker do a little demonstration of how sharp his swords are and explained some little details i’ve never known about swordfighting. i’m hoping my brain remembers that stuff in about a month when i’m struggling to write my novel.
i was completely beside myself after holding a couple of crusader era replicas (13th century). the man that handed them to me had actually made them and chose them for my hand size. you all know that i’m a total pacifist, but OMG those blades were just so alive in my hand. lots of energy and power in those! the downer part is the price tag on them, which means that i’ll not be owning one anytime in the near future, but that sword is totally on my wish list.
then the guy pulls out another sword, only this one i did not get to hold. it was an actual, museum quality, ‘holy crap this thing is real’ crusader sword. 1st crusade no less! it was named ‘Grandfather’. one handed, had a lovely little brass inlay of a cross near the hilt. my eyes had to be big as saucers.
of course there was the usual jousting and sword fighting and folks dressed in costume. ok, what is it with the boob thing? i understand the bawdiness going on here, but when you’re breasts cease looking like breasts and take on a life of their own i think it kinda looses the sex appeal, but maybe that’s just me.
the belly dancers were great and browsing through all the craftpeople’s wares was great fun, despite the fact that i did not actually bring home a fairing from the faire. it looked like they had quite a few veggie food options, though i made the mistake of partaking in quite a bit of bloomin’ onion and felt kinda icky after that. bummer.
at the end of the day we all piled in the car and went to connecticut for bear’s gig. not the most fun way to wrap up the day, but at least we were all together.
after not quite enough sleep, we got up to continue the birthday extravaganza. first up was McDonald’s breakfast. yum. i love my egg mcmuffins!
we made our way to the Bronx Zoo quite easily and got into the park. so glad my birthday fell on a Monday as it is the quietest day of the week at the zoo. no school groups!
i don’t quite know how to sum up this portion of the day. the birds were lovely and chatty, the giraffes were tall and regal. the spider monkeys were too quick for my camera and seemed to enjoy displaying their amazing acrobatic prowess and the african dogs were neat to watch.
and yet it all pales in comparison to the time spent on tiger mountain. the tigers were just gorgeous, stupendous, powerful and amazing. one of them was wandering around and i snapped quite a few pics. their paws are just huge and it was amazing to watch them do things i see our kitty boys do on a daily basis. only these guys are quite a bit bigger to say the least.
as the zoo was closing down for the day, the craziness of the weekend finally started to really catch up with us. i fell asleep in the car as we made our way through NYC rush hour traffic. dinner at Bennigan’s was less than stellar, unfortunately. i’d been craving their veggie burger all week, but arrived there to find out they’d changed the burger. it was still tasty, but just not the same. bummer.
at home i took a nap while the others ran some errands and did some wrapping, then it was time for gifts! it’s so lovely to just go all out with presents for each other’s birthdays. ’stuff’ is not the be all end all of things, of course, but it’s still lovely to have this pile of gifts to open.
i got a new chair for my room from ikea (a pain in the ass to put together, but worth it!) and a small table. now i can watch stuff in my room in comfort and i’m all ready for nanowrimo because i know i’ll have a quiet spot to write. also got Firefly and Serenity which i’ve heard so much about. watch the first part that night and so far i really like it.
my dear, sweet family also got me a bunch of crusades books and videos. despite the fact that they find my passion for this time period a bit hard to comprehend, they’re so supportive of me as i do my research. they also gifted me with various other books and movies and chocolate. yippee!
after a very, uhm, interesting but heartfelt rendition of ‘happy birthday’ we ate some pastry and pie. yum. finally it was time to collapse into bed with Braveheart and watch some Firefly.
a very tiring, but exciting and fun, birthday weekend drew to a close. huzzah indeed.
