watch me fall like dominos in pretty patterns

Well, it's birthday month apparently. All of a sudden Erik, Aaron, Karl, Kristen and my own mother decide to cosmically spring their birthdays on me - with very little warning, mind you. It has been all good fun though, so I forgive them. To start off the festivities, a bunch of us went to a Moroccan restaurant called Marakesh here in Ptown to celebrate Karl and Aaron's birthdays. The food was cozy and the atmosphere was delicious (or the other way around); all ten of us sat around on cushions, ate our Moroccan feast, laughed over this and that and birthday cards, and sighed in relief as a belly dancer coerced Karl's sister, Daisy, into some locomotion (and thankfully not us). Good times. After that, most of us made our way to a bowling alley a ways away, and had a go at it... All except for Jim, Laz and me. They had no excuse, but I had no socks, so I'm going with that - and not the fact that I don't like games. It was quite enjoyable nevertheless.

(Out of the birthday lineup, it should be noted that) on Thursday I met my friend, Laura, at a coffee shop to sketch and talk about our lives and art. She's truely an amazing person - she rents out a woodshop where she creates spectacular sculptures. She's already a good influence on me. In the evening, the guys played at an open mic again - Karl also joined on the guitar with Laz and Aaron. They are kind of / ridiculously good, so it's always fun to hear them play. After that, Jim, Courtney, Karl and I went to Edgefield to eat a post dinner dinner and play pool. Again, good times.

Back to the birthday events: Kristen's birthday was on Saturday, but Michelle and I did an early birthday celebration with her on Friday. We went to WA park in Ptown, drank wine, and ate cheese, bread and chocolates in the rose garden. Oh my goodness! it was lovely. Then they came over to mi casa for a bit and met my roomie Anne and our friend, James.

I worked all of Saturday at the NorthFace and into the night with Sally. She and I have been really smack talking each other - in a funny way. Ha.

Sunday, I went over to Laz's house and we walked around Gresham looking for stores to display his photographs (which are amazing). We had some Thai with Aaron and then drove downtown to visit an artist who's going to paint on one of Laz's guitars. Then, they got a chance to see mi casa (this being the second time this week that I was car-less at my own house. ha.), meet my other roommate Carrie and our curmudgeon of a cat, Rocco. We ended up hanging out in my room while Laz was nice enough to draw out some Arabic script for me and Aaron played some blues on the guitar. So random and fun. Then Laz and I went to watch "The Book of Eli" c. 930... sort of late... but I really enjoyed the movie (despite certain graphic scenes). It ended up being a late night considering I had to still go back to Laz's to get my car, but I really enjoyed hanging out with those guys.

Today I worked at TNF again - it was sort of an odd day again there. At the end of my shift, both of my managers came in the back room and helped me print out a recipe for red velvet cake (for Karl's bday tomorrow) and I ended up staying an hour later to finish that up and chat with Jory about sushi and Adam about my mysterious and secret liking of hip hop music. Ah, they are so funny.

Tomorrow: Karl's birthday. Will consist of making and eating Red Velvet Cake - never made it before, but I used to make regular cake all the time... *crosses fingers*, wrapping ma present to him - which is awesome, and meeting him and Aaron for some musico at the Goodfoot. Should be grand (like grain and sand colliding).

Wednesday: TULIP FEST WITH MICHELLE. excitement.