Happy Birthday to me...

Forty-five. Old enough to be vaguely embarrassed about it. I've spared myself the litany of Things I Should Have Done By Now.

I finally have a job. It's a temporary gig, scoring essays for standardized tests. Training starts tomorrow. We'll see how it goes.

I celebrated my birthday in the usual way on Saturday, watching The Beatles Anthology and opening the place to visitors from noon to midnight. My glass chess set got some use, with my dad helping one of the players along with his mad chess skills. I had a good time and it was nice to see and catch up with all of my guests.

Tonight is steak and chocolate cake at the folks' house. I stayed here for a nap and decided to just make an afternoon of it. I've already opened one of my presents--an autographed picture of Joel Hodgson from puppetmaker40, which also came with a lovely hand-drawn card from my niece, Caroline.

So I'm starting this new cycle of life with some cautious optimism. It's hard to sort my perception of the situation because my vision is clouded by a mild depression that I haven't been able to shake. I've got an appointment coming up with my psychiatrists so hopefully we can come up with something to resolve this issue.

I really need to write here more often.

Today I took pleasure in seeing my birthday cake waiting in the fridge.

Today I learned that men do better if they pose with an animal in their online dating profile but women do worse.