35.

*pretty trees, huh? they are in my yard. and yes, this photo is totally irrelevant because all relevant photos had to be burned to protect the guilty. press on. keep reading. and no, that is not a pile of fresh dog shit you see in my lawn. i promise. with all my fingers crossed.

A few weeks ago I stumbled upon my 35th year on earth.

I'll admit it, 35 years kind of snuck up on me; not unlike the lady in Target Sunday who ran over my foot with her motorized scooter.

As for the celebration that welcomed my 35 years, and Keri's 31 years respectively, it was actually fairly epic, as far as birthday celebrations go.

The party included a bus ride, to relive my middle school days, when, well...I rode a bus. It included a little live music, or 'twang, as the one of two bands says about themselves.

It included a bunch of my favorite people in this entire world, who just so happen to live within a stone's throw of me. And it of course, included some grey goose, (or geese?) which of course, is not to be confused with the goose that flies, or shits, but is another kind of goose entirely, that I suppose arguably does shit, just in an entirely different way.

It included dancing. A LOT of dancing.

It included acrobats. And back flips. And pole dancers. Black lights and green-ish tinted teeth, a guy who claimed he brought his woman straight to the bus from Trinoble, and one of the world's greatest bad mitten players. Okay, I made the bad mitten part up, it just sounded good. All told, bad mitten players or not, it was a darned good time.

It also included my kid, picking out for me a gift all on his own that makes me giggle a little every time I use them: dishes. Because as T said: well, you needed them because...we always run out. Or more specifically as T later clarified: BOWLS, I got you bowls because that is all I really use and there are never any left!

There was also dinner with the family that was darned good and even more caloric and Midwest portion plentiful and it also involved a Giggling Goat. In case you didn't get the memo, I have a little thing for goats.

And perhaps most importantly there was included in my 35th celebration a very, very long nap the day following the aforementioned bus adventure in which I held my head in agony and muttered, "Dorothy, we're not in Kansas any more."

Fact is, we never were in Kansas to begin with, but at that particular moment, I had much bigger troubles than geographic relevance.