What is it about a birthday that makes some people just DYING to rain on the birthday person’s parade?

“Hrmph. Enjoy it while you can.” (I sure am, thanks.)

“Just wait till you’re old as I am.” (Yep, that’s exactly what I’m doing.)

“Ugh, I never celebrate my birthday anymore.” (Loser.)

Get off my case, old farts, and happy friggin’ birthday to me! I’m 28! I use wrinkle cream and I’m 20 pounds heavier than I was a year ago! I’m still single and living with a cat! My little sister is getting married before I am! I have credit card debt and student loans and a mediocre credit score! And in the last 365 days, I had a terrible breakup in the spring, a godawful mess of relationship drama in the summer, almost had a nervous breakdown in the fall, and had to sell my beloved Jeep in the winter because I couldn’t afford it anymore!

AND IT HAS BEEN GREAT!!!

I also got back together with a wonderful boyfriend and am probably moving in with him this summer because our relationship is a hundred times better than it was before. I settled accounts and am friends with my ex. I only have to see my shrink every 2 months now. I got a bit of a raise and my job isn’t on the chopping block. I have a little savings account and a 401(k) and enough pocket money to buy the new clothes I need to fit my ever-expanding ass.

And I’m starting to sound like my mother. If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all. (I’m talking to you – old, ageist, wrinkly, birthday-bashing jerks.)

So bring it on, twenty-eight. Bring. It. On.

Oh, it was cold up there. Good thing I had a little Bailey’s in the hot chocolate or I might have crumpled. 36 degrees in misty rain and gusting wind for four hours – people die of hypothermina in situations milder than that.

But the Cubs didn’t! We stayed till the very end and danced to “Go Cubs Go!” and waved the big “W” flag as the Colorado Rockies fled the field with frozen heads hung in shame.

It was so different to go to a game at good old Wrigley Field again – it was my first trip there in about twenty years. I’m so used to Busch Stadium with its millions of lights and colorful ads and Jumbotron. Even before the flashy new stadium was built in 2006, we had the lights and screens and music. There’s a Build-a-Bear (a Fredbird, really) inside Busch Stadium, along with an arcade and a million other things to divert you from the game you ostensibly came to see. In weather like we had on Monday, you probably wouldn’t have seen over 40,000 people sitting outside at a game in St. Louis. They’d be in the stadium bars and restaurants and watching the TVs and Jumbotron to see what was happening on the field. It’s not that we in St. Louis are necessarily big wusses, but it’s what’s available to us and so we take advantage of those things.

At Wrigley we had no choice. Go big or go home. We went big – literally, bundled up in layers of warmth and waterproofing, giving us an excellent cover for the bootlegged booze. We watched the game as it played out on the field, not a screen, and the scoreboard behind us was the old kind where you can see the person inside pull down the numbers and replace them. There were no instant replays. No trivia for the crowd. It was kind of heartwarming.

But you know, foot-warming might have been better. I couldn’t feel my toes for about three hours after we left, but it was such a wonderful day. A wonderful weekend, really. E and I did the roadtrip with some friends, and we all stayed at a Very Nice Hotel off Michigan Avenue for free, since it’s part of the family of hotels for which he works. Dinner the first night was at Morton’s with E’s dad, and I may or may not have had one too many vodka and Diet Cokes. E kept pinching me under the table to keep me from talking, lest I say something completely retarded in front of his AA dad. Oops.

And as usual, I forgot my expensive camera at home.

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Two Updates:

1. The girl who had dinner with George Clooney did NOT get fired. He got permission from the boss to take her to dinner – how’s THAT for slick? At the Very Nice Restaurant, the customer is always right.

2. While we were up there, we talked to Archie about the Vegas deal. Everything is still kind of up in the air.

I am dropping this letter in the mailbox the next time I go down to the lobby. I refuse to be trampled by an incompetent city bureaucracy, especially one that can’t even pay the fees for its own PO Box and causes hundreds of payments to be lost in the mail, inflicting this same problem on many others who happened to park on the wrong side of the street during street cleaning.

Twenty bucks is a lot of money in hard times. It’s a doctor’s office copay, a tank of gas, or several days’ worth of food. I’m not giving in without a fight.

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3/19/2009

Dear City of St. Louis Parking Violations Bureau:

I am writing in response to the “Final Warning of Delinquent Parking Violation” notice I received from you on 3/16/09, regarding ticket [redacted].

Why are you charging me a $30.00 late fee on a $10.00 ticket that, according to my records and yours, I have already paid?

The ticket was issued on 1/14/09 and my check came to you on 2/1/09. According to my bank, you did not process it until 2/18/09. If I was a moment late in doing my part paying the $10.00, I will gladly pay you the first $10.00 late fee. Yet this notice indicates that since I failed to respond to the ticket greater than 45 days after issuance, I have to pay a fine of three times the original ticket amount. I DID RESPOND. It’s even on the notice that I paid the $10.00 and my check was cashed. It’s not my fault you took over two weeks to process it, but you DID receive it. Please amend your records to reflect this.

I received the “second notice” warning just a day or two after I mailed the $10.00 check. Yes, I ignored it. I ignored it because I had already sent in my check and considered the matter settled.

After receiving this Final Warning, I called the information line. The woman there informed me that the $30.00 is a late fee on the first late fee that I did not know I owed. You want me to pay a second late fee because I am late in paying the first late fee for a check I had already mailed you?

This letter is my formal contest of this unnecessary fine.

You should have just sent me a separate bill and explanation for the first late fee. That would have been another $10.00 and we would be all settled.

I have enclosed a check for the first $10.00 late fee that you did not tell me I still owed after my initial payment. That will bring my total payment to $20.00, covering the original cost of the ticket and the first late fee. I do not believe I should have to pay the additional $20.00 as a fine on the first late fee.

Respectfully,

Rebekah [redacted]

I swear I took my camera to the St. Patrick’s Day festivities on Tuesday so I could have some fun “look-what-I-did” pictures like all the cool bloggers.

But I didn’t take any pictures because I forgot since I was sloshed by 11:30 am, like all the COOLEST bloggers!

My boyfriend lives in Dogtown, the Irish barrio of St. Louis, home to everything shamrocked and the Ancient Order of the Hibernians. It’s not a fancy neighborhood – lots of older homes, duplexes and four-family flats and smallish single-family houses. 364 days a year, it’s just a nice little neighborhood with a few good places to eat and an ecletic, left-leaning population of hipsters in stovepipe jeans, dazed stoners, young families, and some old people who have lived there since the neighborhood sprung up for the 1904 World’s Fair, or possibly before.

A lot of people partied for St. Pat’s over the weekend. But the AOH parade in Dogtown is always ON St. Patrick’s Day, whatever day of the week it is.  And the turnout, no matter what day it is, always tops the city’s “official” parade from the weekend before. The parade isn’t full of slick and glossy floats like the one downtown. Most of the AOH parade is just Irish people walking under their clan crests. There are bagpipers and Irish dancers and marching bands, but the best parts are the people who are just walking on the street, drinking beer, being Irish, and throwing shiny green beads and candy to screaming hooligans like me. It’s an hour and a half of FANTASTIC.

It snowed in 2007. Last year it was cold and muddy and sloggy. The 2008 turnout was pretty crummy (about 30,000 compared to this year’s 50,000) and we shivered in galoshes and sweatshirts.

But this year…

It was SEVENTY-NINE degrees! My sundress saw some sun for the first time in 2009 and I am proudly sporting a shamrock-shaped suntan sunburn line from the glitter tattoo I wore on my shoulder. All we did the whole day was drink, sit on the steps, and walk back inside for more drinks. E lives about half a block off the parade route, so the party was on our porch.

Someone else took that picture over there and put it on Flickr. I took the time to look it up for you. I wish, wish, WISH I had a picture of the pin my friend Kati got. You know the red and blue graphic of Obama, the one that was everywhere in the campaign? It was done in green and orange, the Prez had sideburns and a beard, and it said “O’Bama” on it. Lurve.

Everyone is happy on St. Patrick’s Day. It’s such a nice, non-divisive holiday that brings people together to eat and drink without the negative connotations of the debauchery of Mardi Gras. There’s no forced family love like Christmas, no lonely-hearts crap like Valentine’s Day, no political or religious agendas spewed. But everyone decorates their houses. You can dress up and wear beads and not get flashed. Parents pull their children out of school* and dye their hair green. DOGS get dyed green.

It was a wonderful day and I wish I could tell you more. I would if I remembered any more of what happened before I zonked out at 2:30 pm. Maybe the best days are like that.

But I CAN assure you that I did not eat any cabbage.

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* Unless said children go to St. James the Greater Catholic School in Dogtown, which cancels classes anyway and Jesus loves them for it.

I’m all about traditions and everything, but why am I and a bunch of people who don’t like cabbage going to make a corned-beef and cabbage dinner tonight? Does ANYONE like cabbage? Here, would you like some? We’re just going to compost it at the end of the night anyway.

It even sounds funny. Cabbage.

Maybe we could just start a leetle early on the Guinness for Sunday Funday and call that the beginning of the holiday.