so, i'm 23. i've tried this out on about sixty different people, and it's been pretty well recieved: 23 is one of the first birthdays that signify nothing other than "you're getting older." 16: you're fucking 16, and sometimes you get a driver's license; 17: rated r movies; 18: cigarettes and porn (and voting); 19: you're as old as you can be and still be a teenager; 20: you're fucking 20; 21: booze booze booze; 22: multiple of 11... 23 is just oldness. bernie pointed out that 23 is a prime number, and the first prime number since 19, which was a good four years ago. but yeah. one might even say i've entered my early-mid 20s. gross. and i've got a whole lot of fuck-all to show for it.

whoa, whoa, whoa... bad line of thought. c'mon. let's be reasonable here. or pretend to be.

i'm unemployed, single, and living with my parents.

hey! reasonable, remember?

i'm heading out to shea stadium in a minute. i had had original birthday designs on a birthday game friday night, but my parents had gone ahead and invited the entire family over for a dinner. which was fine, but then i changed the game day (to today) and none of my friends currently in nyc could make it. however, my aunt julie, with whom i'd shared my plans, didn't know this, and got me for my birthday four tickets to today's game. so, now i'm going with my dad, mom and anna, which will be fun, but it allows me to indulge the fallacious idea that i have no friends.

no money, no friends.

anyway, i told people to come to the roof for sunset tonight, so we'll see who shows. it's more or less people trying out for my affections. i'm thinking the no-shows are on a one-way street to friendship cancellation... heh heh heh. not really. i'm not that vindictive.

i guess a small update of the state of things is in order... the people on long island are still figuring stuff out, and are "not yet hiring." my uncle wants me to come up to westchester to help him do stuff on his house. like, human labor type stuff. i have no doubt that he will compensate me well, but the idea of laboring is clashing harshly with my white-collar upbringing. ask me whether i'd rather clear a yard of fallen branches from tropical storm ernesto (do tropical storms get italicized? apparently...) or transcribe a two-and-a-half hour meeting on the current budget of some company i'm temping for, i'd probably go for the touch-typing. is it laziness? fear of actual man's work? probably.

well. perhaps that will do it for now. having now made it through what i can only describe as a surreal birthday, perhaps i'll be able to... i don't know. fucking write, or something.

ps. my parents, whom i love dearly, performed fantastically their tradition of getting me a perfectly lovely gift which i fear i may never use: a heavy gold chain necklace. not like mr. t or anything, but fast approaching. slightly less thick than an mac laptop power cable (the thinner one), the thing makes me think i'm tony soprano, or at the very least, one of his underlings. this, in combination with the leather jacket they got me a few hannukah's ago (or was it a birthday... it's hard to remember) will help me complete my thuggish drug-dealer ensemble... finally.