Gotta make this quick because it's been a busy day and will proceed to be a busy night! :)

First, before I forget, I want to thank the 12 peeps who sent me amusing notes on my WishRoll.com Birthday Greetinger, and the following peeps who sent LJ Virtual Gifts to my Profile Page: beckerbuns, cheschirekat and savvyelfpirate. I love virtual gifts! :) Also thank you to amethyst_hunter for the thoughtful Snail Mail card! It was quite funny! *HUGS to ALL*

This morning, while my mom was doing prep stuff at home for the annual family "May Fest" tomorrow, I went to the Post Office to mail surprises to two fellow May babies from the AWESOME bday_packages community, which I highly recommend that everyone join! Then I went to Aki's Bakery, a delicious San Jose fixture much like Dick's Bakery (of Burnt Almond cake fame). I got one of Aki's exclusive Neapolitan cakes (chocolate, strawberry, vanilla) for tomorrow, when my aunt Janie, cousin Julie and Julie's son Brandon are coming to celebrate my mom's B-Day (May 6), my B-Day (May 16, today) and Mother's Day.

Then I went to Safeway to pick up extra milk and eggs for the strata my mom's going to make for tomorrow's lunch. Then I ate lunch at home, did some stuff (not even sure what!), then went back out to Hollywood Video because you get a free DVD rental on your B-Day. :) I would have chosen Ratatouille, except that I FINALLY got to see it when my mom chose it as her free rental last week. So instead I chose Stardust, another movie I've been woefully lax in watching, even though I've been REALLY wanting to see it!

Then onward to Starbucks, because how could I let my B-Day pass without a festive Java Chip Frappuccino? *giggle* I got excited when I saw not one, not two, but THREE police motorcycles parked in front of the place, but alas -- none of them were yummy. :( One was too old for me and unattractive; one was too old for me and was smoking outside (I'd NEVER date a smoker!); and one was kind of attractive but too old for me. LOL

Back at home, I did dry and wet Swiffering of the kitchen, family room, landing and downstairs bathroom and cleaned the downstairs toilet in anticipation of tomorrow's May Fest. (I wouldn't have bothered cleaning at all, but my mom decided it "must" be done! heheh) Now I need to clean the rat cage and prepare their food dish for later, because I'm going out tonight at my friend Jenny's house for the monthly Bingo Belles game. And yes, she DOES have air conditioning! *cheer* I'm looking extra forward to tonight's game, because each month, whoever has a B-Day gets to play with 3 bingo cards instead of 2, thereby increasing their chances of more wins. And it so happens I'm the only May baby in the group! Whoops! *blush* I forgot: Jeri's also a May baby! ;D I'm also looking forward to visiting with Jenny's extremely loving and funny doggies, Jasmine and Jake!

And now, I leave you all with a meme! There were lots of birthday-themed memes at MemeGen but I didn't like any of them. So, I wrote my own! LOL! It's one of the kinds that fills in the names of folks from my Friends List, and I made it with a lot of spaces to fill in, so you've a GOOD chance of finding yourself in a very FUNNY situation! *giggle*

( The Best LJ birthday party ever! )

Here's a quick recap of yesterday (Tuesday) and today. I'm keeping it short because I'm warm (which often makes me cranky), I'm getting sleepy, and the rats are getting hungry. LOL

Yesterday and today were very BUSY, but for the most part good, and included my early birthday lunch party thrown by my co-workers (yesterday), and a free piano concert my mom and I got tickets for tonight. One of the worst things is that the mercury has been slowly but surely rising, and today it was around 90 degrees! :O To make matters worse, it was kind of muggy as well, which is very UNcommon for this area, thankfully. I am so heat-intolerant, it's not even funny. amethyst_hunter and I think it must be "old age" (haha), as she's having the same problem! (Though I expect it's worse for her in Illinois). I definitely feel like the ice cream cone in my icon when the weather turns hot! :(

Anyhoo, enough rambling! Here's the recap!

( Narrated photos of yesterday's work & lunch festivities! )

( Today was crazy & hot, but the concert was cool! )

Whether you celebrate Mother's Day as a mom, stepmom, grandma or aunt, or as the child, stepchild, grandchild, niece or nephew of one of the above -- I hope you have a very HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY! :D

I'm still going thru all the pix I took of Blueberry & Jellybean on their May 7 B-Day "party", but I'm not done yet. *sigh* Hopefully I'll post soon -- they're very "squee-worthy"! LOL In the meantime, I didn't want Mother's Day to pass without wishing everyone a great day, in whatever way you celebrate!

OH, before I forget, speaking of moms, yesterday I saw THREE different male-female bird pairs. :) One was the house sparrows who are raising their babies in a hole in the side of my neighbor's house. Actually it's for the exhaust air from their clothes dryer, but the mesh fell off years ago, so it's now very appealing for birds who like to nest in cavities. I see these cute birds all the time, actually, and hear them cheerfully chirping every morning and at various times of the day.

But yesterday I also saw a pair of house finches hopping along on the ground, eating things near my 4 o'clock plants, plus a pair of lesser goldfinches visiting and cleaning themselves on the fence and in our blue potato bush tree. And then today I saw the female goldfinch pulling threads/filaments off the fronds of our Mexican fanpalm. I guess she's going to use them in making a nest! :)

Happy birthday, Mom! :D Not that she reads my blog, and I of course already wished her a happy B-Day several times, but there's no harm in saying again! I have several B-Day icons; I chose this one because I would like to "make a wish" that my mom lives for MANY more healthy, happy years! :)

And now, here's why today, May 6, had...
( ...some good stuff )
( ...some not-so-good stuff )
( ...and some interesting stuff )

Some folks may recall my February Valentiner or my March 8 Greetinger, both of which are fun, interactive "widget" thingies from that quirky website, WishRoll.com. Well, I'm doing another! :) This time it's a birthday Greetinger, seeing as my natal day is coming up May 16. *blush* I thought I'd start early, since otherwise I'm so absent-minded, I might forget until the 11th hour! LOL

You can click the pic below to send me a B-Day greeting! :D Festive flowers are added to the background with each new greeting that comes in. I'm such a sucker for cutesy stuff like this!! (BTW, the "Received" counter doesn't refresh right away, so it may look like your greeting didn't go thru, but it did!)

Get your own Greetinger

Happy May Day, Beltane, Walpurgis Night, Lei Day, International Workers' Day, Loyalty Day, and St. Joseph's Feast Day!

Because I'm feeling kind of lazy this evening (heehee), the first paragraph below is actually a copy-and-paste from a journal entry I wrote last year on this date. Some of you may remember it, but there are also new folks on my Friends List since a year ago, and to them it will be NEW! :)

It's amazing how many different holidays, festivals and/or observances all crowd the spot of May 1st on the calendar! That's pretty cool! I suspect most people don't know about ALL of the above (I didn't know of Lei Day or Loyalty Day, and only vaguely knew of St. Joseph's Day), so for the record, here are my two fave references. This Wikipedia entry is the most comprehensive and interesting. However, this shorter InfoPlease entry isn't bad either.

I wish I could say I did something traditional that reflected fertility and festivity and Nature-based spirituality, like dancing around a beautiful Maypole or wearing a wreath of hawthorn blossoms (the haw is called the "mayflower" due to its habit of flowering the first week of May). However, I worked all day. But that's OK, because I am so grateful to have the wonderful job that I have! :) As I've said before, everything about it is GREAT: the duties, the pay, the co-workers, the commute. Plus free lunch each Thursday; today it was Tony & Alba's pizza! And I did do SOMETHING outdoorsy today -- my co-worker Anne A. and I took a healthy and refreshing walk to the giant shopping center whose name I don't know, and we went to Starbucks! The weather was just beautiful! Perfect for May 1st!

I finally finished Photoshopping (alliteration unintentional but amusing) all the photos from yesterday (Sunday), which was GREAT! :D beckerbuns and her kids and I did our fundraising walk for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (total $$ amount in next post) and went geocaching afterwards. *cheer* We took lots of pix of the former and the latter, plus I also took pix of sweet dogs, pretty flowers and unusual oak trees. :) Oh, and Becky took a funny video too, which I shall share! OH, and I also need to share some truly crazy music-related synchronicity!!

But not tonight honey... I don't have a headache (*grin*) but it's almost midnight and I gotta work tomorrow! I figured I'd have time tonight to do a big blog entry or play with my rats, but not both. :( So obviously I chose my furry boys. :) I like to give them a cage-free playtime each night, which they love! Anyhoo, I hear my pillows calling, so I'm going to hit the sack now. Be sure to tune in tomorrow or Wednesday for the whole scoop! LOL

P.S. Don't spill the oatmeal!!

I meant to blog yesterday (Friday night) but somehow, between doing other things, the night got away from me and it became too late to first sit down and start writing.

( Friday was a busy but good day. :D )

P.S. Despite the fact that my "hot" icon, below, looks angry, I'm not! LOL! The weather took a very warm turn today, and being the heat-intolerant person I am, I felt quite uncomfortable for a while.

Hi all! :) I always have trouble asking people for money for fundraisers I'm participating in, mainly because I never want anyone to feel "railroaded" to give. Then again, if I don't tell people what I'm doing, there's no chance of EVER getting a sponsorship donation, so I might as well at least TELL people, right? *blush* Anyhoo, this Sunday my dear friend beckerbuns and I are participating in "Great Strides", a fundraising walk in Palo Alto for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Becky's son Ricky, 12, has cystic fibrosis; we are walking in honour of him and all the other kids and adults affected by CF.

I'd write more, but I'm almost late for a chiropractor appointment, so I will leave you with the link below, which takes you to my personal Great Strides fundraising page. You can read more about the fundraiser there, and also about Ricky. :) Thank you SO MUCH for any amount you give, no matter how small!! *hugs* And if you don't want to donate, that's OK too. No hard feelings!! :)

http://www.cff.org/Great_Strides/dsp_DonationPage.cfm?walkid=5375&idUser=250342

I hope everyone had a good Earth Day. :) Tonight's icon REALLY sums up how I feel about the environment, the earth, and all the animals, vegetables and minerals (sounds like 20 Questions, heheh) that inhabit it! I know some folks did Earth Day-related things last weekend, but some also did stuff today. If anyone did and/or attended anything cool, I'd love to hear about it! As for me, I unfortunately didn't do much, ( but I did do this little bit! )

Well, OK, so it wasn't actually wild. But I found that title amusing. ;) My weekend was, however, very BUSY, but in a very good way! Below is a breakdown of the three days, so you can read them one at a time if you prefer.

( FRIDAY: the $50 sale and the great bingo game! )

( SATURDAY: firemen, chiropractors and an aggro yet funny dinner! )

( SUNDAY: the wild & crazy dream! )