This post is ALL about my birthday weekend, which I have to say was a success.
It all started on Friday night. I planned for my friends to meet me at Tacos N Tequila around 8:30 for dinner/drinks. The wonderful Ross (who was sweet enough to be the DD for both nights) picked up me and Steph at my parent's house (since I left Noah there for the night so he could have a big house to run around in). We headed to TNT, and on the way it starts POURING down rain. I was not going to let this get me down. We get to TNT and the hostess says that we are the third big party in line, so it will be a little while. We didn't get seated until about 9:30, unfortunately, but with drinks in our systems it was ok. I kept getting asked, "What are we going to do if it's raining still when we are ready to go downtown?" I was very confused by this question. It seemed like a trick question to me. WHAT DO YOU MEAN WHAT WILL WE DO? We will go downtown. There was no question about that. After finally getting seated we ordered more drinks and got our food and had a nice dinner. Margarita number 1 was a nice margarita. People at dinner included: Chris, Angela, Liz, Rachel, Marshall, Ross, Stephney, and Nicole. All of which are some of my favorite people in the world. The wonderful Chris and Angela decided to pay for dinner and I think I can speak for everybody that we were so very appreciative of that. Thank you.
Dinner is finished and so we all get into our cars to head downtown. (Everybody but Marshy) I knew that if I got Chris and Angela to drink enough at dinner, they would end up coming downtown. ;) We started at Mooseknuckle, which is where Nicole and I usually start. Let me just tell you, this first night, I think I did 4 shots in 15 minutes. Not a good idea. At Mooseknuckle, this guy named Jamal started signing to me in ASL, and so I started having a conversation with him. He was deaf, super nice and had been friends of the bartender's for like 4 years. I talked to him off and on the entire time we were at Moose. When my clan decided it was time to move to the next bar, I decided to tell the Jamal that we were leaving and it was nice to meet him. This is when in sign language, you sign the sign for WRONG, to indicate something went not as expected. He asked if I wanted him to come with us. I told him no, but that it was nice meeting him, and we head to 512.
About 10 minutes into 512, Jamal shows up. To make a long story short, he followed us almost the entire night, and it would have been fine, except he was mooching off our drinks, and hitting on one of my sister's friend, who showed up. He got a little creepy, but we got him to leave later in the night. Funny story though, Jamal decided he wanted to have a conversation with Ross. So I walk over to be the translator, because, obviously, Ross knows absolutely nothing about sign language, and Jamal pushes me away and says they are fine. Every time I would come back to check on them, Jamal would tell me they were ok, and I'd look at Ross and could totally tell most things were not registering. So to Ross, thanks for putting up with that for like 20 minutes!
I started feeling sick early in the night. Not because I drank too much, but because I had way too many sweet drinks. I started drinking only water very early. That kind of started to ruin round one of my birthday. After 512, we headed to the bar Madison, because Chris and Ang got free bottle service. It was completely empty, but a very cool looking club, and hey, I won't complain about it being empty, because the dance floor was all mine!
At about 1:30, Steph, Ross, and I decide that it's time to leave. So we say our goodbyes and get into a cab, which was Ross' first cab ride experience in his entire life. That's what happens when you live in Abilene, TX for 5 years. We get back to the car, and Steph and I are starving. So of course, where do we decide to stop??? WHATABURGER. And, let me tell you, it was delicious. We get back to my parent's house, and sit around for a little bit. Then Ross left, and Steph and I head to bed so we can get up and start all over again the next day.
Birthday celebration round two: This was my actual birthday day. I had to get up at 8:50 am to sign up for a class at ACC since mine was cancelled three days before it was supposed to start due to not enough people signing up for it. I'm sorry, but that just does not seem acceptable to me. 3 DAYS before it started. Talk about a little bit of stress. But I got it all figured out.
Steph and I officially got up about 11:15 and talked about what all happened the night before, and my parents arrived at the house from being out of town around 1:30. We went to lunch with them at North, one of my all time favorite restaurants. So delicious if you haven't tried it. After lunch, Steph went to do some things with her family, and I was exhausted so I decided to relax. I did so until about 7:00, then got ready to start round 2 night of festivities. I invited Dylan, his girlfriend, Lindsey, Ross, and Steph over to my parents for some pre-going downtown fun. We played Kings Cup, and it was so fun. Steph and I got to experience the Shampoo Effect, which if you don't know what it is, that's ok because we didn't either until the night before when Chris explained it to us. We thought it was a little stupid at the time of explanation, but it was funny all Saturday night. Basically, it's the same effect that when you wash your hair with shampoo for the second time, you know how it gets a lot more soapy than the first? Well, if you drink one night, then go out and drink the next night, it has that same effect. It's all still in your system, and the effect is a quicker one. Anyways, after that, we headed downtown to meet up with people around 10:40. We were going downtown and I had to pee really bad, so Ross finally dropped me and Steph off, while the rest of them tried to find parking. We were the first of our group to show up at 512. We got a free drink. and the night began. Nicole, her boyfriend, Dom, and their friend Barrett showed up. Then Vanessa and Jenna showed up. And then to my surprise Megan and Collin showed up! By the time Megan and Collin showed up, I was really happy, and it was PACKED in the bar. Everything happened very quickly from that point on. I do remember turning to Steph and saying, "I'm having so much more fun than last night!" and she said, "ME TOO! Why is that?!" I think it was because we had a significantly less amount of sugary drinks. Ross, Dylan, Lindsey, and Steph all needed to leave around 12:45 because they all had things to do in the morning, and I had planned on going home with them. I was having such a good time, I didn't want to, so Megan and Collin were going to take me back to my apartment when they went home. But when I went to say bye to all of them outside, Steph decided I should come home with them now, and that ended up probably being better. I didn't want to end up in my apartment alone at the end of the night. I knew that wouldn't have ended well. So I was dropped off at my parent's and got to snuggle with Noah.
Overall my birthday was a blast. I have such amazing friends and family. I feel so blessed to have all of you in my life. I thank you for making my 22nd birthday a special one, and showing me how blessed I am. There were a few people I wish could have been there to celebrate with me, but you guys were there in spirit!
I'm still 21 in Guam!
