I Ride My Bike, I Roller Skate, Don't Drive No Car.

Please imagine a wee spotty Anthony Michael Hall singing to Molly Ringwald in the passenger seat of the front half of an old American car in a typical High School shop class garage as you read the following: "Duh nuh nuh nuh nuh, you say it's your birthday, duh nuh nuh nuh, it's my birthday too, yeah!"

It's my birthday! Or it was my birthday, several days ago now. (Thursday, according to the belated email I received from my Stepmother on Friday that said "Yesterday went by in a minute, and I'm only now sending you my birthday wishes" but truly, it was Wednesday). It was terrific, thank you.

The darling man who spoils me rotten at every gifty opportunity purchased a fantabulous bicycle for me. It's called "The Amsterdam" (from Electra), and yes I feel totally Euro riding it around. It has a sweet not-too-shrill bell and a light that generates power from the turning of the front wheel (which my grandfather says adds a twenty pound drag equivalent, but I am inclined not to believe him because this is the 21st Century and I am confident that the technology of such things has improved since the last time he had anything similar on his bicycle in the 1980s). The chain is enclosed, as are the gears, so no grease or catching of my skirts on moving parts (because when have you ever known me to wear pants, except overalls once or twice while fishing or carving pumpkins ten years ago?). All I need to complete the oh-so-EU package is some kind of saddle bag on the rear and maybe a wicker basket for the front.

The aforementioned darling, taking the shiny new toy down from the crusty old bike rack that lay neglected on the porch all winter and seems to have served as a nice shelter for several insect and arachnid families.

Wheeeee, biking! I am especially thrilled that my shoes match the bike. I totally planned that. And the fact that I look like I just woke up, put on a velour jogger over my nightgown and hopped carefree onto my stylin new ride? Completely intentional as well.

Earlier in the morning we went to breakfast, and I tried my hand at food porn photography:Not quite what I was hoping for. (It might have been helpful if I had remembered to take photos before digging in - smeared red pepper coulis is probably not attractive in any light, I would think).

Went for a swing around the hood. Nice day for it. Didn't fall off or kill myself: It's like riding a bike.

Napped. Chatted on the phone. Wrote in my journal. Read tarot cards. Chatted with Joosh. Hunted online for reviews of the city's best Carrot Cake - really just wanted the cream cheese frosting, and Portland's infinitely discriminating Foodies helped a sister out by continually reviewing different options based on their components, cake and frosting, instead of just whole enchilada. Awesome.

Headed out to "A Piece Of Cake" which was well-reviewed, conveniently close to the Watson's and claimed to be voted "Best Cake In Portland." Which is maybe not the whole truth, as it turns out. It was mighty fine, don't get me wrong, especially for the vegan and gluten-free options we sampled (yes, yes, I'm turning into THAT person, whatever) but I don't know that I would say best in the city. In fact, having satisfied the chocolate itch but not the Carrot Cake need, the next day I bought slices of Vegan Carrot Cake and Vegan Wheat Free Oatmeal Cake from New Seasons and both were amazing, much more satisfying than the carrot option from the night before. Maybe my error was in purchasing Cupcake cake, instead of Slices of Cake cake.

Anyway, went to Sushi at the old favorite. The kids did very well and the food was huge, fresh, delicious and cheap, as per usual (the best part though was the fact that Sarah and Jakob threw us into the parties-of-six-or-more category that can leave a cell number and wait somewhere warm to be called back to a ready table, instead of freezing our collective buns off outside with the rest of the shnooks - since the Watson's live so close, we kicked it at the house and then hightailed it over apres phone call).

Then back to the house for statements like "Ugh, I'm so full" and Jakob's cute attempts to stall bedtime, and a little bit of baby snuggle time for me.

The object(s) of my affection (the one in pink, with the round head, and the one in black, also with a round head, though the one in blue bearing a slight resemblance to Ben Affleck is no chopped liver and does tell a wicked story).

Can I just take a minute to say: Baby snuggles are the best best best. Followed by cupcakes. (Which were totally good, don't let my curmudgeonly withholding of the "Best In Portland" moniker deter you. The only thing that should deter you is the scary "Amby's-Kitty-Cat-Pee-Grandma" style decor of the interior of the shop... dusty old 1950's aprons, weird ceramic antique-ish tea sets, boxes and boxes and SHOEBOXES of random single cards for all occasions, including some in Spanish and Russian. I wish I'd taken photos. Oh wait, you can see a small one right here, but it really only scratches the quaint surface).

More bad food photos for you. Chocolate Cherry, Carrot, Lemon White Chocolate Chiffon, Chocolate Caramel and Chocolate with Vanilla Frosting. Three of these vegan & wheat free, if I'm not mistaken, but I can't remember which three.

We divided each in quarters and went to town, but were bested by 3 and 4 quarters each. I'm told that the next day Jakob said "I'm going to have one of Amber's cups!" which is especially cute since I didn't think he had even spotted them the night before. Smooth operator, and cute to boot.

The piece de resistance of my entire birthday, however, was this:

I keep opening that sucker up and giggling. Eventually it will probably stop making me laugh and start making me feel heinously old since that movie came out TWENTY-FOUR YEARS AGO. But for the moment I am still blissed out on birthday goodness, so who cares, years are just numbers and blah blah blah. And I loves me some Jake Ryan always and forever... even if I am now old enough to be a cougar to his high-school hotness (the only thing about this that doesn't send me screaming to the botox clinic is that the actor was at least 25 at the time of filming, and while maybe not totally kosher, that's still better matched with 32 than 18 will ever be - too bad I keep getting older while Jake is frozen in cinematic time). Sigh.

Happy Hanukkah, Goyim.

Happiest of Hanukkahs, folks.

For you, a gift, the gift of the miracle of light:

It's the little menorah that could. The very one purchased with Bex at Noah's Bagels on Solano, in Berkeley, like a million years ago (um, more precisely: eleven years ago).

Don't you like my fetching pastiche here, arranged around the fire in demonstration of the conflicted struggle between Boho Artiste and would-be Business Woman, the oppositional forces of which I am obviously grappling with on a daily basis? To wit: Oh wait, this is the wrong photo. Dang. This is the one I took with my camera phone, because I could send it to myself by email because I can't find the thingy (you know, the thingy) that lets me pull photos off my camera and put them on my computer. I do know the name for it, but it escapes me just now. I'm very tired. Be quiet, I do too know the name.

Anyway, okay, well in this photo you can see only a tiny piece of my Boho/Business identity crisis, namely that there are two phones and two business credit card settlement notices on the table (long story there, not important or interesting, except that there will be cash back, oh yes there will be cash back); as well as my expensive and pillar-shaped "Deluxe Hanukah (sic) Candles" from New Seasons; a chestnut that I found on the street and thought would be a cool thing to do something cool with (like what? Your guess is as good as mine at this point); and my little silver piggy bank Christmas tree ornament that I think I may have accidentally stolen from Target because it was not on my bill post checkout, and was more in my purse than in my shopping bag when I unpacked the goods at home. Hmmm.

(Not shown and/or just beyond the frame of the cameraphone version of my desk: camera; watercolors; post-its; biz credit card; biz receipts; web site how-to book; artsy "To Do" pad from Powell's; knitting needles - I suck, in case you were wondering-- bead project; pretty paper for folding interesting paper boxes with which I had reasonable success for Jess's shower; ten printouts about how to market using Facebook - gag, not for my own business, fyi -- and of course my giant 22" LCD monitor. Please hold all judgments until the results of the duke-it-out match have been tallied in full and new business cards - or artist cards! - have been printed).

So anyway, the focus of the photo, the menorah. It's moved with me 8 times so far, and been lit probably 9 out of the 11 Festival of Lights'n'Latkes since then. Not bad for a $6.99 little bitty from the bagel shop.

Two years running I couldn't find candles that fit the wee holes, and both years Joosh whittled the ends of the candles to the right size. Once they were giant thick 'oh no the electricity is out' candles, and he fully slivered them down to practically matchsticks. Every night. That's like, 2+3+4+5+6+7+8+9, so what 42 candles total? How cute is that (especially for an anti-semite, right Ma?)?

Unfortunately, bad jew that I am, I ALWAYS forget the third and fourth to the last words of the candle-lighting prayer - l'had'lik neir - and have to go look it up on something like Jew Faq (dot org). Thank g-d, once again, for the interwebs. I would be a shiksa without it.

And speaking of (the interwebs, not shiksas!)... In addition to the Hanukkah wishes I want to say a mighty Congratu-effing-lations to Bex on completion of her first semester of the brutality that is law school. Dude, you are 1 down and only 5 to go. And you are a rockstar.

I feel like I had very deep thoughts to share with you all about my acupuncture treatment today, but unfortunately anything remotely deep and/or sensical has fallen straight out ma heed.

So I will instead share with you my new haircut and wish you good leftover latkes tomorrow morning.

You like? I went to a salon that specializes in curly hair. The camerphoney quality of the photo, on top of the low lighting (of the menorah flame in an otherwise dark room, thank you very much) doesn't show all the magic that is the separate little spiral curls out from the top of my head, but trust me, they are luscious. And of course they are nothing that I will be able to recreate tomorrow, but that's okay. Just for tonight I will love them like they deserve to be loved, and tomorrow I will lament their loss and see if any of my ridiculous hair product (that I never use because hello, I work at home and who cares?) can reassemble anything even remotely similar without the shudder-inducing crunch of mousse, as is the standard when trying to coax out the ringlets.

And yes, I'm wearing a pajama top. And yes I wore it all day. Whatever. At least I wore a skirt, and not PJ bottoms, as I've been known to wear in places like Andronicos and Baker's Square and Spat's. The only bad thing about the PJ top wearage today, actually, is that there's this ridiculous little bow at the bust, under a line of lace, and I wonder if my new haircutter lady (tats, pin-up girl style, etc) thought I was some sort of Holly Homemaker. My hair was a teensy bit Baby from Dirty Dancing when I first walked out, which was not what I had in mind when I said I was "looking for a bit of a change". We'll see what tomorrow brings.