A Rite of Passage

Yesterday was my 21st birthday!

I know that a lot of people make a huge fuss over it; I know this through many parties back when I used to work at the Sushi House. Many Sapporo bottles were opened on those occasions.

I didn't make it that big of a deal. At first I thought it would be great to invite people to either lunch or dinner at the local Elephant Bar. My family celebrated birthdays there, and they have awesome Asian food on their menu. But I decided not to do that, since it means a lot of money has to be spent. So what I did instead was that I bought Funfetti cake mix (YAY, FUNFETTI! SO MUCH NOSTALGIA), strawberry frosting, and learned how to use the brand new oven for the first time since the kitchen got renovated.

My family also unearthed an old, unused mixer that was probably a decade old. It's really, really new, and after watching a lot of food channels, I became a bit inspired as I mixed the cake.

I also managed to use up these mango and almond pudding mixes that were sitting in the pantry for a couple of months, and I bought some soda and chips from the 7/11 down the street. I also ordered some pizza online from a local store instead of something general like a Dominoes' Pizza parlor. Though if the choices were available, I would have been all over Pizza Hut.

So most of the people I invited came and then some: my awesome ex-coworkers were there, my college friends who were still in town were there. The people that didn't make it, I'll eventually see them over the weekend. We bonded over food, fanfiction, video games and Netflix. I got food for my birthday, which is great, and my ex-coworkers bought me beer. Blue Moon and Smirnoff Ice, to be specific. For Netflix, we watched Batman/Superman: Apocalypse, which was all about Supergirl, annnnnnnd..... the film didn't make me like Supergirl any more than I did before in the "Justice League: Unlimited" episodes. I didn't watch enough "Superman: TAS" to have more of an opinion, but oh well. I did like the Superman/Batman/Wonder Woman dynamic, though; Everybody's commentary made watching the whole film hilarious.

The only drama that happened was HOLY CUSTOMER SERVICE-FAIL, BATMAN, where's our pizza?? I called the pizza place, whose front desk sheepishly told me that their fax machine taking care of the online orders was on the fritz, and I confirmed that I still wanted the pizza. Half an hour later, during an intense discussion over Elena of the Turks and the natures of Shin-ra Electric, my friend Krisee noticed that a van was moving back and forth for about 3 minutes. Poor guy, I had to go out of the house to wave him over. I didn't feel too guilty, though, since I already tipped over the online order.

But inside, my friends were discussing over how in the past if a pizza would be more than twenty minutes late, the pie would be free of charge. Since mine was over three hours late (well I also busted out some frozen pizza to bake in the oven earlier, so it wasn't a big deal), a couple of my friends said I should call them to see if I couldn't be charged for it. Krisee, bless her heart, offered to make the call, which I let her without thinking. Her tirade was incredible; one of those passive-aggressive "I didn't want to say this, but...." kind of conversations. Hearing it actually reminded me of my days being at the cash register in the Sushi House.... Ohhhhh, I felt so guilty as she berated the pizza parlor.

But I scored a future free pizza :)

Overall, it was a fun and relaxing party. I got money from my parents and I baked my first cake. Sometime next week, one of my friends will take me to what in IV is called "The Loop" which is to get one glass of booze from each bar along that route. I'll make sure I'm safe when that happens. Also, I'll be seeing more people later before they go to college.

Celebrating with friends was my favorite part of the party.