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Today is my birthday. I am 29. A real 29. Not one of those 5th anniversaries of being 29, either. So, yeah… my birthday.

I am honestly not one for big celebrations of my birthday. I don’t dread getting older and having one day that specifically signifies it, but I just don’t get all into celebrating it. Milestone birthdays can be different. 29th birthdays… not so much. Oddly enough, it feels like I was 28 for a lot longer than just a year, too. Either the year took forever to finish out, or I was incredibly bored for a good portion of it. I tell you what, though, these last 4 months have just blown by. Says something about my job, I think. Time flies when you’re having fun.

Of course, as birthdays go, gifts can, and often are involved. No exception here. However, I am not one for being materialistic. I feel a bit guilty to get gifts for something as trivial as surviving another year. “Here! You’re still alive! Isn’t that fantastic? Have a Sony Universal Remote!” But sometimes you get gifts you don’t really expect or think about and those seem… nicer. I have received one so far. From my wife. For all intent and purposes, it might as well be the only gift I will get, cuz I may not remember what others give me — no offense. The -new- 40GB iPod. And so far, it is awesome. I mean really awesome. My only concern is that my grimy paws are muckin’ up the kewl metal surface of it. Gonna have to whip out the Oakley microfiber cloth to clean it up. I have 302 songs on it now. On shuffle. God, it’s sweet!

Speaking of Oakley (weird tangent, I know), a long time ago — about the time I was first getting paychecks — I used to buy these sunglasses without question. The first pair I got were Eye Jackets. Due to manufacture defects in the ear pieces, they broke. Two pairs. No more dumpin’ my money on those. So then I move to the Titanium (not sure if that is what they were called back then, closest to them now is the T-Wire). Those got stolen. That really made me made, cuz they were hella expensive. After that, I just stuck to $10 glasses. And you know what - no breakage, no stealing, long lasting useful sunglasses is what I had. Then while working as a waiter, someone happened to leave their sunglasses at the restaurant. Nice sunglasses. Oakley Straight Jackets. You know what happens to sunglasses left at restaurants for a couple of days? First come, first serve, baby! Guess who first come. Karma paid me back. Took a while, but I have now been the proud owner of someone else’s Oakleys for the last, oh… 8 months.

Happy Birthday to me! And while I am at it, Happy b-lated to my cousin (Aug. 3rd) and happy birthday to his mom (Aug. 5th). I should get a tattoo… I’m old enough to start trying to reclaim my youth, right?

America has a new team — and it looks like they putting more than the “F” in Freedom.