It was a good birthday. Heck, it was an awesome birthday. I got presents, I had a party, we all had fun, and I was very very happy. I haven’t been so happy in a long time.

This was the birthday I almost didn’t live to see, if you wanna get all melodramatic. I never doubted I’d make it here. My birthday party was planned 6 months in advance, way back in April as I lay on my hospital bed while the IV machine whirred. I would have ice-cream cake, I decided.

So yes, we did have ice-cream cake yesterday, along with pizza, chips and Gabriel’s coffee jelly. We played Saboteur and Munchkin Cthulhu and Monopoly the card game, which ends much quicker than Monopoly the board game. My colleagues bought me a Crumpler bag, and brought in a cake which we forced on the students with the promise that it carried blessings for their O Levels.

Today all of us at the office went to Pizza Hut for lunch and they gave me a free dessert. It was quite good, and would have been better if I wasn’t already stuffed full. I settled my eBay purchase, got my paycheque, and made the biggest decision of my life. And no, opting for chemotherapy was easier than this decision, because that’s sensible while this decision is based purely on desire.

Finally, after 13 months of waiting, the Vaio Z series was refreshed with Windows 7 machines. I contacted a regular on the Hardwarezone forums, who works at Sony Style in Tampines One. Sony machines are price-controlled so you can’t get a discount, but I did get some nice freebies.

I rushed to finish my work before 9 so that I could get there before the shop closed. I called a cab because none were coming, and during the cab ride I wondered if this is what new mothers feel as they’re wheeled into the delivery suite (that is, if the pain wasn’t preoccupying them). Finally, after so long, they’re going to meet the mystery individual that has been so very close and yet ultimately unknowable – until now.

Part of it is just how very long I’ve been waiting to make this purchase, but so what? Lots of people save up for ages to buy something, I’m hardly the first. Maybe it’s also the momentous occasion of a giant expenditure, and the first time I’m buying a computer with my own money. Prior to this, the most I’d ever spent on an item was 450 dollars on my bass. Yes, rent costs twice that, but rent is a necessity.

So now, the fruit of my labours is copying files to recovery discs while I type this on the empress dowager, my Acer. The Acer is 4 years old, although it had a hard drive and RAM replacement so actual age is about 2 years? Dunno. I’m keeping it around to watch DVDs on, because I have a little utility on it that breaks region codes, and I need that. The utility doesn’t work on 64-bit computers like my new Vaio.

And just like new parents, the fun ends once the help leaves and you’re alone with the baby. And you find out that it cries and poops and you have lots of caring to do. Soon my pristine hard drive will clutter up, despite my best efforts at file management. I have got better at it though, my work computer is much neater than my own computer. Anyway Windows 7′s Libraries function makes neatly arranged folders an obsessive-compulsive option.

Anyway, I really had fun this birthday. And getting presents is very nice, especially as I wasn’t expecting any. And now I have a really good haul, and what did I do to deserve it? I got born. That’s quite humbling actually, that people love you so much that the anniversary of your being born is something to be celebrated. So, thanks to everyone for making this such a memorable birthday!

Ahhhhhh so many things to buy with Windows 7 coming out!

1. Sony please hurry up and refresh your Vaio series with Win7, I want it factory-installed as I don’t like messing about with installing OSes.

2. The Sims 3! Because living my own life isn’t enough. I want to control little virtual lives too.

3. New Wacom Bamboo Fun tablet is now multitouch. For 300 bucks. Hm. Hm. Still thinking about it.

4. Apparently anyone can pick up a copy of Microsoft Office 2007 Home and Student, which is the edition that I like because it’s cheap and has OneNote, which I’ve learned to love. So, no rush to get this. Office 2010 is also coming out, public beta comes out next month. Never thought I’d get excited over a productivity suite, of all things.

5. I want to take my new laptop home and install Diablo II on it, I’m tired of waiting for Diablo III to drop. That’s when I’m not too busy earning Simoleons and dictating the toilet habits of my Sims.

6. I need a new pair of daily-wear Adidas shoes, my current Ingia pair are worn out at the sole.

7. Arggghhh gotta find time to try on, buy and alter jeans. I hate buying trousers. On the other hand, good thing I’m buying them now and not 4 months ago when I was much thinner.

8. Forever Katamari is out on the PS3, I had a go at it last weekend at Funan. But I don’t have a PS3 and I don’t want to buy one just to play Katamari… I should rent one. I don’t even have a TV~

9. Need to buy a new bottle of skin makeup primer from M.A.C. as my red earth tube has started to smell. Erk.

On Thursday morning, I found bloodstains in the mouse cage. I know what this means. They never fight badly enough to draw blood, so someone has a tumour somewhere.

It was Zero. The quietest, most skittish one. I took her to the vet where I waited nearly 2 hours before it was our turn. And I had an appointment too.

She’s back in my room now, isolated in a little box so she won’t have to move much and hurt herself. She hasn’t had anything to eat or drink. I don’t know how to get her to eat her medicine. Unlike Kipley, who just disliked the medicine, Zero seems to have lost all appetite.

I regret not fattening her up with peanut butter before sending her in for surgery. At least I’d know she had some energy stores to last her.

Now I have to deal with working while worries about a little sick mouse 20km away haunt me.

I broke a ceramic bowl this morning. It was a free soup bowl from Campbell’s Soup. I was wiping it dry and it tipped out of my hands.

I wouldn’t have been wiping it dry if there had been space on the dishwasher. There would have been space on the dishwasher if I had cleared out my pan and bowls. If I had quicker reflexes, I could have dived for the bowl instead of watching stupidly as it tumbled towards its doom. I killed it.

I feel incredibly sad that I cannot do right by those things in my possession.