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I'm officially OLD. I still can't grasp the fact that I'm now 24 years old. Ever since yesterday morning, I've been suffering a "quarter life crisis." My nerves have calmed down considerably, but part of me is still freaking out. It's just that when I look around me, a lot of my friends are getting married, are engaged, some have children already...what do I have? I'm still single, still in school, and working a dead end job for the time being. Then I realized my situation and why I'm at where I'm at. Clearly I have trust issues and I am beyond jaded when it comes to guys. I've been hurt one too many times that finding "the one" will be a difficult task. Seeing as how Adrienne, Angel, and I have coined ourselves each as one of the Kardashian sisters, I can only hope that I can find "the one" like Khloe did, even though it was all in a month. I've opened myself up emotionally to a guy for once, and look where it got me. My walls have not only gone back up, but they are enforced with an alarm system and guard dogs. In fact, it's now a fortress! In the guy front, I have a feeling another friend is crushing on me, but I'm personally not feeling it. I don't really know him, he's a mutual friend of a friend and I've only hung out with him twice and saw him for three seconds on another occasion. I'm a dork and he's a dork, but he's way too much dork for me. School was something I wasn't ready for since the start of middle school. Now that I've found my niche, I have to remember that I'm now supporting myself through school with my parents helping out with whatever they can. I changed majors a few times, so of course that took a toll on my graduation status. I think I began freaking out, because I'm having that fear that all college students are having: finding a job after graduation. I've found some jobs that pay a lot of graphics and digital design, but I still have a lot to learn about photoshop, illustrator, and I still have to learn dream weaver. I know Trader Joe's pays at least $12-$15 an hour for an artist to draw the signs for the aisles. I know I'll be alright. We all have to start somewhere; Andy Warhol got started drawing and painting signs for grocery stores and magazine ad's. Jobs...I'm in college. I fall into every stereotype of working a crappy job. Of course people tell me that it'll all pay off in the end. I know it will. All of this thinking is what calmed my nerves. I'm now 24 years old. So far it's been a good year. I have a really good feeling about this year. I'll just have to see where life takes me.

My birthday itself was a lot of fun! Of course I was Filipino time fashionably late to my own party. I had a few set backs. My parents took me out to a late lunch at my favorite Mexican restaurant, Guapos. We went grocery shopping after, and then I had to clean up the house a bit. My parents went to shop for a new rice cooker and take my dad's friend to the metro, and I was going to take his truck. Since my body couldn't handle shoveling anymore, the snow on the edge of the driveway held the truck hostage. I had to wait 20 minutes for my parents to come back so my dad can work his driving magic, and get the truck out of the driveway. On a happy note while being stuck at home, my "Carry you There" scarf came in the mail! I was so happy that I had to wear it right away. From there I had to get Tommy and Angel, and we were stuck in traffic on 95 South into 495 West. We made a pit stop at Target to kill time and get Angel some pain killers. Plus she was feeling nauseous because of some dieting stuff she's taking. We had to pick up Jenny and she just got out of rehearsal, so I was giving her some time to get ready. I was two hours late, and of course Isaac, Paola, and Jess were already at Rio. Isaac knows about Filipino time, because he grew up with a lot of Filipino friends. Turtle and Malwina got there about 10 minutes after we parked. Megan got there 20 minutes later. The Amazing Art place was fun! I immediately had my mind set on painting a tea pot for our Alice in Wonderland opening night Back Row tea party. The tea pot will be strictly ornamental that night, since I'm dressing up as the Mad Hatter. The design is very simple, because I wanted it that way. It didn't turn out the way I had imagined it, but I like it just the same. I gave out some Anti-Valentines day stuff. I got those giant hershey kisses for the cousins and a box of Hello Kitty candy bracelets for Tommy. Angel and I have started calling him "Hello Kitty" an Russell; he looks like Russell from "Up." The entire night the three of us were wearing the Hello Kitty candy bracelets, and we even filmed a commercial for it HAHAHA! Jay didn't show up like she said she would, so I have two extra Hershey kisses for myself. Dinner was at California Pizza Kitchen, and it was really crazy. The girls went to the bar while we waited for our table, and they offered for me to join them. They were hoping that I would give up my straight edge and have a drink. Sorry! They did toast me from the bar, though, so it was cool. When we got our table Jess tried to trick me for a sip of my raspberry lemonade. She was drinking a long island (I think), and offered me a sip for a sip of my lemonade. I told her she can just have a sip for free, I'm not falling for it. Mike, Angel's boyfriend, met up with us at CPK and joined us for dinner. Megan sat there observing how my cousins and I interacted, and said that this explains the craziness that is me. She was so entertained and amused by how crazy we are. It was time for the cake and I knew Tommy was going to pull something. Megan got Twilight plates for the occasion, and I got to choose who I wanted for my plate. Pfft, Team Edward of course! I blew out the candles, and Tommy attacked with icing. I took a handful and got him back. Megan also told me to remind her to tell me the back story about the cake as soon as I cut it. It was a rainbow cake, and the colors made me think of Andy Warhol. It was originally supposed to be a soup can, but time wasn't agreeable. Megan said that she came across the recipe on Stumbleupon (OH stumbleupon!) and the description said that it was perfect for birthdays, mom's birthday's mothers day, coming out to your parents, coming out to your parents on your mom's birthday, coming out to your mom on mothers day, etc. I told Tommy to get his flip camera ready and asked Paola to take a picture. I took a finger full of icing and told Angel to pose with us. I tagged her with icing at the count of three. We stayed until closing time, and parted ways from there. It was a simple, low key birthday and it was a lot of fun. Although the ceramics painting place is a bit pricey, the tea pot was about $48, it was something that everyone enjoyed. Tommy, Angel, and I are trying to plan another hang out in two weeks since Tommy's parents were being....ugh...and were scowling about how late he was. I told him that I was unaware that he had a curfew, and he told me that he had no idea, either. So whatever, we'll hang out again. They were pretty irritated that they couldn't go to Guapos. I text Tommy while we were waiting for our food, and he was blown. He told Angel in the car, and she had the same reaction. So two weeks!

I celebrated Singles Awareness day at work with Eric and Joey. We ordered a pizza and dealt with couple after couple coming in. One lady tipped us twice after talking about our Singles Awareness plans after work that involved ice cream and a gory movie. I spent my night watching Keeping Up with the Kardashians instead of watching 500 Days of Summer like I had planned. For some reason I thought today was Monday, and I made plans to watch 500 Days of Summer for Singles Awareness with the girls. Oh well, I think I might do that tomorrow. The lady told me that I shouldn't do that to myself, it's torture. No, torture would be watching "Casino Night" over and over and over again. Torture would be watching this particular clip over and over and over again:



Sigh. Oh Jim. WHY CAN'T YOU BE REAL?! So yup. Happy Singles Awareness Day!