21st Birthday

No, not mine, I'm 19. But my boyfriend's! Honestly, I've been trying to take a step back from him recently. Learning to do things on my own and trying to hang out with other people as well. It's a real struggle. I mean, he's great and all, but I just need some alone time right now, you know what I mean?

His birthday was fun though. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, so we went on a bike ride and played tennis. Then I drove him to Joplin and we went to this place he's been wanting to try called Magic Noodle. His parents are missionaries, so he spent the first half of his life in Singapore and appreciates "authentic Asian" food. And he always says it bugs him how in America you can mostly only get Italian noodles (pasta) which aren't "real noodles". I think that's kind of funny.

So we went there. I was feeling fairly ok with it, because Asian food is generally healthy, right? I ordered a soup with glass noodles and vegetables. Well, the soup came out and it was in a HUGE bowl. He had ordered soup as well and I asked if he was going to finish the whole thing and he said yes, but he was used to rice stretching out his stomach. Seriously, this was probably two or three times the size of my stomach!

It was very good, I ate maybe a third before I was truly full. And I didn't feel too bad about it because it was healthy and for his birthday and he really enjoyed it.

Then we went to Petland and held the puppies and ran around Toys R Us and goofed off with the light sabers.

For his gift, I'm taking him to play paintball this Saturday. He says all in, it was an amazing birthday planned and one of his favorites. Mission accomplished =)

I had asked him if he wanted to hang out with his buds instead and do all the "normal" 21st birthday "stuff", but he's drunk before so he said he didn't feel the need to and would rather hang out with me.

On a side note, I'm submitting a couple of pieces to contests and hoping maybe my writing will get some kind of recognition. I've been published 3 times in various magazines and hold a copyright, but I would really like to continue to compete and push until maybe I can get my memoir and maybe a novel published. That would really be my dream. I let off of it for a while last year, but I'm really trying to get back into it. So I've been exercising my poetry, short story, and novel muse. Wish me luck!