happy birthday to me

so, my birthday was last thursday, and I have to say I was really impressed with how many people remembered it. (I'm sure Facebook et. al. had absolutely nothing to do with that.) So anyway, thanks for all your emails and stuff! I ended up celebrating at a very odd party- Silvia, my very Italian neighbor, had a party with all her Italian friends and her Italian mother, so I invited everyone I knew (none of them Italian) and together we crammed 34 people into a 1-bedroom apartment.