• Went to Atlanta and met my best friend from high school’s baby daughter.
• Went to Pittsburgh for a family reunion, where I was told by no less than three people “Wow, you look like a White!” (that’s my mother’s maiden name, not a commentary on my pasty appearance), met a lot of cousins I had never met before, and saw my high school band director and his wife. Also, went to my first casino.
• Went to Philadelphia, stayed in a hostel, and did research in the American Philosophical Society where I got to examine the originals of letters from Benjamin Franklin’s wife, daughter, and sister. I also ate a cheesesteak while I was there.
• Went to the Berkshires several times.
• Went to the beach.
• Started working out on a semi-regular basis.
• Heard Foster the People live in Prospect Park. I didn’t see them because there was a barrier around the band shell and I was outside the barrier, but they sounded great!
• Celebrated nine years of being with Rick.
• Got into my first fender bender, which was really just an epic fail on my part while trying to parallel park Rick’s car–I don’t get a lot of practice and I cut it way too sharp. I scraped and dented the side of Rick’s car on someone’s bumper. Since this only happened on Friday, I still feel pretty awful about it, even though he has been amazingly nice about the whole thing.

There are also the things that I did that I wouldn’t write into an essay, like:

• Drank a lot of wine.
• Taught Charlie how to beg for food on his hind legs like a meerkat.
• Knit a wee bit.
• Did some thesis work, but not as much as I might have.
• Watched a lot of True Blood and Torchwood, which is directly related to the bullet point just above this one.
• Actually, the working out thing from above should probably go here, because it’s kind of mundane.
• Was bitten by approximately five million bugs.
• Made it halfway through my Invisalign treatment (so far, it’s not like I quit after I got there).
• Wasted a ton of time on my iPad.
• Read the entire Hunger Game series, some of the Game of Thrones series, and am still reading the latest Julia Grey mystery.

Things I’m going to try to cram into the remaining two weeks of vacation because I either haven’t done them or haven’t done them enough:

• Go to Governor’s Island.
• Hit the Rickshaw dumpling truck.
• Go to the beach at least one more time.
• Go to the Bronx Zoo with my goddaughter.
• Back to school shopping and a haircut, because kids should not be the only ones who benefit from this time of year.

The Coop, for those of you who don’t live in Cambridge, sells Harvard and MIT logo merchandise in every size, shape, and price range. Well, maybe not every price range. I didn’t see anything under $5, for instance. But everything above that, yes, I saw. And the swarm of people in there this weekend for Freshman Parents’ Weekend…my god. It was like we had all been drinking the Harvard Kool-Aid. You could see it in everyone’s face: “My kid (or pseudo-stepkid) is in Harvard and seems to like it here, WE CAN FINALLY BUY THE LOGO STUFF!!!”

In my insanity, I might have bought a blanket, a t-shirt for Samang, a coffee cup for my mom, a Harvard Fair Isle winter hat, and two collapsible beer cozies. Among other things. Rick might have bought me a blinged-out Harvard shot glass. (He bought way more stuff than that, I just picked out the most random thing he bought.) Oh, the insansity.

And yet…my pseudo-stepkid is in Harvard and not only seems to like it there, she seems to be doing fairly well there. I think I have a right to be a proud Harvard parent. If you see me on the street, decked out in my Crimson gear, please try not to mock me. I will thank you for it.

Other things making the kickoff of my birthday week awesome: a winning Steelers game, a haircut, a spa pedicure, and a small yarn expedition. My life is good. Now I just need to catch up on the homework – I’ve got a 600 page book due on Thursday (halfway through right now), 100 pages for Wednesday, and a bunch of articles to read for my first paper in the Vietnam class.

In the absence of a better explanation, I am totally going with “time warp.”

I told Sage that if her mom and dad capitulated, I would take her. They did, and I did (Rick came too, since she is under 18 and needed parental consent and I am not legally a parent). We went to the same place where I got my navel and rook piercings, and where we took Amelia to get her helix piercing almost three years ago (damn, time flies!). I went into the back room with Sage for moral support. I asked her if she wanted to hold my hand while it was done. “There’s no shame in it. I held someone’s hand when I got my piercings done, Amelia held my hand when she got hers done,” I told her. “Amelia is a wuss,” Sage proclaimed. She graciously forbore to say the same thing about me. “Okay, then,” I said, and just stood back.

She got marked for the piercing, okayed its position, and then she got pierced. No problem, the kid didn’t turn white, she didn’t look faint, she was a real trooper as the piercing artist put the ring in. She looked in the mirror and gushed, “It’s so cool!” Since she was taking it so well, I asked if we could stick around a few more minutes so I could get another hoop for my own helix piercing. She agreed and gleefully went off to show her dad, who was waiting in the main shop area.

I was paying for my new hoop when I heard a tremendous thud. I looked over my shoulder and saw Sage on the floor, with Rick crouched beside her. Five minutes after she was pierced, the shock of it had caught up with her, and she hit the decorative steel plating on the floor like a ton of bricks. I ran over in time to have her look at me and say in wonder, “Did I just pass out?” Why yes, grasshopper, yes you did. The piercing artists were awesome about the whole thing, sat her down in front of the airconditioner and gave her a lollipop to raise her blood sugar while I ran downstairs to get Gatorade from the bodega. When I got back, Rick went out to get the car, and pretty soon we were on our way to her apartment, not much the worse for wear except for a bump on her head.

Turns out this was the first time she had ever passed out and she while she didn’t like the whole process, she did like being able to say she had passed out. It made the story, so to speak. I told her it probably would have been better if she hadn’t told me that Amelia was a wuss, since Amelia had not passed out after her piercing, but I was informed that was not the point. The official story is that for Sage’s 15th birthday she got a helix piercing, and she passed out. And it was LEGEN-wait-for-it-DARY.

I guess I’m at a loss. I hope it passes soon.

Hey, world? She’s pretty fucking awesome.

Fortunately, although we got into line at about 6:20 (gates opened at 6:30) and were well back in it, we found a guy that Rick plays softball with. Who happens to be the head of security for Celebrate Brooklyn. (Hi, Mike!) He got us in ahead of most of the line, and we were able to set up our blanket and picnic spread in plenty of time, which means that when Amelia arrived in Brooklyn, she had someplace to meet us. Fortunately, she got in ahead of them closing the gates as well, because we hadn’t come up with a contingency plan for that.

The show was fantastic. It was a lot of songs that David Byrne had collaborated on with Brian Eno, but there were a couple of big Talking Heads hits as well, and they kept the crowd jumping. But although I was very happy that it was someone I liked doing the opening concert of the year, I was happier still that the venue was finally open. I spend a lot of time at Celebrate Brooklyn concerts/movies/dance pieces in the summer because it’s a great chance to hang out with friends and have a picnic. Seeing it through Amelia’s eyes last night, I found an added benefit.

“Wow, I didn’t know there were this many hipsters in New York!” she exclaimed when she got to our blanket. And thus the “Count the Hipsters” game was born. Last night’s total, before the show started: 54. Good times.

The number wouldn’t matter, except that in August, the Youngest turned 13 and was able to join Facebook like her older sister and I. She was thrilled that she was finding so many friends and thought the was the queen of popularity. She proudly announced to us that she had 100 Facebook friends, and asked how many we had. The Oldest had over 500 (she runs in wide social circles because of her mother’s lifestyle). A little crestfallen, the Youngest turned to me and asked how many I had. Surely an old person like me wouldn’t have as many as a really cool 13 year old. I told her I had about 165 (this was pre-knitter/friend explosion). She was seriously bummed, not taking into account that I’m older than her, work in several different fields and have online friends. At that age, I guess it’s all about the numbers, not the circumstances that would explain those numbers.

Since then, we occasionally compare numbers, and I think she is always hopeful that she will surpass me. Today’s: Oldest, 590. Youngest, 147. Julie, 282. Facebook: helping me fuck with teenagers’ self-esteem and earn the “Evil” in Evil Julie since 2008.

1. Where her nose and ears are. I was pointing out facial features on a monkey doll she has, and said “Here’s the monkey’s ear.” J would then say “Here’s Mommy’s ear” and point to her own, and I would follow suit, and then we would say “Where are Samang’s ears?” And she pointed to them right away.

2. To clap after good plays during a football game. Actually, she just learned how to clap after any play in a football game, but she just turned 17 months old. We’ve got time.

3. To say “apple.” I had brought the laptop over to J’s house to do some work yesterday, and Samang was entranced with the glowing Apple logo on it. I told her it was an apple, and she said “Ahhh-pull” for the next ten minutes.

4. Possibly the most important thing I taught her: how to do a fist bump. After a few false starts where she poked my fist with her pointer finger, she is now fist bumping like a pro and gave fist bumps to Mommy, Daddy, Uncle Rick, and Mama Julie. Repeatedly. We are still trying to do “thumbs up,” but that seems a little more challenging. At least now if Barack Obama sees her at the Inauguration Parade, she will be able to greet her new President: