You're just going to have to cut me some slack.

You may or may not have noticed if you've interacted with me in the last week or two that I'm slowly cracking up. It's because it's February. February has always carried some sort of anxiety with it. Always. The closer it gets to my upcoming 2nd 25th birthday (Remember the time warp folks.) the more and more scattered I become.

I'd like to say it's because I've been super busy at work. Or the fact that I took out my Ring which was keeping my hormones on an even keel. Hell I could even blame it on the zany weather we've been having. We've already established that the crazies come out when it's warm but I think this would be a disservice. It's because my birthday is in February...

Birthdays, like Holidays, make me nervous. Really nervous.

This year I said to myself 'I'll be armed with tools to fight the anxiety!'

'I'll have lost 15 pounds and have the exercise to fall back on!' While this is true, I've lost 13 pounds since my last birthday (Somehow I've gained 4 pounds in the last two weeks because apparently the weight loss gods HATE ME) it doesn't seem to be helping too much. I'm still pretty much bananas. I thought that exercising would burn off all that extra energy and it does do that, it just creates twice as much energy as I had before so now I'm really on a rampage.

'I'll have had another whole year of being single and appreciating a single life!' I'll say this about that. I've had my fun this past year, but not too much fun. Actually is was almost exactly zero 'fun' but I did manage to get some practice in right under the deadline. I'm still almost practically celibate which according to the Church works for some people. Not me. And when you're just a bit off-kilter it helps to have someone around to yank you back down out of the clouds. Not that I'm super-duper crazy but I am a little aloof. But like normal woman aloof. Unless I'm besought with a demon and in that case maybe celibacy is the right path for me. I'll starve the demon out or something.

*Although Sex on Skates did move in next door to me which is either extremely fortuitous or God has a really sick sense of humor. I haven't figured out which one yet. I'm still working on that one. Next on the list of culinary treats is banana pudding. Boys like banana pudding right?

But if you get right down to the meat of the problem, ignoring the issues with mortality that birthdays bring, ignoring the anxiety that planning a fun-filled event that people will enjoy brings, ignoring the attention people shower you with on your birthday whether you deserve it or not, it comes down to one thing and one thing only.

For one entire evening I'll be forced to sit and choke down a meal with both of my parents all the while praying they'll behave. That they won't make asses of themselves in public, in front of my friends or even in front of me. They'll sit there and do their cute flirty, angsty bantering back and forth and people will laugh and I'll cringe because I know what it really means.

That they're about one asinine comment away from stabbing one another in the eyeball with a fork and creating an incident. An incident that only I can deal with because they thought it necessary to beget one singular progeny. Me.