All I want for my birthday...

I am going to be one year older soon.

And in line with keeping with tradition, I am writing a birthday wish list. I am a firm believer in telling people what you want because this increases the chance of you actually getting what you want as it takes the guess work out of the equation, and subsequently allows the other person to concentrate their efforts on getting you what you want. This, of course, does not gel well with some people. In fact, in a recent discussion I found myself in when it comes to birthday gifts, to some people, giving a wish list took away the meaning of gifting – you know the whole, I see this thing, think about you and then actually give it to you. I guess viewed this way, I am just a terrible person when it comes to gifting. Or perhaps, I just don’t know people that well to be able to give them with an object that I deem to be something they may derive a lot of enjoyment of.

But I am all in for open and transparent communication that’s often borderline inappropriate, so here we go. Before we launch into this year’s birthday list, let’s see what happened to last year’s wish list.

Running without pain. While I ran for most of this year without much pain, there were definitely moments whereby running was painful. This stays on this year’s list while I work out what is the most optimum way for me to run. My personal best for this year is 5km in 26:30. It happened just once and I haven’t had a repeat performance ever since. If I get to beat this time next year, that would be fucking awesome.

A dog. Oh gawd, I want a dog. Since forever. This is also not possible given our living situation. So this is put on hold indefinitely. It hurts my chest writing this (then again, I am currently battling a throat/chest infection).

A huge kick-ass mirror. Don’t know happened with this one because actually, found a good candidate for the apartment and then don’t know what happened, didn’t end up purchasing. Hm. Perhaps this is a good sign that this should not have been on the list.
(but I still kind of want the mirror…)

This year’s birthday wish list goes like this: all of the above plus the following (in no particular order of importance)

Fried chicken. Holy fuck, I abstained from fried chicken for a whole month and have not been missing it since then like I thought I would. I have not had fried chicken in what seems like forever and I find myself not thinking about it as often as I had been in the past. While this break up is definitely unintended, it is much welcome by my arteries and my heart, but somehow my throat responded by getting an infection (see above). That said, I want some fried chicken. It’s my birthday and I will eat fried chicken if I want to. If I die, I will die on a high, which is infinitely better in my books rather than living a mediocre, fried-chicken-less life.

Clothes that fit. I tagged along a dear friend to his tailor yesterday, and got to witness a lesson on fit. Clothes that fit is like so fucking important that I can even begin to tell you why that’s the case. Yes, I know that these days my fit standard is somewhat on the poor end of the scale, with all those oversized shirts – what can I say, it’s hot outside. Yet the real reason is that my body shape is changing, quite possibly due to my exercise routine. On this note, while I am all in for being healthy (it is after all the most important element of an enjoyable life), this whole business of changing shapes is getting annoying. Because as much as I like going shopping and dressing myself, this is also a very expensive process and my bank account needs to be kept happy.

But those things, really, are not that important. Because if I were to be completely honest, I already have all that I want. I am happy with the decisions that I make in my life, I am blessed with good health and I enjoy the company of the finest people in this life – people, whom I feel, love me without having to mouth those words.

I am very very lucky.

And I actually look forward to getting older, and hopefully, wiser.