I Am Twenty-Eight

"Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that the people who have the most live the longest."

Larry Lorenzoni

My birthday visited me last month and since I have tweaked my social media accounts to not alert my acquaintances to its passing, I received only birthday wishes from the usual suspects. My mom and dad did, and so did my sister. As with all previous years, I got a birthday greeting on Facebook from that one guy with whom I went to high school who was born on the same day I was. The nursing matron who oversees the department I work in wished me as well, no doubt after recently handling my work documents but thankfully, she did not pass the word. Like some mountain-dwelling misanthrope, I purposefully kept my birth date a loosely guarded secret just to see who doesn't care enough to remember, so I can in turn forget their birthdays in a passive-aggressive fashion. Take that, friends-I-don't-have!

My wife reminded me of it weeks before le quatorze juillet (my birth date) came up, repeatedly asking me what I want for my birthday. Then, in spite of the (variable and confusing) answers I gave her, she got me a bottle of Ralph Lauren's Polo Blue Eau de toilette because my last bottle of BO concealer ran out two years ago. I take it that she thinks I stink but she's still married to me, so I guess it's true love after all.

She wrapped it so I can unwrap it in a few hours time at dinner.

Eau de toilette literally means "toilet water".

Now I shall smell like a polo player.

This prompted me to look up the difference between eau de toilette, eau de parfum and eau de cologne and apparently, they are just different gradings for a scent's concentration. Eau de parfum contains about 10-20% aromatic compounds, eau de toilette has 5-15%, while colognes are usually citrus extracts with 2-6% strength. There are significant overlaps in the number ranges because the French just don't give a fuck like that. Anyway, the different grades dictates whether you can spray a fragrance on yourself liberally or simply dab your pulse points with a drop or two. Judging from how some people's application of their fragrances can make my eyes water from 6 feet away, I suspect that very few people are aware of this fact. They won't notice that their scent is overpowering of course because of olfactory habituation (the why-is-this-pile-of-poop-smelling-less-offensive-the-longer-I-stand-beside-it? phenomenon). Maybe I can share what I learned about perfume strengths with them and lose even more friends.

And what did I get for myself?

Well, since I asked, I'll tell me. I bought a new smartphone to replace my stupidphone. It's a Samsung Galaxy S5 - an Android - because I am an atheist and I want no part in the Apple religion. I also bought myself a few video games from Steam (Penny Arcade's On The Rain-slick Precipice of Darkness 3 and 4, and Might & Magic Heroes VI) and made myself a birthday drink for good measure.

It was a piña colada, of course.

Add cat to taste.

And because birthdays are just thinly veiled excuses to stuff our faces and then vowing (and failing) to eat less for a whole week after that, we went to Sharing Planet, a nearby restaurant that serves food portions meant to be shared by two or three average-sized Malaysians. Cheryl and I ordered two whole portions and ate till we hate ourselves.

Quesa-nacho grande. La tentación del diablo!

Mixed grill, with the addition of a slab of rump beef.

Now I'm twenty-eight. I'm at that age when I need to mentally calculate how old I actually am if people catches me unaware with a sudden question. I guess the older you get, the less significant each year becomes, eh?



Thirty ahoy,
k0k s3n w4i