Thanks for the happy birthday wishes! It was a swell birthday, but it was also a birthday that was EERILY SIMILAR to another birthday I had not too long ago.

Let us flashback to…say…CHAPTER ONE of my book Happy Birthday or Whatever. The title of said book draws from the chapter in which my PARENTS FORGET MY BIRTHDAY.

Now let us flashforward to present day, August 25, 2010, also known as my birthday (and the birthdays of Regis Philbin, Elvis Costello, Ivan the Terrible, and, in addition, my friend Natalie. I should note that I’ve only had dinner with one of those four people. Hint: It’s not Ivan the Terrible). It was a good birthday. I ate a very civilized dinner with a few of my closest friends, including Chris who was carrying a murse. We made fun of him and agreed that in order to offset the mursiness he had to carry bacon, ammo, power tools, various knives, and a bottle of Old Spice. Anyway point is, it was a very pleasant evening, murse and all. I did not want a rage-a-thon this year. Figured I’d wait for the weekend like a responsible grown-up, which I now am. Not really.

But wait…something is missing…hmmm…something is misssiinnnggg.

Oh right. My parents TOTALLY FORGOT AGAIN. Again!!!

You’d think that when your kid writes a BOOK about forgetting her birthday, you’d start, you know, remembering.

So the next day August 26, is my parents’ anniversary. So I call my mom and I’m like heeeyy girl, what’s up? And I say happy anniversary! And she goes, oh is that today? Really? What’s the date? I say it’s August 26th. She goes whoaaa, where did the time go, are you sure its our anniversary? And I say yes, I am sure because I have a thing called a calendar, it is a device from the future in which you can annotate important dates. This “calendar” is also available in digital forms, such as on a computer or on a cellular telephone. And then I wait for it. You know, the REALIZATION that she has made A HORRIBLE MISTAKE. And she goes, oh well, I’ll call you daddy later, what are you doing for your birthday tomorrow?

*forehead slap*

I say DUDE my birthday was YESTERDAY, and she goes, NO, and I say YES and she says NO, and that keeps going for awhile and then she says sorry and says “Oh my gosh, I’m such a zero.” Which actually made me laugh because I have never heard her say that before, I have no idea where she picked that up. Sometimes she says “I’m going to give you knuckle sandwich” which is pretty hilarious and my father calls rolling through a stop sign a “California Stop” instead of a “California roll” even after I explained that it’s a play on words with the type of sushi, but he thinks that is nonsense. I think that cream cheese in sushi is gross. Cheese and seaweed is weird, you guys. Seriously. Who was the dude who said “Oh shit I just had a great idea. What if we take some raw fish, add some cream cheese, add some rice and wrap it with seaweed? Awesome, right?” The man was obviously from California.

Anyway my mother says sorry, I go it’s fine, but really, what is wrong with you? Then she says, oh it’s really hot in Los Angeles! I’m not sure if she was trying to change the subject or if perhaps the 103 degree heat has actually made her “go full retard.”

So then I think, do I call my father, wish HIM a happy anniversary? And I think no no no, in just a few minutes, he will call me. Because my mother will call him and tell him that they forgot something important and in addition, did you know it was our anniversary today? No, me neither! OMG!

Anyway he ended up calling and apologizing.

Oh, I should also mention that my brother had REMINDED/WARNED them it was my birthday. Like, seriously people. He said he tried, but failed. Anyway the whole thing is hilarious and sad, but probably more hilarious. More sad the first time, more hilarious the second time.

I learned an important lesson today: Always order more desserts, even if people say no no no I’m full I don’t really need to eat dessert. Because they are lying. Everyone needs to eat dessert.

Today is my birthday. This means you can’t yell at me for not blogging in a long, long time. I’m specifically blogging today because I know you guys have to be nice to me and not bitch me out for being a bad blogger because it is the anniversary of what is most likely the third most important day in my parents’ lives. Maybe even fourth. Shit, maybe I’m not even in the top five! That is sad, though not surprising I suppose. There’s their meeting/getting married, moving to the States, having my brother, and having me. The question is whether or not my mother kicking cancer is more or less important than me and my brother’s births. Hmm, anyway, the point is, it is a somewhat important day. For me, I’d say it’s an adequately important day. Therefore, you must be nice. Let’s keep things civil, people.

I just returned from my yearly visit to Canada. It was very Canadian, thanks for asking. This is what I saw:

It was a regular, non-double rainbow all the way. You can’t see them, but that rainbow is entirely composed of mosquitoes that were all chasing me. I managed to get a mosquito bite on my face, which feels awesome, and one dangerously close to my ass. They attack me when I’m going to the bathroom and my defenses are literally down. Bastards. Bastards!!!!

I should mention that while I was there, I did see another Korean girl. She was working at the grocery store. I am sure that she went home and told her parents that she, too, saw a Korean girl. Funny how that works.

So what have I missed?

My very, very good friends Karina and John had their baby today. Maxwell was born this morning, and was THREE WEEKS early. But he’s healthy and a wallop of a boy/man at 7 lbs and 21 inches. If he actually came on time, he’d be like bigger than me, which actually isn’t saying much. Congrats to them and their families and congrats to me because now I have a new toy. I cannot wait to teach him stuff. It’s gonna be awesome! First I will teach him how to make a good martini and how to make a pipe out of an apple. These are important skills. Then, we will go break shit together.

Hello friends, happy New Year!

People have been saying LET’S MAKE THIS THE BEST YEAR EVER! And this is all peachy fine. HOWEVER, I’m thinking why should we make this year the BEST EVER? Why not just make it NOT suck? It’s not that I’m a pessimistic person. I’m just more into setting goals that are achievable. I mean BEST year? How can you possibly know that this year will be the BEST EVER? I mean you haven’t lived all your years yet, so “BEST” is kind of a hard thing to judge. This year might be the SECOND best or THIRD best. I mean maybe in five years you will have a really really awesome year and THAT will be much better than this year. So what I’m trying to say is that let’s just make this year not suck and it will bound to be better than 2009, and, quite possibly, the best, but it certainly doesn’t have to be THE BEST. If 2010 is better than 2009, then we can be happy with better. We can be happy that it doesn’t suck because honestly, not sucking is truly a big accomplishment and we can be proud of that. I’m already proud that 2010 is not sucking, erego, I have achieved my New Years’ resolution of not sucking. DONE AND DONE.

Also, I’ve also noticed everyone saying how 2009 was truly the WORST year ever. Again, you have no way of judging that. There might be really really shitty years to come. Also, I can think of a few other years that sucked more than 2009. The year was BAD, maybe, but it wasn’t THAT bad. I mean it sucked, yes, but I thought 2008 was actually worse. There were probably some years during the 50s that sucked too. I bet you year 1 sucked too. Transitional year and the whole year-re-numbering thing probably was a real pain in the ass. Like you know how after daylight savings you get all confused? I rest my case.

Los Angeles was fun blah blah blah except for the part where my family forgot to pick me up from the airport blah blah blah. It was like 3:00 on Christmas and I get off the plane and I’m like YEAHH I’M PARTYING IN THE CITY OF ANGELS! I go outside, call to see where my ride is and my mother’s like “Airport? Is that now?” And then I fall into some insane rage and I’m like did you FORGET TO PICK ME UP FROM THE AIRPORT and my mother says I didn’t forget to pick you up from the airport, I just thought you were coming at 3:30. And I say no, it was always 3:00. Keep in mind that my parents live about 45 minutes from the airport (WITHOUT traffic) so even if she thought it was at 3:30, she should definitely be ON the frickin road by 3:00. Which she was not. And she starts backpedalling and being like, no actually you’re brother is picking you up. And I’m like oh is he already here? And she says no he just left. Sigh. So I spent a good 45 minutes hanging out at the airport and suffering from acute rage. Yay. I love Christmas. So of course I’m at the airport yelling on the phone being like why do I bother even coming here for Christmas. Why don’t I just come another time when it is easier and cheaper to travel, we don’t even celebrate Christmas, it is just like any other day in our family. And then I realize I’m totally that asshole who is yelling on the phone at the airport on Christmas. And people are like all staring at me and my eyes are like spinning in my head and smoke is coming out of my ears. The works. Then my brother picked me and I said don’t you guys realize that if you fuck up I’ll write about it? Have we not learned anything? And he says no, do you have $2 for parking I have no cash on me.

But the rest of my vacation was rad and did not suck! Mission accomplished! My bandmate Andy Burne got engaged to his ladyfriend Julia! Nathan and his ladyfriend are coming to visit in February! I saw the Bauhaus show at Moma! I got cushions for my shoes! My apartment is really clean! And according to the Weather Channel “It feels like 1°F”!

Also, please note that Annietown has migrated. Things should be all awesome on your end. One of my best friends in L.A. Micah is taking over and hosting Annietown from his living room which may or may not have mice. Special thanks to Ravi who has been hosting the past 2 years and being a good sport about my asshole texts at 3 am OMG RAVI ANNIETOWN IS DOWN. Ravi I love you and you continue to be awesome and full of win and bacon, you’re two favorite things. Now Micah will be my bitch.

Micah! Fix my sidebar! (uh when you get the chance?)

I’m considering doing a redesign of Annietown. Part of me is like, why change it? It’s fine, it doesn’t have to be fancypants, I’m just sharing WORDZ here, not doing anything insane. Then the other part of me is like, well I could make it snazzier? i.e. HAVE MORE EXPLOSIONS. I shall ruminate.

I celebrated a birthday last week. I hope I never stop having birthdays because THEY ARE AWESOME. We should have more birthdays, right? Would that make it less special? Maybe. But you know what? It would really spice up the economy. Just saying.

My mother called me at 9:30 in the morning, while I was at the office. She was like “What are you doing?” And I was all dude, I’m AT THE OFFICE because that is what I do on a Tuesday at 9:30 and she’s all, “Happy birthday! You so old now. You should have baby and I raise it for you.” That was all.

My cousin, who lives in Seoul, had a kid, but then went through a divorce. She’s a concert pianist and goes on tour a lot, so my aunt and my mom are more or less raising the kid. Being raised by one’s grandmothers basically means you get a shitload of attention and, like, all the ice cream you want. So they want to have another sibling for the kid so he can, you know, “keep it real.” Which, I suppose, is where I come in. PLEASE NOTE: My uterus is currently closed. Sorry for the inconvenience. At this time there are no plans to open my uterus. However, you can sign up for the newsletter to get the latest updates on my uterus. Just kidding. A uterus newsletter would be heinous. Or, awesome. You know how some people will send you email from babies or pets in the first person, like “Hi, Today I had my first piece of cake and boy, was it messy!” or “Today I went for a long walk, played fetch with Mommy and Daddy and I found a dead squirrel!” Well, my uterus newsletter would be like that. “Today I’m dry and old and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to breed! OMG, sad face. But don’t worry Mom is totes taking good care of me! LOL!” Yes, my uterus is like a 12-year-old girl. Disturbing, I know, but listen, it’s my uterus. I can’t change it. It is what it is, you understand?

Speaking of uterii, in Canada, I saw this sign and, of course, had to take a photo of it because the rest of my body is also 12 years old, just like my uterus.

So here’s the moral of the story: I am older in Earth years, but in mental years, I am still, like, 12 years old. Now, who wants to drop me off at the mall?

Hello friends!

Happy belated New Year! As usual, I am late. But I’m OK with that. You might not be OK with that. And I’m OK with that, too. I’m OK with a lot of things, really.

I am back in New York now. I flew out last night at 9 pm and landed this morning at 5 am. OMG death. Then I decided to be “bad” and splurge for a cab ($53 after tip OUCH) despite my New Year’s resolution to SAVE THE CASH MONIES. So already 2009 is full of broken promises and shattered dreams (shattered dreams, feel like I can run away, run away). But there were no yellow cabs at that Ricky Retardo hour, so as I was going outside there were all these gypsy cab hawks asking if I wanted a cab and one of them actually grabbed my luggage from my hands “I will take you! I will take you!” and I was like “Don’t you dare grab my bag, it’s not polite” and shooed him. And suddenly I became like the biggest Courtesy Cop ever. But dude, don’t grab people’s shit! I mean, come on.

I spent New Year’s eve with friends from New York actually. Marco and Lizzie were visiting and staying at The Standard downtown, which they should just rename The Doucheturd. SO MUCH DOUCHE. Normally it’s kind of douchey but on New Year’s eve it becomes Douche Central. Marco pointed out it’s like we were hanging out in the Meatpacking District, something you couldn’t pay me to do. Really, if you said, hey Annie I will give you $53 to hang out in the Meatpacking District tonight, I’d say no. Then I’d stick a shiv in your gut and steal your $53. And let’s be honest, $53 would buy you like 2 drinks. Anyway we were not slutty enough or twenty-one enough to be hanging out there. There was a girl wearing something that only had one side. Like just the front. It was like she was wearing a napkin around her neck, it was grotesque and seeming impossible. I was wearing jeans and I felt like I was wearing too much pants. Too much pants! Oh yes, such a thing is possible!

We ate in Koreatown for “King’s court” style dinner, which is an awesome way of saying food just keeps coming at you until you want to die (of happiness, of overeating, of flavor, of soju that tastes like “kissing your grandmother” as Dan put it) and the went to HMS Bounty for drinks. I love that bar for no particular reason other than it’s old skool, charming L.A. Good times, people, good times.

So normally on New Year’s day I spend it with my entire extended family and we bow for bucks and play New Year’s games. But now we don’t get bucks, which makes hanging out with family much less profitable. I’ve written about this before, in the book, the one over there in the sidebar. I normally show up to my aunt’s incredibly hungover and wanting to die. So I kind of prepped myself for a day of answering why I wasn’t married/with child/a millionaire/a doctor and then my mom said, hey, sorry to do this to you, but I think we’re canceling the new year’s stuff. Your father’s kind of sick and your aunt is too tired to cook for 3000 cousins. And suddenly it was like a major GET OUT OF JAIL FREE AND HERE IS A NEW FRYING PAN AND A SALAD SPINNER. Stoke city! I went back to sleep.

Micah and I were at some vegan restaurant (YES VEGAN. AND DELICIOUS.) and we were sitting next to two dudes on a man-date/broppointment and one guy was all stoked for the waffle special and I was like oh they stop serving breakfast at 11 am. The time is 3! And when he overheard this it looked like I had kicked his dog in the nuts. Like how dare you ruin this moment. Don’t you hate that? Breakfast should be served all day all the time. Like, wtf. It’s even easier to make than dinner, what’s wrong with people?

I already miss my L.A. friends. Didn’t even get to see everyone. I hate when that happens. Also if you managed to reach the end of this post you deserve a cookie. Mail me your address, I will send you a cookie. No joke. Do it.

Happy 09!

Also, I decided that in 2013 I will start high fiving again. I stopped in 2003 and Micah and I decided that a decade without high fiving sounded about right. So there you go.

Hello from (greater) Los Angeles! My time here has gone something like this: driving, driving, driving, park, driving, driving, driving, oh no traffic, beer, beer, taco truck, brrrrr, Lost Boys 2: Shit Sandwich, driving, driving, huevos rancheros, yay, zzzzz. That’s it. I’m helping my brother find an apartment and holy shit it sucks. No no it SUCKS with a capital SUCK. I realize no matter what city you live in, finding a place is exactly like kicking yourself in the neck. But wait, Annie! It’s imposible to kick myself in the neck! That’s where you’re wrong, buddy. And right. Today’s gem included a studio that had a shared bathroom which the landlord didn’t mention in the ad. Like did she think we wouldn’t notice? That was some New York shit right there. Also I’d like to point out that L.A. was COLDER than NY the last few nights. That’s COLDER with a capital SUCK. Tomorrow we shall continue the pain and suffering. And driving. Did I mention the driving? Also I’m helping Mike find a car too. I’m like his PA. That’s personal assistant, to be clear. I am not his Pennsylvania or whatever. But I should get some kind of trophy or something for doing this. Mike: give me my trophy dammit. Where is my trophy!!!

Also Korean food, how I missed you, old friend. You never judge me. You just love me and give give give. Sniff. I love you.

I’m here at lovely John Fitzgerald Kennedy International Airport waiting for a flight to the greater Los Angeles area. On the way here I saw a rainbow over Queens. It was the filthiest, most polluted rainbow ever. Then whilst in line at Jamba Juice, a woman flipped out because she didn’t like the employee’s attitude, and got all “I’m going to sue!” and then an old man collapsed in the terminal and the medics came. And now they are playing Wham! in the terminal. Which came after Kenny G version of Auld Lang Syne. I can’t tell if I’m having a positive or negative experience.

Happy Holidays!

Thanks for all the well wishes and emails and IMs and texts and hugs and burritos. I have amazing friends and for this, I am very grateful. So thanks you guys, seriously. It makes the whole thing go down a lot easier.

Anyway, before she passed away, my grandma knitted me the ugliest vest I have ever seen. A sweater vest. It’s purple. Very purple. OK think of a muscle tank. And now make it purple and wool. And now give it a small boatneck collar. It’s very, uh, unflattering. I put it on and it looks like I got beatdown by Barney and Grimace. I don’t know how to knit, but I’d like to somehow reknit it into something else that I can use all the time, which would be kind of nice. She also knit a hat so big I can pull it down over my entire face. Hahaha I could like rob a bank. But I won’t, not because it’s illegal, but because who has time to rob a bank? I mean you go in there and you have to wait in line forever, it’s just not worth it.

In other family news: one of my younger cousins, 19, wants to BE A RAPPER!!!!!!! DUDE!!!!!!! He has a big fat diamond earring and everything. Cap turned to the side. I want to die. I’m like really? A rapper? I mean, I’m not saying you should be a doctor or a lawyer, but this is definitely one of those things where you should have a fallback career. Just saying. He was wandering around my grandma’s apartment with his iPod on and rapping and doing that rapper thing with the hands you know that karate chop thing. Dude. A rapper. FROM THE VALLEY. I mean the VALLEY. Look at this place. There are malls everywhere. Panda Express. CPK. You know what I mean? But, he apparently recorded a demo!!!! Dude, WTF is right! A RAPPER. Good times.

One of my cousins flew in from Seoul, and he’s the oldest. He’s awesome, one of my favorite people in the family. Anyway he has a ponytail now. A PONYTAIL. The man is like pushing 40. And he’s like yeah I just hadn’t had time to cut it. I’m like really? You didn’t have time in the past, oh I dunno, TWO YEARS it took to grow that beast? He said he’d cut his ponytail off and make soup out of it just for me. Speaking of food, his favorite game is this: “If I gave you a hundred bucks, would you eat that piece of beef?” “What if you ate that piece of pork right now? What would happen?” “OK how about TWO hundred. U.S. dollars.” And then everyone at the table shouts do it, do it, do it (including my parents). Seriously does this joke ever get old? Probably not. Anyway yesterday we went to INSANE KOREAN BBQ place. They brought out like gigantic platters of meat. Like a big meat pile. It doesn’t bother me I mean come on, it’s beef I have SEEN BEEF BEFORE OMG, but then everyone does the joke where when ever I’m about to eat something they say oh be careful, there’s beef in that and I actually stop to look because I can’t tell you how many times they’ve actually sneaked beef into my food, it’s ridiculous. And then they all laugh, like ha ha ha, made you look. It’s like being in junior high. I’m going to shove everyone in a locker.

So my grandmother passed away this morning. She was a good woman, a very good woman. She’s the one who knitted me the absolutely ridiculous Rastafarian cap last Christmas because “that is what all the kids are wearing” in her neighborhood (she lives/d in South Central, no joke) and when I was little she sewed overalls and a sweater set for my stuffed animals. In high school, she wanted me to get my eyebrow pierced because she thought it was kind of cool, but more importantly it would horrify my mother. She was also the best cook on the planet, and now that honor goes to my mother. I’m sad, but I’m OK. She led an amazing life, saw her first grandkid, etc. All the stuff people say about grandparents, you know, applies here. But I’d like to point out her last words to me, which I thought were very fitting for her. She had a heart attack on Sunday and I talked to her the next day while she was in the hospital. “Hi Annie, how are you? Eat well. Get married. Take a nap. I’m gonna go now.” That made me laugh. Like do it in that order, you know? Eat, marry, nap. So then my mom was like “So, did you HEAR THAT? Do you UNDERSTAND? Get on it!” Anyway, it’s not a bad swan song for my grandma.

So thanks, Grandma. I’ll miss you.