Dee's lessons for life #6: Don't wear strappy shoes to dinner when dinner is roast. That just leads to gravy between the toes, and that's never good.

Plus, let me just say that 22 feels no different from 21. I'm still tired, I'm still hideously busy, and I still have an essay due on Friday. I was hoping that a birthday might miraculously change these things. It didn't.

My birthday lunch yesterday, held in the half-hour I had off from the Fantasy Writing workshop I was attending (which was really quite good) turned out somewhat surprising as the Male showed up, with a huge, gorgeous bunch of roses so dark red they're almost black. It's the most beautiful bunch of flowers I've ever seen.