Birthday Weekend

My friend Odyssey (who I met over LiveJournal and has now been my friend for about 20 years now) came to visit me for the weekend of my birthday. Ody has been very busy building a new business for the last few years, and we’ve hardly had time to even Zoom much, so he made a special trip to hang out and catch up.

Which was really nice, because I had no other special plans at all! It all just lined up perfectly and I was extremely grateful.

Yesterday, he and I trundled up to the attic and got cozy. He noted that it was easy to hear talking in the window seat nest where we situated ourselves, and that was true. The walls were close in so it automatically focused our voices nicely! And then we talked for HOURS! Most of that talking was by myself, and I yakkity-yakked enough that the next day I was just slightly hoarse. But that very focused talking time helped a lot, we both felt like we were all caught up on so many things from the last couple of years.

Today he took Cat and I out for brunch at the Elks Lodge McMinnamin’s in Tacoma, and we got to hang out some more and look around the eccentric restaurant, one of many for the McMinnamin brothers, who’ve been doing their thing in the Pacific Northwest since the early 90s. (Seriously, look them up on the interwebs for more information– they’re really cool!)

This afternoon, Odyssey asked me to help him budget, and I happily sidled up and went through his expenditures and figured out a plan to pay off the loans he took out to start his business within slightly more than a year! Apparently, how I went about it was new to him, but I think he can remember the “50/30/20″ plan (which you can check yourself by getting Elizabeth Warren’s For All Your Worth.) It felt good to be helpful!

Tonight, we’ll have the “Chantilly” white cake and frosting with fresh berry cake Ody bought for my birthday as well! It looks promising!

Monday, my friend heads back home to the San Francisco area, so it’s not a long plane trip, and then it’s back to ordinary life for us all.