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I just might go with greatest birthday ever.  Seriously.  Who knew that 29.2 could possibly top 29.1?

Sporting a new shirt from Sharon AND playing Catchphrase at the same time?  It is just too much awesomeness for one birthday!

(For those of you who can’t see the shirt, it says “Take me to the bank…cause I’m money.”  I thought it was perfectly appropriate giving the current market conditions!)

There were so MANY awesome birthday-related celebrations, I actually have to use numbers to capture it all properly.

So here you have, in chronological, the best birthday ever:

1.  Thanks to my friend Hannah, I got to go to a Fashion Week event (something I never thought I would do.  It was really fun and if you follow the attached link, you can see all the celebrities that were there.  Of course, my sister Sharon laughed at me because I didn’t know who half of them were.  I apologize for the lack of photos…I had technical difficulties with the camera.

2. Elizabeth and her brother, Steve, came to visit.  I posted all the latest pictures, including other random things we did that week here.

3. After that, we went to the movie premier for the “Battle in Seattle,” which happens to be about the WTO riots in Seattle a few years back (something very relevant to my PhD.)  We had a surprise visit from the director, Stewart Townsend (left), Charlize Theron (right) and the other main actor (middle – I forget his name).  It was awesome!

Not the best photo, but you get the idea (we were close)

Okay, and now we are getting into the meat of the birthday awesomeness.  (Drumroll please).

4. We got a surprise visit from AMIR!!!  This of course meant that we went on an outrageous bender.  For those of you who don’t know what a “bender” is, let’s just say his friends were Austalian and man can those Aussies drink!  We danced until dawn and slept in until dinner and then danced until dawn the next day.

The man, the myth, the legend…Amir…in NYC!

5. Then, we got surprise tickets to see the Daily Show with Jon Stewart live!  (Thanks Claire!)  We laughed so hard you can almost hear us…well, not so much.  We were in the back (but it was still really close because the studio is so small!)

Red on our way out of the Daily Show (You can’t take photos inside).

6. Then, as if that was not enough excitement, I got a box of presents in the mail from my sister and my “MIL,” Jan!  I was so excited I opened them right there on the kitchen floor!

Coming home to gifts after watching the presidential debate? Priceless!

7. Mere performed on the day of my birthday!  (Which also happened to the be the birthday of the lead singer, Braz!).  By the way, I accidentally left my camera at home, which is why there isn’t a single photo of my real birthday!

8. And finally, for the absolutely BEST part…literally the coolest thing ever…we got to see The Colbert Report live last night.  For those of you who don’t know, we are both MAJOR Colbert fans, so it was awesome to be there to see him in action.

My long lost friend and “Sewer Sister,” Jennifer, sent me shirts to give to Stephen. I gave him two, but kept this one for an apres-show photo shoot. Please note, the man himself gave me the Wriststrong bracelet I am wearing in this photo.

The night was so awesome it is deserving of some sub-indexing.

A. We were sitting second row CENTER, only 10 feet from the desk!

B.  He answered questions out of character before the show started, including mine!

C.  I caught a Wriststrong bracelet sent into the crowd by the man himself (see above photo).

D.  The show was HILARIOUS.  If you haven’t seen it, it is online here.  You can hear both of us cheering, consistently (including Red’s foot pounding at the top of the show).

E.  He gave Red a shout-out twice for screaming so loudly (”Someone is cheering for venereal diseases” and, “We’ve got some Job fans in here!”)

Anyway, thanks to all of you for your awesome birthday wishes because MAN did it work!  GREATEST BIRTHDAY ON RECORD. The best part is I haven’t even opened my presents from Red yet!

Enjoy the meager photo medley of the week!