02EE6: Celebrations - Part 1

I'm still dictating my blog posts; maybe I'll get used to this. This is kind of efficient, and I end up with a slightly longer blog post.

Great news, everyone, I got to sleep in our bed tonight. I'll say it again, I got to sleep lying down in an actual bed. It was glorious.  Sure, the strap of the sling that I had on was a bit irritating at times, but that was a necessary evil. Irritation trumps pain.

So we went over last night as part of our preliminary birthday celebrations.  Only a few friends joined us, but it was still a good night. I kind of like these more focused Thursday nights before the big, noisy Friday night celebration. As much as I want to celebrate with friends, I also want to celebrate with the O Bar people because they're also like family to us. And you’ve got a celebrate your birthday with family, right? They open the show with a couple of Kylie Minogue numbers, which was a bit of a surprise.  It's not the first time they have tried to indulge me on my birthday with Kylie performances, but it also hasn't happened as much in recent years. So to have that kind of thing return last night was a delightful surprise and quite touching.

This also marks my first attempt to film using the old monopod stick that we had gotten pre-pandemic. We had used this as a camera stand when we were still vlogging via baduy pride, but it hasn't seen much use since then. It was a bit of a struggle to maneuver the camera with the monopod tripod resting on the bar table, and that was despite our being a smaller group. the significant times of being out of focus or with the wrong zoom setting. I'll probably have the stick to this style of filming in the long term, but it'll definitely be easier when I have my right hand back to assist.

I think my other goal, apart from getting through this frozen shoulder ordeal, is to train my left hand up to a greater degree of utility. Who knows, maybe I’ll approach being somewhat ambidextrous. 

I took the day off today (because hey, birthday leave!), but the main achievement was sleeping in. I did have to answer a few emails, and then Tobie and I ventured out to rescue a package from the post office.  This was the collector's edition of Railroad Tiles that had been stuck in customs limbo since July.  I'm just glad we got it back, and we settled a few other errands before going home. Then it was time for cake number two: a mango bravo that we got to share with the family here. Good stuff.

 All that's left is the bigger O Bar birthday celebration later tonight.