A Birthday in July

______For those of you who are fellow Americans, I hope that your Fourth of July was patriotic, filled with freedom, and that the entirety of the day your mind roamed aimlessly on subjects pertaining to bald eagles, stars, and grilled meat.  For those of you who aren't from our stars-and-stripes country, I hope everything was still pretty darn awesome for ya.  I rather enjoyed slumbering away to the sound of fireworks that night--it was comparable to falling asleep to the lovely pitter patter of rain, except less predictable and much more dangerous.

______Also, my birthday is today!  I have turned the ripe age of 19, meaning that the only new action which I can legally perform is smoking (and consequently, getting lung cancer).  Alas, lung cancer isn't really much of a priority in my life right now, and so turning such an age isn't all that exciting. But what is exciting is sitting down for a satisfying meal at our favorite local bakery with our new neighbor-lady; we took her there for lunch today and I decided to bring my camera along and snap a few pictures while we were at it.  I had a very delicious Chicken Waldorf Salad that included chicken, apples, and walnuts with a light raspberry dressing on the side.  It's funny--I used to think that putting fruit into a salad was a rather strange concept, but now it's the only kind of salad I'll probably ever touch.  When my brother comes home tomorrow, we're going to go eat dinner at a lovely, new Italian restaurant, and later scarf down the deliciousness that is homemade cookie cake.





______The presents I received included a lovely new purse (which is the perfect size for lugging my camera around in), some pretty clothing, a Def Leppard CD (I'm currently collecting 80's music), and a year-long Flickr subscription (meaning that now I don't have any excuses to not take pictures due to a lack of online storage). 

______I hope that the start to your July was as fantastic as mine, citizens!