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Hi guys, I'm back! I'll share photos and foibles from the vacation soon (did you know that you should never actually put toilet paper in Dominican toilets? Fun fact, and one learned the hard way...) but of course today I have more important things to do.

Like turn 30.

(Get it? XXX is thirty in Roman numerals! All of you searching for free porn, my apologies.)

I was trying to remember other milestone birthdays on the plane ride home yesterday, and here's what I can remember:

10: My parents threw me a big party and, as I recall, I wore my festive Bartman tee shirt. I still have the invitation:

(Note my Babysitter's Club membership card in the lower right corner. I had to black out my SSN because I know you are all jonesing to steal the identity of a unibrowed ten year-old. My signature doesn't look that way anymore, FYI. I finally learned how to sign my last name, and the 'a' in Una is no longer trying to hang itself.)

20: My friend let me throw a dance party on the top floor of the frat house she was then living in as a boarder. I made a mix of early 90s hip-hop, did some body shots, and had someone accidentally put out a cigarette on my hand.

21: Another house party, held in my college apartment, to which I am pretty sure I wore a leotard and a pair of pleather, faux-snakeskin pants. Ah, youth.

This year is going to be slightly lower-key. I've taken the day off work, and my plan is to wander around and laze about. If I make it into the city, I may visit 110 W. 17th Street, where I was born.

It's not a hospital; I was born in an apartment. On purpose. My mom had a home birth, and while I'm sure there are many of you who might balk at this, or want to tell me how dangerous you think it is (please don't), I have to say that there is something special about being able to mark the exact spot you first came into the world.

A few weeks ago, my dad took a photo of me outside the building.

Let's pretend my eyes are closed out of emotion, because I'm taking in the moment, or imagining being back in the womb, and not just because I blinked.

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