Pre-Birthday

Hello! Today was my official pre-birthday, AKA friend-birthday. Since my real day is so close to Christmas, everybody tends to be out of town, so I’ve had to adapt. Even though the celebration was only in the evening, I had a pretty good day from the start.
1) I had a good run at the gym. I usually go four times a week (sometimes more, if I can be bothered to go during the weekend), and I’ve fallen into a pattern of four different treadmill ‘workouts’: a regular run at my training speed, speed intervals, a long (slower) run, and incline walking, usually with a mile of running thrown in for good measure. Today was speed intervals, and I was quite pleased with how I did.
2) I had to put gas in the car on my way home, so I was able to use one of my free coffee coupons when I paid inside. The coffee itself is about as good as you’d expect from a gas station (that is, not very), but the little cups of flavoured creamer make it super special. I took a couple of extra ones — shhh. Usually when I have an English-muffin-based lunch, I drink tea, and I was surprised to find that my free coffee just wasn’t as good an accompaniment. So I drank it afterwards and then wrote over-excited e-mails.
3) Speaking of e-mails, I received some fun ones today. I can’t say what about just yet, but they helped contribute to the day’s goodness.
4) I met a few of my friends at The Bad Waitress for dinner, which was very nice. There were five of us in total, which I know isn’t much of a birthday ‘bash’, but it was exactly what I’d wanted. I had a veggie burger, which was alright (to be honest, I prefer a Boca- or Morningstar-style veggie burger over restaurant-made ones, which tend to be mushy and not quite as flavourful). Then we split a banana split, which was my True Pre-Birthday Wish (and which was bought by Alex, because she’s such a good friend). Four of us dug in, but I’m pretty sure I ate at least a third of it. Well, it was my pre-birthday, after all.