1. Begin the night before your birthday. When someone offers to take you out to dinner, pick the best place you know that you would never pay for yourself. When the waiter asks if this is a special occasion, say yes, and graciously receive free champagne, dessert, a rose, and a photo that they print out for you right there! Just after he has been told that it's your birthday, he will say, "Oh! How old are you?" at which point you will look up from your menu and he will look at you full in the face. He will then abruptly change the question to, "What's your name?" Answer the question as if this awkwardness did not just take place. When you ask if someone would like to share that appetizer you have your eye on with you and they say no, order it anyway. And even though you have your free champagne, order a bottle of wine. Ask for a recommendation, and go with the one that you associate with a nice memory. Return home warm and fuzzy and full. And as little tipsy, cause that wine was good.
2. Arrange for your birthday to fall on the Friday before a Monday holiday. Also arrange to have this Friday off, and do whatever you want all day. Ideas include:
a) Attend your first pilates class. Because you are there on a work day, you will be in a class with women over the age of 60, and one like-aged man. Not only will you look young in comparison to these women, you will also find that you are really good at pilates! (This is what you tell yourself.) Looking around the room during the stretching exercises, you will observe how much more flexible you are than the rest of the class. Soon you will think, "What's wrong with you, you old hags?" So, you need a towel for support during this exercise, do you? Ha! I scoff at your towel!" You will learn to avert your eyes from the old man, as he is freakishly limber and therefore does not make you look as good. The next day your entire torso will hurt every time you cough, and you will realize that maybe you are not the pilates genius that you thought you were.
b)Nap. Just because you can.
c) Allow your mother to take you out for a manicure/pedicure. If you can spot the overly aggressive manicurist when you walk in, avoid her. And then please tell me how you knew to do so. Or else, find yourself bleeding when she is only on the second finger, and spend the rest of the time tense and on edge. Find yourself constantly hurting your fingers for the rest of the weekend, as they have all been ripped raw. Even as you type this, that first finger especially aches. Wonder if you can write a post without using the letters p, l, and o. No, but at least your toes are nice.
3. Gather some of your favorite people together to keep you company that night. Begin with some good food. Then make them play a childish game with you, because it's your birthday.
Don't be afraid to employ questionable tactics in pursuit of victory. For example, say you can't reach the ball (due to your petitness) before a gentleman with longer arms can. Use your bumper car to crush his scoopy-thingy. For the rest of the night, chuckle evilly to yourself every time you drive by him and he is still trying to repair his broken scooper. 4.Don't leave the matter of a cake to chance, but take it into your own hands, and seek out the best cake you can find. So what if it is declared to weigh more than five cheesecakes. You deserve it, because nothing is more important than you. And cake. And chocolaty goodness.
5. Because you still have a long weekend ahead of you, take off for a different city the next day.
Visit good, old friends, and let them spoil you with homemade food, margaritas, and ice cream. Play with the children you meet, and marvel at how one little person can look so much like two people who are so different. Allow a friend to drive you back to your college town - which is like your other hometown - where you reunite with all of your old favorite places to see and eat. 
Allow your little brother to treat you to a meal, even though he is a student. Take in a historic site that you never made the time for when you lived there as a student yourself. 6. On your last night,a few hours before your 6:30 a.m. flight takes you back to work, wake up and remember that you had contact with a victim of the stomach flu a few days earlier. As you hug the toilet bowl and beg it for mercy, think about all the people and places you have visited in the past three days, and wonder if you should tell them you may have brought them a stomach virus, or just let it be a nice surprise. Then remember that you have a window seat waiting for you in a few hours, and wonder what lucky individuals will have the pleasure of sitting in the two seats next to you. Begin devising a plan for collecting as many barf bags as possible before the plane takes off.
Ah yes, sweet birthday memories...
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