I keep telling myself that one week from today is just another birthday, that turning 25 isn't significantly different than turning 24 or 22 (although 23 is significant because I'm not going to be a prime number again until I'm 29).

I think I might be lying to myself. It feels significant. It feels heavy and weird and impossible. I never considered being older than 25, because I don't dwell on the future that much. It's not that I live for today -- it's just that being ADD, plans for the future always get waylaid. Things don't really change when your Big Ideas keep getting put aside for the next bit of shiny. So you stop. You make a reasonable, flexible budget (which you tend to overspend) and hope that your charm and your uncanny ability to rally together a last-minute plan get you through the year.

midnightfae has some sort of awesome (in the classical sense) and complicated Birthday Plan for me. I have no idea what it is and I'm grateful, because surprises are awesome. Plus, she gets me the best presents. She freakin' tracked down a Clone High DVD for me for Christmas in 2005. Clone. High. WIN.

Keep an eye out in the next seven days for the tracklist for my annual birthday mix CD and the semi-annual Top 25 movies update.

The roommate is planning something extra-special for my birthday. She has told me this much, and that I'm to keep the weekend after my birthday (Feb 22-24) open, but nothing else. She's quite keen to keep it a surprise and I am quite keen to be surprised. That's how birthday presents go. And midnightfae always comes up with the very best presents.

I also know that she has involved some of my friends in this evil (read: awesome) plot. This she did not tell me. See, my roommate, cunning as she is, doesn't know how to use a Mac. She's been borrowing mine while Dell tries to figure out how to repair her laptop and sometimes she leaves her LJ session logged in.

Like today. I opened up Firefox and there's Livejournal, logged into her account, with the words "No-Nate filter" on the Recent Comments list in large, friendly letters. You've never seen a browser window close so fast. I was practically out of breath from the effort.

I promptly went and taught the roommate how to use Apple Key + Q to completely close a program.

If you're in on the plot, don't let me know anything. Not even a vague hint. Last year, for Christmas, I randomly guessed as a joke that she was giving me Tom Servo. I swear I didn't know she'd been gathering gumball machine heads and spring arms for months (that project is, sadly, not yet complete due to various distractions). I have a terrible knack for working these things out based on ridiculously scant information and I do not want to be ahead of the game.

This has been a public service announcement for the Let's Keep Jetpack Monkey in the Dark Regarding His 25th Birthday Society. We accept generous donations of complete information blackouts and they're tax-deductible. Please, give today.