Tag: Birthday

Barry Anderson Audiobook – Chapter 1

June 27, 2021 /

I guess any chance I had to pretend that I wasn’t the author of this novel went out the window when I recorded an audiobook version of the first chapter, in my voice.

Still, despite the very silly premise, and my inability to do male voices (which is a problem less often in Barry’s case šŸ˜), I think I have decent comedic timing, and it’s exciting for me to hear the correct inflections for each of the characters’ lines.Ā  It feels like I’m listening to my friends talk, even if it’s essentially a very painstakingly edited version of me playing with dolls in my bedroom.

In fact, it took multiple months longer to get this out than it should have, because Audacity decided to flip out and put all my clips into a blender, and delete everything before a certain date, but I went through every single 3 second clip it still had (there were over 3100, and they were all mixed up, and most of them duplicated) to try and salvage what I could.Ā  As it was, the only reason I have the original version of the first 20 minutes (all the actual recording files and bloopers tragically lost), is because I was obsessed enough with listening to myself talk that I’d exported a draft version of the beginning, just so I could listen to it over and over again.

I really wanted to get this up today, because today (June 27th) is Barryā€™s birthday (is that a spoiler?Ā  I never actually mention the date in the story.Ā  Itā€™s not hard to deduce however), and toiled with extra rush this week trying to get it up, and was still only able to post it this late in the day, trying to get it the best I could.Ā  But oh well, itā€™s still a good tribute to my favorite little idiot, that Iā€™m managing to post it on his special day.

Hopefully this audio version of “Barry Anderson –Ā Chapter 1: Birthday” will both enable people who find it easier/more convenient to listen than to read to get the beginning of the story, and is also hopefully a fun dramatization of the beginning of a pretty Grape, er, great adventure šŸ˜‰.

(That link is to the audiobook homepage.Ā  You can listen to the file embedded, or download to listen elsewhere.Ā  For free, obviously, yay.)

Thirty

October 22, 2019 / / 2 Comments

So my birthday is July 26, 1989.Ā  That means Iā€™ve been 30 years old for three months, this week.Ā  So forgive the belatedness of this post; thatā€™s just how I roll apparently šŸ˜œ.

My actual birthday didnā€™t go exactly as planned.Ā  I had shyly asked my friends if theyā€™d mind having a photoshoot for me, after Justin and I went to a sushi buffet.Ā  They were really sweet and willingā€¦ and then on the actual day things kept coming up, including a need to go to the DMV and taking care of my skin.Ā  So Justin and I ended up celebrating my birthday with late night overpriced sushi, right before the restaurant closed, and a walk in Downtown Chattanooga.Ā  It was nice, but I was super disappointed.Ā  Tears were shed, which I felt super stupid for.

But I realized that so often I feel like I need a special occasion to let myself be special.Ā  So I felt like if my birthday had passed and gone, Iā€™d lost my opportunity.Ā  And thatā€™s not cool.Ā  Why as adults do we feel the need to reserve being special for when people and events give us permission??Ā  Thatā€™s lame.

So instead, I waited until it was pretty outside, instead of 90+ Fahrenheit, like it was at the end of July, and asked my friends to take several hours out of a random Thursday, taking photos of me like the fricknā€™ covergirl I am šŸ˜‰.Ā  And they were awesome and did it and made me feel incredible. And I had nearly 2000 photos to go through, which is absolutely bonkers.

But Iā€™ve never felt as pretty in photos as I felt in these ones, and thatā€™s a really special feeling.Ā  Iā€™m a total goober, and they helped me feel like thatā€™s cool and pretty and worth looking at šŸ˜Š.

At the beginning of my actual birthday, 4am to be exact, I wrote up my feelings on turning 30, Four Sides of Calise style (if youā€™re not familiar, you might want to check out that intro so you know why four different parts of my mind are talking to myself).Ā  Usually Iā€™d make stick figure comics to go with it, but that takes forever, especially with this much dialogue.

Besides, now I have a photoshoot commemorating being 30-and-3-months old, to illustrate this post instead.Ā  And Iā€™ll caption each picture with which side is predominantly showing, because thatā€™s fun, and I like pinpointing it in myself, and why not? Continue reading

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