A pessimist is what an optimist calls a realist

As of yesterday, I am now participating in my company’s 401k program. I feel kinda more adult like now. I’m officially saving for my retirement! At the tender age of 26 and 11 months! Dude…I’m just a little more than a month shy of turning 27…but that’s another paragraph for later in this post.

But I was looking through the booklet my job supplies that “describes” the portfolio options and I was just confused. I wasn’t really sure what to pick and I never did get the chance to call my financial advisor Lola to consult with either since I was up against the deadline for this quarter. Oops. But hopefully the ones I picked will work out. If not, I can change them right? Right? Someone please say right.

I’m feeling pretty responsible though. It was a little weird picking a beneficiary upon the event of my death but I got over that. I don’t have too much being pushed towards the fund at the moment but hopefully I’ll be able to up my contributions next quarter. But a little is better than nothing.

So its official I guess. This whole saving for retirement makes me a responsible adult doesn’t it? It does huh? That’s fine by me. I’m almost 30…I think being 30 qualifies you as an adult. That is until I turn 30 and decide to change it because I say so. Speaking of which, the annual birthday countdown will be in effect starting this Saturday. Oooh can you feel the excitement of the Birth Month celebrations getting ready to start? Because I can.

I still kind of can’t believe that I’m going to be 27 this year. It just doesn’t sound right to me. I don’t know why though. I’m not afraid of getting older but I’m also not in a rush either but what can you do? It happens. Might as well embrace the fact that I don’t look anywhere near my age and be happy you know? That and know that with each year, I get the chance to make my birthday party even better than the last because there are no more limits to what I can do. Do you know how exciting that is by itself?

So this year’s rough theme is “Talda and the Chocolate Factory.” My birthday activity will be a tour of the Scharffen Berger Chocolate factory in Berkeley and then lunch somewhere on Bay Street in Emeryville afterwards. While technically low-key compared to last year’s “Retro Bowling Birthday Party” I’m still looking forward to it. I hope the factory tour is as good as I’ve heard. I remember when the Jelly Belly factory tour used to rock your socks off. They’d give samples of the candies in various stages of creation but they don’t do that anymore. Instead you just follow some guide and watch everything on monitors around the factory. If only Scharffen Berger employed Oompa Loompas. That would be awesome! I already sent out Save the Dates and the response so far has been great so I can’t wait to start formally planning this…sometime this week.

But then the month gets even better. Yeah uh huh it does. Because I’m taking a vacation from work for a week and the bf is coming in! We don’t have the exact dates yet but he will be here for my actual birthday and will stay for a few days. I’m so excited. This will be the very first time we celebrate a birthday together. Granted he’ll be here during the week so getting together with friends will prove to be tricky but I don’t care. I’m just excited that I finally get to see him again [yup, it’s been about 7-8 months since our last visit in December].

I do have some other things in the pipeline but I haven’t gotten around to planning those yet so we’ll see if they happen. I hope they do. I’ll keep you updated on that!

Scout’s honor.