Olivia's birthday

The Thursday before and Friday of Olivia's birthday were pretty sweet, all in all. I had only one day to shop for Olivia so I skipped my 12:30 and 3:35 class and went to New York on the 11:00 train. I decided to take her out for birthday lunch and she had Pad See Ew and I, beef teriyaki at cafetasia. Afterwards, we went for bubble tea and she took some time to do her work in her room while I went hunting for a present for her. I walked in the East Village and went into a store called something like Himalayan Visions. At first I couldn't see much and the Nepalese or Mongolian vendor was aggressive and I was getting a little freaked out. Then I found some delicate necklaces of sterling silver with gold plated chain, some with peridot beads, one blue topaz drop and one larger amethyst drop that were wired on to the somewhat thin and short corded necklaces. I wasn't sure whether to get Olivia the blue topaz which I thought caught the light better and would match with her coloring better or the amethyst from India that had a deep color and didn't think the simple cutting or gold plating was worth the price of $60, nonetheless I came out of there with an amethyst necklace and hoped she would like it. Then I went to Toy Tokyo which I have been procrastinating on going to for a while and found the amazing fun boxes of surprise mini food (some sets were sushi, rice balls, broiled eels, soba, seafood soup, apple pie, bread, collard greens in the vending basket. etc.). They also had surprise boxes of sneakers, small ones like SB Dunks and Bathing Apes, but those were a little too expensive. It was completely amazing though, and I got one special occasions fun box for Olivia and one for me. Luckily Olivia was done with her work and wanted me to accompany her to the cab so I came to her dorm and waited for her. When she came out, I knelt before her with the box with the necklace and said, "O Olivia, I wish you would have a good birthday and be happy and healthy and wealthy and long living," something along those lines. Her fun box was soba and mine was rice balls, she likes rice balls better and they look more interesting so we switched. She was a little hungry so we went to the Max Brenner's in the East Village that is at the end of her street for fondue. It was the first I've ever had and she had a pink strawberry drink with clear gummy bears on it and I, the Cookieshake. I took her into the cab and we talked for a while and she met Becky to watch Spring Awakening, the musical. Afterwards, Becky took her to a corny Italian restaurant. The next day I had to meet my mom and Garik, a man who she once thought she was in love with before she knew my dad who is visiting from Odessa and is an annoying, milk toasty man. We went to the Met and I went through the Flemish Primitives, the Rembrandt exhibit, and the Lehman collection rather fast. My dad refused to meet us in the Met and we had to come to 49th and meet him. On 56th or so we went to Wondee Siam for Thai food. I couldn't eat that much but I did order the Noodles Talay. My parents and Garik and I walked to the MoMA and it was 6:00 by the time that I made it to coat check so I had to leave. I had to meet Olivia at 6:30 at Ruby Foo's. It was raining and I did stop in Zara to look for a coat for Olivia. I also went to Swatch and found a watch whose strap was astroturf which I think would have amused Olivia if I wore it. Olivia and I met in Ruby Foo's though she was 6 minutes late. She bought mojitos for the both of us and still Becky didn't show so we sat down. Olivia was worried about her, worried that she might have been mad, and I was worried that it would spoil her meal. We found out after a while that Becky was in the hospital because her brother got into a car accident. We ordered a platter of dim sum, a sample platter of Ruby Foo's house rolls, the bento box of dessert, a lychee mist for Olivia, and ginger passion flower tea. The sushi was great, there was sushi with sirloin steak in it, Chilean sea bass, smoked salmon lollipop roll, and another fish. The plum sauce made all of them taste like eel. The bento box dessert was really creative because it had apple pie in the shape of sushi, basically dough curled around apple curled around dough curled around apple and there was a macaroon sushi that was chocolate on the outside, coconut in the middle, and chocolate on the inside like a salmon sushi. There was also an ice cream in the middle that you had to grab with a straw. All in all, we were very satisfied and slightly drunk. We took a cab to Spring Street and Employee's Only. It is a bar that serves absinthe, it has an Arabic or key as a title and only the word Psychic in red in the window. There is red light inside and art deco painting the shelves of the drink display are clear green tinted glass lighted by normal colored Christmas string lights. The public is trendy, post hipster 30 year olds, the men were for the most part good looking as older men go and the women were conventionally good looking. We started with two absinthe drips in which the waiters lit a cube of sugar on top of the drink held in place with a spoon on fire and dropped it in the drink. It tasted like licorice and extremely strong. I was very afraid of it so I only sipped it and got about one centimeter through the drink. Olivia had been drinking and drank both our absinthe drinks. She also had one of the fancy drinks they made at the bar, some were of elderflower, pink with champagne, she had the one where they mash ginger, dried cranberries, and sugar in a tall glass with a mortar, pour in some lemon colored alcohol, and mix it. It was very fresh tasting. Olivia tripped off the absinthe and said that colors blurred when she shook her head around, was mesmerized by candles and lights, and said the bathroom tiles changed from red to black. Olivia also got a Tarot card reading from the psychic advertised in red on the window, a girl with black hair and a big hat, about choosing the more intelligent of two lovers. She continued to trip when we went back in a cab to the East Village where we went to m2m and I bought her an alaska roll to sober her up and myself an alaska roll and radish kimchi which was not that good. She was still tripping, but was very tired and I was going to stay over until at the last minute I decided to take the second to last train, she went to her dorm, and I went on the 1:20 train.