This was a mostly quiet week. I got back from DC on Monday afternoon and vowed to spend the rest of my day off getting shit done. I met up with Aaron and we went to the Greenline for some quality coffeeshop work and gossip time.

 

On Tuesday I had a relatively uneventful birthday. Aside from facebook messages, some mail, and a few phonecalls, I didn’t do anything for it. When I got home from work, though, my new roommate Jules (on the left), and his friend Shay, had made me a birthday cake, which was really sweet. Jules has only lived in our house for two weeks or so and I don’t really know them, so it was extra nice that they took the time to do that.

 

The candles even spelled out the letter R

 

That night I went to a show at the mitten. This is a band called Very Happy.

 

There were several bouts of technical difficulty.

 

My friend Ryan gave me a birthday popper/noisemaker, but I didn’t get to pop it. It fell apart in my pocket. When I reached into my pocket a bunch of confetti fell out.

 

Traveling, from Bloomington

 

The Max Levine Ensemble also played and it was my favorite time I had seen them. Here’s Andy and Jacob curled up together on a couch upstairs at The Mitten.

 

On Thursday, my roommate Jacob made a fancy dinner for the household.

 

When Jacob gets into cooking mode, it’s a beautiful thing.

 

After dinner I went to a theatre production of Slaughterhouse 5 with a bunch of friends. In proper Ramsey form, I fell asleep about 20 minutes into it and slept for the whole thing. I don’t do well with dark quiet rooms past 9pm….

 

It was a fun thing anyway and nice to do something different with my friends. Afterward we went to the cheap chinese place that West Philly can’t get enough of, Luckys.

 

During our fancy dinner, my roommates and I were talking about drunk food (I was hypothesizing what my drunk food might be since I’ve never drank before). Jules told us that he had heard about a thing from Lucky’s called a Pizza Roll, which actually comes out looking like an Egg Roll! So I was told that since I would be near Lucky’s, I should inquire for all of us.

 

I came home from the play bearing “dessert”

 

So you know, this is what a Pizza Roll from Lucky’s looks like… in all of it’s glory. It’s essentially a giant Pizza Bite, but vegetarian.

 

Jacob’s seal of approval

 

Jule’s looking less sure about it

 

On Friday night, Karen had organized a big fancy friend Valentine’s dinner. We went to a crepe restaurant called Beau Monde and we all dressed up.

 

It was build your own crepe style. The menu had all sorts of fillings and you chose what went in it. My savory crepe was fancy mushrooms, swiss cheese and creme fraiche.

 

My dessert crepe was one of the house crepes (already a packaged deal on the menu). It was bananas, white chocolate, caramel, and ice cream. It was incredible.

 

I got these dress shoes at a pop-up vintage sale on Milwaukee Ave in Chicago. These things have gotten so much mileage for something I made 20 bucks for. I still love them every time I put them on.

 

When I first moved here I only had South Philly friends. I felt like I was constantly making the bike ride south just for short hang outs, but rarely would people come out West just to get coffee with me. Winter has been a nice transition because it forced me to actually make a really solid crew of West Philly friends. It’s made socializing a lot more effortless.