Birthdays and the angst attached to them

So, whenever people ask me what I did for my 21st birthday, I don't know what to say. I did what I tend to do every year: small group of people for dinner and ridiculousness. I enjoy that.

But they balk when I tell them I did something small.
"You drink, right?"
"Yeah."
"And you didn't have a party?!"

Truth is, I haven't had a birthday party since 5th grade. After that, my birthday sort of lost its importance to me. I even actually forgot a few years until someone reminded me. And even then, it consisted of a cupcake with a candle in it before everyone hurried through their morning rituals. Not that I blame anyone - I was, and still am, surrounded by busy people. My family are all busy, and the year we started taking finals in middle school marked the time when all of my friends were busy, too.

The fact that my birthday often passed unmarked was never a problem. After all, the people born close to holidays must have it ten times worse. But what got to me was when people started feeling guilty about not celebrating. elenuial was a tad upset that he couldn't do anything major, and that he hadn't planned anything in advance. I kept telling him that there was nothing he could do, and that academia eats your soul. Even still, I can't help but be a little disappointed every year. This is the first year that it's actually noticeably bothered me. And that upsets me - that I let myself get even marginally depressed over the fact that the day I was born is surrounded by circumstances that conspire to keep it from being celebrated.

But, since there's nothing I can do to change that, it's mostly a suck-it-up-and-deal kind of affair. Which makes poor elenuial feel worse, because it makes him feel like a failure as a romantic partner, and then I feel worse for being the source of his fretting.

I like celebrating other people's birthdays. If I were any good at planning events, I'd throw elenuial a late birthday party in January, mostly for the fact that he loses out to christianity every year. However, any ideas for that went out the window as the only weekend before term starts, he and I will be playing in Voidstalkers. Right before I was about to ask if he'd like to do something for his birthday that weekend, he told me that he wanted to play and asked if I would like to as well. So I didn't even suggest it, figuring that he seemed excited and that it would be good large-game practice for Intercon in March. I wonder now if I should've said something, but I didn't want him to feel guilty for wanting to choose gaming over my attempts at celebrating his birthday, especially since we're apart for it every year.

I also wonder if I should stop celebrating my birthday altogether. It might sound extremist, but that way, no one feels neglectful or guilty over something that's supposed to be a good deal of fun.

I have no idea.

-Haz

Photography dilemma.

I've been approached by another photographer, with a another awesome-sounding project.

He's doing a collaboration where he does the photography, and his parter turns them into Final Fantasy characters by digital painting. So you really do come out looking amazing. A few examples of finished products of previous photos-to-paintings are here, here, and here.

The five classes he wants in his party are ninja, white mage, red mage, paladin, and dragoon. Each model gets turned into a painting like the ones above as their characters.

Sounds fucking amazing, right?

Here's the catch: The models are digital paper dolls. Since the painter and photographer will be designing the costume, the photo shoot will be nude and clothes painted on.

Meaning the models need to pose like they're casting spells, fighting, what have you - totally in the buff and on a greenscreen.

I would love to have the finished product, but I'm not sure if I'm ready to pose naked in front of an entire professional crew. And yes, they are professionals, but it's not them I'm worried about. =/

Decisions, decisions.

If I do it, though? So not a paladin. I'm leaning towards one of the mages.

Would you guys do it?

-Haz