-Upon turning twenty-eight next week, only 731 days will remain before my thirtieth birthday.  This realization is frightening, because I’ve found that twentysomethings generally pass judgment on other people’s age without paying attention to their own.  For instance, a twenty-eight-year-old pilot at the airport seems young to me; a twenty-eight-year-old chick on MySpace seems old to me.  But a twenty-eight-year-old sitting in the airport checking his MySpace (i.e., me) seems just right.  With that in mind, over the past few months I’ve tried to pay careful attention to what turning twenty-eight really means and what the last 731 days of my twenties might be like.  First observation:  calculating to the day exactly how much time you have left in your twenties is really unhealthy, neurotic, and weird.  

-You know you’re twenty-eight when, for the first time in your life, you turn to your buddy and complain that the bar you’re in is “too loud.”

-You know you’re twenty-eight when you find yourself reading Maxim while taking a shit in your apartment and thinking to yourself, “Why the hell do I still subscribe to Maxim?”

-When your birthday nears, girls find out what zodiac sign you are.  Chicks seem to find it interesting that I’m a Gemini.  Some of the most intelligent women I know read their horoscopes religiously.  Who the mother-fuck cares?  It’s all bullshit!  If I bang a Libra, I don’t think, “Our moons must be aligned!”  No, I’m just wondering how I even managed to take her home since the bar was so goddamn loud.