Snatches-of-Bliss-and-Are-You-Freaking-Out-Yet?

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* Welcome *

Changed da house,
Changed da look.

BTW, my bathrobe's usually pink
and we don't have a fireplace.
Other than that,
it's pretty accurate...

Psst...click the words above to navigate.
Best viewed, unfortunately, in Internet Explorer.

Tuesday, May 17, 2005

~ Tony Turns 30 ~

We managed to celebrate Tony's birthday this past weekend; an interesting occurence since Tony really doesn't like making a fuss of his birthday EVER, but this year marks his 30th. The trick, my friend, was not to let him get away with a non-event for once, and yet celebrate it in such a way that he didn't mind the attention TOO much and it didn't embarrass him.

I also had to make it a surprise, because as soon as I were to tell him that a bunch of us want to herald his 30th year with him, he'd try to wheedle out of it for sure.

While I'd be quite comfortable if the congregation sang a birthday song and did a few Hip-Hip-Hurrahs (the norm, after Sunday morning announcements), doing that to Tony was tantamount to making him walk to work in his underwear. It's very ironic that he would marry someone like me who would blog about this, but I try to be sensitive.

What I did instead was to mention in passing that Aileen had invited us to her place for lunch on Sunday, and to make it up to him, we'd celebrate his birthday quietly on Saturday. Even THAT had its little drama because he was initially hesitant about wasting a productive Saturday afternoon on a birthday lunch in a chi-chi restaurant. It wasn't until I faked annoyance that he eventually complied.

Saturday lunch turned out intimate and delicious. We had lunch at The Green Herring - a truly gourmet cottage experience. I don't quite know how to explain it, but the blue eye cod I had melted in my mouth along with the lemon butter, and his beef pie thingy was tender, succulent, and absolutely satisfying. We spent the rest of the Saturday afternoon NOT doing housework and working on assignments and freelance jobs, but just snuggling under the covers and watching 5 hours of West Wing reruns on his work laptop.

Sunday morning, he looked worriedly at the church newsletter to make sure his birthday wasn't on it, winced towards the end of the announcements as he anticipated the birthday song, and when neither happened, beamed.

The afternoon fellowship after bible class was uneventful; a handful wished him a Happy Birthday quietly and moved along to other topics. We had split into classes according to gender, so while he was blissfully unaware in one room, I was tying up loose ends in the other.

It was only until he drove up to Aileen's place and noticed the Chapman's car parked in front, that the side of his mouth twitched as he said, "I think I've just been set up."

And as soon as he walked in, the Chapmans, Kirkpatricks, Randalls, Audrey and Aileen started singing Happy Birthday as boisterously as possible. I think that was the most fun part.

The lunch was simple and quick, filled with weird anecdotes about prosthetic legs, the definition of Thongs in different countries, and health check ups for primary school students in Singapore. He was presented with 3 cakes - one chocolate cherry ripe mudcake, one sponge cake with icing and rainbow sprinkles, and one upside down tupperware covered with 30 stuck-on Mars Bars.

He admitted very grudgingly later that he had actually enjoyed himself. Surprise, surprise...

And that, my friend, is how you bully your introverted husband into celebrating Life. He'll learn to appreciate it eventually.

# posted by Velle | 1:10 pm

1 Comments:

Wow, nice lil surprise you have there. Darcy's the same, he doesn't like to make a big fuss out of his birthdays and the only time i managed to make a lil fuss out of it was when i ordered and sent a cake to the courthouse he was working in last year. Simple but it got him the attention i was hoping for. :) Nice one. Good job girl. :)

By kabluey, at 1:37 am