The Best Birthday Ever

Thanks to my crappy, overstuffed, slow-loading computer, I'm actually getting this in after my actual birthday has come and gone. Therefore, I am now invoking the sacred Birthday Rule (probably ratified by Ernest Hemingway or Edgar Allan Poe, or some similarly late-night hard drinking badass) which states that it's still your birthday so long as you're conscious from the start of The Day. So, until I sleep, perchance to dream or pass out or am beaten unconscious, it's still my mufuggin' birthday.

My beautiful, long suffering wife has left me to my own devices while she semi-chaperones a classmate's 21st birthday on this very evening, and I can't help but remember the best of all my 39 birthdays^[1]...

IN: BISHOP APARTMENT, April 10, 1994

TIM kisses SANDY goodbye as she leaves for work.

SANDY: I'm sorry I have to work today, being your birthday and all.

TIM: No big deal. I'm not a big birthday guy anyway, and you'll be home soon enough.

SCENE.

Flash forward about 3 hours. Tim has exhausted his video game options by now, taking the 1984 Auburn Tigers to the national title on Bill Walsh's College Football. Masturbatathon 1994 has been postponed indefinitely, due to Hot Ass Newlywed Sex.

TIM (to himself): Hmmm... told G I'd get his storage space in order one of these days, while he's out of town. Wife's at work, nothing better to do. Let's knock this out now, instead of taking time away from Married Time. I'm so smart. Good thing I don't care about celebrating my birthday.

SCENE.

Moving forward another 3 hours. Tim returns home, satisfied with his efforts today.

TIM: (surprised) Hey, honey, whatcha doing home?

SANDY: (steamed) WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?!

TIM: Huh? I was just...

SANDY: I GOT OFF WORK EARLY FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY?! WHERE WERE YOU?!

TIM: Um... I thought...

SANDY: I TOOK OFF EARLY FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY!

TIM: Well, I didn't know you could even do that, and I needed to finish up some stuff for G, and...

SANDY: OH MY GOD! I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU'D DO SOMETHING LIKE THAT ON YOUR OWN BIRTHDAY!!

TIM: (a little frightened, as if he'd stumbled onto a mob murder scene) Wait... it's MY birthday, right? I didn't know you'd be off and I was just going to...

SANDY: (as loud as Iggy Pop piped into a jet engine) YOU HAVE RUINED YOUR BIRTHDAY FOR ME! I HATE YOU!

SCENE.

And somehow, she stayed with me. And every year, I tell her she's the best present ever.

(I'm serious. I do. Wouldn't you?)

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[1]Maybe it's the liquor consumption, but I have no memory of the first 2 or 3 birthdays. You'll have to wait until my mom releases her memoirs to find out if those first two or three involved me pistol-whipping a cab driver or me doing 45 minutes of ribald standup comedy.