heather's bd

Yesterday was Heather’s thirtysomething-th birthday and we were happy to have been invited to celebrate it at Buca di Beppo along with Robyn and Margaret. We gunned our Xtera up and down Dupont streets until we finally found parking a few blocks from the pop-pular Reagan Hilton. It was good seeing the girls since we hadn’t seen them since last Christmas. We had a blast cracking each other up.

The food was surprisingly good for a national chain and the service was very cute despite his distracting over-plucked eyebrows. The wait staff did a wonderful job of getting the entire room to sing “Happy Birthday.” I never sing in public, as I’m legally tone deaf, but I love singing “Happy Birthday” just like Roseanne sings the national anthem if it causes major embarrassment.

Heather is known for giving the cheesiest gifts. Things like gift-wrapped mints, N-Sync Christmas albums, and “I Love Tad Hamilton” stickers. I wanted to find something to get her back at her for years of bad presents. I went into Lambda Rising knowing I’d find a “woman’s-themed” birthday card for her there and while checking out, right on the counter in plain sight, I found the perfect gift, a DICKY-DOOS game set. “Can you please gift wrap this for me.”

She complained when she read her card, “I’m not a control freak.” Oops, I forgot to cross off control. I knew the DICKY-DOOS caused the right level of discomfit as it was immediately placed in a bag. I suggested she bring with her to NYCity so she could kill time on the four hour train ride. “It’ll give your mom something to do.”

They asked about my nephew and I told them about his copyright tat (©). I was psyched that he got one until I actually got to see it. A - Its minuscule, barely the size of a dime, B - it’s oblong, not circular, and C - “Johnny, I don’ think the copyright symbol has a period after the C.” All in all, lame.

Robyn was thinking of getting a tat and found the copyright symbol idea attractive. I promised her I would forward her a pic of Corky’s ©. It wasn’t until I composed the email that I realized the “C” was for Corky. Duh! She liked the © but thought she may get a registered symbol (®) for Robyn instead.

Margaret’s still trying to integrate herself back into the real world after spending a year in Iraq. The funniest things she said all night was, “I leave for year and when I get back some Paris person is all over the place. What does she do?” She does nothing that matters.