the best laid plans ...

Last night, after months and months of planning, I gave Amanda her birthday present. Though her birthday isn't for another week or so, the original plan was to give her her presents this weekend. We're going away to Yosemite and I thought it would be nice to celebrate her birthday up there.

Well, for her birthday, I had this grand theme of "relaxation." I got her a bunch of bubble bath stuff and some peppermint foot lotion from The Body Shop. The biggest part of the present, however, was a novel. Not just any novel; the first three chapters of a novel I've been writing for her over the last six months. It's taken a ton of work and gobs of my freetime to get it to where it was. But it was printed and ready to go, and like I said, going to be unveiled on Saturday.

Enter life and its inherent complexities. As we sat down to eat dinner last night, Amanda looks at me and says completely out of the blue "I would love to have a bubble bath tonight. It'd be so great if I could take a bubble bath while you read me Harry Potter..." My eyes went wide.

Holy crap, thought I, that's exactly my birthday present to her and its sitting wrapped upstairs as we speak.

She then continued. "I almost stopped off to by some bubble bath stuff on my way home tonight, but then you called and asked me to pick up the chinese food on my way home."

My eyes got wider and I started to wrestle with what I should do. I figured I could either wait until Saturday and give it to her when we were acting like it was her birthday. Or I could spontaneously spring her birthday on her and give it to her then thereby granting her her birthday wish.

The wish won out. So, Manda had her luxurious bubble bath while I read her chapter 1 of The Amber Lantern by candlelight.

It didn't go the way I planned, but I'm not complaining. She seemed to love her presents and cried a few tears of joy. I'm really glad I could make her so happy; and after six months of secrecy, I'm still a bit shocked that I can now openly talk about the book.

(everyone else can avert their eyes now if they're anti-Blog-Displays-Of-Affection)

So, Happy Birthday, Rooni. Hope it was a nice night for you. I love you.