B's Birthday Dinner

On Saturday night we celebrated B’s 24^th birthday. First off, a milestone: now, the fashion girl in me kicks in every once in a while, and even though B dresses much better than the average man (he is European after all), he hates to shop and I always think to myself, ‘If I see that boy in a t-shirt, jeans and All-Star Converse's one more time I just may scream’. Sheepishly, he mentions that he’s thinking of doing a little shopping that afternoon—he needs new work clothes and wants something new to wear for his birthday that night. I’m elated but I try not to show it so he doesn’t get scared off… for some reason he has this wild idea that I’m a crazy shopaholic and is scared to enter any stores with me (ok true, but so unfair). We head over to Les Halles to hit up H&M, Zara and a couple other European discount fashion chains.

I drag him through the stores and hold up vests, pink sweaters, blazers, skinny jeans (not too skinny!) and ties—lots of trendy but classic and mature pieces that would look fantastic on him. He practically shouts at me, “Stop trying to dress me like ‘The Swede’. I’m not your gay friend”. So I back off just a bit and coax him into a compromise. We bought a few white button-down dress shirts, properly fitting dress slacks, some sweaters/cardigans that can be dressed up or down… and my biggest accomplishment: I made him graduate from colorfully printed boxers to neutral-colored boxer briefs. After he stopped complaining about never being able to father children, he agreed that they weren’t so bad.

After a quick lunch, we split up. Went home to get showered & dressed and then he went to meet his friends for pre-dinner drinks while I went to Café Oz, a central Aussie bar, to meet my Man United buddy to watch the Arsenal match.

B came and picked me up with his friends around 8:30pm and we headed to Los Mexicanos, a theme restaurant with live music and dancing. 15 of us (10 of his friends, 3 of mine) ate [bad] mexican, drank tons of margaritas, I bought him a rose from the vendor and we all danced until around 1am. The night was a lot of fun—and it was so cute to see him so happy, the life of the party. He said it was the best birthday he’s had in a long while… he doesn’t usually celebrate his birthday but I kept bothering him about how loser-ish that was till he finally decided to plan something.

(he got a Lorie music video DVD, France's Britney Spears, as a gag gift)

Oh, and I chipped in with his 3 best friends and bought him top-of-the-line rollerblades. He laughed b/c he’d never thought of rollerblading but said he’s looking forward to testing it out—in a private secluded neighborhood, away from the guys he plays basketball with at his local park. Personally, my idea was to get him a 6-month subscription to Glowria (France’s new version of Netflix) b/c he just bought a new flat-screen TV and DVD player and he’s a huge movie buff… but I figured I’d acquiesce and go with their choice since they’ve known him longer/better. I’m happy to report that he kept saying that my gift idea was fantastic and he would have loved to get that instead. Oh well, looks like B and I will be skating through the streets of Paris together this spring! :o)