Birthday Week, Day One

Some hate their birthdays. I love mine. I love it so much, I stretch it out as long as I can. It's my birthday week. No wait, it's my birthday month. It's a month of using my birthday as an excuse to do anything I want and not feel guilt. "It's my birthday, I'm gonna sit at home and read all day." "It's my birthday, I'm not cooking and we're going out to eat." Jeremy says we go out to eat a lot during my "birthday." Hmm.

December is not my birthday month, but it is Joshua's, and since I've set the example, we've started the celebrations early. Last night we took him out to eat, where ever he wanted. He wanted to go to Friendlies. The kids always want to go to Friendlies. It's not a bad place, just gets a little old after awhile.

After we ate, we walked to the front register to pay our bill. There was a huge "Crane" game in the front filled with medium sized stuffed crap. Ok, some of the animals were kinda, sorta cute, but mostly it was crap. Joshua begged, "Please, can I play the crane. Please, Please?"

Normally I say no. "Well, ok, it's you're birthday and it's only 50 cents. You only get one shot though."

"YESSSSSSS!!!!!" Josh shouted. He studiously planned his strategy, talking it through with Ruthie. That one is too buried. This one is sticking out, but nothing good to grab onto. That one might be easy, but I don't really like it. Finally they settled on the monkey with the santa hat, after Jeremy said, "Just put the coins in already, and play." It was snowing outside, and he was feeling twitchy about driving home. It had just started collecting on the roads and he wanted to avoid the idiots who continue to drive at normal speeds despite the fact that the roads are not quite plowed and salted.

Joshua inserted the coins. He carefully and meticulously directed the Claw towards Santa Monkey. He hit the button and the Claw grabbed onto the monkey and picked it up. Holding our collective breaths, we watched the monkey drag across the other stuffed crap. The Claw dropped the monkey into the bin, and the kids cheered.

"I was sure that it would drop it when I saw it dragging over the other toys," Jeremy said.

"Yeah, me too," I replied.

The excitement in the car was almost uncontainable. The kids chattered about what Joshua would name the monkey. Jeremy leaned over to me and said, "Spank."

Joshua said, "Yeah, Spank would be a good name for the monkey."

"Uh, no. You cannot name the monkey Spank." I glared at Jeremy who was silently laughing so hard he was shaking.

"Why?" asked Ruthie.

"Because. I. said. so." I glared even harder at Jeremy who was now wiping tears from his eyes.

"Yeah," he added trying to sound like he wasn't still laughing at his own wit. "Spank wouldn't be a good name for the monkey."

Subject matter dropped, the kids settled on the name "Zub." We returned home. The Boy opened his birthday present, Mario Kart for the Wii, and proceeded to talk about his good fortune over Zub the Monkey, declaring this to be "The Best Birthday Ever."

This morning, the kids were still feverishly chatting over The Crane.

"I still can't believe I won," Joshua said.

"I know!" Ruthie added.

Hannah in her six-year-old wisdom said, "That's because, Josh, you were One With The Crane. You became The Crane."