39 Años

This past weekend I celebrated my 39th Birthday! It was a fun weekend with family, friends and an asphalt contractor. Susan and I started the day with a free coffee at Caribou. (Actually , Susan started her day much earlier with some exercise and prodding me to get my lazy birthday butt out of bed). Mom and Dad joined us and we really had a nice visit. I wonder if they (Mom and Dad ever thought one day they'd just be sitting in a coffee shop with their 39 year old middle son? After that, we were headed to do some errands and I forgot about a scheduled meeting with an asphalt contractor - who I just happened to notice as we were leaving the property! After two depressing hours looking at failing concrete and asphalt we were off to do our errands.

The best part of the day though, was dinner at the Ocean Club with James and Megan. We've really enjoyed getting to know both of them. One of the really positive results of living in a condo is making friends. So, the four of us headed to the OC for dinner. We hit the bar for some smokin' martinis. Literally, they pour them over dry ice and they actually smoke! Then, we were sat at a round booth table. It was great! We had fondu, wine (a really nice Acacia Pino Noir) and steaks! Well, James and I had steaks. The ladies went with the crab cakes. James and I both tried our steaks 'Oscar' style. Basically, then put crab meat and bearnaise sauce on the steak. It was really good and I would definitely recommend it! Makes me want to try crab legs! The most traumatic part of dinner happened when Megan couldn't decide which dessert to order. Megan is a most awesome April birthday too, so we both were able to get a free dessert. She said something like 'I can't decide and it makes me want to cry!'. At that point our waiter stepped in to save the day. He brought the three desserts we wanted to try for free! After having the desserts, definitely try the creme brule at the Ocean Club -- you won't be disappointed. It was a fun 3+ hour evening with lots of laughter and good food. You can't ask for much more than that. A big THANKS to James and Megan for spending the evening with us.

On Sunday, we went to Buca di Beppo for dinner at the Pope Table with my family and a larger group of friends. This was my idea because B16 was in the US. We've had a lot of fun there before, but I forgot about the challenge when it comes time to pay for dinner. They won't bill individually, and we usually just break up the total into equal parts. This time, for some reason, there was a lot of chaos with the bill and what people owed. Susan ended up paying almost half the tab. I feel really bad about this. She was so generous this weekend with her time and money. Plus, she bought me a grill I've really been wanting. She really spoils me sometimes, I hope I'm worthy.