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Time! Is Marching On! And Time… Is Still Marching On!

October 3, 2008:
Entertainment: TV, Life

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Because I am a human (like you, I assume), I have two things: a navel, and a birthday. The navel does not do me much good—it just sits there on my stomach, not even bothering to sing like in those stupid jeans commercials—but the birthday is very useful, since birthdays are a good excuse to make people give you stuff. (Navels are not. I’ve tried the whole “hey, let’s go out and celebrate my navel” thing, and it didn’t go over too well.)

Not that my birthdays are all about the stuff. Normally my birthdays are all about angst, regret, and overconsumption of cake. But this year, in celebration of the big two-five, I thought I’d take a break from all the “what-have-I-DONE-with-my-life” whining and just focus on the good stuff: presents, family, and overconsumption of cake. (Some things never change.)

As it turns out, this was the year that everyone expected me to have a quarter-life crisis and resulting angsty breakdown. Can I defer it until next year, folks? I’ll make up for it with extra angst, I promise.

Even if I had been angsty, I wouldn’t have been able to keep it up for long, not with the pile of gifts I got: skeleton dishware, a skeleton windchime, season two of Hawaii Five-O, and—cover your ears, I’m going to squee—the first season of Foyle’s War on DVD. (SQUEE! Okay, I’m good now.) My favorite gift, though, was a little wooden chest my husband deorated with painted picture of planets and stars. Handmade gifts always floor me anyway (I suck at crafts, and have the deepest awe for those who don’t), but this? Is gorgeous. I would upload pictures, but I also suck at picture-taking, so I will have to have my husband take some for me. That man can do everything.

I got another odd birthday gift, from a most unexpected source. Le me explain:

Birthdays, of course, are a perfect excuse to sleep late, and that’s just what I did. I turned on the Today show, just to hear the headlines, and promptly fell asleep for an hour or so with the TV on. I was sort of waking up by the time Matt Lauer, Ann Curry, and Al Roker had gone outside to schmooze with the crowd, and so I dimly heard Matt Lauer saying something about “finally getting to the biggest news story of the day…” And then, all together, the three of them yell, “HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ROMY!”

Which did not get an immediate response from me, because I have notoriously faulty hearing and am always thinking I hear people saying my name when they’re actually saying something else, so I just lay there and thought, “Heh, funny—that sounded like my name.” But they are still jabbering on about Romy’s birthday, she’s such a sweet girl, they love her so much, and by that time I had woken up enough to realize that they really were saying Romy… and then Matt Lauer said, “Happy birthday, Romy. Love ya, sweetheart.”

Blink. Blink. Matt Lauer… loves me?

And then I remember: he has a daughter named Romy. Who apparently shares my birthday as well as my name. So I assume he was talking about her, not me.

At least, I hope he was talking about her. I hate to break your heart, Matt, but believe me… it just wasn’t meant to be.

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