the birthday surprise: part 1

Keeping birthday plans from your husband is a difficult task, as the element of surprise is most definitely an art I have yet to perfect. As Mr. M’s birthday was on Tuesday, I had asked him to keep Saturday evening free and clear for the last part of his birthday celebration. He logically assumed we were headed out to dinner, and asked for one question to be answered, “Is it in town?” I answered no… and his immediate reaction was “Hooray! We’re going to Mustards!” My reply was simply, “Nope. You’re wrong.” How his mind jumped so quickly to this assumption of dinner in Yountville, I’ll never know, but he’s been craving an afternoon visit for weeks to enjoy a savory Mongolian porkchop. Luckily he was wrong… but he somehow still managed to nail down the vicinity of the destination.  This would be the first erosion of the secret…
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Then I got a call on Friday night when I was on my way home from work. Mr. M asked if I wanted to go out and get sushi… and I stumbled. I said, “How about anything but sushi?” Quickly the phone was transferred to the hands of our friend who tried his best to convince me that all I wanted to eat was raw fish. “No really… anything BUT sushi.” He kept insisting until finally I said, “I don’t want it to spoil Saturday!” That stopped him in his tracks and utterly confused him, so the phone was passed back to a now befuddled Mr. M. “What do you mean it would spoil Saturday?” Ugh…. Why couldn’t I just say that I ate sushi for lunch, or that I was feeling ill, or …. something else? Now the cat was out of the bag as to our food of choice…
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So we went out to eat “not sushi” for Friday with our friends, and arrived home to greet my parents who were enabling our getaway on Saturday. All was swell as we were chatting away until the local news flipped to its sports segment and started talking about the race this weekend at Infineon. “You guys are going to need to watch out for traffic up there tomorrow.” Gulp… uh oh mom… don’t say it! “But mom, we’re not going to Sonoma.” “Oh I know, but people will still be all around Napa anyway.” Baddump. Secret destination confirmed.
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Surprise clues revealed: Dinner. In Napa. Serving Sushi. Oh boy.
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I asked Mr. M not to enter his clues into Google, and luckily he didn’t. As he had to work all day, I set our destination time at 4pm, and we were both dressed and ready to go out for our “not so surprise surprise Birthday celebration.”
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The first stop was definitely a bit of a surprise. Seeing a movie in a movie theater is quite the luxury these days. As neither of us can attend during a “kids hour” show mid-week, we usually trade off the favor between us (so far it’s mainly just Mr. M going and me staying at home). So halfway to Napa I made Mr. M exit the freeway and drive into the parking lot of a megaplex and we went to see this awesome flick:
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Yes, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World was pretty wonderfully nerdy and fun. We giggled throughout it at the sly gaming references and the gag lines as well (VEGAN superpowers!)… and drank our way through our large “snack” of a fountain Coca-Cola. Then it was off to the real destination… 
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(to be continued)