I was asked yesterday how I felt about turning thirty, and I realized that I feel the same way about it that I feel about all impending birthdays: incredibly excited. I've known people who hate having birthdays; they don't like getting older, they don't like the annual assessment of their lives, they don't like the attention. I feel the exact opposite. I thrive on attention, both from others and myself, and my birthday is always a time that I can be unabashedly self-absorbed (as opposed to being unintentionally self-absorbed and having such behavior brought to my attention and feeling an ass.) And having a big birthday like thirty? You best believe I will be taking all chances to direct focus on myself.
And yet, I cannot be anything but stunned and moved when a friend lavishes attention on me preemptively, as has happened with my great friend Ann Marie. Though the Divine Ms. AML will not be able to attend my birthday party proper (Sept. 12th - mark your calendar), she will be making a special flight in from New York City two weeks later to take me out to dinner at the awe-inspiring Alinea. I am flabbergasted.
So all friends who are not Ann Marie, the bar has been raised. And for the few of you reading this who are not friends with Ann Marie, you should be, because as you see, she is the best.
Seriously, check out Alinea's website. Their food looks like it was designed by a chef-version of Frank Gehry who went to the future and had a culinary internship on the moon. And I imagine it tastes pretty fucking good too.
2 comments:
Was that even food on the Alinea website? It looked like my Play-Doh concoctions from my earlier days. Hmmm.
Prepare to be even more excited - further research for your dinner.
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/05/12/080512fa_fact_max
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