How to Give Your Wife The Perfect Birthday Gift (During the Recession) in 16 Easy Steps

by Marinka on March 31, 2010

1. A month before beloved wife’s birthday, say, “so your birthday is coming up, any ideas of what you’d like?”

2. Take her at face value when she says, glancing lovingly at you and the children, “What more could I possibly want? I have everything I need right here.”

3. A week later, find a voodoo doll of yourself next to the Cartier catalog.

4. Approach beloved, and possible premenopausal wife, and ask again, “any special requests for your birthday, honey?”

5. Become mildly alarmed when she snaps, “What does Hallmark suggest for ‘passing youth’?”

6. Become medium alarmed upon discovery that voodoo doll seems to have a cast on both arms and is now using crutches.

7. Attempt to distract wife with Good News! “Honey, we are going to be spending your birthday in white water rafting in Virginia!”

8. After Googling “fainting spells”, attempt to revive wife.

9. Answer wife’s questions of “what fresh hell is this?” and “we’re all going to drown and/or die of hypothermia” with a confident, “that’s really unlikely.” Ask wife, nicely, to stop referring to it as white waterboarding.

10. Become alarmed when find voodoo doll buried in cat’s litter box.

11. Enjoy silent treatment from wife.

12. A lot.

13. Achoo.

14. What’s this? A cold? A MANCOLD? A COLD A FEW DAYS BEFORE WE ARE SCHEDULED TO GO WHITE WATER RAFTING? THIS WILL NOT DO! A PERSON SUFFERING FROM A COLD MUST REST AND REMAIN DRY AT ALL TIMES!

15. Cancel white water rafting trip. Tell wife that there will be no white water rafting on her birthday.

16. Sit back and she exclaims, “this is the best birthday present ever!”

One year ago ...

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{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }

Maggie May March 31, 2010 at 12:17 am

Ha! Sounds good to me. White water rafting kind of totally freaks me out.

So Happy Birthday!!!!

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Steph March 31, 2010 at 12:25 am

Totally agreeing that white water rafting is scary–after seeing Deliverance. Marinka, please tell me how you are able to have your darling husbandrinka follow 16 steps.

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Steph March 31, 2010 at 10:52 pm

omigoodness, in my admiration of your 16 steps I neglected to wish you a very Happy Birthday!

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Jonathan March 31, 2010 at 2:35 am

LMAO at “white waterboarding”. Hope you have a great birthday with fabulous presents in addition to remaining dry!

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Kari March 31, 2010 at 2:59 am

Oh, the mancold. My husband has had a mancold for over a week now. He caught it from me. Of course, I had a womancold that lasted only a couple of days – but when it passed to him, it had escalated into full blown mancold. Damn viruses. Now that he’s feeling better, this new strain might pass back to me, and I could come down with paybackcold big time. Yes, I think I will.

Happy Birthday my friend!

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Vicki
Twitter:
March 31, 2010 at 7:31 am

Happy Birthday!! You know what they say in Russian, “shtob tvoi zhelaniye sohadilis’ stvoimi vozmozhnestemi.” In this case, it looks like God/Motherfuckin’ nature decided to go ahead and give Husbandrinka that man cold so they would.

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christy March 31, 2010 at 9:34 am

Fantastic news! Not the cold, the cancelled trip! Yippee! And happy birthday to you, too!

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Elise March 31, 2010 at 1:51 pm

De-lurking to wish you a happy birthday Marinka, and to thank you for all the laughter your blog has given me! Nice going on escaping white water rafting – sounds like that voodoo doll worked his magic! 🙂

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anna see March 31, 2010 at 1:51 pm

happy birthday! glad you escaped the raging river.

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Loukia March 31, 2010 at 3:46 pm

Your posts are always so awesome. I WILL bow down to you at BlogHer! And um? White water rafting is freaking scary, OMG! I went a few years ago, when I had time to do things like that, you know, before I had kids? And I wore my purple bikini and some shorts and put my hair in braids and was all ‘lalala’ I won’t even get wet! And I wore a fanny pack with that contained gummy bears, a pb&j sandwich, and my cigarettes. Okay, THEN? I got on the boat… and within minutes? I WAS SOAKING WET! Imagine that? I GOT WET! And imagine my HORROR when I went to have a cigarette when we had a ‘break’ on the rocks and realized they were SOAKING WET!!?!?! OMG. Worst moment ever. Anyway. It was scary and fun. I fell out of the boat two times. And once, I had to have a life preserver thrown at me b/c I was like, stuck in a current. So yeah, good thing you’re not going! Yay for man-colds!

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GrandeMocha
Twitter:
March 31, 2010 at 10:41 pm

So the vodoo doll worked, eh? HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

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the mama bird diaries
Twitter:
April 1, 2010 at 9:58 am

This totally ruins the surprise white water rafting trip i planned for you.

how old are you anyway?

And as a birthday gift, can you tell us why that ring was in the fruit bowl like a month ago.

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Crys April 2, 2010 at 11:43 am

Happy Birthday! You and my brother share the same day!!! Of course, since I’ll never hit 30 he’s OLDER than I am!!! WOOT!

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Noelle April 4, 2010 at 10:55 pm

Three words: SPA GIFT CARD
(or is giftcard one word?!)
Why is it soooo hard for them to comprehend?!

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