Yo PARTY GIRL..Happy Birthday and Shit...

It's Tuesday, September 29, 2009. It's my birthday. It's 9:00 in the morning and I am sitting in the bed, watching The Doctors and eating fudge cake and ice cream.
Like I said, it's my birthday damnit and I am starting my day the way I want to.

So here's a story for you...

In 2000 I met a man by the name of Giovanni. I was at a Superbowl afterparty with DIGITAL GIRL. We had already pissed off half of our linesisters and forced them with our bad attitudes to take early flights back to their respective hometowns. However, this night on the town was the BEST. We were at this party, tipsy, flirting, dancing, getting free drinks, meeting men...you know, doing what 23-24 year olds do.

While walking up the stairs, my hand is grabbed by a man sitting at the bar. He says to me, "come on over here doll...lemme talk to you". I head over there and make the acquaintance of Mr. Giovanni. To this day I still can't tell you his last name. We chat it up, he makes me laugh and he invites me to dinner the next day. Over dinner I am quickly intrigued by his story. He tells me about his family in Cleveland and Sicily. He tells me about how his grandmother makes this wine that is so strong, he can't drink but so much of it. He expresses his love for African American women and he also tells me about all of these cops, athletes and coaches in professional sports who "owe him favors". Hot Damn...I done met Tony Soprano.

For some strange reason Giovanni and I become friends. We chat on the phone, we go to lunch whenever he came into town, but we NEVER dated. I wasn't no fool. It was cool to have someone like him around, but to date...nah...


Like clockwork, every year at exactly midnight on September 29, Giovanni is ALWAYS the first person to call me for my birthday. If I answer the phone he says, "YO PARTY GIRL...Happy Birthday and Shit, you're not going to beleive this, but I almost forgot. I been calling you for your birthday the past 3-4 years and how could I almost forget ?" If I don't answer the phone, he leaves that same exact message on my voicemail. I have not visibly seen Giovanni in about 7 years, but he still calls me every year to wish me happy birthday and I actually look forward to it.

So as I finish my fudge cake and ice cream and prepare to get dolled (casual chic) on this last day of fabulosity, I am more than certain that one of these three (3) voicemails on my phone is that of my man Giovanni. He never leaves a phone number, so I can never call him back. He wishes me happy birthday and keeps it moving until the next year.

I can honestly say that this birthday has been wonderful thus far. The celebration began Saturday with a very nice dinner with NGF and it will end today with a Yankees Game with THE GIRLS and an album release party of one of my clients. I plan to do today ONLY what the hell I want to do. And right now, I gotta go.... my ice cream is melting :)