Birthday!

Twenty-seven years ago today, about the time I'm writing this (between three and four in the afternoon), my wife and I got on our motorcycle and headed up to a specially scheduled venue for a party we'd been planning for some time. We were a little tight on space in our tiny car, and we needed to get a few things ready anyway, so we planned for her mother to follow a little later with our three children aged seven, six and four.

Everything was already set up and waiting for us. There were treats including a cake as I remember (no, really) and drinks and even staff to wait on us, hand and foot. The children and their grandmother arrived in plenty of time for the party to start. The only one missing was a special invitee, whom we'd not really met before.

He arrived a little later.

One could accuse him of arriving "late," and certainly he didn't arrive until after all the other guests, but maybe just a little like a wizard, he didn't arrive early or late, but precisely when he meant to.

A great time was had by everyone and we all got along with him so well that we invited our honored and newly met guest to come home with us.

And so he did.

And we've all been delighted by him ever since.

Happy birthday, Thierry Daniel Bateman.