It was Burke’s birthday. She is blurm-bling-years-old and so a day of enjoyment was called for to celebrate this inauspicious number and event. The idea was: zoo, cake, burger, cake, air conditioning.

The pluses with a summer birthday are clear. Your range of activity is way open. You can drink outside, go outside, walk outside, play outside. When you’re an October birthday like me, your range of places to drink are limited to: a pub.

As far as I am concerned, the problem with a summer birthday is the heat. But this doesn’t seem to be a problem for the summer-born people. Those people born in summer seem A-okay with the sun activities. They enjoy the feeling of baking shoulders and prefer their beverages to be consumed in the al fresco. The summer people are like human charging ports, a day in the sun energizes them and allows them to glow warmly and happily. They are psychopaths.  

I am an autumn-born person. My idea of fun is avoiding the sun at all costs. I drink my beverages indoors and with a wall or even a few walls between me and the orb of discomfort. Most of my shots are quietly dedicated to the fact that I live in a place which the sun avoids for six months of the year. I get a charge from the shade.   

But it is not my birthday, it is Burke’s. And she has decided on the zoo.

It should be mentioned that I am for this plan in theory. I like walking, animals, and beer and hotdogs. All of these things can be found or done at the zoo. But in practice, and as an autumn-born, what I really want is to hide in my coolish flat for this hot day and watch movies. Maybe we could just let me hang out at home, eat, drink, and watch 30 Rock while animals pass by the flat and watch me. I would be OK with this. Nevertheless, when it’s your partner’s birthday, pitching these fanciful (read: stupid) ideas are not an option. Also not an option is going along with the plan and being miserable. You have to sell it. You have to be into it. I shower. I practice my smile. I remember there will be beer and elephants and my smile becomes genuine.