After a little (unintentional!) summer break, my husband and I returned to our monthly “outside date night” on Saturday. We planned to see Julie & Julia followed by dinner. That was the plan…
After dropping the kids off, we went to the movie theater. My husband Reggie dropped me off to get the tickets while he found a parking space. I went to the box office to get the tickets…but the movie was sold out. I called Reggie on his cell phone so that he wouldn’t waste time looking for a parking space. Then, he picked me up. I was trying really hard not to say anything, but my husband knows me so well. “It’s not my fault,” he said twice. I didn’t say that it was (out loud), but I was thinking it! Finally, my husband acknowledged that he should have gotten the tickets in advance and apologized. He just hadn’t thought that it would be sold out since the movie had been out for a while. After that, we were happy and laughing again.
As his “penance”, I asked my husband if he would put on his MBA hat and help me come up with a plan to monetize my Mom in the City site. We went to Starbucks and had a nice time coming up with a plan. I’m from an investment banking/research background, so I had two plans to share. One was more lucrative while the other was more in-line with what I enjoy doing/am currently doing – just on a bigger scale. I love my husband. He’s so supportive. He encouraged me to do what I enjoy rather than going after the quickest money maker (whew!). Since we were on a good roll, I slipped in how much I would need in order to get some legal/financial and web design changes done. A part of me just assumed that he would say, “Okay…just take it out of the budget.” He didn’t. Rather, we agreed that (going forward) I could keep whatever I made financially until I covered my projected costs. I pouted, “So, you’re going to make me bootstrap this?” (I just like the way “bootstrap” sounds. Honestly, I think that his way is the fairest.)
After our little coffee talk, we went to the second part of our date – dinner at a local Brooklyn restaurant that had been recommended to us. As we were driving, Reggie joked, “Oh no! The restaurant is closed.” Then, we pulled up to the restaurant and…yes, it was closed for business. I laughed so hard that tears came out of my eyes. I wasn’t upset. This wasn’t his fault. It was just so funny how our date had become a comedy of errors. My husband got out of the car to double check that the restaurant was really closed. I knew that it was when he came back shaking his head from side to side. It was hilarious! Eventually, we went to Stan’s Place, a Creole-styled restaurant for dinner.
I had some jambalaya that was pretty good. For me, it was just fun spending time with my husband without any interruptions from our little ones. I just had to laugh (again!) when I saw what was written on the bottom of the restaurant menu:
Let the good times roll…indeed!
(I did see Julie & Julia the next day with a girlfriend. I really liked the movie. The husband/wife relationships of the two couples were so sweet – especially Julia and her husband. And the food…from the fish in the opening scene to the duck at the end – my mouth was watering. I have officially put “visiting Paris to eat” on my dream list for summer 2010…)