The Big 3-0
By Paul Morrone CFP®, CPA, MSA
Apparently turning 30 is kind of a big deal. Being an October birthday and having friends that are older than me in general, I’m usually one of the last people within my group of friends to celebrate the major milestones (16, 18, 21, and now 30). I’m not complaining, because after 21 I’ve learned that being the ‘young one’ is actually something I enjoy. However, what it does mean is that by the time my birthday rolls around that just about everything that someone could have done for their birthday usually has been done. Again, not a complaint on my end as I’m pretty simple, don’t need a big to-do and am incredibly difficult to surprise.
Jill continually likes to outdo herself, and over the past few years has pulled off some pretty spectacular events without me having any idea whatsoever. This year was no different. My birthday went off without a hitch and that night we attended a cooking class that Jill had signed us up for. She told me about it in advance and we were both excited as it was Italian night; the timing with my birthday was just a lucky coincidence. We made a 4-course dinner, enjoyed some wine, and at the end got to enjoy the food we cooked along with the 12 other individuals that were part of the class. I’m not generally a soup person, but one of the recipes was an Italian take on a French onion soup, which stole the show and was the unanimous favorite among everyone in the class (email me if you want the recipe, it really was that good).
I thought I was out of the woods as we had already scheduled a nice dinner with my parents, Kelly and Dave for the Friday night and had brunch planned with a couple of my guy friends the following Saturday morning. After brunch, we started to walk around New Haven to stretch our legs. Little did I know they were strategically directing me toward Crown street where I saw about a dozen of my friends waiting to surprise me. Jill was standing there with a huge grin on her face because she knew she got me good, again.
What I still didn’t realize is what we were getting into. She had booked a ‘petal pub’ for a couple of hours, which was an absolute blast. The concept of a pedal pub is simple, it’s an enormous bike that holds 15 people which you take (i.e. pedal yourself) around the city, stopping at various bars/restaurants along the way. They are more popular down south (think Charlestown, SC or Nashville, TN) because of the relatively flat topography and year-round warm weather, but we are now lucky enough to have our own to enjoy in the Elm City. During the ride, you have a bartender serving drinks, music playing and just about everyone staring at you from the streets. Mother nature had blessed us with quite possibly one of the nicest fall days I can remember and after two hours of working around our way around the city we finished the afternoon with pizza at Bar. Hats off to Jill for pulling it off and to all my friends for being a part of such a wonderful day.
