Monday, June 23, 2008

Longest day of the year

When Tamara told me her birthday for the first time she told me I could remember it because it's the summer solstice and the longest day of the year. Tamara takes birthdays much more seriously than I do. She's done pretty sweet stuff for me and others for birthdays, Easter, Thanksgiving, and...well, it goes on and on. You've seen some of the events on here. So I thought I should at least try return the favor on her favorite day of the year. Only the best for my babe. Due to some logistical errors (I was working on a dial up connection) the celebration last year wasn't quite up to snuff. I knew I had to come through this year and I can say this year was like upgrading to DSL.
Before I get into what we did, let's talk about some other notable birthdays on June 21. We have Prince William, the Keatons from Family Ties, and Jean-Paul Sartre. For a list of important events that occurred on this day, check out this. Not too shabby.
To celebrate Tamara's big day, we decided to do a video scavenger hunt because, well, that's what she wanted to do. We came up with a list of things everybody had to video and gave everything a certain number of points. We tried to come up with stuff most people wouldn't do but everybody really came through. We were really impressed. We met at Bryant park and from 4:30 until 7 everyone filmed (thanks Kayte (and Bravo) for the Flip cameras) stuff all over the city. We had a beautiful rendition of I'm a little teapot, a 15 second summary of the show Gypsy, inappropriate jokes, photobombings (Intentionally posing in other people's photos, for a later surprise) of wedding pictures, multiple sweet tattoos, an almost incident of roid rage, and two breathtaking dance performances. To see these and others, Tamara's videos are here on youtube. It's really worth five minutes of your time. You'll probably end up spending more because it's so entertaining.
Everyone came back to our place (thanks Kendra for decorating) and we watched all the videos, had some average pizza (thanks for backing me up Caitlin), some amazing cake (thanks Ann), ate some sweet cupcakes (thanks Jen), and laughed at everybody's work. You know, the normal stuff.
If there are any lessons I can take away from this here they are. First, people will do amazing things when there is a camera involved. I mean, some of these dances are ridiculous and no one would do them if they weren't captured on film. Second, it's amazing what people will do when you ask them to. There were people flexing, telling jokes, letting people on buses, etc. all because someone asked them to. People are nice if you approach them correctly. Third, I learned I can come through on a birthday with help from other awesome people. Last, with a bit of planning and everyone's energy, you can have a really good time. We had a great time and hope you everyone who participated did as well. We're lucky to have such awesome friends and if we ever move we'll really miss them. Wait, what?

11 comments:

Kelleen said...

I'm so upset that I missed it. It really sounded like a ton of fun. If only I had a dang cell phone I'm sure I could have found you. But Bryant park was beautiful at 5:00 when I finally arrived.

Side of Jeffrey said...

The wedding photobombing was epic...that was impressive to me. Oh, but lets not forget the dance off.

Reagan said...

that is a beautiful picture tam :)

GINA said...

Sounds like you guys had a great day! I wish I could have been there. Let's not forget someone else Tamara shares a birthday with...I know she's not famous, but she's my mom! LOL

Mia said...

Ok those videos were hilarious. I think you have some pretty great friends to go out there a do all that fun crazy stuff for you. Glad you had a great birthday!

Chelsea said...

Happy Birthday to Tamara. What an awesome day to have a birthday! You can't be anything but happy when the sun is still shining so late in the evening.

Karyn Mann said...

Looks like your birthday week was a success! Not everyone deserves a long stretched out Bday- however, you are certainly one that does. Congrats on another year!

Brandon Burrows said...

It was such a fun time! I'm sad that I missed the viewing of all the different groups.

Here's a tech question. How do you get the cool "hot link" on the word instead of typing it in afterward? -Brandon

Side of Caitlin said...

Happy Birthday Tamara! We had a great time and we now have some classic video footage to show off Jeff's skills.

jrushing said...

Happy Birthday!! Awesome day too. It sounds like you celebrated well!

Ryanne said...

So cool! I have never seen anything like this before. Tamara is one lucky girl! Happy birthday.