I contacted one of our friends on FB, M, and realized that the last time I had written a message to her was last year, when I tried to get her and her husband to come to our house for a birthday cookout! I think I gave them about 2 days' notice. This time I was smarter and gave them a few weeks.
T decided that he wanted to go to Rodizio Grill, a nice Brazilian steakhouse. If you haven't experienced one of these places, the idea is that, for a set amount, you get to choose from a large, unlimited salad bar with green salad fixings, but also assorted marinated salads, fruit, oddities like hearts of palm, pickled quail eggs, and faro, and side dishes like penne alfredo, mashed potatoes, rice, and baked beans. Then waiters wander from table to table with large skewers of different kinds of meat, and they slice a piece or two of whtever they have for you at the table. There are options like whole sirloin, pork loin, sweet and spicy chicken, wild boar, linguica sausage, and whitefish with red peppers. A favorite that comes around on the skewers is grilled pineapple, which is really delicious. On the table, you have little appetizer dishes of cinnamon fried bananas, fried polenta strips, and tiny cheesy muffins. You can order drinks, and there are a variety of yummy deserts, too, if you haven't managed to stuff yourself silly by the end of the night.
We went to dinner at one of T's coworkers' house last weekend, and he invited them out to dinner with us. I decided to go along, acting as if they would be the only ones coming with us, when I knew there were another 4-5 people that M had helped invite. As it turned out, I was able to use the coworker invite to my advantage. I wouldn't have bothere making a reservation for just T and I, but I was able to pretend I'd made a 6:15pm reservation for 4, when I really had a 6 pm reservation for 9. T actually called M's husband, and he lied about not being able to come, which sold the surprise even more. In the end, T's coworkers ended up not being able to make it, and I apologized several times for the fact that we were going out alone, so it was an even bigger surprise for him to turn the corner and find everyone at the table. I was going to avoid their version of the tableside birthday song -- a large group of waiters singing in Portugese with a large drum to add to the noise -- but M's husband made sure it happened.
We chatted for a long time before, during, and after dinner, which was wonderful. The SLC Rodizio is located in the Trolley Square shopping center, so we even went for a little walk and got some treats at the toffee shop afterwards. It certainly wasn't elaborate, but it was a nice little surprise, and I think T really enjoyed it.
Happy birthday, babe!
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