Things

[edg]

First,

Happy 25th birthday, jhyanmar!

Had a lot of odd dreams last night; a surprising number of them involving checking my email. Of the two dreams about which I remember any sort of detail, the first involved sleeping in my car at an elementary school so I could get up early and go out with one of the (male) teachers as a proxy for a (female) friend (and having to defend myself online against insinuations that I was going out with this guy because I was interested in him); the second, which I remember much more clearly, involved nakedsilhouette (why did I automatically remember your old username?) managing and promoting a rock/techno show in my area, and going around all of the back roads around here on foot, polling to see what kind of music would play well. When I encountered her, I was driving, but my helping (she insisted her feet weren't sore as she limped painfully up the road) was to carry her on my shoulders. There was also a cameo by "Joey Manley" (I blame demiurgent, who in this dream was a rockstar programmer driving a land-yacht (land yacht not actually a yacht) convertible in a devastating shade of purple.

Anyway.

I'm not going to be online much today, at least before evening; I'm meeting up with my aunt and her... boyfriend? fiancé? I don't know ... to visit the Walters Art Museum, which was, the last time I visited it (in... eighth or ninth grade, so at least eleven and a half years ago), the Walters Art Gallery and possibly lunch; after that, I have a party to attend in honor of the birthday of a friend from high school whom I hadn't even been in contact with at all since I graduated eight and a half years ago. (We ran into each other, completely coincidentally, at the Volvo/Toyota parts shop where I was picking up a replacement taillight socket. If I'd literally been a minute earlier getting in and out of the shop, or if I hadn't turned to scan the shop exactly when I did - the parts guy was running my credit card - we'd never have seen each other. So. I'm not going to the party for very long - an hour or two at most - but it'll be nice to catch up at any rate.)

Apropos of which, what do you bring to a party given in honor of someone's birthday, when you haven't seen the person in better than eight years, and when you've been invited by that person? Am I under an obligation to bring anything? I have learned from my parents that the all-purpose "going to a party" gift is a bottle of wine, but is that appropriate here?

Comments

[ex-tepes85.livejournal.com]

It's a bad gift if they're a recovering alcoholic... ;)

[curiousangel.livejournal.com]

I'd feel under obligation to bring something to the party, and since you don't know the person very well any more, a bottle of wine seems like a safe gift. Food might be inappropriate for the nature of the party, or excessively duplicative, but with wine, the host can say, "Thank you!" and put it in his cupboard for later use if he doesn't want to open it that night. Generally, I try to ask when the invitation is issued/received, so that the host can make assignments as needed, but wine's a good short-notice, didn't-know-what-you-needed thing. The only way you can really go wrong is if the host is morally opposed to alcohol, but not even Jesus took that harsh a stand, so I wouldn't sweat it.

[brianh]

Thank you. :)

[archangelbeth]

Hey, you, you had a birthday?? Congrats on the "ding"!

[brianh]

Yup. :P Do I get my title now?

[archangelbeth]

Well, you get a surname at 20 anyway...

[archangelbeth]

Gift cards for a local bookstore or "high falutin'" fancy-food store? The latter, you can present with a, "I understand that a bottle of wine is the traditional gift in these circumstances, but I don't know what sort you'd like, and you might want chocolate instead" speech? (Possibly along with, "Paralyzed by the possibilities, I was susceptible to the seductive sales pitch by the store employee who whispered in my ear and showed me this nifty card.")

(Me, I like bookstore cards. O:>)