Happy Birthday Tom!

It was a riot last night as me and the gang celebrated with Tom his birthday (and official entrance into the 30s) at O Bar. Even with the hilarious freak out moments, panic phases, and bloopers, the night was still one major success. A pity many other friends whom I tried to invite to come were unable to join the celebration. But as far as the core group is concerned, the PGH table peeps were complete!

Some weeks ago, Tom, Nico and I were enjoying a post-gimmick breakfast when the topic regarding the date of Tom's birthday came up. Nico and I traded jokes that we should have a special show for Tom, being the central hub of how many of us friends got to know one another. The joke turned into a plan and the plan was quickly forgotten... til barely a week from the party date itself. Nico and I launched into action, recruiting two others to assist in the planning, and just two days before the party, I was able to recruit Jay to help us out.

Dance practice. Choreography. Dress rehearsals. And Vodka.
By 4a.m. of the night of the party, we were ready, nervous, excitied and freaked.

February 24, the night of the party. At the stroke of midnight, it would be Tom's birthday (which also means its been one year that I've been hitting O bar for dancing and beers.)

The night began with me, Nico, Sonny and Joemar arriving at the bar early to make preparations for the show and party to come. As expected, Murphy's Law reared its ugly head when the two burned audio CDs I brought for the surprise show (the compilation, and a back-up copy) both were unable to be read by the machine at O bar. Panic begins. Sam and Ian are there on time, but everyone else isn't. I call for beers. Then I opt to call my sister, who was in my car at the time (due to coding, I had to borrow her car) to bring my car over. I recalled my car had mp3 cds that had the songs we needed.

My sister arrives, the cds in hand, we rush to the DJ to test them, but before we could, we receive a call that Bagets, who was helping us with our show, needed us to meet her instead at some other place in Malate. Leaving the CDs with Sonny and Lorrie and trusting them to speak to the DJ for us, we rushed off to meet with Bagets and began prepping for the show.

Sonny texts that the songs are not in the CDs.

I text back they should be.

They couldn't get my mp3 CDs to work. I text Sonny to relax instead. Bagets happens to have one of the FOUR songs we were planning to perform. We will just borrow it from her and have just one number. We calm down.

Sonny comes up with an idea. He and Lorrie find a still open computer shop in the area. They look for the tracks we needed and prep a CD we could use for the show. Message arrives: we have all four songs. Things are falling into place.

We head back to O bar, with the tension so high neither Nico and Joemar could breathe. I suggest screaming. We scream four times and by the fifth, attempt all is good. We arrive. Our friends are all there. So are loads of other people we don't know.

The music plays.

The show begins.

"When I Grow Up" by the Pussycat Dolls

"Mercy" by Duffy

"Single Ladies" by Beyonce

"Dancing Queen" by ABBA

Too bad others missed it.

Happy Birthday Tom!

Here's to my best friend and the man who introduced me to O bar, which has lead my life to making so many new friends and acquaintances and has opened my ears to new kinds of music to enjoy. We have gone a long, long way before we finally found that niche where we can be friends. Many more birthdays to come, Tomato.

Many more to come, indeed. ;-)