A Birthday Robbery

My dad’s birthday is on Christmas Eve. But before you start feeling bad for the guy for getting birthmas gifts (birthday gifts wrapped in Christmas paper), he enjoys saying, “I’m older than Christ!”

Since my family is getting bigger and my siblings have spouses and in-laws to entertain/visit on the holidays, we always make a point to at least get together for my dad’s birthday, thus leaving Christmas as the in-law vistation day.

My dad, God love him, is a curmudgeon. Like a combination of Archie Bunker, the dad from the “Wonder Years,” and Red Forman of “That 70s Show.” Well he used to be, anyway.

With the birth of grandkids, it’s like he’s gone haywire. Before the arrival of Grandkid #1, my mom asked him what he’d like to be called: Grandpa, Pop-Pop, Poppy, or some other such nonsense. He simply replied, “Sir.” So my mom retorted, “If my grandkids are going to call you anything, they’ll call you Sir Pop.” But when the little ones try to pronounce Sir Pop, it usually comes out as “Sah Po,” and the old curmudgeon just melts.

This Christmas Eve, we all gathered together for delivery Chinese food from Wok ‘N Roll, located about 5 driving minutes away. My sister, a neurotic party planner, had scanned and emailed the menu to have everyone’s selections and have our food delivered before the rush of Christmas Eve orders.

But, of course that didn’t happen.

After about 30 minutes, my nephew, known as a finicky eater who can seemingly run on 5 pieces of spaghetti for 3 days, started to whine that he was hungry. The appetizer of crunchy noodles with sweet and sour dipping sauce had vanished. After 45 minutes, my sister called only to be told something about the owner’s son being tied up in a robbery.

This may be a common occurrence in Harlem or Queens, but my parents’ house (three blocks from my sister) is bordered by a corn field. Our high school had off for the first day of deer season because half the students would be missing (mostly boys, but some girls too). The street that my sister lives on doesn’t have curbs or lines for lanes. So a robbery is kind of out of the ordinary.

Once our food finally arrived and we finished feasting (my nephew ate 10 grains of rice and was full), we turned off all the lights, presented my dad with a cake, and sang “Happy Birthday.” And like every other year, my dad sang along with us, essentially singing Happy Birthday to himself. But this year, surrounded by three grandkids, all watching his face glow in the light of candles, he sat clutching a stuffed animal under each arm not even realizing his curmudgeon status had fallen another notch.

After his presents, and some early Christmas presents for the kids had been opened, we sat around in blissful silence for a few moments until my sister bleakly said, “Sorry about the robbery, guys.” And maybe it was the two limoncello shots or four daiquiris, but I thought it was just about the funniest way to end Christmas Eve.

Here’s a link to the actual news story about the robbery. When they said the owner’s son was “tied up,” they literally meant it, as he had been tied to a chair during said robbery.

http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/phillipsburg/index.ssf/2010/12/phillipsburg_police_investigat_5.html