I turn 30 in one week. Almost to the minute, actually. I think I was born sometime around 12:30 in the afternoon. My great aunt used to tell me that being born close to noon was a good thing…so I got that going for me, which is nice.
Lots of people have emailed wondering what’s going on, because my posts here have been less frequent, so I’ll address that for a minute: It’s summer. It’s warm and beautiful outside, and I’ve been spending less and less time in front of the computer. This is quite the opposite of a year ago, when I was sitting here for 5 hours a day, working on the site, updating the weblog and answering emails…I guess my priorities have been reassigned, because there is really nothing in the world more important to me than hanging out with my wife these days.
Speaking of my birthday and my insanely cool wife, she had a HUGE surprise party for me on Friday night! She got all of my friends in on it, even convinced my family to come out, and totally surprised me. 100%. It was really cool.
See, she’d told me that our friend Burns was going to see James Brown, and he had an extra ticket, so he was going to take her. This left me without anything to do on Friday night, so my friend Stephanie (who introduced me to Anne) and I decided that we’d go do something, and that something ended up being going to see Save Ferris at the OC Fair.
I was all excited to leave early, get to the fair in the afternoon, and eat numerous types of food (all on-a-stick of course), ride the dangerous carnical rides (staffed by creepy dudes on work release of course), and learn many exciting facts about Emus and Ostriches (sitting in a pen right next to a stand selling Ostrich and Emu burgers…on a stick of course).
Trouble was, Stephanie told me, she couldn’t leave until almost 7PM, because she was doing something really important (turns out it was setting up for my party). So I waited…played with Ferris, played Tony Hawk 3 (opened up the Cruise Ship level!) and ate some Chick-Nuggets, lamenting the fact that they were not on a stick.
Well, 7PM finally arrives, and Stephanie isn’t at my house. 7:30 comes and goes, and she’s still not there. Now I’m beginning to get anxious, because SF goes on at 8:30. Monique put us on the guest list, and I think it’s extra rude to show up late when you’re on the list.
It’s 7:45 when Steph finally shows up. I run to her car, jump in, and tell her that we may need to push the speed limt just a bit so we get there on time…and she tells me that she needs to drop off an envelope at this guy’s work for a friend of hers. She tells me that it’s right off the freeway, so it should only take 1 minute.
So I tell her that I’m going to count once we get off the freeway…which I do. I’m approaching “50” when we pull into the parking lot. Stephanie tells me, “Run this envelope in, and give it to Terry. He should be right inside the door.”
I hop out of the car, run up the stairs, and say, “I’m looking for Terry!”
Turns out there’s not a Terry there, but my wife, parents, and most of my friends are, and they all yell, “SURPRISE!!!”
I was totally stunned. It was the last thing in the world I expected, and we went on to have an insanely fun night at this place. There were batting cages, lazer tag, basketball courts, video games…funny that we had a party for my 30th birthday at a place I would have loved when I was 12. This fact really sums up who I am. 🙂
The party was awesome. I played nearly an hour of lazer tag, learned that even though I’m left-handed, I bat much better from the right, and ate way too much cake.
The best part, though, was the feeling I had when I stopped to think for a second about how hard it is to pull off a surprise party. I know how hard it is, and it really made me feel loved by my wife and friends, because the pulled it off flawlessly.
Saturday was spent doing a bunch of nothing, and yesterday Anne and I took Ferris to the Dog Beach in Orange County. If you live with an hour of this place and you have a dog, you just gotta go. It was really, really fun.
One last word on updates, and the frequency of them: I’m writing this from work, because my computer at home completely blew up this morning. Smoke and everything. So until I replace it, we may all have to spend even more time outdoors…which isn’t such a bad thing, really. 🙂

Last summer, at the Creation Grand Slam convention in Pasadena, there was a tribute to Gene Roddenberry. I was asked to speak at the tribute, and I eagerly agreed. However, the tribute was going to conflict with a show that I was in at the ACME, so I couldn’t be at the tribute.
By the way, can I please say “tribute” again?
Tribute. Tribute. Tribute.
Well, I was very torn. I really wanted to be there to honor him, but I couldn’t back out of the sketch show at the last minute. So, I asked my friend Richard, who was putting together the event (notice I didn’t say “Tribute?”) if I could write something down, and have it read on my behalf. He agreed, and I was able to be in two places at once. Sort of.
Earlier today, Anne and I were cleaning and organizing stuff in our house, and I found what I’d written, dropped behind a dresser, on a folded up sheet of yellow legal paper.
I’d like to share it with you all today.

“Gene Roddenberry’s office door was always open to me, regardless of who was already there.
He always made me feel important, like he was proud of the work I was doing, and that he was glad to have me as part of his great creation.
When we were shooting TNG, I had no idea that he had named Wesley after himself. I’m glad, because at the time, the sense of responsibility would have paralyzed me.
However, knowing that now, the sense of honor and pride is overwhelming, and hope that, somewhere, Gene is still proud of all of us.
Gene was an anachronism in Hollywood. He was a warm, caring, profoundly creative man who never compromised his vision.
I am proud to be part of his legacy, and it is an honor to remember him tonight.”

It’s nearly 10PM.
The kids are with their dad, leaving Anne and me in an empty, quiet house.
We sit at our dining room table, Ferris asleep at our feet, the 85 degree Southern California air stirred only by a single fan in our air-conditioner-less house.
We’re reading. She reads a magazine, I read a book, and Charlie Parker travels through time from 1950, transported by our radio, tirelessly bebopping at us.
These moments that we share, just the two of us are precious few, and I cherish them.
I close my book and tell her, “You are the other half of my heartbeat.”
They’re not my words. I’ve borrowed them from Dizzy Gillespie, who was speaking, ironically, of Bird…
…but truer words have never passed my lips.