the day that will live in infamy

it is sean's birthday today.

it was sean who introduced me to the theory of the birthday week, and as such, he's been getting the rrrroyal treatment since monday, when he got his choice of dessert. doesn't sound like much, but he takes his dessert seriously. (he chose warm apple crumb cake with fresh merrymead cinnamon caramel swirl ice cream.) yesterday, he got his ipod speakers. today, his family are meeting us at a nearby restaurant to celebrate his birthday and his grandmother's birthday, which is tomorrow.

there's alot of sean stories I could tell you, having to do with funny experiences with outdoor defecation (there are, seriously, quite a few of those) and drunken debauchery. I could even tell you sweet stories like what he was like at bella's birth or how he proposed. (and I think I did tell you about our first dates at the mexican restaurant and with the cheese sandwiches, right?) but I'm going to tell you (with prior permission from sean) about one of the best sean stories I ever witnessed, which some of you already know - the cat door.

we live in a smallish row home that was built in 1920. as such, we have radiator hot water heat and no air conditioning. in the winter, it's no big deal because the radiators work quite well and the house stays toasty. however, in the summer, we have to put in room air conditioners and partition off all the bedrooms because it's just unbearable up there and the air conditioners only really cool off small areas. so we put an air conditioner in our bedroom and closed the door at night. maggie, our dog, would always follow us wherever we go, so she'd already be in our bedroom when we went to bed, but kitchen, our cat, loves to roam at night.

because our bedroom door didn't really close or lock correctly, the cat would come in in the middle of the night by pushing the door open. if we barricaded the door shut, she'd scratch endlessly at the door to get in or out. so we decided that we should get a cat door for our bedroom door so kitchen could come in and out as she pleased, and the cold air would stay in our room.

I bought the cat door and was intending to install it myself. I had read the directions and it seemed pretty easy. but sean wanted to do it himself, and so at 8am on a weekday while I was at work, he began what he (and I) thought was a simple, couple-of-hours task.

I called him at around noon to see how things went. he answered the phone completely flustered and angry. I asked him what was wrong, and he proceeded to tell me what had happened.

you have to use a template and cut a hole in the door to install the cat door. he took the door off the hinges to work on it, naturally. he didn't want to get sawdust on the floor so he took the door down to the basement. he used the jigsaw to cut the hole, but the blade broke, so he took trent (who was home from school for the summer) to home depot to get another one, which didn't fit. he finally got the saw to work and cut the hole out, installed the door, and heaved the door back upstairs.

as he put the door up to the jamb to put it back on the hinges, completely pleased with himself for not making a mess AND for being a total handyman, he noticed something was very wrong. he said to me "so I got the door back up and now I am so angry..." and before he even had a chance to tell me what happened, I knew. he had cut the hole AT THE TOP OF THE DOOR. so unless our cat was 7 feet tall, she wasn't getting in the cat door. he was so angry, but my god. it was the funniest thing I had ever heard. people two rows down from me at work were wondering if I was okay, because the laughing I was doing sounded more like choking than anything gleeful. in fact, for a few minutes there, no sound was coming out of my mouth at all. I demanded that trent take a picture before sean fixed it.

oh, and fix it he did. I told him to just flip the door upside down and put it on the hinges that way, so the hole was at the bottom. but the hinges weren't equal distances and the door was now 3 inches too tall for the door frame. so sean, having just used the jig saw, and now drunk with power and rage, proceeded to cut this wildy jagged piece off the top without measuring. needless to say, it was way more than the 3 inches we needed. and he also had to reinstall the cat door itself because now it opened upside down.

we never did fix that door. it still has the lock on the outside (great for pranks!) and it still has a jagged 4" gap at the top, making it seem more like a saloon door than anything else. but the cat has her cat door and she does use it. all's well that ends well.

sean, thank you for always making me laugh. happy birthday, handyman.