“It must be tough,” my friend said.
“What?” I said.
“It must be tough, you know, having a birthday so close to Christmas,” he said.
“My birthday’s not close to Christmas,” I said.
“Yes it is,” he said. “Your birthday is December 7th. That’s only 18 days before Christmas.”
“Uh, no,” I said. “Christmas is the birth of Christ, which happened at, like, 0 A.D. And my birthday is December 7th, 1977 A.D. So I was born one thousand nine hundred and seventy seven years after Christmas. That’s not close at all.”
“Don’t be a jerk,” he said.
“Don’t make boring small talk,” I said.
“And anyway,” he said. “Jesus’ actual birthday was closer to 5 B.C. OK, genius? So you were actually born, like, one thousand nine hundred and eighty two years after him.”
“Well,” I said. “Now who’s being a jerk?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I guess I am.”
Then I punched him in the face.
“How about now though?” I said.
“Yeah,” he said. “Now you again.”
He rubbed his jaw and handed me an envelope.
“Anyway, happy birthday,” he said. “It’s a gift card to Ranch 1.”
We went to Ranch 1. I got a chicken club meal. And my drink came in a cup with Christmas trees on it.