The Pizzazzy

The plan It began with me and Shilpa deciding to give Anand some shock on his birthday. Eventually the plan evolved into a fairly bigger one when we roped in Shraddha as well. Nitin and Shilpa accompanied by their four years old and Shraddha would come at midnight with a cake, snacks and candles. Anand who would be already deep in sleep and oblivious to all the excitement would be pleasantly surprised. 

 The Twist  Just a day before, Anand and my brother-in-law Sameer decided to start with their 9 to 10 p.m. Badminton session with Rahul. This had been in the pipeline for sometime and when it finally happened the timing couldn’t have been worse. After the badminton round and with the adrenalin rush it was way past 12 when finally Anand went to bed. And I was worried that our plan would flop if this repeated the next day. The counter plan  The next morning I roped in Sameer also and told him to make some excuse and not go for the Badminton that night. I was avoiding telling Aai and Sameer fearing that they might give away the plan by mistake. When Sameer was all smiles after hearing my plan I wasn’t sure he wouldn’t do exactly what I feared. So, I roped in Rahul. I thought that if the host only changed the badminton plans then it will not raise any doubts. 

 The excitement  We were pretty excited about the whole plan and from office also we were visualizing Anand’s irritation and shock. All three of us I, Shilpa and Shraddha were looking forward to the night. Meanwhile Anand got the pre-planned call from Rahul also. Almost caught  As soon as Anand’s plan got cancelled he called me. And I said “Oh so Rahul called you?” Immediately Anand’s antenna was at work and he smelled something fishy. He asked me if it was me who told Rahul to cancel it. I said “why would I do that” and I sweet talked him into some other topic.  

The wait  I made Anand go to sleep at 10 only after an early dinner. And as usual Anand immediately fell asleep. I did my usual reading till 11 and since there was still one more hour to go I put my cell on vibrator and closed my eyes not intending to sleep off. I was holding the cell so that I don’t disturb Anand and wake him up. And I drifted off to sleep and when I got up after some time I went out of the room deciding to wait for our friends. The second twist  As I came out of the room with my eyes still blur from sleep, I noticed Shraddha and Shilpa already in the kitchen getting things ready. I immediately joined them in lighting the candles and also setting the environment. We put the night lights on, and also placed candles on a few candle stands. Now that we were all set I went to wake Anand up.   

The shock   I gave a light tap on his hand – this is how he likes to be woken up from sleep – and I simply told him there was someone at the door. So, he got up groggy from the sleep and came out of the room. We all started singing in chorus and he took in the scene. With shock and confusion on his face he smiled and said “Thank you Thank you!!” More fun  After all the wished we told him to cut the cake. He placed himself nicely in front of the cake and blew away the candles and just before he could cut the cake he looked away, and the magic candles which Shraddha had got were lit again. Since he was still in a state of slumber he was confused and blew them off again. And after doing this for a few times he realized that we were having a nice time at his expense and removed the candles completely. And we all carried on the party for a while and soon after said goodbye to our friends and retired for the night. 

The next day  We relived the moments from the planning to the execution enjoying every moment to various group of friends and family. Aai who slept soundly through the whole party was also impressed by the whole thing. This happened to Anand for the first time and he actually enjoyed every bit of it. Guys next time, we have to think of something more exciting. That evening  Anand was really lucky this year. The same evening when Daddy arrived from Mumbai and we all went out to Season’s for dinner, somehow the staff realized that we were celebrating Anand’s birthday and they came up with a complementary cake for him to cut and it was somewhere around 11:00, so the day began and ended with cutting of cake. It was a great day, half of which, we spent in Home Town mentally building a dream house.