What a hilarious story. I know that beer. Quite strong!

Here in Austria there is a tradition at "round" (i.e. 40, 50, 60, etc.) birthday parties for someone to make a slide show of the person's life progression. I kid you not when I say I avoid birthday parties like the plague after having sat through many.

The worst I can talk about because we aren't friends anymore. My ex-lawyer's (long corrupt MF **shole story) wife (also a horrible person) had her 40th(?) birthday and we were invited. Obviously, this is while we were still friends (i.e I was still an effing gullible moron).

I don't know how long the slide show actually was in wall-time, because it broke the laws of physics. Time slowed to a crawl like in “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” when young Tom Riddle is asking Slughorn about Horcruxes.

It wasn't just that it was boring as fuck watching pictures of people I'd never met in places I'd never been from decades ago. Nearly every photo had a long-ass story that involved some inside joke or not-quite-exposed secret that only the insiders present were privy to.

Tectonic plates move faster than the pace of that slide show. I don't know how long it lasted as I zoned in and out alternating wondering if I could "slip off to the bathroom" and never return or just puncture an artery to end my misery.

I'll end on a high note. My wife and I have the nicest next-door neighbors I've ever had in my adult life (not so short at this point). We were invited to the wife's round birthday party, and oh-my-God am I happy everyone knows I work weekends right now so I'd be able to escape without insulting such nice neighbors.

I got caught off-guard by the start of the slide show. No escape. After the fact, I couldn't be happier. Her dad put together a slide show of about 10 minutes that was just a beautiful tribute to his daughter and his son-in-law, their love, their lovely kids and the love the whole extended family shares. I swear on whatever you think is holy that I'm tearing up just thinking about how beautiful it was and how lucky we were to have been invited and did not cut out early.