I’ve spent several days looking for the best gift to give andrea on her birthday. I’ve browsed several sites and seen numerous items on sale – PDA phones, new laptops, even some Seiko watches – but unfortunately, nothing available is within my budget. Especially after Mateo’s gruelling and costly ordeal recently with some kind of pneumonia-like disease, my budget is almost next to nil.

So instead of trying to surprise her with something fancy, I just approached andrea and asked her directly what she wanted. She told me that new graphire tablet is enough of a birthday gift so she really wanted nothing else. I surrendered.

In the end, I bought her nothing. And before her birthday ended, I just simply gave her a relaxing foot and full-body massage. Heck, I told myself if I can’t buy her anything, I’ll just pamper her to sleep! I guess it worked!