Katie's Graduation Party

June 16, 2002

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Cast of Characters

Katie	Toula	Sole Heras	Ken Haag	Ann Bishop
Brian Bishop	Freddy	Marta	Pete Guzik	Allie Guzik

Overview

Of course, we always knew it would happen.

Eventually, Katie would finish her Associates Degree from Mercer County and be the proud owner of a diploma.

To celebrate this achievement, her host parents were kind enough to throw a party for their favorite Greco/German au pair at their house in Princeton, and even invite a few friends. We figured all the friends were busy and that's why we were invited.

What to get?

So, typically Brian, on the day of the party Ann and I scratch our heads as to what to get our mixed-heritage friend that A.) she will like and B.) will be significant enough to commemorate this occasion. Bag of charcoal? Gift certificate to the Dollar Store? Lint? What!?

First it was going to be a gift certificate to Dick's to buy sporting equipment for her career as a Division I softball player. But we just didn't like the possible interpretation problems that might occur when she opened the card. I mean, sure she speaks english well enough to get a college degree from an American school... but you can never be too careful.

The next idea was gift certificates to the movies. After all, you have to be a complete dolt to not like movies. And we make it a policy not to hang out with anyone who doesn't like movies. But then we thought, 'movies? Is that really what YOU would want if you were graduating college?'

So we settled on a gift certificate to the Gap. We knew she liked their stuff, and figured that at least a garment might last a little while.

The Party

So we get to the party and as we are walking up what we THINK is the right driveway we notice that we don't know any of the people who are prominently gathered on the lawn. Katie's host mom, whom we had never met, recognizes the confused look on our faces though and says, "If you're here for Katie's barbecue, you're in the right place."

Now, I don't know about you people, but whenever I hear anyone tell me, "you're in the right place," I just go with it. She could have told me I was at the World War II reunion barbecue and I would have pulled up a chair and gotten a burger.

As it turns out, Ken, Sole, Marta, Freddy, Katie, and her sister were all hiding inside. They thought they could escape that easily... ha.

The most interesting person we met that night (besides the seven year old who told me that flying cars were slated to roll off the assembly lines in 2008) was Katie's sister Toula. Toula had been staying with Katie for three weeks as a 'tourist'. She has Katie's same features and abundance of curly black hair, but her story made me suspicous and I immediately phoned the FBI to report her. I got a recorded message from John Ashcroft saying, "I am the master of the universe. All who oppose me shall see the inside of Camp X-Ray. Dirty bombs rock. For all other inquiries, please ask one of the know-it-all whistle blowers on my staff who don't know when to keep their memos to themselves. Vote Republican."

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