For Christmas I received a brilliant calendar with movie posters from the classic age of cinema. Each month I have decided to have a dinner party culminating in a viewing of that particular month's movie.

The continual beat of the baby drum has been getting louder and louder at Chez Brewster. I will turn 30 on March 25 which means my wife will turn the same six months later. With an empty crib and old age coming quickly, the old biological clock is drumming out all other sounds. No matter how much cotton I stick in my ears, in my ear I hear the ever constant shout of my wife saying, "Let's have a baby. Let's have a baby. Let's have a baby...now!"

I finally relented. I finally gave in and...I got her a cat. That softened the drumming a little. The relentless chanting of "BABY - BABY - BABY" slowed down to a whisper. It was still there, but I could at least drown it out with an old episode of Moonlighting, or Ryan Adams' excellent, never released album Destroyer. For a little while anyway.

Really, I know I'm on the losing end of an argument. Sooner or later I must give up and agree to have a child. In fact, I want to have children, just not now. I don't know when, and certainly I must admit the time is quickly becoming now, but the thought of how much I'll have to give up, at how much work children are, makes me want to wait a few more years.

The other day, without provocation, and without discussion, in a nonchalant manner, my wife mentions that we'll start trying this summer. I was too shocked and too tired to attempt an argument. At this point I've pretty much given in to the idea.

My friend, and coworker, Tim, keeps telling me to take his three children for the weekend. "Two days with my kids and she'll never want any of her own," he says.

February's classic calendar movie is the Wizard of Oz. This, I thought, was the perfect opportunity to invite Tim and children over to test his theory. For $20 he promised to bribe his kids into behaving badly.

In our typical, wait-till-the-last-minute approach, we hit the stores on Friday night in search of a copy of the movie. $50. That's what they are asking for some new whizbang 4-disk version of the Wizard of Oz. Fifty freaking bucks for a movie. We ran all over town looking for an earlier, cheaper version. Found a 2-disk special edition for $20 at Best Buy. Still more than I wanted to pay, but what can you do when you've invited guests over to watch a movie and it's too late for Netflix?