First, the bride:
Christina was a picture-perfect bride, and I know, because I watched her be in about six thousand photos. My job during those photos? To make fun of the weird-ass poses the photographer was putting her in. (At one point, he had her on the bed in her wedding dress, with it yanked up over her knees. I said to him, "What is this? The Dirty Dirty Bride Collection?") He would say things like, "Look a little towards me" and I would say, "Is that a BUG?" and she would crack up. I hope she actually got some good photos out of it, but I worry that she didn't.
Oops.
So before there was a bride, there was a rehearsal. It looked a lot like this:
The wedding was supposed to be outside, but soon after these pictures were taken, a light rain started to fall (which turned into a pelting, bed-rattling thunderstorm overnight).
[Sidebar: it was warmer in NYC over Memorial Day weekend than it was in Vegas. I had to mutter a great number of obscenities while shaking my fist at the sky. I don't think Mother Nature gave a shit.]
We headed inside for the rehearsal dinner, and the bartender told me, appropos of absolutely nothing, "I used to be an elephant in a past life." I said, "Wow... Could I have a Jack & Ginger, please?"
There were some toasts:
And some secrets:
And some general happy-bridey-ness:
At one point, the father of the groom got up to give a speech, which may or may not have been on the longish-side, depending on who you ask... And he said, as he was closing, that there were some extra guests at the party tonight. Guests, he said, that the groom (Joe, or Joey, as his family called him) didn't necessarily want at the party, but here they were anyway...
The Blues Brothers:
Adding a truly Vegas element to the event, the bride and groom were asked to get up and shake their tail feathers. Oh, and did they!
The next morning we woke up and the bride had lost her voice. When we went to the front desk to ask about the steam room in the hotel, they told us it wasn't part of the complimentary gym, it was part of the $25 spa... a fee they wouldn't be waiving for the bride, even though she brought them all this business. (Rude.)
We headed out to the nearest 24 Hour Fitness, and had a discussion of how the bride and other bridesmaid looked so great in their bikinis. "Kate, it's simple," said Dayna, "Tan fat is cuter than white fat." (I have since purchased some self-tanner!)
After lunch, I got a message from the girls that the wedding program wasn't coming out right, and would I take a look at it? Being a computer trainer, I heartily agreed, and knocked the program into shape in no time. However, as I was wrapping that up, I got a call from Dayna telling me that Joe had sent a text saying that he had cut himself shaving and was at the hospital getting stitches. Nobody had heard from him for the last half hour, and Christina was getting really worried.
I left the program assembly line and joined the bride... where we got the text, "It was a joke. Hehe." Our response? "The wedding's off. Hehe."
Fast forward through a lot of stuff, and now we're in the bridal suite, with the photographer taking artistic photos of her shoes (why do they all do that??) and the hair and makeup folks turning Christina into a princess. We go for the wedding, and despite her best intentions, Christina's nerves get the better of her.
I walked her up and down the hallway, saying things like, "In Tahiti, there are warm beaches, and coconuts and everybody takes deep, relaxing breaths."
(Don't ask me how, but it kind of worked.)
The ceremony was gorgeous. Short, sweet, full of love. I'm sure the photographer got a lot of great contorted-face pictures of me, as I fought back my tears. (I suppose it would be only fair, since I made him work for his money.)
The first dance was terrific, too. They were so happy and so cute, and performing in front of the most adoring crowd ever. (And the song they picked was so sweet. While I don't know the name of it, I've now got it stuck back in my head.)
The toasts... well, they were perhaps one of the lowlights.
The best man started out by saying, "Joey's a nervous guy. Always has been. But this morning he was completely calm. When I went into his bathroom, though, I found these." And he pulled out two bricks.Silence prevailed.A cricket chirped.Seven people got it. (He was shitting bricks.)
Then my table cracked up at the sheer absurdity of the whole thing.
The maid of honor didn't necessarily pick up the slack. "Chrissy called and told me she had met someone. 'But,' she said, 'he's a laywer!' I said, 'I'm a lawyer, and you like me.' 'Yeah,' she said, 'but it gets worse... he's a conservative!' I laughed and said, 'But I'm a conservative and you like me!'"
(Aren't there rules about weddings that include things like not talking about politics???)
Later in the evening, Christina tossed her bouquet... into the swag decoration over her head. Joe also tossed the garter... to three single guys. That's it! Three single guys! (And one of them was 7.)Two old men fell down. (Unrelated to the garter, we think, but there's no proof.)
The wedding ended, the couple left for their honeymoon, and Dayna and I were left to wander the strip at a cafe in the Paris Casino, where they have a Bloody Mary Bar. I recommend it. We dubbed this one The Bloody Mary That Saved The Day.
(If you're wondering, yes, that is a pepperoni stick in there!)
I caught a redeye back to New York and was so tired that I cried tears of joy upon arriving at my apartment and sleeping for the next five hours.
It was beautiful to see Christina in her wedding... and to meet Joe, finally! I realized how odd it is to have friends who live all the way across the country, and how little I get to see them. Thank god for weddings, or I might never have met this guy!
I mean, what?
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