"Where's the Schnapps?"

One reason that our recent Michigan trip was so long was because I was a groomsman in a wedding for 2 of my closest high school friends.  They started dating sporadically the summer after high school (I like to think I had a big part in them getting together), and now they're married!!  It was a fun wedding to return home for, and I thought I'd detail some of the more interesting points of the whole proceedings.

Angela Gerber Photography

It started 2 nights before the wedding, when I went with the groom and his family to pick up our tuxes.  At one point, the fine chap whose store we were renting tuxes from offered us beers while we were trying on the rentals.  The groom and I laughed it off, yelling outside that people should drink up.  It tuns out that the guy was politely standing outside of the dressing rooms speaking only to us, and nobody heard him offer beers.  So, we kind of unknowingly ignored him, which is way awkward retrospectively.  The groom's father also made some comment about how gay the guy was.  Well, at some point, guy had his hands all up in my slacks trying to fix the fitting, so that image entertained dad very much.

The next night was the rehearsal.  I'm pretty sure it's the smallest, country-est church Annie has ever seen, let alone been in.  The quote of that night was "the organist couldn't be here because he's pulling wheat."  Classic farmtown convo.  The Best Man is the groom's much younger brother, who was hidden from us for most of his childhood.  He really likes me, as the person that made it out of Monroe and all the way to L.A. He said he was freaking out about his speech, so I told him to send it to me, and I'd give him some feedback.

And the day of the wedding started quite usually.  We all met at the bride's grandfather's, since we'd be driving around in his classic cars to get to the ceremony and pictures.  It was in his driveway that a mosquito was caught sucking on my new tattoo.  It was also the first time that I got to go through their shed of classic/antique (mostly Nash) automobiles.  It was pretty cool.  Oh, and one of my best friends who missed the rehearsal and all of the plans due to another wedding showed up already in his tux.  We'll call him G-raffe.  The rest of us had our tuxes at the church, and we were planning on going out to breakfast in comfortable clothes.

So, we all sat at Bob Evans and had breakfast, alongside one of us in a full tux.

On the way to the church, we realized G-raffe had brought a flask, but didn't fill it yet.  So, in a line of classic cars, we had to try and figure a way to get to a liquor store without the rest of the procession following us.  We managed to pull off with only one person following (bride's father, whom we told that G-raffe had to pee really bad), but the place only sold wine and beer.  Not acceptable.  So, instead, we drove to the church, dropped off dad, accidentally missed the driveway, and drove to another nearby party store to fill the flask with rum.  We claimed we were just showing off the car.

Skip ahead 2 hours.  We're all tuxed up.  All of us, this time.  The groom's mother walks in with smelling salts.  She's really worried that the Best Man is going to drop in the middle of the ceremony.  So I stuck one in my inside pocket, in hopes of saving the day if Best Man goes down.  Then we're off taking a ton of photos, like this:

We finished and headed off in a shaded area with picnic tables, behind a big wall blocking us from the parking lot and church.  G-raffe pulls out the flask, swigs, passes it to me, I swig, and then nobody else would even touch it (don't even get me started on the utter lameness of half of these guys).  That was until the groom's dad came rolling around the corner.  "Where's the Schnapps?"  I'm pretty sure he didn't know that we were flasked up, but it was a classic line, well-deserving of some rum.  The bride's dad may or may not have partaken, also.  The groom's dad went on to tell us about how he got pulled over on the way there this morning.  The cop ended up following him all the way to the church to confirm that he wasn't lying, but it's really no surprise.  The groom is always late, and has a plethora of speeding tickets, so I could see it being a little genetic.

The wedding was great, but really hot up in that full tux.  It was so ridiculously hot in Monroe for the first weekend of October, and I was dripping mid-ceremony.  At the end, I poked G-raffe and asked him if I had white stuff around my lips.  It always happens when I get really dehydrated.  He just looked at my lips with 'what the fuck?' face, which meant I did, so I had to vigorously wipe them on my sleeve before walking down the aisle.  I also spent the first 2 minutes of the ceremony trying not to giggle.  Something about uber serious situations does that to me.  I picture the maid of honor letting off a little toot, or the flower girl falling over, and then it's 5 minutes of me trying to keep my shit together.  I also may or may not have grabbed G-raffe's ass a few times.  And 'swiped a credit card'.  ;)

Throughout the pictures afterward, we had to keep returning to my rental car to 'check on the baby'.  I had stolen a cooler from the ringbearer (they stuffed it with is lunch) and had filled it with pre-mixed Jack 'n Cokes.  We shoved G-raffe and the bride's cousin, we'll call her Lately, in the rental, and Annie drove our slowly-getting-intoxicated asses back to the bride's grandfolk's and then on to the reception.  Not before I peed in an ancient outhouse at the grandparent's.  (They have plumbing, but it's there as a shout out to old times.)

We showed up to the wedding in fine shape.  And here's where things got interesting.  Open bar?  Yes please.  We continued to drink.  At no point was I really drunk, or anywhere near black-out like I had been at the last wedding I was in.  (Sorry, B&G!)  The Best Man won the speech battle.  I really thought the maid of honor was going to pull out all the stops (since she's super smart and competitive), but with the help of my speech, he kicked her ass.  #winning

At some point, somebody handed G-raffe a microphone and asked him to say a few words.  He kind of freaked out, thinking it was to the whole audience.  So, he called over Lately and I.  What a trio we were.  I'm pretty sure I detailed some things on that video that should have never been spoken aloud.  (Sorry, B&T!)  Then, on the spot, Nate and I made up a song and sang it, straight outta 'Whose Line is it...'.  I can't wait to see that.  It's gotta be epic.

Then Lately went on to steal the blog-worthy show.  At one point she was retelling an incident between her and an aunt of hers, who asked about G-raffe.  Her response was, "Yeah, I blew him like 10 years ago, but there's nothing there now."  She didn't know, but the bride's mother was standing behind her.  And Lately is far from quiet.  The bride's mother escorted Lately out to the hallway for a little 'picture'.  Lately had another great moment later where she was detailing how the flower girl was all hyped up on sugar and going crazy while we were trying to eat... or something.  The flower girl's mom was within earshot, and dragged the flower girl over to Lately to apologize.  Which was all kinds of awkward.  Lately begged the flower girl's mom (by the way, the bride's new sister-in-law) not to force her daughter to apologize.  That it really was no big deal.  The mom skulked off, but she sat at the main table with pissed off face for a while.  Nice job, Lately.

G-raffe & Lately may or may not be shown here, in the bottom left.  I'm the top right.

Other notable moments from the night were my dancing.  This blog set me up for really high expectations on the dance floor.  I feel like I fulfilled them.  There was one moment where I was in the center of a big circle gettin' jiggy wit it.  And killing it, if I do say so myself.  But when I danced my way to the edge of the circle, in came a green man.  Straight out of 'It's Always Sunny...', totally stealing my thunder.  It was entertaining, but scorned I remain.  There was also a fun moment in the photo booth with G-raffe where I was pantsless in a half-assed attempt at reenacting the creepy, tucked, mirror scene from Silence of the Lambs.

I guess there is one other quote that's worth mentioning.  An old female rival (both voted Smartest in 8th grade), whom we'll call Moo Mist, made this comment about the Best Man, who as I've mentioned we were hidden from for so many years.  "I mean, him and the groom look nothing like each other.  I'd fuck Best Man.  I mean, not that the groom is ugly..."  Paraphrased, but pretty spot on.

And I think that's about all I'm allowed to publish about it online.  Anyone seen that video yet?

Congrats, again, B&T!
~RoB

Royal Wedding - Day 2

If you haven't already, you should catch up with us so far by reading about Day 1.

I woke up with a little bit of a hangover.  For me, that means I'm super, duper hungry and I have to poop.  I don't throw up, I'm not out for the count, I may need a nap, but in general it's just that I need protein and some bathroom time.  However, the after effects lasted longer than I'm used to (into the early afternoon), which makes me feel like I'm getting old.  I've been told (by this girl) that we have harder and harder times rebounding as we get older, and I'm starting to believe it.

So, that first Jack&Coke at around 1:50pm didn't go down so well.  Why was I drinking at 2pm?  Well, we were at a Nebraska fan sports bar watching football.  In full Michigan garb.  Our game was about to begin.  Wait, weren't we in NE for a wedding today?  Yeah, but people keep scheduling their damn weddings on football Saturdays, so you have to work in some football whenever possible.  Anyway, the double Jack&Coke (it was only $1 more) didn't taste very good.  However, all of the shitty bar food that we devoured did, so it worked.  Though we were the clear minority, everyone was really nice, and most of the football on the TVs was going our way, so we just enjoyed.

Skip ahead to a trolley that was taking us from the Hilton to the church.  The church was cute and tucked into downtown.  Overall, the wedding felt super fancy schmance (word?).  It made me remember how different people dress between the two coasts.  A tie is pretty formal for a Northern Californian, and it was the extent of my outfit.  Yet, I was the only man not in a suit at the church.  (Heck, I had sneakers on.  There was dancing to be done later.)  It was the fastest ceremony that I can remember, and the preacher/minister/pastor/deacon? was pretty entertaining.  It was over, we were standing in the courtyard ready to throw petals, the bride and groom came out and loaded the party bus, and then the progression to the wedding needed to be figured out.

This was the most awkward part of the weekend.  The whole wedding party loaded the bus.  Then all the hip, young kids loaded it.  Everyone that Annie and I knew was on the bus.  Yet, there was a substantial group of people still loitering outside of the church, mostly the bride's family.  So, we just waited around for some sort of group motion toward the reception, by some mode of transportation.  I was positive that the reception was just a block away.  I kept pointing at the building I thought it was.  Eventually, we reloaded the trolley and made it to the reception without any problems (I was wrong and glad I didn't drag Annie to the wrong place).  However, there were a good 10-15 minutes of Annie and Rob standing around awkwardly and alone.

The beginning of the reception was a cocktail hour with, yet again, another open bar.  We met up with a friend from MI and proceeded to 'try' all of the appetizers that we're being served.  Some were 'tried' more than once.  Shit didn't get real until we walked into the ballroom though.  It was like walking into the new Aria in Vegas.  A huge chandelier winds down from the ceiling with the 6?-tiered cake centered beneath it.  It was beautiful and impressive.  There were so many money signs floating through my head.  (I'd be lying if I didn't say that I kept thinking about all of the money going by at every step of the process.  It didn't make me any more excited to get married one day.)

S&N initials were found everywhere.  It was a lesson in advertising.

Eating, drinking, first dances, cake cutting...  Finally, it was time.  I had told some of the locals about my dancing experience and how I was a Zumba instructor.  It was time to show off.  So I did.  I danced a ton for the rest of the night.  Whenever in similar situations, I have to take regular breaks for water and to wipe down my sweaty body.  (It's always a fun game hiding water glasses and napkins from the wait staff so that I can continue to use them... while they're told to pick them up.)  The Cupid Shuffle came on 2nd or 3rd, and I got called out by the DJ.  "I'd follow the guy in the tie."  I'm the guy in the tie.  There was one other guy there I saw swing dancing with his mother... or something, but he was my only competition.  It was all about ->this guy<-.

I danced with the bride's mother, an aunt, the groom's mom, heck... everyone.  Some dudes, too.  At one point I was starting to wind down (and the music wasn't helping), when a middle-aged woman approached me.  "I just wanted to let you know that you have quite an audience; you need to keep going.  You've been winding down a little, and I thought I'd let you know we're all watching you now."  Then she returned to her group along one of the walls.  This was right on par with the group of white guys standing by my table that fist-pounded me at one point when I was returning to my table for the water/napkin routine.

I've never Soul Trained.  There was talk, but it never got pulled off.  I was also told that I should try a back flip off of the main table.  I considered it, but Annie called me stupid and brought me back down to Earth.  At one point, a girl grabbed the mic and thought it was drunken karaoke time.  (This same girl had an epic moment where she fell in front of the bride and groom later that night in the hotel, was picked up by the groom, and started to be escorted back to her room before one of her friends found her and yelled at her for being dealt with by the bride and groom on their wedding night.  When the bride was telling the story the next morning, it sounded like a dream... but it wasn't.  It was hilarious.)

The reception ended at midnight.  We all lit sparklers to escort the bride and groom out.  Then, the cool, hip kids progressed to a late-night pizza parlor and sports bar.  Nothing significant happened after that, and we progressed back to the hotel without hitting any bars, and we went to bed at a reasonable hour.  Oh, we did have to walk by a mural twice during this portion of the night.  There was a creepy girl painted that stared into your soul, no matter where you were standing.  It still kind of haunts me.

The girl under the arrow.  I picked a weird angle so that she doesn't invade your dreams.

I woke up feeling spectacular.  That didn't appear to be the case for most of the other participants.  They apparently didn't burn the alcohol off by dancing like the rest of us.  There was one last group brunch before we all split to head home.

So, that was the wedding.  I really don't know if I could handle the attention that a bride and groom get for a whole day.  I'm happy enough blogging for attention, where I don't have to make eye contact or small talk or "practice hugging short people".  This was, hands down, the fanciest wedding I'll ever attend.  I'm very happy that I was able to be there for the bride and groom, and they seemed very happy to have us travel so far to share it with them.  I'm also happy that I met a bunch of new people that I very much enjoyed, and I've already started my Facebook pursuit of all of their friendships... for stalking at a later date.

Yet another wedding this weekend in Oakland!
~RoB

The last day in Omaha is summarized here.

Royal Wedding - Day 1

Annie and I took off to Omaha, NE, to participate in the wedding of one of my favorite people ever.  He's the groom in the pic below (not to say that his new wife isn't just as amazing as he is).

All of these fancy cartoons are taken from the groom's blog.

The trip started with an invitation to the rehearsal dinner.  (Technically, I guess it started at 3:45am when the taxi picked us up to drive us to SFO.  After all, we had 2 cities to touch down in before we would eventually make it to Omaha [though we were on the same plane throughout].)  I guess checking into the hotel happened before the rehearsal dinner, as well.  We took a shuttle from the airport to the wrong Hilton.  Why the fuck are there two different Hiltons in downtown Omaha?  We also received a gift bag when we checked in, which excited Annie so much that she hasn't stopped talking about it.  Seriously.

Moving on.  I had never heard of general riff-raff being invited to the rehearsal dinner (or anybody outside of the actual rehearsal), but I'm glad they did it.  It was the first opportunity to meet people and family, and it was a good introduction to the high taste and classiness that the wedding would be.  We discovered that there were only a handful of people that we knew, and only 1 or 2 that I knew well (the groom was a friend of mine from U of M).  So, I had to come out of my shell a little and try to be social.

There was way more food than I expected, and it was really good.  (I ate just before going so that I wouldn't be a ravenous monster.)  The red wine was Flowing, with a capital 'F'.  Anytime somebody walked by, your glass was filled.  I probably drank something like 10 glasses.  After a slide show, we all congregated to the bar, and the Jack&Cokes started to make their appearances.  Then there was talk of progressing onto the next bar.  Which led to more and more bars, until we closed the bar at our hotel and I finally returned to the room with an already sleeping Annie.

Notable moments were:

Giving the bartender at some dive a $10 tip after keeping a tab open.  Alcohol was cheap, and we drank alot, so it was a fair tip.  However, he walked out from behind the bar to approach me as I was walking out, shake my hand, and thank me for the tip.  This is why I tell Californians that they have no fucking clue how nice we are in the Midwest.

A fight broke out at one bar right next to us.  The crowd splitting the multiple guys apart ended up pushing us into the bar.  We pushed back, and one of the groomsmen jumped in front of the groom in an attempt to shield him.  (Way smarter than my "punch him, pussy" cat calls.)  It was just this side of ridiculous, but the craziest part was the drunken redneck yelling "I'll fucking kill you, faggot!"  Who the fuck says the word 'faggot' anymore?  In my head I pictured him spelling it 'faget' or 'faggit'.  We were also surprised that they let him sit back down and continue drinking.  I guess it makes sense not to kick everyone out so that they can kill each other in the street.  Or maybe that's just how things roll 'round here.

Great Facebook statuses when I woke up:  "Alcohol is so cheap!" In Nebraska, True.  "What bar number is tjis?"  Fair question, but asking the same thing 12 minutes later is a bit obnoxious... and a sign that things are going downhill.  "Crazy dex happening in rhe 5040s. Come lisson!"  This was the last thing I communicated before passing out around 2am.  I thought I could hear some wild sex going on in my hallway.  I apparently thought we should all congregate outside of the participants' door and enjoy it together.  Note:  drunken texts are funny and between two people.  Drunken facebook statuses are funny and between 1,000 people.  Try to keep that math in perspective next time, drunken ~RoB.

Magically, a hotel shuttle arrived outside of one of the bars as we were all about to stagger home.  I have no clue who was in a right enough mind by that time of the night to make it happen, but kudos to them.  There were way more of us than the shuttle should transport, so the Super Groomsman (who shielded the groom) and I were going to walk back.  It would be an opportune time to start burning off the alcohol before taking off to nappy, nappy land.  They ended up shoving our whole party onto this little shuttle, which probably wasn't smart by any means.  I stood the whole way back.

My attempt at taking a pic turned into a fairly accurate representation.

Those people still going strong made our way to the hotel bar just before last call.  We ushered out a bride and groom, still in full wedding reception garb, cuz everybody within 4 states was getting married at our hotel in Omaha over Labor Day weekend.  Anyway, by this time there was a half dozen of us, including a girl that had fallen out of the shuttle onto the pavement at the Hilton, only to return in sweatpants and a renewed enthusiasm for drinking.  I had promised the Super Groomsman that I would still walk around with him before hitting the sack, but whiny messages from drunken Annie sent me up to my room with the groom when he finally decided to call it a night.  I found out the next day that the Super Groomsman managed to stay out an hour past that point, and he eventually returned to his room "smelling like a homeless person".

It had been a while since I've hit the hard alcohol, and Day 1 in Omaha was way more fun than I had prepared for!
~RoB

(Day 2 to come.  Day 3 is summarized in my last post.)

The Wave

I spent almost all of Labor Day weekend in Omaha, NE for a wedding.  It was great fun.  My first time in Omaha.  I'll dive into the drinking and facebook statuses and food and dancing and fanciness in another post.  However, one of those wonderfully awkward moments happened at the airport on the way home.

On the last day that Annie and I were in Omaha, we were eating lunch with the bride and groom and the groom's brother and girlfriend, and some other peeps.  The groom's brother and I realized that we were taking the same shuttle from the hotel to the airport.  Ha.  That's funny.  We're like the same people.  (Except they were heading back home to Brooklyn, and we were flying to San Francisco.)

But then we asked what flight they were taking, and we pieced together that we were actually taking the exact same flight out of Omaha.  We had a layover in Chicago (yeah, look at a map, Southwest), and they had the same one.  We also learned that the groom's father was going to be on the flight with us.  Look how cute we are!

So, we all get to the airport.  Annie and I apparently run through the airport, because we were through security and at our gate in a few minutes.  (By the way, Omaha is the emptiest airport I've ever seen in my life.  It was almost creepy.  The TSA agents were lonely and wanted to be our friends.)  We sat down at our gate, and we ran into the groom's father within a few minutes.  We wondered how the groom's brother and sister had gotten so far behind us, which led Annie and I to realize just how quickly we move through airports these days.

There was also one last kicker we discovered.  For those that have never flown Southwest, it has open seating, and you just walk on in the order that you checked in.  For the flight to Chicago, the order we were in line was:
A40 - Groom's Dad
A41 - ~RoB
A42 - Annie
A43 - Groom's Brother
A44 - Groom's Brother's Girlfriend.
One big happy family.  Though it is half true to say that it all happened by chance, we were on the same schedule forcing us to check in after the wedding reception, so it's not too surprising.  Yet, why is it so difficult to make this happen when you actually try?

Anyway, I took off to the bathroom and to fill up my TSA-emptied water bottle.  Upon coming out and walking in front of my departure gate, I looked toward the hallway leading from security.  I saw the groom's brother finally coming through and he waved.  That's fun.  I waved back.  Then I turned to continue my way to my seat, and I realized the groom's dad was behind me.  I hadn't just been waved at.  Yet, there was no mistake in my 'standing in an empty airport terminal waving wildly at, what turns out to be, nobody' wave.  Awesome.  Why am I so awkward?

I mean, I totally understand.  I had just met the groom's father this weekend and I absolutely loved him.  He was kind and smart and nice and always smiling.  I'd enthusiastically wave at him on sight if he was my dad.  Especially if we didn't see each other often and we got to spend most of the rest of the day together.  Me on the other hand, I'd only wave at me if I had to.  (Most people have to, when I awkwardly wave at them across BART cars and public venues, lest they look foolish.  By most people I mean Annie.  I usually wave like a toddler, too.)

Not exactly related, but the same feeling.

Suddenly we all got our hands up...
~RoB

Life Update (and a package of bacon)

I finally hooked up my computer, and I seem to be over the cold that had me all fucked up this weekend, so expect more of this... at least until I get a job.

Haven't heard much more about granny.  She's currently in a rehab center, which is a step up from the hospital.  She had a small stroke.  Add that to the lung cancer, and now a diagnosis of severe diabetes, and she's surprisingly alive.  Since the last time she went home, she ended up back in ICU, the doctors thought it would be best to have her in a supervised facility before sending her home to rest up for cancer treatment.  My mom is staying there, so it didn't seem logistical to fly there and plug up the house.

One of my favorite people of all time happened to be in town this weekend.  We went out to dinner at Waterbar on Saturday night.  It was so fun to see him and meet his fiance!!  He said they've planned the wedding in Omaha, Nebraska, so I totally want to make it there over Labor Day.  I didn't hear how traveling back to Chicago went, considering the Snowpocalypse, but I hope he's ok!!

I'm pretty much finished cleaning and decorating Annie's apartment.  It's pretty snazzy.  The bathroom, though less functional, is probably my favorite room.  I've also been cooking like crazy: blueberry muffins, monte cristos, vegetarian chili, burgers (2 kinds), and bananas foster were all things that I made from scratch last week (not counting everything else that I cooked that wasn't entirely 'from scratch').  Annie and I polished off a whole package of bacon between Bacon Blue Cheeseburgers and Monte Cristos on Sunday, which I don't even feel guilty about, though it definitely lowered our life expectancies.  I'm planning on making a sweet potato cake tonight, as soon as I grab some eggs from the store.

I emailed out my official counter-offer today, and I didn't get my new, fake ACT scores back yet.

I'll bring the funny later,
~RoB