Thursday, February 23, 2006
"Go Ink To Da Chap Hell Endive Gone A Get Mary!" (Or “Dat Tux Would Really Look Good Sleepin’ Wit Da Fishes...")
I originally wrote this on August 20th, 2001.
So planning a wedding turns out to be hard work.
Coordinating an Allied invasion of Germany, for instance, was probably not this confusing. The Allied leaders pretty much knew what their objective was (invade Germany), and probably didn’t spend much time debating whether the tanks would look better in Dusty Rose or Chartreuse (the answer is Mint) or worrying about the seating arrangement of the troops in the Armored Personnel Carrier (O’Brien can’t sit next to Washington, and Sanchez gets more kills if he doesn’t sit next to Dombrowski). Our wedding, however, is completely different.
There were countless decisions that had to be made, including, but certainly not limited to, picking a date, changing the date, choosing the people in our wedding party, changing the people in our wedding party, finding the perfect bridesmaids’ dress color (lavender), changing the bridesmaids’ dresses to an even more perfect color (silver), making up the guest list, increasing the size of the guest list, adding more people to the already expanded guest list, booking the church, and finding the ideal Filipino priest to officiate the ceremony.
His name is Father Peter and he is a Catholic priest from the Philippines, and an all-around wonderful guy, even if he is a little on the short side. I’m sure he will bring a lot of color to the proceedings, especially due to his unique method of pronouncing normal English words. During one of his recent sermons, I had the pleasure of hearing him attempt the phrase “sometimes it takes people unawares” and coming out with “Shom Time It Taking People’s Underwear”. This, of course, is awesome. Can you imagine the fun we’ll have with “In Sink Neigh Shin Hell Till Debt Do You Park” or “I Know Pronouns You Manna Wife”?
Another fact that factored into the Father Peter factor was the fact that he’s vital to fill in an empty ethnic slot. Anyone who’s ever watched a World War II movie can tell you that you need a certain blend of ethnicities, or else the mission will fail. Our wedding party is no different. We have the Italian, the Polskie, the mixed breed (played with ghetto style by my brother), and, finally, the Asian (F. Peter). The wedding will be a success for sure!
Other necessary strategic decisions included whether or not to have a ceremony with no mass, actually with a mass, but maybe not, but probably yes, choosing the best location for the reception, finding a new best location for the reception, getting my fiancee's uncle to cater the party and getting everybody involved to agree upon the dishes to be served, adding salmon to those dishes, arguing with the reception hall manager about the prices of soda (in Canada it’s called “pop” – be forewarned) and linens and place settings and server fees, choosing and ordering our invitations, addressing and assembling our invitations (this is comparable to the procedure used to assemble, say, an M-1 Abrams tank), sealing our invitations, realizing we (meaning “I”, not my fiancee) didn’t put stamps on our (“my”) reply card envelopes, opening up all the invitations to put stamps on those little envelopes, then realizing that the inner envelopes had no glue on them, cursing, reaching for the blue stick of paste, re-addressing and sealing all the envelopes, hoping nobody would notice, and not telling my fiancee for two months.
(deep breath)
We also had to pick our wedding favors (which required a fair bit of assembly themselves, like a sniper rifle), purchase gifts and bags and cards and trinkets and whatnots for the members of our wedding party, hire a DJ, hire a photographer, hire a videographer (turned out to be free because it’s a family member – whew!), choose a wedding song, choose a different wedding song, choose a different wedding song, choose a different wedding song, choose a different wedding song, help our parents choose colors and what to wear (answer: desert fatigues), get a marriage license, book rental cars, book hotel rooms, create an itinerary for the wedding weekend, create a shower and wedding registry at various stores, and act really, really, really, really, really surprised when the shower occurred, even though we knew exactly when it was, where it was, and pretty much every gift that was going to be given that day.
That brings us to August 20th. Only 47 more days to go!
I must confess that nearly every decision listed above was made capably by my fiancee (with the exception of that invitation fiasco). I really do think that men are fairly extraneous with regards to planning a wedding, except at the actual ceremony part. I did, however, get to do one thing entirely on my own. I got to pick out a tuxedo, with the assistance of Vic, the proprietor of a local menswear store called Torino.
Vic and I considered a wide variety of tuxedo styles, from the standard red bowtie/red cummerbund model (very popular with a certain “cool cat” type of “hipster”, especially those born before 1950), to the pretentious fancy European fop model (ruffled shirt, shiny round lapels, paisley vest and tie, fifty buttons, and optional hair gel), to the classic Jersey Shore Mobster model, replete with black jacket, black vest, black shirt, black pants, and, naturally, a skinny white tie. I would have gone with the last one, but they couldn’t find cement shoes in size 9 ½ wide. I went with a nice, elegant, modern tux instead. It has two buttons, and actual pointy lapels. It’s going to look sharp as I belly-slither down the aisle, with my groomsmen offering cover fire. If I don't make it, at least the chaplain can give last rites.
See you in the trenches!
So planning a wedding turns out to be hard work.
Coordinating an Allied invasion of Germany, for instance, was probably not this confusing. The Allied leaders pretty much knew what their objective was (invade Germany), and probably didn’t spend much time debating whether the tanks would look better in Dusty Rose or Chartreuse (the answer is Mint) or worrying about the seating arrangement of the troops in the Armored Personnel Carrier (O’Brien can’t sit next to Washington, and Sanchez gets more kills if he doesn’t sit next to Dombrowski). Our wedding, however, is completely different.
There were countless decisions that had to be made, including, but certainly not limited to, picking a date, changing the date, choosing the people in our wedding party, changing the people in our wedding party, finding the perfect bridesmaids’ dress color (lavender), changing the bridesmaids’ dresses to an even more perfect color (silver), making up the guest list, increasing the size of the guest list, adding more people to the already expanded guest list, booking the church, and finding the ideal Filipino priest to officiate the ceremony.
His name is Father Peter and he is a Catholic priest from the Philippines, and an all-around wonderful guy, even if he is a little on the short side. I’m sure he will bring a lot of color to the proceedings, especially due to his unique method of pronouncing normal English words. During one of his recent sermons, I had the pleasure of hearing him attempt the phrase “sometimes it takes people unawares” and coming out with “Shom Time It Taking People’s Underwear”. This, of course, is awesome. Can you imagine the fun we’ll have with “In Sink Neigh Shin Hell Till Debt Do You Park” or “I Know Pronouns You Manna Wife”?
Another fact that factored into the Father Peter factor was the fact that he’s vital to fill in an empty ethnic slot. Anyone who’s ever watched a World War II movie can tell you that you need a certain blend of ethnicities, or else the mission will fail. Our wedding party is no different. We have the Italian, the Polskie, the mixed breed (played with ghetto style by my brother), and, finally, the Asian (F. Peter). The wedding will be a success for sure!
Other necessary strategic decisions included whether or not to have a ceremony with no mass, actually with a mass, but maybe not, but probably yes, choosing the best location for the reception, finding a new best location for the reception, getting my fiancee's uncle to cater the party and getting everybody involved to agree upon the dishes to be served, adding salmon to those dishes, arguing with the reception hall manager about the prices of soda (in Canada it’s called “pop” – be forewarned) and linens and place settings and server fees, choosing and ordering our invitations, addressing and assembling our invitations (this is comparable to the procedure used to assemble, say, an M-1 Abrams tank), sealing our invitations, realizing we (meaning “I”, not my fiancee) didn’t put stamps on our (“my”) reply card envelopes, opening up all the invitations to put stamps on those little envelopes, then realizing that the inner envelopes had no glue on them, cursing, reaching for the blue stick of paste, re-addressing and sealing all the envelopes, hoping nobody would notice, and not telling my fiancee for two months.
(deep breath)
We also had to pick our wedding favors (which required a fair bit of assembly themselves, like a sniper rifle), purchase gifts and bags and cards and trinkets and whatnots for the members of our wedding party, hire a DJ, hire a photographer, hire a videographer (turned out to be free because it’s a family member – whew!), choose a wedding song, choose a different wedding song, choose a different wedding song, choose a different wedding song, choose a different wedding song, help our parents choose colors and what to wear (answer: desert fatigues), get a marriage license, book rental cars, book hotel rooms, create an itinerary for the wedding weekend, create a shower and wedding registry at various stores, and act really, really, really, really, really surprised when the shower occurred, even though we knew exactly when it was, where it was, and pretty much every gift that was going to be given that day.
That brings us to August 20th. Only 47 more days to go!
I must confess that nearly every decision listed above was made capably by my fiancee (with the exception of that invitation fiasco). I really do think that men are fairly extraneous with regards to planning a wedding, except at the actual ceremony part. I did, however, get to do one thing entirely on my own. I got to pick out a tuxedo, with the assistance of Vic, the proprietor of a local menswear store called Torino.
Vic and I considered a wide variety of tuxedo styles, from the standard red bowtie/red cummerbund model (very popular with a certain “cool cat” type of “hipster”, especially those born before 1950), to the pretentious fancy European fop model (ruffled shirt, shiny round lapels, paisley vest and tie, fifty buttons, and optional hair gel), to the classic Jersey Shore Mobster model, replete with black jacket, black vest, black shirt, black pants, and, naturally, a skinny white tie. I would have gone with the last one, but they couldn’t find cement shoes in size 9 ½ wide. I went with a nice, elegant, modern tux instead. It has two buttons, and actual pointy lapels. It’s going to look sharp as I belly-slither down the aisle, with my groomsmen offering cover fire. If I don't make it, at least the chaplain can give last rites.
See you in the trenches!
