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Or, in which I manage to insult and/or be ungrateful to many people involved in yesterday's festivities. (Although it's not like they were in my honor so I should just suck it up and deal with misogyny, embarrassingly socially inept (to this city gal's (admittedly strict: ask Podraig) sense of etiquitte) suburbanites, and a menu that couldn't have been worse for Vegetarians if they had done it on purpose.)
You may say, "well, Alice, you wanted to be miserable." To which I respond, "actually, I had a lovely time and came out of it with a better opinion of the bridegroom than I had going into it. I just like to complain."
Lovely Former Roommate and her Former Fiancee are now formally hitched, and I did manage to finagle a ride down to Santa Clara for my mononucleosified ass in order to be present. I think they were happy I made it... I mean, it's not like I pushed the groom down the stairs or anything (which, by the way, would technically have been possible, as he stood right next to the banquet-hall stairway to say his farewells to the guests).
The Tridentine mass was...long, and Latinate, and all of the nuptual blessings and prayers seemed directed at preserving the virtue and loyalty of the wife, with no mention of the possibility of husbandly infidelity or the like. Combined with the reading from Ephesians 5 (which horrified a certain dear former-Chamberlin-house physics grad student), it was... a bit too much wifely submission with a bit too little husbandly reciprocation. But I'm biased. And, some certain Calvert House peeps might claim (*coughcough*H.C.*cough*), a rabid, rampaging, feminazi.
Two and a half hours after the ceremony was over, we hiked our way to the restaurant for item two on the day's agenda: the wedding banquet. Not much provision had been made for the Vegetarians on the guest list, although (because I eat fish) I had it better off than Kathleen did. (Although after the shark-fin soup I think it might be time for me to admit that neither my moral sensibilites nor my poor stomach can countenance the ingestion of aquatic creatures anymore. Unfortunately, I love salmon with a deep and abiding passion.)
One of the features to keep us entertained during the nine-course meal (of which only two courses contained no fish or meat, and one of those was dessert) were some games, making fun of the bride and groom. The "ask them questions" game was mostly uneventful... Thomas's older, suburbanite guests did not entirely understand that one was supposed to ask "Jas or Tom" questions, and instead asked rambling questions that required worded answers. Think of that annoying person at the conference who wants to give his opinion instead of asking a question.
The second game, however, asked a blindfolded Thomas to shake hands with a selection of ladies and pick out his bride from amongst them. Former ScavJudge Colin was first up, although his willingness to volunteer as a lady certainly befuddled Jas's brother, who was emceeing. Shaking Colin's hand, Thomas pronounced, "well, that's my mother..."
Our back table of Chicagoans just about died. Collectively. I haven't seen Hayes laugh so hard since he tried to mess with Kathleen's world by creating a fake Wikipedia page to claim that bread yeast was not only an animal, but a mammal.
We Leave for Chicago on the Fourteenth
And from there, to Toronto. There are, however, some things in San Francisco that I must do posthaste. Like, tomorrow.
1) Get the backup files from my old laptop from CD onto the new laptop.
2) Figure out this so-called "skype" thing so that I might have some small chance of conversing with that be-hatted fellow.
3) Remember to charge my cell phone so that I can have an uninterrupted conversation with Carolyn.
4) STUDY FOR THE EXAM I MUST TAKE IN A MONTH.
5) Call Matt "the Cat" C. and Andrew "Ghetto Puppy" H. and pester them into hanging out with me before I flee the country.
You may say, "well, Alice, you wanted to be miserable." To which I respond, "actually, I had a lovely time and came out of it with a better opinion of the bridegroom than I had going into it. I just like to complain."
Lovely Former Roommate and her Former Fiancee are now formally hitched, and I did manage to finagle a ride down to Santa Clara for my mononucleosified ass in order to be present. I think they were happy I made it... I mean, it's not like I pushed the groom down the stairs or anything (which, by the way, would technically have been possible, as he stood right next to the banquet-hall stairway to say his farewells to the guests).
The Tridentine mass was...long, and Latinate, and all of the nuptual blessings and prayers seemed directed at preserving the virtue and loyalty of the wife, with no mention of the possibility of husbandly infidelity or the like. Combined with the reading from Ephesians 5 (which horrified a certain dear former-Chamberlin-house physics grad student), it was... a bit too much wifely submission with a bit too little husbandly reciprocation. But I'm biased. And, some certain Calvert House peeps might claim (*coughcough*H.C.*cough*), a rabid, rampaging, feminazi.
Two and a half hours after the ceremony was over, we hiked our way to the restaurant for item two on the day's agenda: the wedding banquet. Not much provision had been made for the Vegetarians on the guest list, although (because I eat fish) I had it better off than Kathleen did. (Although after the shark-fin soup I think it might be time for me to admit that neither my moral sensibilites nor my poor stomach can countenance the ingestion of aquatic creatures anymore. Unfortunately, I love salmon with a deep and abiding passion.)
One of the features to keep us entertained during the nine-course meal (of which only two courses contained no fish or meat, and one of those was dessert) were some games, making fun of the bride and groom. The "ask them questions" game was mostly uneventful... Thomas's older, suburbanite guests did not entirely understand that one was supposed to ask "Jas or Tom" questions, and instead asked rambling questions that required worded answers. Think of that annoying person at the conference who wants to give his opinion instead of asking a question.
The second game, however, asked a blindfolded Thomas to shake hands with a selection of ladies and pick out his bride from amongst them. Former ScavJudge Colin was first up, although his willingness to volunteer as a lady certainly befuddled Jas's brother, who was emceeing. Shaking Colin's hand, Thomas pronounced, "well, that's my mother..."
Our back table of Chicagoans just about died. Collectively. I haven't seen Hayes laugh so hard since he tried to mess with Kathleen's world by creating a fake Wikipedia page to claim that bread yeast was not only an animal, but a mammal.
We Leave for Chicago on the Fourteenth
And from there, to Toronto. There are, however, some things in San Francisco that I must do posthaste. Like, tomorrow.
1) Get the backup files from my old laptop from CD onto the new laptop.
2) Figure out this so-called "skype" thing so that I might have some small chance of conversing with that be-hatted fellow.
3) Remember to charge my cell phone so that I can have an uninterrupted conversation with Carolyn.
4) STUDY FOR THE EXAM I MUST TAKE IN A MONTH.
5) Call Matt "the Cat" C. and Andrew "Ghetto Puppy" H. and pester them into hanging out with me before I flee the country.
2 Comments:
My mother recently said that if I had a wedding liturgy remotely like the one you describe, she would murder me (and possibly my bride).
My parish presently has a policy that everything that disagrees with their radical theology is OK as long as it's in Latin. Boy, do I have an idea to shock the clergy. The rubrics allow the use of old BCPs. So all I'll ask them to use the Elizabethan era Latin BCP. Unfortunately, if I'm successful, I end up dead.
By
Caelius, at 7:07 PM
I'm glad that your mother and I are in agreement on this.
By
Alice Teresa, at 7:20 PM
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