Wedding bell blues.

* I was in the park with Solenn yesterday. Solenn and I
walked around for about four hours, then lay on a grassy hill and
watched people. Then we had margaritas at Zocalo. Really good day.

* When you wake up at 1 p.m. the day after your brother's wedding
reception to find that you ACTUALLY slept until 2 p.m. the day after
your brother's wedding, you get really, really pissed over Daylight
Saving Time.

* It's fun to watch people scramble to change the wording of certain
blessings when the Pope dies on the day of your brother's Catholic
wedding. "No, you can't say 'To our Holy Father on Earth ...' like you
did at the rehearsal. There won't be a new Pope for a couple weeks."

* My overwhelmingly Republican aunt asked when she was going to meet
my boyfriend Ash, then referred to herself as a modern woman with an
open mind. It was sweet, except that I had to tell her (and all my
cousins) that we'd broken up. I hope that's not the only time they'll
be open to meeting my hypothetical boyfriends, for I eventually should
introduce one of them. My aunt got the photo of Ash from my mom, and
she sent it to her daughters.

* My grandpa and his wife, on the other hand, called my father
"Benjie," even though my dad's 30 years older than me and bald. They
told me it was because Dad was wearing glasses, and they thought I
did, too.

* Conversation between me and Grandpa at the rehearsal dinner, wherein
he manages to ask me a dreaded question AND pick on my stepfather
(whom Grandpa despises) while sitting next to him:
GRANDPA: "So when are you going to get serious about someone?"
ME: "Um, never."
GRANDPA (eyeing my stepdad): "But Jerry will build you a house when
you get married. He does it for everyone."
ME: "Um, I don't want to live around here."

* I sorta caught the garter at the wedding reception. But there was a
scam involved in getting it to me. Samantha, my brother Dan's wife,
went to UGA - same as me. My brother went to Georgia Tech. So, during
her wedding, Samantha wore two garters: one for UGA, the other for
Georgia Tech. So, when Dan removed the garter, Samantha said it would
determine where their kids went to college. There were five total
single men at the wedding, and four of them (including the hot,
straight one with the fauxhawk) went to Tech. So the UGA garter went
to me once selected, for I was the only single Bulldog. All the Tech
guys walked away from it.

* I hope no one ever finds out that, after my sixth glass of white
wine, I idiotically asked the mother of the bride about their
estranged son. Her reply was, "Weddings like this bring people
together." And I said, "It's all right. There are people here that I'm
not speaking to ... Wait, I'm bringing the wrong vibe into this." No
one seemed bothered, but, honestly, WHAT IN THE HELL WAS I
THINKING???? (Yeah, I got so stupid I dialed Ash up a couple times
this weekend. It was like the "drunk dialing" scene in SIDEWAYS. Dumb,
dumb, dumb. He never answered his phone nor returned my calls. Smart
man.)

* My conservative Republican aunt and uncle laughed out loud when I
said my cool aunt's huge, throwback hairdo made her "look like an
astronaut's wife." I fear I'm betraying the cool people with my big
mouth.

* I wanted to slow dance with my stepmother, who looked phenomenal,
but they never stopped playing hip-hop, the "Cha Cha" slide and Jimmy
Buffett. I was in an emo mood, so I sat in a chair the last half of
the evening and sulked.

* One of the bridesmaids, I think, believes I hit on her when I walked
up to her on the dancefloor and said there should be more
representatives of "Y chromosome" dancing. Frankly, I just wanted to
find another gay man in the room. There must've been one ...
somewhere.

* The daughter of one of my father's friends came to the wedding with
her parents. At the start of the reception, she wanted to talk to me
about fiction writing, so I asked her to dance because no one was
dancing. She gave me her e-mail address. I think she has some sort of
crush on me now.

* My brother hugged me four times. His new wife bemoaned the fact that
we didn't talk at the reception when I said goodbye to her. She looked
completely amazing, of course. (I hope she never finds out what I
asked her mother about. Never, ever. Hopefully, her mother was having
cocktails and forgot all about the stupid thing I asked her. God, what
was I thinking?)

* I'm in wedding photos. I was invited to take part in the ceremony at
the last minute. They asked me to seat my mother and stepgrandmother,
which I happily did. Everyone said I looked great.