Week 31

Hoo boy. Less than 9 weeks to go. Less than 60 days. Yegads! I am feeling pretty good. Nothing new to report in the health department except I'm getting more sleepy and Brenden is getting all wiggly.

I have been reading with rapt fascination a site that Helly linked to on her blog: Etiquette Hell. The Wedding Etiquette stories are absolutely riveting and guffaw-producing (and wince producing).

I was abashed by people bitching about people putting everything in the store in their registries. I always do that so that people have plenty of things to choose from with different price ranges, not so I can have the whole damn store! Each and every gift I have received I deeply appreciate, from the least expensive to the most. I hate to think someone felt obligated to get us anything and are now grumbling behind my back about how greedy I am. Loot is terrific, but you know what? We're not poor and I'm not exactly keeping a list of those who did not offer up tribute. That's ridiculous. Someone got Jon and I a pack of Huggies and a 12 pack of beer, which are great gifts as both products will be desperately needed (though I doubt that the beer will still be around when Brenden is born).

And I would like to recount some of my wedding experiences. All have been pleasant, for the most part. the first wedding I ever went to was my friend Nancy's. I was clueless about weddings then. Looking back it was most definitely the nicest one I've been to. The only thing that upset me was the guy I was dating at the time stood me up. Turns out we had broken up; he never bothered to tell me though.

I've been to my mom's which was very nice and informal. Her husband's family outnumbered us about 10:1 but I think we made up for lack of numbers with enthusiasm.

My then-boyfriend Jon took me with him to Salem, Massachusets in 99 or 2000 I forget which because he was going to be the Best Man at a friend's wedding. I liked both the bride and the groom, but man did I feel out of place. His grandmother was nice enough to let us stay at her house. The wedding was nice, as was the reception. The only thing that SUCKED was that Jon sat with the wedding party, and I sat with all the other WP dates at a table in the back. It was very uncomfortable for me. I think I would have handled it better now, as I'm getting better at talking to strangers (owning a small business and being an instructor has done that much for me). I don't blame them for arranging things the way they did, but I swore I would not separate dates if I got married (which I did not, but then again our wedding was ultra informal).

Like I said, I liked the couple, but they angered me when they couldn't be bothered to attend our wedding. Jon went out of his way, literally, to do all his duties as best man. We weren't rolling in dough or anything but Jon arranged the bachelor party, got the hookers strippers, beer, etc. to make sure Rob had a good time. I was angry because I know it hurt Jon.

Speaking of our wedding. I wanted to elope in Vegas, but Jon got that look in his eyes. So we decided to have a skydiver wedding. We knew a skydiver who was both a Universalist/Unitiarian preacher, and he worked cheap ($50, a free jump, and a 5th of Jack Daniels). The Drop Zone owners were gracious enough to let us use their DZ for the party. I was really thrilled at who and how many showed up. One jerk asked me how many marriages that made for me. He meant to be insulting. He was always an asshole anyway. I never did get my dream of dumping a can of soda on his camera equipment. So Prick, I mean Rick, please come visit our drop zone. Please!

Anyway, we did the brief ceremony on the ground, but did the "I do's" in the air. Our wedding load were good jumpers, but I wanted some friends in there too (at that point I had less than 200 jumps. The people I jumped with were usually at my skill level). I seem to recall I got some on board. As for how you say "I do" in the air, we did it with hand signals.

Even though it was informal as hell, I was stressed out. I was so happy that after the jump we tapped the beer. If I have anything to brag about, it's that we have one of the more entertaining wedding videos (that has not been shown on "World's Funniest Whatever"). Someday I'll post pics.