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Yesterday seemed pretty rushed. The massage lady Susan came when we were both in the shower- she thought she was scheduled for half an hour earlier than I thought she was scheduled. Luckily I saw her car and checked at the door before she left to go back home.
The technique was interesting. It involved checking the range of motion of some joints, then resistance- she would hold my leg (for instance) at a certain angle and have me push in a certain direction. It did increase the range of motion quite a bit, but it wasn't the same sort of relaxing massage you think of when you think of massage, and I'm not sure how long the effects last since I don't tend to do much athletic activity where I could gage such things. It also seemed geared towards making you more symmetrical. Hub was pretty symmetrical, so he got half an hour of the new technique and half an hour of regular massage. We then took Susan out to lunch at Zorba's and chatted a bit- then it was time to get out to Wild Basin for the wedding.
I got dressed in my 'dress robe' and went fairly minimal with the jewelry; I also put on a bit of make-up since there were going to be approximately 8 skillion pictures of me taken, even if I was not the focus. It's enough to make anyone a little self-conscious. Anyway, we got there and waited for the brides to show up. I joked about starting without them, but it was such a short ceremony that it'd be done before they arrived. It was just as well, because the folks that do Haunted Trails had stuff all over the place that needed to be moved; the guy who schedules things did not communicate with them at all so there were blood-dripping signs and plastic severed body parts all over the place that were not really conducive to a wedding atmosphere. The brides eventually showed up about 15 minutes after the ceremony was supposed to start, so there was some last minute fussing with hair and flowers and whatall. When we finally started, there were maybe a dozen people not in the wedding party. I read okay; I flubbed in about 3 places, though hub says he only heard one so I may have recovered well enough (though someone had a video recorder- *wince* that was a first for me). Both of the brides got tearful during the ceremony, but held it together enough to make it to the end. Then it was cheering and 8 skillion more pictures snapped.
I had a couple of parents come up after and tell me the ceremony was 'interesting' in a way that it was obvious they didn't know what to think about the pagan element, which I had toned down but not completely erased. But no one was crabby about it to my face anyway, so I'm not going to worry about it. It did occur to me later that I read probably twice as much as the other co-officiant; I asked her if she was okay with that and she said it was just fine by her, she said all she felt she needed to say. She had never done it before, or much public speaking it seemed like; her reading was a little flat. Not that I'm all singing the gospel, but there's a certain cadence you get into, read, look around, smile, read, make some eye contact, etc. Karen said she had gotten several compliments on the ceremony so overall it was happy. I was especially pleased that despite the storming the night before and the overcast for most of the day, the Sun came out right in time for the ceremony.
Hub was frustrated because the parents were crowding him out. He had the professional 35mm camera, and they were stepping in front of him to take crappy pictures on their cell phones. He's not aggressive enough to gripe at them aloud and they were too focused on the brides to notice his baleful glares. Maybe if he gets roped into wedding photography in the future I'll have to get him a cattle prod.
Next was dinner. For some reason the brides thought it was a good idea to seat hub and I next to children. They had no interest in talking to us, we didn't really have anything to say to them, so we just muttered at each other across the table. The food was pretty tasty- County Line does good barbecue, if you're into barbecue. They had a German chocolate sheet cake rather than your standard wedding cake. The impression was getting around that I was abstinent since I wasn't drinking, until I explained that I just never acquired a taste for beer or wine. Then one of the brides gave me a Smirnoff Ice, which tastes exactly like lemonade. I would never have guessed there was alcohol in it if I'd sipped it out of a glass. Scary.
As previously mentioned, we were sent home with lots of food we'll need help eating. I'm not a huge fan of barbecue so I hope we can tempt some people over. After we got it home, we both were achy and tense and spent some time in the hot tub until Karen called and invited us over to the hotel. There was a lot of drunken conversation that we didn't get a lot out of, so we came back home by midnight so I could get a little sleep before today. It was nice to see Karen, and I hope she can come back to Austin soon and we can spend some quality time together. And I was also happy to do wedding number four. I really like doing weddings, even though they can be stressful.
The technique was interesting. It involved checking the range of motion of some joints, then resistance- she would hold my leg (for instance) at a certain angle and have me push in a certain direction. It did increase the range of motion quite a bit, but it wasn't the same sort of relaxing massage you think of when you think of massage, and I'm not sure how long the effects last since I don't tend to do much athletic activity where I could gage such things. It also seemed geared towards making you more symmetrical. Hub was pretty symmetrical, so he got half an hour of the new technique and half an hour of regular massage. We then took Susan out to lunch at Zorba's and chatted a bit- then it was time to get out to Wild Basin for the wedding.
I got dressed in my 'dress robe' and went fairly minimal with the jewelry; I also put on a bit of make-up since there were going to be approximately 8 skillion pictures of me taken, even if I was not the focus. It's enough to make anyone a little self-conscious. Anyway, we got there and waited for the brides to show up. I joked about starting without them, but it was such a short ceremony that it'd be done before they arrived. It was just as well, because the folks that do Haunted Trails had stuff all over the place that needed to be moved; the guy who schedules things did not communicate with them at all so there were blood-dripping signs and plastic severed body parts all over the place that were not really conducive to a wedding atmosphere. The brides eventually showed up about 15 minutes after the ceremony was supposed to start, so there was some last minute fussing with hair and flowers and whatall. When we finally started, there were maybe a dozen people not in the wedding party. I read okay; I flubbed in about 3 places, though hub says he only heard one so I may have recovered well enough (though someone had a video recorder- *wince* that was a first for me). Both of the brides got tearful during the ceremony, but held it together enough to make it to the end. Then it was cheering and 8 skillion more pictures snapped.
I had a couple of parents come up after and tell me the ceremony was 'interesting' in a way that it was obvious they didn't know what to think about the pagan element, which I had toned down but not completely erased. But no one was crabby about it to my face anyway, so I'm not going to worry about it. It did occur to me later that I read probably twice as much as the other co-officiant; I asked her if she was okay with that and she said it was just fine by her, she said all she felt she needed to say. She had never done it before, or much public speaking it seemed like; her reading was a little flat. Not that I'm all singing the gospel, but there's a certain cadence you get into, read, look around, smile, read, make some eye contact, etc. Karen said she had gotten several compliments on the ceremony so overall it was happy. I was especially pleased that despite the storming the night before and the overcast for most of the day, the Sun came out right in time for the ceremony.
Hub was frustrated because the parents were crowding him out. He had the professional 35mm camera, and they were stepping in front of him to take crappy pictures on their cell phones. He's not aggressive enough to gripe at them aloud and they were too focused on the brides to notice his baleful glares. Maybe if he gets roped into wedding photography in the future I'll have to get him a cattle prod.
Next was dinner. For some reason the brides thought it was a good idea to seat hub and I next to children. They had no interest in talking to us, we didn't really have anything to say to them, so we just muttered at each other across the table. The food was pretty tasty- County Line does good barbecue, if you're into barbecue. They had a German chocolate sheet cake rather than your standard wedding cake. The impression was getting around that I was abstinent since I wasn't drinking, until I explained that I just never acquired a taste for beer or wine. Then one of the brides gave me a Smirnoff Ice, which tastes exactly like lemonade. I would never have guessed there was alcohol in it if I'd sipped it out of a glass. Scary.
As previously mentioned, we were sent home with lots of food we'll need help eating. I'm not a huge fan of barbecue so I hope we can tempt some people over. After we got it home, we both were achy and tense and spent some time in the hot tub until Karen called and invited us over to the hotel. There was a lot of drunken conversation that we didn't get a lot out of, so we came back home by midnight so I could get a little sleep before today. It was nice to see Karen, and I hope she can come back to Austin soon and we can spend some quality time together. And I was also happy to do wedding number four. I really like doing weddings, even though they can be stressful.
