The “bad wedding = amusing story” that we keep telling, is the one where the minister apparently knew the happy couple a little too well, and gave a long, rambling oration (using the word “cleave” way too much) that turned into a counseling session. He seemed to harp on the groom’s temper, to the point where my wife and I nudged each other and said “holy crap…did he just suggest that the groom try not to beat up his new bride?”
Wow. I can’t top that, but recently at my SILs wedding, the reverend made a comment about how they’d done things ‘a bit backwards’ and had ‘already suffered loses’ because of it. This was while my SIL was still recovering from surgery after having a miscarriage. (Yes, the groom would’ve been the father)
Owls has one bad wedding story he loves to tell, because it creeped him (and a few others, I’ve heard) out so bad. The wedding was not only very religious, but there was a big emphasis put on how the bride and groom were still virgins, and how they’d both made promises to stay chaste until married. Do you really need to announce that the bride and groom are still virgins in front of the whole world? Especially when that’s only likely to be true for a few more hours?
Me.
But to nitpick – I don’t enjoy all weddings. I’d just don’t not enjoy all weddings (got that?). I’d say half I enjoy, and half I have similar thoughts as Diogenes and others. Maybe I’ve just been lucky in the ones I’ve been too.
Waitaminnit - “yesterday” as in “I got married yesterday”?
And you didn’t start a thread about it?
Regards,
Shodan
Actually, it wasn’t so much funny as excruciatingly embarrassing. I DO NOT WANT TO KNOW THESE THINGS! My sister was in the wedding party, and watching her blink repeatedly and then turn her face into the “I’m smiling in public now” mask was rather fun.
The “comedy gold” wedding I attended, many years ago, involved two ringbearers who decided at the wedding they didn’t want to be ringbearers - they wanted to be Robocops. Luckily, they had thought ahead and brought plastic helmets and guns. The groom, who was very, um, laid back with chemical assistance, if you know what I mean, approved this. He and his lovely bride also had the bright idea of incorporating their pet ferrets in the wedding, making them little ribbon halter/leash things which were to be held by the ringbearers as they processed in.
The Robocops lost control of the ferrets within 10 feet. Ferrets and armed Robocops (waterguns only, but still) swarmed into the audience. It all proceded logically and inevitably from there.
I’ve definitely gotten milage out of that one, over the years.
I think this is one reason for the popularity of Las Vegas weddings.
My best friend from high school was here with his wife recently - their youngest son got married here and about 16 people from back home (Illinois) all flew in.
Everybody had a great time! The wedding ceremony was brief, but quite nice in the Little Church Of The West wedding chapel. Afterwards, they all went to the buffet at Mandalay Bay (hey, don’t laugh! They had a great selection of food, a separate room just for them and everybody got to eat what they wanted, as much as they wanted!)
Plus, the bride and groom saved a bunch of money, everybody was happy to come to Las Vegas and spend a few minutes at the ceremony and then eat - and then party on for a few days, getting together with people they wanted to hang out with.
Plus, I have heard you don’t exactly have to twist people’s arms to get them to fly to Las Vegas for a wedding. Most seem quite happy to use it as an excuse to come here.
I like the concept of weddings, but usually the execution leaves something to be desired. I’m all for two people in love making a lifetime commitment. However, I hate ceremonies that last an hour, receptions that last 5 hours, frilly gowns, generic party favors, the pressure to make use of the dance floor, awkward conversations with people I don’t know, and all the attention and cost of details that no guest will really remember a year or two later.
The best wedding/reception I ever went to was brief, nonreligious, and simple. Guests weren’t held captive for hours, and the guest list was short, so everyone knew each other and was totally comfortable. The bride clearly didn’t spend thousands of hours and dollars obsessing over every little detail, but put just enough time and care into the stuff that was most important to her. She didn’t include crap just because of tradition or because the bridal magazines told her to. It was great.
I like weddings, but I do like 'em short and less formal where ceremony is concerned. On the other hand, I love dancing and getting all prettied up–especially being a groomsman. What can I say, I love how I look in a tux.
My own was a 15-min ceremony with just our parents and closest friends, and then we had a big informal BBQ in the park–no formal clothes, no formal toasts (yeah, my little bro stood up and pontificated a bit, but he’s genuinely funny and knows how to talk). Granted, no booze, but plenty of barbeque and soda and iced tea. With board games, bocce ball, horseshoes, and freakin LAWN DARTS. Even Dio has to admit he’d’ve liked THAT party.
On the other hand, the worst was one of my buddies for whom I was co-best-man. At the reception, my duties apparently consisted of:
- prevent groom’s sisters from causing a scene by trying to sneak rum-and-cokes to his teenaged youngest brother.
- prevent groom’s sisters, both engaged, from attempting to get into the pants of the other best man, also engaged. (His fiancee’s reaction was along the lines of "Eh, I trust him, and if they get too bad, I’ll find something pointy and remind them that I was an all-state saber fencer back in the day)
- negotiate/prevent screaming match between groom and groom’s mother over such topics as the cost of the wedding and mom’s opinion that the bride is a bitch (she isn’t)
- clean up assorted drunken mutual friends whose reaction to the entire situation was abuse of the open bar.
I admit lawn darts was pretty cool. I can’t believe they banned that game. A few punctured skulls and the government totally overreacts.
Do the people who don’t like weddings also dislike other kinds of religious, cultural, or personal rituals? How do you feel about (for example) Christmas trees? counting down to New Year’s? bedtime rituals?
amarinth, that’s a good question. I enjoyed holidays, rituals, and ceremonies when I was a kid. When I became a parent and was responsible for those events, and when I realized how much work, expense, and stress was involved, I liked them less and less.
The last ceremony I took pleasure in ( :dubious:, yeah, I know) was the funeral for my husband’s aunt. She was a much-loved woman in her 90’s who died after a short illness. Family members spoke at the funeral, sharing stories about Aunt Geneva, how she wouldn’t let you visit without feeding you, how she managed to sew and bake and work on the farm even after she lost an arm in a baler, and how she truly never had a bad word to say about anyone.
I like Christmas trees. I stay home on New Year’s Eve. I try to scare the little kids on Halloween and I give great candy. High school graduations make me tear up. Birthday parties are cool until the kid is five or six. Mother’s Day and Father’s Day are creations of Hallmark. Cookouts and fireworks on July 4th are the best.
I love everything about Christmas. Fourth of July fireworks & bbq’s are great.
Actually, I really like ritual (it’s the ex-altar boy in me, probably). It’s deviating from ritual that bugs me – like writing your own vows. Another example – high school graduations are fine, until some yahoo parent fires off an air horn when his kids’ name is called.
Bestest wedding I’ve been to: held in a small Italian restaurant, about 50 people. The groom is a wine wonk, so we were well-libated. Some time spent drinking and shmoozing, a registrar appeared and performed the 10 minute ceremony, then servers swooped out with trays of champagne and hors d’oeuvres. And we actually had time to talk with the happy couple without being stuck in some gawds-damnation receiving line. It was a party, with a civil ceremony part way through. Not some scripted pageant.
“It is all about the Bride, the Groom just needs to show up.” I think I heard that on Top Chef. And to me that is so true. We had the option of a small wedding and a honeymoon in the Bahamas or a large wedding and a honeymoon at the nearby comfort inn.
One guess on what option my lovely soon to be wife chose. :rolleyes:
Depends on the wedding - can’t say that they are “all the same.”
I’ve been to big huge country club open bar weddings. I’ve been to six people in a courthouse weddings. I’ve been to cake and punch receptions. I’ve been to Buddhist ceremonies. I’ve been to Star Trek weddings where the best man was a Klingon. I’ve been to dry weddings. Weddings for co-workers, relatives, and very good friends. Small weddings in parks and homes and weddings in big churches where I blend into a crowd of 500.
Some of these have been massive bridezilla fests where I’ve been too involved to have fun. Some have been weddings where my job was to be a guest and the bride and groom wanted their guests to enjoy themselves far more than have the “perfect wedding.”
My own preferences - dancing and/or good conversation- preferably both. I’d prefer, but don’t need alcohol. Two people in love with each other. Not too much involvement in wedding politics on my own end - if the wedding is big enough and I’m there as a mere guest of a guest in the crowd, I could care less that the bride picked her bridesmaids because they were all size six, and left her best friend cut out because she’d become a size fourteen AND decided to have the NERVE to get ENGAGED at nearly the same time - if they have good music and an open bar. Touches of individualism - whether that be a wedding in a garden or unusual bouquets or music that makes me smile. I’d rather have good party subs than a bad roast beast buffet.
Free booze? Maybe I’m missing something, but have you been to weddings where you’ve had to pay? Honestly, I have never heard of such a thing. Ever.
22KE
I’m amazed at the frenzied bridezillaness of so many brides to make this “HER DAY”. Too many young women make the ceremony the main point of the whole thing, complete with as much money as dad, the groom to be and various family members will cough up.
So what you end up with is a huge ridiculous pageant-y thing that showcases the bride and her wants and wishes, and pretty much ONLY her wants and wishes. Complete with much drama and hysterics on her part. This part always boggles my mind, these girls rant and rave about how they are only this way so that “their day” can be a perfect golden memory, but how “perfect” can it be if you spent the preceding X number of weeks or months doing the world’s best imitation of a lifer crack addict undergoing withdrawal? Are you really going to be able to overlook or forget that you spent an entire day hunting down the hapless florist and browbeating him for some small flower slight for the entire day? How can your day be remembered as “perfect” when you spent the morning hungover and suffering (and making your bridesmaids suffer) from hour long crying jags?
Now, I know that not all bridezillas are quite as bad as those on the tv reality shows, but it still boggles me that for so many of these girls, the money aspect (as applies to how fancy and “perfect” her wedding is), is so monumentally important. So much money wasted on what is basically an overblown “Miss America” for those girls who didn’t get to be cheerleaders or whatnot, or who were and don’t want their days as the HS/College Prom/Beauty Queen to be over yet.
Marriage isn’t about the ceremony, it’s about a life partnership. And the wedding isn’t (or didn’t use to be) about the bride getting to be an overblown spoiled BlingBling STAR for the day, it was about inviting your loved ones to share in one of life’s most important moments with you AND your groom.
So, to make a short story long (:D) I agree wholeheartedly with the OP.
I think he means that this is a place to GET free booze, not that there are weddings where the booze isn’t free. As in, “oooh a wedding! Cool we know there’ll be free booze” let’s crash it.
Unfortunately, yes. Sometimes brides make their guests pay for their own drinks. :eek: It’s apparently “accepted” in some parts of the country and absolutely appalling in others. I think it’s because the bride wants more party than she and the groom (or the parents, whoever is paying) can afford. It’s right up there with “buy me a honeymoon” registries and “gifts should be cash only” on the invitations. Too crass. Just MHO, but I absolutely hate it when the hosts turns their guests into paying patrons. Ick.
I think it would be a lot classier if the hosts just offered beer/wine, or a dry wedding, rather than making guests buy their own refreshments.
Generally, though, I love weddings.
Best wedding I ever went to was here. It was a whole weekend job and upon arrival we were upgraded to a magnificent suite. The bridge, groom and guests all had dinner in the italian restaurant that evening and the following day we got dressed up like something out of Four Weddings and a Funeral and had drinks on the terrace pictured before the couple were married in the library which is the room pictured behind. They had a harpist play Pachelbel’s Canon and it was perfect. Then we had more drinks and a formal lunch. Believe it or not, a lot of the guests got changed into swim gear and spent some time in the pool (with the bride and groom looking on, thrilled that every-one was having such a great and spontaneous time!) before heading to the disco that was put on in the evening. Following day, we all had breakfast together before heading off.
Delightful.
Don’t get me started on the Lutheran wedding with the German prayers between each course…