American wedding

this weekend we respectfully attended ben's cousin's wedding.
It was my first real catholic wedding. i took it as a cultural experience. ben kept saying how brave i was, sitting during mass all that time, especially since my tummy was making all sorts of sounds.
1:30 in the afternoon, everybody meets by the church, hi, how are you, so nice to see you, let's go stand in line to be seated. follow me ma'am, take the usher's elbow, bride or groom's side?
dearly beloved, the minister attempts to make jokes while trying to transform everybody into better people.
organ music at the background, a long file of bridesmaids walk slowly towards the podium, clickety clacketing on matching stilettos, wearing matching aqua-marine dresses (the exact same shade as the bottom of a swimming pool), matching jewelery, matching smiles.
they joined the line of 9 (nine!!!) grooms-men (who had the same aqua color of vests and ties under their rental tuxes), in a perfect arrowhead. a couple of flower girls, giggling, a rings barer (who, by the way, got so excited about wearing a little tux, that he decided he wants his parents to buy him one). silence.
here comes the bride.
(oh, she's so pretty!)

the ceremony included some readings, some preaching, some singing* (*sure ben will have something to comment about that), please stand up, please be seated, please stand up, please kneel or be seated, bless this and bless that, love isn't a feeling (it's a gift from jesus), it's your duty to bring lots and lots of children (and grandchildren), spread the word. fill the earth. amen.
please repeat after me,
you may kiss the bride.

after a long hour or so, the priest informed everybody that they are now relieved of their duty to go to sunday mass, as this attendance counts. lucky me, i thought, now i don't have to go twice ;)
koesers approach the priest for communion. megan, matt and i stay behind. bless you, bless me, bless them, i now introduce mr. and mrs. mark and ginger koester. shaking hands, this is my wife, nice to meet you, nice to meet you, you are so beautiful, thanks for giving my husband a good reason to get wasted on a golf course last month.

an hour later, back at sandy and gary's hotel room, sandy opens a cooler full of beer, louann arrives with another cooler (one of many, apparently they had one delivered to the groomsmen's trolley), grandpa koester with a bottle of jim beam and grandma's in charge of the ice. kevin tries hard to make his plastic bottle of coors light 'ching'. cheers!

drinks, dinner, speeches, champaign, gling-gling-gling-gling-gling with a spoon on your glass keying the bride and groom to kiss, wine, first dance ("lady in red"), cake, wine, bride and groom sell dances to anyone for a dollar. music (country?!? what the...), dancing, talking, let's go outside - maybe it's quieter there, let's go back inside, i think the mosquitoes are out. a provocative girl with too-short shorts drinking too much. a grooms man goes MIA (so we heard the next morning).
the bride still looks so pretty. the bridesmaids are shoe-less.
i'm tired. let's go. we must be getting old, it's only 10 in chicago, but we've been doing wedding stuff since 1. we went to bed before mom&dad koester, but at least we stayed up longer than the grandparents...
good morning, no hangover, all you can eat breakfast buffet, one of the groomsmen overslept with the girl with the too short shorts and almost missed checkout.
let's go back home see if the scroogim still love us :) how many tub-poops you think we'll have to deal with???