For Christ's sake, check the shoes. Black and white wingtips aren't something you see everyday. you know, for all the grief a guy like me gets for having absolutely no style, not only do I have it up to my eyeballs; but so does the old lady. Somebody better send this in to The Manolo, just so we can prove that the metrosexual of the trend is just the fad of the latest bullshit. I rest my case.

My inlaws are not sane. Well, when I read that it sounds like I'm saying all of them, but it's really only two - Mom and Dad InLaw. Completely and totally off the reservation, as they say. Apparently it didn't used to be that way, they just got divorced and went cuckoo. Personally, I think that anyone who behaves like they do is not suffering from some acute-onset adult psychosis. What these people demostrate is something that is obviously deep-seated and severly manic.

The bachelor party was a full-on riot. Thursday, I ran out of work early, drove to Raleigh and hung out with one of my old college pals there. We basically had lunch, and then he dropped me off at the airport. Where I commenced to prime myself for the flight by drinking those damn expensive airport beers. I don't really like flying (which is another poast altogether), so tieing on a decent buzz ensures that the time is spend in the air either seems shorter, or is spent sleeping.

Dude, we got our first actual wedding present today. And as I've said before, I'm a big present-opening kind of guy. So I come home and there's this fucking big ol' box from Bed Bath & Beyond. Mind you, I'm not big on towels and sheets and shit, but I love cooking, and I can tell by the size and weight of the box that this is some cooking-ass shit yo.

Of course, the wife understands that I am a present-o-phile a little better now (since I complain about not being able to open them), and says it's okay with her if I open it. So there I am, super-stoked that I get to open this bad boy. I nicely slice the packing tape, flip the lid open gently, take note of the inspection slip, read it, nod like I know something about it (I'm really into presents), thumb through the accompanying paperwork (packing slip, etc), nod like I know something about that too. Then I pull out what must've been a two and a half foot by twenty foot sheet of paper. I guess they just used it to pack the box tight, but it's just so amazingly huge, I've never seen a peice of paper this big. I pull it all the way out of the box, untwist it, stretch it out to full length across the living room floor and entry way. I marvel at it's dimensions. Where did they get this? Can you imagine how fun it must be to work with sheets of paper this big all day long? Good Lord, imagine the pranks you could get away with if you had access to a single ream of paper from which this peice came! I decide to wear it.

Hey, shove off, I said I like presents!

So there I am, swaddled in the packing material that my new shit came in. My shiny, new, perfectly perfect thing. If it has buttons, dials, selectors, or settings, they probably all click, spin, switch, or turn with that smooth but precise action that only new buttons, dials, selectors, or settings click, spin, switch, or turn. The interior box is probably filled with all that senseless packing that conforms to the shape of my new item - carboard that's cut to size, bubble wrap, directions and warranties folded neatly and laying on top. If it has electrical cords they are, no doubt, tied just so, with the perfectly-sized twistie tie. I mean, how do they do that? When you go to store the damn thing, or have to pack it up to move, it never goes back in the box like that. Never.

Mumified in my new paper duds, I begin gently rifling through the outer packaging. It's got a slip saying who it's from, conveniently, with their address so we can send 'em a thank you note. Nice touch. I pull back a sheet of that foamy papery stuff they usually slip on top of the item and behold...the fucking thing is wrapped. Wrapped in wrapping paper with a card and everything. The blood rushes from my face. I feel like I've been kicked in the stomach. No, stabbed. Stabbed in the back, betrayed, made a fool of.

Oh, she knew. She had to've known! She wouldn't let me open the present knowing I would actually get to see it. She knew I'd open it with all the giddiness of a schoolboy, and then be crushed to see it was wrapped. She knew!

So, the fiancé had her bridal shower this past weekend. I guess I wasn't super-duper excited or anything, because her sisters were coming to spend the weekend at our place, but I wasn't exactly put out either. It was going to give me a day or so of peace and quiet, not to mention the presents.

Contrary to what one might assume, the haul she pulled in was pretty good too. Some new glassware, a nice skillet, and a handful of various other kitchen implements. I'm a big fan of food and cooking, so I was happy. Of course, there was an ulterior motive. You see, I'm an unabashed fan of throwing things away. The opposite of a pack rat, but I don't know the term. At any rate, receiving new things means I get to divest myself of old things.

Now, lets be clear here. I don't just go around throwing crap away at random. But if it hasn't been used in a year, and I'm not party to some contract to keep it; it's going bye-bye. And, of course, with our current living space being steadily usurped by a pile of wedding paraphernalia that seems to have it's own agenda of Manifest Destiny; I'm primed for some serious purging. So when the old lady shows up with three armloads full of loot, I'm already filling boxes with old shit and setting them by the door.
"What are you doing?" she demands.
"Oh, just putting this stuff aside. Since we got all that new junk, I'm just going to get rid of our old stuff."
"But you can't just throw that away." She begins to gesture towards the pile of old shit. "People could use that."
"Ok, well, we'll take it down to goodwill." Then inspiration hits me; I am a genius. "Hey, didn't your sisters need some of this stuff? They're still in college, we should let them have their pick."
"We have to wait until the wedding though."
"But they're here now. Why don't we just let them take it back home with them?"
"Because dear, we're going to need our old stuff until the wedding."
"Yeah, I know. I'm not getting rid of everything, just the stuff we can replace with the items you received today."
"That doesn't matter, because we're not going to use the stuff we got today until after the wedding."
My head starts to hurt here, so you'll have to forgive me if the dialogue gets blurry.
"But. You already opened the gifts at the bridal shower. They were... bridal shower gifts. They're yours now. People don-"
"No! They're for the wedding, and what happens if we don't get married?"
"People don't give you a gift, let you unwrap it, and assume you won't use it. That why people who mail Christmas gifts put little tags on them that say 'Do not open until Christmas.'"
"That's different."
"No, this would be like someone giving you a birthday gift a few weeks before your birthday, letting you unwrap it, and then demanding that you not use it on your birthday. Bridal showers are different events from weddings, and the gifts received are different."
"No."
At this point I'm beside myself. My house is filling up with shit. It's in the guest bedroom, it's in my bedroom, my kitchen is filled with a bunch of old shit that needs to be gotten rid of, there were people here this weekend who were eagerly volunteering to carry the clutter away, and she still says no. I'm completely vexed. I mean, I've tried logic, I've even had discussions with the old lady and other females in which (might I add that I neither coached, goaded, or signaled to the female third party) the other females actually agreed that said unwrapped presents were now fair game. I just never get to do anything I want anymore. I'm convinced that she hates me, and derives some form of pleasure from my complete consternation. And I say 'form of pleasure' because I'm not quite sure that something so evil ever experiences what mere mortals describe as pleasure.

So I’ve got this wedding invitation. I’ve never met the bride or the groom in person, but you could say we’ve been corresponding for some time. Because the groom is fucking Shank. Our Shank. The Shank that blogs right here on this wonderful, mostly bio-rhythmic site. Most people don’t realize that Shank and I go way back.

I’m torn, really. The guest list is very tight, so it’s certainly an honor. Let’s weigh the pros and cons.

Cons:

Not much face time with shank. Let’s face it, it’s his wedding day, and even an asshole like me realizes that it’s full of family obligations. I’d have to pay for plane tickets for myself and my wife, though I could just fuck them on a gift and call it even. I wouldn’t know anyone at the wedding, including the groom.

Pros:

I could fuck with people big time. Shank himself suggested I go around telling people I’m his astrologer. If he’s got no objection to that I’m sure I could push it a lot further, implying illegal activities, homosexuality, owed money and plenty of other good stuff.

I could go around saying that I’m, “Here to get what’s coming to me,” and simply walk away.

I’ve been known to have business cards printed up for all kinds of wacky shit before, including Private Investigator, Commode Salesman, etc. The possibilities are really endless. And I’ll be drunk and inciting others to get slammed as well. I could casually insult old people, stand up and make incredulous toasts and use excessively foul language.

I could slap people on the back obnoxiously and tell them about my third testicle. I could goose the old broads. I could rent and wear a ridiculous white tie and tails outfit. I could wet my crotch with water and walk around looking as if I’ve leaked pee on myself. I could “cut in” when old people are dancing.

Think of the material I could get at an affair like this.

I think I’m going to check my schedule.

Wedding Party Entry - 'When I'm 64' by the Beatles
Cake - 'Sugar Sugar' by whoever the fuck that fifties band was
Garter - 'Idiot Boyfriend' by Jimmy Fallon
First Dance - 'All I Ask of You' - Phantom of the Opera Soundtrack (Sarah Brightman version)
Bouqet Toss - 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun' by Cyndi Lauper
Mother/Son Dance - 'Simple Man' by Lynyrd Skynyrd or Shinedown (I haven't decided yet)
Last Song - 'Margaritaville' by Jimmy Buffet, or 'Forever Young' by Rod Stewart. Still up in the air.

Misc. genres: Beatles, Bluegrass, Big Band, Jack johnson, O.A.R., Semisonic, Club Jazz.

So I have to give a toast at the wedding right, since I'm the groom. My first instinct was "Fuck it. Ceremonial crap is empty." But then it hit me - I will be able to talk, and 150 people will have to listen. Saweeet. So I started formulating a story, a soliloquy, a dirty fucking laundry list of shit that I've wanted to say to people for a long time. I'd say bits and peices of it outloud to the mirror while brushing my teeth or knotting a necktie. I'd lay in bed spending that quietness before my eyes shut running sections of it through my mind. It was to be my masterwork: pithy, funny, poignant, smart.

We were sitting around one day and someone said something like "Damn, the motherfucker really gets on my nerves" about a mutual friend.
"Yeah, I know. I'm so telling him that during my toast too."
"For real?"
"Yeah. Hell yeah. I talk, they listen; if they don't like it they can leave early and spare me the expense of finger sandwiches and beer for one more person at $18 a head."
"Damn. Balls on this one."
The old lady got wind of my plans to hand out peices of my mind while streamlining our wedding budget. She said I shouldn't do that: It was rude, and it would ruin the reception. Unfortunately for me, she was right. And yet, I still feel like I should say something important while I have all that attention. Surely there's something relevant to most or all of those people there, that I can share or say and still be pithy, funny, poignant, smart. I suppose I could adapt one of Paul's legendary shit stories, but then I run the risk of being recognized as a phony, given the number of people who've heard of Paul's shit.

I'm wondering if maybe I should just keep a peice of paper folded up in my pocket, and scribble notes on it as they pop into my head over the coming months. It would come off a little disjointed, sure; but I'm not exactly the world's greatest writer, so it would probably be shoddy no matter what.

What if I write the toast, and then just keep it in my pocket over the next few months and edit it when I have spare time? Maybe that would work better. Jesus, I'm already overextended on the planning phase of this thing anyways. I should just hire some jackass to do it for me.

The fiancee has what I call a creativity-based, emotional response to stress. I'm not saying it's a bad thing at all, I mean, she eventually comes to some enlightened decisions. It's just the Mr. Toad's Wild Ride through the depths of complete and utter pandemonium that I can't handle.

Well, and sometimes I unknowingly set it off, but that's neither here nor there. I had a little nooner with the boss yesterday, whose son recently tied the knot. So naturally, the wedding thing comes up, and we chit-chat back and forth. She's very engaging, my boss. A sense of humor that smarts like a bullwhip.

Anyways, I come home yesterday and start talking about all the fresh wedding ideas I have. A somewhat unusual situation, since I tend to let her run the wedding plans; but not unheard of. So we talk about a few things, blahblahblah, and everything's fine. Then, at like 10:30pm,
the surface starts to crack, and she begins her decent into madness.

She clams up. There's the vacant stare, the somewhat disassociated demeanor, and the expressionless face. I guess I'm kind of afraid that maybe I know it's already started, this stress management of hers, so I drop a depth charge.
"Hey, everything okay. You look a little stressed, what can I do for ya?"
"Eh. Nothin'."
"Okay."

Then the sniffling starts.

"Babe, really, talk to me. You wouldn't want me to just lay there and do this, you'd want to help. What's up?"
"Really," her voice is quivering now as she talks in between sniffles, "I don't think it's anything you can help me with."
"Okay, but if you want to talk or vent, just do it." This usually does the trick, and in true form, it works.
"WE'VE ONLY GOT SIX MONTHS LEFT AND WEDON'TEVENHAVETHECAKECUTTINGSONGPICKEDOUTYET!"
"Ho, hey. We've got a dress, food, a place t-"
"Yeah, but there's a millionotherthingstodobetweennowandthe-"
"It's okay. I swear, we've got plenty of time to iron things out; we've got plenty of people to help us. I'd say we're 80% complete at this point."
It is here that the litany reaches full pitch. She begins to lament everything from her shitty groom (hey, right here dear, hi, me), to our busy schedules, to the wedding party - everything is on the table now. Ah, the sound of hysterics at full volume. But see, this is where she releases the tension. I don't let it bother me because she only does it about the wedding and it seems to help her gain clarity.

Eventually, we get all calmed down, and we're talking and laughing. I turn and say "You know, you gave blood today. Maybe you're body's just exhausted from the drain." She gives blood often, and has been known to suffer side effects. "Yeah. Oh, that and the only pills left for this month are the placebo's." I grown and roll back over, at least we found the root cause.

She's fucking crazy. Help me.

Please?

Her: I did something bad today.
Me:...What?
Her: I went shopping.
Me:...And?
Her: I spent $XXX.
Me (laughing):...What the hell did you buy for that much money?
Her: Two pairs of jeans and six pairs of shoes.
Me(laughing harder, because crying is not an option): What are you going to do; go barefoot on Sunday?

I laughed until I got in the shower and then I cried, so the water would hide my tears. Tears of hysterical laughter mind you, but tears nonetheless. She wants to take our seperate bank accounts and put them together in one account when we get married. I guess she thinks if we pool our resources we can really take advantage of the investment goldmine that is the Women's Accessories department at Dilliards.

Wedding invitations are by far the most infuriating waste of money on the face of this Earth. They're like hundreds and hundreds of dollars!

The entire design is completely retarded. Firstly, you put the invitation in an envelope right. Then, you put this thingie into another envelope, along with this stupid card and another fricken envelope! What the hell people?

I mean, when I was a kid the local skating rink used to host birthday parties. If you had your party there, the rink would send these little postcard invites to all your little crumb-snatching, rugrat friends. It doesn't really take three fucking envelopes and three sheets of paper to invite someone to a shindig am I right? Or email. Why can't we just send a mass email to everyone, and have them RSVP?

Well, apparently women are insane. Did you know when they're little girls they starts planning and thinking about their wedding? Like how they want it to be and all that? Okay, show of hands, how many of the men here ever thought about what kind of cake they wanted at their wedding say, more than a year before they got married? Yeah, that's what I thought. I mean, I don't even know what I'm going to wear each day until I get up, and the women are planning this wedding thing like decades in advance. The only thing I've ever planned more than a year in advance was a car loan or a mortgage. And I only did that because I had to.

So in the end, I've concluded what every married man already knew: You can't fight 'em on anything. A logical appeal doesn't register when they've spent years living their wedding day in their minds, yapping it up with other women about how they're getting married. It's like a fucking cult man; and my fiancee is only a fraction of the freak that some of these other women are. I agree with her, and count my blessings that she's not completely lost her mind.

I tried to teach myself to surf recently. I can't decide if I'm a worse teacher than I am a surfer or vice-versa. Either way I've decided to take lessons. There's a Hawaiian expatriate at work who gives cheap lessons. I'm not sure what in the hell makes a native Hawaiian move from his home to this relative dump, but maybe he knows something I don't.

We've been trying to pin down a photog for the wedding recently. Some people actually had the nerve to tell us they didn't want to book us because; based on our budget, they were afraid of losing someone else who could make them more money! No offense, but I went to school with some photography majors, and they're hardly the type to turn away work, nah mean?

The best part was this little exchange.
Dialing phone, ringing.
"Hello, Fucknut's Photography."
"Yeah, Fucknut; I was just wondering what your rates are for weddings. I'm looking for someone to take some shots for maybe an hour or two during and after the wedding."
"Well, we normally don't do that. But what our usual package involves is about 4-5 hours of photos, usually about 2,000 photos narrowed down to 1,200 really nice shots, and we put them on disk for you. The package runs about $1300."
"$1300 for the whole day?"
"Yeah, and we may show up for the rehersal dinner just to get to know the wedding party."
"Hm. Who makes $1300 a day? Isn't that what the whore in Pretty Woman charged?"
"I'm sorry, what?"
"The whore in the movie, I think she charged $1,000 bucks a day. And she was played by Julia Roberts. I mean, unless you're gonna show up with a hot, really hot, hooker on your arm who will suck my dick on command, I don't really think I'm willing to pay $1300 for you to stand around at my wedding and take photos for a few hours."
"We'll be at the rehersal dinner too."
"Right, which I am paying for. I'm not going to pay you to stand around at my rehersal dinner, eat my food, and not have my dick sucked by the hot whore you're going to have with you."
"Well, we could drop the price to $1,000."
"Who the fuck makes $1,000 a day?"
"It's actually more than one d-"
"Right. I forgot, you'll be at the rehersal dinner. Great. I'll tell you what, $850 for both days and a blow up doll and you got yourself a deal."
-click-

It's like they don't want to make any money. I mean, if someone offered me $850 for a day's work, I'd be all about it. I should just buy a better digicam, put a decent looking whore on retainer, and I'd have myself the goddamn cheapest photography biz in the nation; plus a sweet gimmick to boot.

Well, the fiancee and I have officially scrapped all our plans for the wedding. We had begun to plan this event so that it would be an above par affair. We didn't want our guests to be disappointed after travelling from far and wide, only to show up at some average ho-hum todo. We wanted them to be happy they came, grateful that at least they hiked all that way for a little friggin ambiance.

Let me tell you how much of a pain that was. It was emotionally grinding us both against eachother, like a pistil and mortar making a fine pumice of our lives. We would argue about details we discovered neither one cared about. We would worry about saving the money up, what would we do if disaster struck? Could we take money from the wedding fund? She was working two jobs, I was working and going to grad school, she starts hers in August. We were juggling a million flaming bowling pins and we really only cared about six of them. Okay, maybe seven. Point is, we weren't planning our wedding; we were planning a wedding for our guests.

Over the 4th of July weekend, one of the family relatives offered twice to basically cater our reception at cost. We shrugged it off politiely not wanting to impose. We got home and discussed the option. It actually came out that doing something like that would be typical 'us.' We're pretty laidback, low-maintenance people when it comes to partying. The stress relief and down home feel was beginning to appeal to us.

Then my parents offered us their house to hold the reception. We were sold. We haven't argued about wedding details in a week, many times the interval we were before. We realize that it's not going to be the standard formal affair, but we know it's going to be hella fun. Besides, neither one of us is really interested in standards anyways. Now we can invite as many people as we want, without having to worry if we can afford another $20 a head to feed them. We don't have to worry about being out of some fancy shmancy reception hall in four hours, we can stay and party until everyone falls out. It's kind of weird, because at first we started out really wanting to do it up, thinking that a good time meant spending lots of money. Now it's going to be something completely different, and completely reflective of who we are.

The best part about it, is if someone doesn't like it, I'll know they never really liked me. Which is okay, because when we start lighting the fireworks, we're gonna need a target.

So, tonight I need to make an appointment for us to meet with a DJ and a baker. The DJ thing I think I can handle. Stereo shit, a masculine feild if there ever was one. Even though picking one out should be pretty straight forward, once the woman throws her monkey wrench of femalogic into the cogs, who knows what'll happen right?

As for the cake thing, I don't even wnat to know. I'm not a big cake person, but apparently that's something that gets you drawn and quartered in the nuptial world; so the fiance has layed down a gag order. I totally want to needle these bakers, but I'm not sure if it will be worth suffering the consequences. I mean, what the hell do I need edible flowers on a cake for? Why can't we just have a regular old cake? Why the hell do you need cake at a wedding? Since we're spending all this dough on food, why spend a lot on cake, when we can spend an equal amount on something like sorbet that's awesomer? Or cheesecake?
"No, those are all options for the grooms cake."
"The groomscake? What the hell is that?"
"It's a smaller cake that's usually chocolate if the wedding cake is vanilla, you know, so there is a choice of flavor."
"Well, it doesn't make sense to have two cakes. Why don't we just get something cool for the same amount we'd spend on this hyped up wedding cake?"
"Because wedding cake is what you're supposed to get, it's what we're getting, no more strange ideas from you okay?"
"Doesn'tmakeanysense."
"Are you done?"

Went and opened a joint account at the bank today. The finacee and I are going to start saving for the wedding expenses, so we figured this would be the best way to do it. Plus, after we get married we can use this account as our shared account to pay bills and all that shit.

Anyways, we've been saving since march, and finally scrapped together enough dough to open a decent account. I went over to the bank with more money in my hands than I think I've ever held, this side of a really big drug deal that is.

What just blows my mind is that we're saving our asses off, funding this wedding to throw for our friends. Really, that's what it is. We want to throw a great party celebrating us. So I said bye bye to a big pile of cash on Friday, but I guess we're assuming it's all worth it in the end. But part of me watched it depart and thought it would easily suffice for a downpayment and/or closing costs on a new home.

You think about weddings and look at the cash you saved and it seems like a small amount. Then you think about homes, cars, investments, and all of a sudden it throws you into a panic. Because here you are sitting on the seed of a nice financial investment that could be easily cultivated, and you're blowing it all on one day of...flowers and shit.

Logic tells me that it really must be a woman's world; or this shit wouldn't be going down. I don't ever want to hear one more word about women's rights. Speak up on the subject and I'll choke you to death with the reciepts.