DADDY IS SICK

Well, I am ill and if you look at what time of year it is, it seems about right. I generally fall ill sometime in late December or early January. Last year, I managed to get a nasty sinus infection right after Christmas which I suffered with for almost a month before going to the doctor for antibiotics. It remains the worst sinus infection I’ve ever had.

This time around, I just start coughing last Thursday. It was weird. I felt fine and then on Thursday evening, I felt this urge to cough a bit. The next morning, I woke up and bam, I instantly had a cold with a cough. There was no preamble with a stuffy nose nor a sore throat. I went straight to the cough. I suppose I should feel lucky that my sinuses are clear and my throat feels fine but it still sucks to be ill. I hate coughing. I think I’d rather have a sore throat and a stuffy nose. Now I’m all tired and hacking up a lung all the time.

I hope this resolves itself before I go on the holiday break.

OFF THE GRID

Hey, are you aware there is a new Star Wars movie coming out on Friday? So yeah, there is and I’ve done my best over the last two years to not learn any details about it.

It’s been difficult to avoid all the trailers, pictures, news, and just about everything for this movie. I adopted the same strategy for Revenge of the Sith and I was successful. It was easier back then though as social media was not as prevalent as it is now though. YouTube and Twitter weren’t a thing back then and you had to rely on old-fashioned web pages.

The premiere of the newest Star Wars movie is on Monday evening in Los Angeles. You can expect story spoilers to make their way onto the Internet after that. I wasn’t planning on seeing the movie until a few weeks after the release date but I might not have any choice. I will need to see it just to avoid having it spoiled for me.

In the light of this, I am going to attempt to stay off social media until next weekend. No Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, MySpace, AOL Home Page, and Usenet until I can see this movie. It will be difficult.

BORAT RETURNS

After a public absence of about seven years, comedian Sacha Baron Cohen trotted out his Borat character on The Jimmy Kimmel Show this week. The character’s return was staged as a promotional bit for Baron Cohen’s new movie, The Brothers Grimsby. The movie also stars the very underrated Mark Strong who is wonderful in just about everything he appears in.

It was somewhat odd seeing Borat again as Baron Cohen wisely retired the character after the Borat movie was released. As much as I enjoy Borat, I hope he doesn’t make another appearance for a while to keep it special.

HOLY, IT’S DECEMBER

I guess on some level I understood that we are now in December on the calendar but I guess it only registered with me this evening how far we were into the month already. By my estimation, it is now December 10th which is crazy. There is just over two weeks until Christmas. Where did the time go?

I think on a subconscious level, I’m still back in November somewhere and not just the end of November, probably somewhere near the beginning of it. Two weeks until Christmas! I’m not worried about presents or crap like that. I just give my parents cash so five minutes at the dollar store for a card and trip to the ATM will take care of that. I just can’t believe the end of the year just came up like that. Wasn’t yesterday just Halloween?

WEDDING DAY

I honestly didn’t realize how much effort and energy is expended by people in an actual wedding party until my friend’s wedding on Saturday. In the past, as a guest, all I’ve had to do was RSVP, buy a card and gift, show up at the ceremony, show up at the reception, eat, and drink. That’s so easy. If you’re actually involved in the wedding, it’s more like doing all day marathon. It’s exhausting!

The night before I checked into a hotel with my friend the groom. We did this because the first of two tea ceremonies would be at the same hotel at 9am in the morning. I only got five hours of sleep that night since we were busy with last second preparations for the big day. My friend had it even worse. He was so amped up from all the running around and worried about missing some vital detail that he was restless for almost the entire night. It didn’t help that I snored. He said he got about 30 minutes of sleep.

Our alarm woke us up at 7am, so we could have plenty of time to get ready. Since we are dudes, it didn’t take us long to change into our suits. We actually had to wait nervously for about 25 minutes in the room as we waited for the signal to go to the massive suite where the bride’s relatives were waiting for us.

Just after 9am, we were given the ok to the suite. The tea ceremony there was for the bride’s family. It was the biggest and longest tea ceremony I’ve ever seen. Usually these things take about ten minutes and include only the immediate family. This one was about an hour-long. There were so many family members there.

After that was done, the bride, groom, maid of honour, myself, the wedding photographers, and a few helpers then drove from the hotel to the groom’s parents’ house to do their tea ceremony there. That was about fifteen minutes of driving. The tea ceremony there was quick, taking probably less than ten minutes. There were some light refreshments served afterwards. We couldn’t linger too long because we then had to go to a golf course club house to prep for the wedding ceremony.

It was another 15 minute drive to the golf course for setup of the guest book, meeting with the officiant, last-minute consult with the event planner at the golf course, and setup of the music system. The bride also changed into her wedding gown at this point in a private room. Did I mention that I had both the rings at this point? I’d been carrying them all morning from the time we left our hotel room to the golf course. My biggest nightmare was that I’d somehow lose the rings somewhere and somehow.

We had about an hour to set up before the start time of the ceremony and guest began to filter in almost immediately. For a 1pm start time, people were cutting it really close. Some people were too late because the wedding procession was about to begin and there was no way they could get to their seats without disturbing it.

As for my turn in the procession, I’d practiced it before and people told me to slow my walk down. I tell ya, I knew I should go slow but when almost 200 people are watching you walk, you get nervous and you just speed up. The ceremony itself went without any major problems. My nightmare here was that I’d somehow get light-headed and pass out in front of everyone and ruin the ceremony. I did not do that. The only slight hitch was that I had a little bit of trouble getting one of the rings out of the leather pouches they were stored in.

After the ceremony ended, the guests were directed to the next room where light snacks, cake, and champagne was served. The food came out almost immediately, which was very impressive. It was at this time that people could also get photos taken with the bride and groom.

After about an hour of mingling, the wedding party had to go out to get pictures taken. The couple decided to go out to Steveston for their photos. It’s a beautiful and quaint part of town by the ocean. You have to remember though that on Saturday, there were torrential rains and gale force winds out. It was also very cold. The bride and groom were forced to be under umbrellas almost the entire time for their photos. They were out there for almost two hours when the lack of sunlight forced them to stop.

It was then off to the restaurant where the reception was being help to set up there. We had about an hour before dinner was served. We had to set up the table cards, seating charts, video slide show, and a GoPro camera.

This was the last event of the day but I still had to make my best man speech and toast. When the guests arrived and dinner was served, I was happy to be eating some delicious Chinese food but that only meant my speech was coming up. I think my speech was three courses in. As they were clearing away the second course and getting ready to serve the third course, I could see the emcee giving me the signal that I would be up soon.

I had sorta practiced my speech the week before but I wasn’t really worried about the execution of it. I have no problem with speaking in front of large groups and I have a lot of experience with that. My only worry was the content of the speech. Would people find it funny or entertaining? Would it wind up being just a big inside joke that only the groom and I would understand?

It was too late to worry about that because I was introduced to everyone and I was up. The words just flowed, I paused when necessary, and worked the room as much as I could. To my relief I did get a few laughs and I got to the end where I toasted the bride and groom.

It was such a weight off my shoulders once I was done and could sit down again. I drank a whole glass of wine in one gulp. That was my last major responsibility as the best man. The rest of the dinner was quite relaxing after that.

Being the best man for my friend’s wedding was definitely an honour. No best man should ever take that role lightly. It will require effort, planning, some inevitable stress, and patience. You are there for the groom and you need to do anything that’s required to make the wedding go smoothly. I’m not sure if anyone else will ever ask me to be best man but I sure learned a lot about wedding this time around.

OIL BLOTTING PAPERS

One of the best gifts I got from the wedding weekend was a package of oil blotting papers. During the festivities of the day, one of the groom’s sisters gave him a box of oil blotting papers because she thought he was getting shiny in the face. If you’re not familiar with these magical sheets, they are basically like when you use paper towels to absorb the excess oil from the french fries you just made in the deep fryer. Now instead of paper towels, it’s these thin sheets of rice paper like material and instead of french fries, it’s your gross oily face.

Now my friend didn’t look all that shiny, so he gave me the box to hold. He never got to use them and he looked pretty dry all day anyways. I have a pretty oily t-zone so I went into the bathroom before the reception started and blotted to no end. It was pretty gross.

Usually at work, near the end of the afternoon, I’ll go into the bathroom and use a few paper towels and rub my forehead and nose with them. I’d like to say the paper towels don’t look like I just dabbed some fried chicken fresh out of the fryer but that would be lying. Now that I these blotting papers, I can probably just blot at my desk. I don’t give two sheets who sees me as long as I get rid of my shine.

I SURVIVED

On Saturday, a good friend of mine got married and I was the best man for the whole event. I wasn’t sure how I’d survive the whole day as I only got five hours of sleep the night before and the wedding events began at 9am and didn’t wrap up until 11pm. We were on the go for the entire time in between.

I’ll reserve another post for the actual day but I will say that I didn’t do much of anything today. I was so tired from Saturday. I didn’t even have that much to drink outside of a single glass of wine. After getting about seven hours of sleep, I didn’t even leave my bed for another two hours this morning

After getting a late lunch, I felt the need to nap, so I slept for another three hours or so. Man, weddings can be exhausting. Actually, my friend the groom probably was even more tired than I was. He said he only had 30 minutes of good sleep because he was so worried about the big day.

The modern, big family wedding can be a joyous occasion for sure but it asks a lot out of the bride and groom. I am sure they are very thankful they can just relax as newlyweds now.

THE BEST MAN APPROACHES

As you may recall, I am the best man for my good friend’s upcoming wedding. He is getting married on Saturday. I am taking Friday off to help him prepare and for me to ensure I have everything I need to make his wedding go smoothly. Being a best man is a lot of work and I was very naive about what the effort that goes into that role in a wedding. It has caused me a bit of stress but that’s because I don’t want to screw this up for my friend. Weddings are such interesting cultural experiences which leave very little room for error.

The wedding day approaches though. I made it through the bachelor party and now I just need to guide my friend on the big day. I need to not lose the rings and not forget the words to my speech at the reception. Beyond that, it’s just a few other small details and I should be good. I’ll report back on Sunday evening.