Dec. 5, 2003
5 Weddings in 7 Weeks (Part II)
OK, so before I get to the wedding reviews from October and November, I want to talk about the CD a little bit. Why? Because it's almost here! And I'm excited. And when my friend Shelley in Colorado e-mailed me to ask for more information about it, I realized that those of you who haven't been actively working on the CD don't know very much about it. So here is her question (which I left in because she gave me such a great compliment) and my answer:
>Can you tell me a little about the CD?! I know it will be excellent. It's
>you !
It will be MOST excellent, but not just because of me. I got one of the best guitar players and pop craftsmen I know to produce and play most of the guitars on the record (my ex-boyfriend, Kenny Howes), and the drummer is my current boyfriend, Derik, who is one of the best drummers I've ever heard (and no, I'm not biased). It was recorded by Lee Flier, a local musician and friend of Kenny's who used to be a recording engineer in L.A. Other special guests are all over the record: Kelley sings back-up, Becky plays flute, Dolph (from Three-Quarter Ale) plays mandolin, and I turned one of the songs over to Matthew and said, "Make it a Karma Lingo song!" That was the best part of recording this CD, knowing that I had all of these talented people to turn to who could make it great! There are a couple of quiet folk songs on the record, but mostly it's straight-up rock and roll. It's a combination of old songs I've been playing for a while that people have been asking for ("New England," "I Don't Like Drinking," "One Fish Two Fish," "The Ersatz Bluegrass Band") and new songs written in the past year ("Sebastian," "Apples Red," "Runaway Bride"), and I think it's a really good mix of stuff. On the first record, there were a couple of songs that I got sick of really quickly and didn't think were as good as the others, but I honestly can say that I love every song on this album. I don't know how other people will feel about it, but I really love this record! I hope people will like it as much as I do.
So there you have it: my official commercial for Were You Prom Queen? It's not too late to preorder and get the special goodies! Send in your form now....
OK, on to weddings. First of all, I would like to blame someone for the fact that this entry of The Goober Diaries is late. However, I am not sure whom to blame, so I'll move on to the meat of the matter. (Is that a saying? It sounds wrong. What's the saying I'm trying to quote?)
The last wedding of October was the Halloween wedding of my friends Sarah and Jeff of Mickle-A-Do at a house that is a replica of the Haunted Mansion at Disney World. It was every bit as much fun as it sounds, and I am so glad I got to go share that excellent party and memorable night with them. The guests' attire was a mixed bag of costumes and fancy dress (I tried to do both by borrowing my Victorian caroling costume), adding to the surreal feeling I get when I see people I know from the Renaissance Faire whom I've never seen in modern-day clothing before. The wedding cake was chocolate-frosted and festooned with spiders and ghosties. Sarah's sister had managed to find a skeleton couple in wedding attire who light up and sing "I Got You Babe." Penny had found goblets with monsters on them for the first toast. Jeff's music for walking down the aisle was a spooky version of The Wedding March in a minor key with a pained ghost howling "I Dooooo" in the background (he says it's from the Haunted Mansion ride). Jeff and his Best Man had fashioned a beautiful full moon out of fiberglass, which hung over the ceremony like a blessing. Jeff and Sarah's vows were heartfelt and moving. And then they descended the staircase into the reception wearing fake noses. In short, there were so many memorable moments that the entire evening was made of them, like a necklace of strung beads - there's no way I could pick out just a few. And unfortunately, I can't even show you the pictures! I took lots of them, but when I took them to the CC&P November birthday party, they disappeared. If you were at that party and you have them, will you please let me know? I got some great photos, and I'll be so sad if they're gone forever!
The last wedding of the year was Bettina and Carl's, at which I had the honor of singing as part of the choir. The church had one of those old-fashioned choir lofts overlooking the church, so we had a bird's eye view of the ceremony, as well as the opportunity to surprise everyone and go, "Hee! Made you look" when we started singing. Well. We would have been able to do that if we hadn't given our presence away more than once by waving and calling to people we knew ahead of time. Bettina and Carl requested formal attire for their wedding, which gave the fashionistas of the Ren Fest set an opportunity to work their finery. My friends all looked so pretty! I'll admit that we couldn't help being a little catty and playing "spot the bridesmaid's dresses," but all in all, I just really enjoyed having the opportunity for all of us to put on fancy dresses and play grown-up.
As for the wedding itself, well, it was every little girl's Dream Wedding! Bettina made her dress, which was corseted and bell-sleeved with a long train and a tiara, and the wedding cake was made to look like a castle. The wedding itself was in a Catholic church in downtown Atlanta, and everyone behaved with due pomp and ceremony. (I point this out only because there was no pomp or ceremony of any kind to be found at the rehearsal, to which we were all an hour late, and at which I feared the wedding party would wither away and die under the frosty glares of the church staff, who seemed quite ready to go home to their beds.)
The reception was at the Shriner Temple on Ponce de Leon Avenue, one of those buildings you always see and wonder idly what it looks like on the inside. Well, now I know! Inside the grand, mosque-like façade resides a hallway full of plaques that kind of reminded me of the VFW, several very nice ballrooms, one of which was occupied by the wedding and another of which seemed to contain a scary business association of some kind, and a lounge area with sofas and chairs that contained, on this particular night, scores of bored and tired children. I suppose I should have been sympathetic to their plight, but honestly, I think being bored at a wedding with a pretty, pretty princess, a castle-shaped cake, a bouquet to be tossed, food to be eaten, and dancing to be done shows a severe lack of imagination. When I was a little girl, all I wanted in the world was to go to weddings like this one.
I now present to you a Fashion Gallery from the evening, starring Bettina and featuring me and my glamourous friends. First, here's the bride:
Another picture of the bride with my friend Cathy, whose dress was really pretty, even though this isn't a very good Oscars shot:
Here's me with Becky, both of us working basic black:
And here's Nancy and Matthew (Nancy wore my favorite dress of the evening, a one-shouldered cranberry dress with a matching cranberry velvet wrap - way to accessorize!):
Here's Rivka and John (only a true winter like Rivka can pull off that much scarlet):
Here's what happens when the leftover wedding cake is left unattended:
And, finally, a shot of the guys (I love when guys dress up):
Memorable wedding moments:
So now, that's it. No more weddings until spring. Then, I'll be present at the weddings of both my sister and my very first boyfriend, both of which will be highly trippy and insanely fun.
Now it's Christmas time, and it's my very favorite part of Christmas time: the beginning! I'm dusting off my caroling costume and music book, I'm getting out my Christmas CD's, I'm debating whether to get a tree (and, if so, how to keep the cats from destroying it), and I'm not sick of it all yet. Yay, Christmas!
Oh, and my other current obsession is The Lord of the Rings. I have already purchased my tickets for the midnight showing of Return of the King, and I am beside myself with anticipation. Derik, coolest boyfriend ever, got me the Two Towers extended DVD for Christmas and gave it to me early so that we could watch it over the Thanksgiving weekend, and boy did we watch it! We watched about six hours' worth of the making-of documentaries, then watched the actual movie. Oh, and we also have tickets to see the extended versions of the first two movies in the theatre next week. I am one obsessed little fantasy freak. In fact, here's how bad it is: last night, I dreamt that I went to a Renaissance Festival in New Zealand with Elijah Woods (who plays Frodo in the films). He had normal clothes on, but he was still wearing his curly hobbit wig. The Ren Fest was very realistic, much more so than ours, and I kept asking him what things meant that I'd never heard of before. Then, as we were leaving (the Ren Fest was up on the top of the hill they used for Edoras in the Two Towers film, so we were driving down the hill), they shot off red and blue fireworks, and I said, "Hey, wait! That's not Renaissance!" before I woke up. Yeah. Way too excited about Lord of the Rings. But if any of you reading are fans, my favorite behind-the-scenes look is Ian McKellen's journal of his experiences making the movie. It's really quite interesting to read; he's a good writer (you can hear his voice as he writes), and he talks a lot about New Zealand and what it was like to be there. Happy reading!
What’s in my stereo at home:
What’s in my car:
What's in my CD player at work:
Me and my boy, photo courtesy of Cathy