h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Warning This Journal entry has not been tested or proof-read for that matter...it prob makes no sense to anyone other then me and as such is pretty much like all my other journal entries...


I recently had the privilege of attending my first actual church wedding. Maybe you have heard of Shea and TJ tying the knot...if your on this site then there is a very good chance that you did. If you have not read anything on the wedding then you may want to check out Shea and TJ's journals and the wonderful report Clive put together for the post, before and maybe instead of reading anything which will be in my journal here. This information will be factual (or as near as I can get with my memory) and it will contain much information that you might feel helpful in describing the wedding and following reception.

Prep information

I guess all stories have a beginning and this one shouldn't be any different. The only problem is which beginning to start with. I could talk about the first time I met Shea face to face or even the first time I met TJ face to face, but is that really where I want to start hmmm. I could go into the past of my friendship with my guest Aaron O'Keefe, but maybe I will save that for latter. I guess it would be safe to start off briefly with saying that Shea and TJ actually invited me during the Feb NYC meet-up. Now you may be asking yourself why would they, after meeting me personally actually agree for me to show up at the wedding....The only explanation I could give you that would sound plausible is, alcohol and lots of it. So here we go I have been invited and I don't have a thing to wear . (I haven't ever bought a suit...I think I wore a borrowed one in a school play once but that was years ago.) So after I get the invitation in hand I go about getting ready. Now I don't have near as many things to get ready for as lets say the bride and groom but I still have some things to do. The invitation is for Donald Jones and Guest. Well I go out and get me a guest...a lovely young lady who is going to be my date for the whole shindig...Well a little while latter she takes a job prevented her from going so I said to myself, "what shall I do now". Well what could I do but look for a new guest. I have known Aaron O'Keefe sense we were freshman in High School and as a matter of fact he is the person that actually introduced me to H2G2 in the first place. Well it seems our intrepid explorer decided to get his butt back from overseas and we have been trying to get a chance to hang out...so I of course suggest the wedding. He is thrilled with the idea and decides to extend his visit to a whole week. With the guest part taken care of I head out to get a suit. I am happy to say that I am now the owner of a very nice (IMHO) suit in which I can now go out to things (not sure other then weddings) that need one. I tell Aaron of my purchase and he tells me...oh man I don't have a suit. I suggest a shirt and tie because that is what Shea had told me originally to wear. He says there is no way he's going to let me get to wear a suit and him only a shirt and tie so he decides to wear his Dress Blues. So now I have a guest and a suit now it should be a simple matter of waiting out the time oh that and figuring how I am actually going to get to and from the wedding ....At some point or another I work it out with Clive and Amy+ so that they will be able to crash at my place before and after the wedding. So everything is working out just about fine...Aaron will be driving down on the 3rd then I will get Amy+ and Clive at Penn station on the 6th then we all head out on the LIRR on the 7th. Well room opens up before the wedding for my fellow researchers so that they will actually be able to stay out on Long Island before the wedding and will only need to crash at my place after the wedding...so what does this do...it frees me of all responicbilities and I don't have to be anywhere before the 7th. Now you may be asking yourself once again "what the heck is this guy babbling about", "and why would I need to know any of this" well this is my story and I will tell it like I want to . So I have Wed, Thr, and Fri off from work, Aaron, after trying to go instead to Canada then hang out with yours truly, arrives on Wed night....now much of Wed through Fri is a blur and most of the things I do remember I will not put in this story...lets face it those things would make a much different story...I will say this, there was much and general acting like dag on fools those days before the wedding... there where some late nights and not a lot of sleep was got....matter of fact we had left the city early Fri with the intention of getting some much needed sleep before the big day...and that fell through horribly...we ended up staying up watching movies, and you guessed it, drinking till oh about 2 hours before we had to get up and get ready to head off to the wedding....so you can see the kind of mind set and shape we were already in.....

So that brings us to the Wedding day
So here we are on the 7th of July at about 0530 ing like crazy trying to fully wake up so that we can get ready for the long day ahead of us. It starts simply enough shower find the clothes put em on that sort of thing....I am so glad I left extra time in our schedule because either time decided to go a bit faster that morning or we were just not up to speed. We left the house and stopped for coffee on the way...in the back of my mind I kept telling myself... "self I know the is very important, but don't you dare spill it on yourself." I am happy to say that I didn't, and that we made it to my towns train station on time. This train ride is roughly 45 mins and takes us into grand central. I would like to point out this also marks the beginning of strangers stopping Aaron to ask about his uniform. This happend on the ride out, during the wait before the wedding, after the wedding, at the reseption, on the way home, and even after we got back home...It was very very funny. We of course ride on the wonderful subway system to Penn station where we boarded yet another train to take us out to Long Island....this train ride was around two hours and I must say...we had the est train... it was a double decker and the seats were pretty . What was not were the 250 children all pumped up about going to the beach for the day,they were extremely loud the whole way out...So we get to the last stop on the train and get out hopping to see our ride (Shea's brother in law) figuring we would stand out, we look around for a bit but do not see anyone that we think could be going to a wedding anytime that day. Now thankfully there is about 20 cabs just waiting for someone to hop in so we do and asked our cab driver to take us to the proper church. Now our cab driver, who I think has in the past played in just about every mob movie ever made or at least he looks like he should of, tells us all about any family member he has ever had that got married in this same exact church. We get out in front of a very empty looking church and parking lot and had roughly an hour to kill before the wedding. The only problem is there really isn't anything we could do to kill time, so we head into this lovely little white church were the wedding is going to be held. Now before I go on, I would like to say that if you have ever really desired to be allowed in heaven then it's probably not a good idea to stand in a little church for an hour killing time when you have been parting and drinking all week and you have had very little sleep. Ok that being said here goes this part of the story. So here we are no one is in the church but us and we just kinda stand in the nice airconditioing for quite a while...we use the bathroom that we found (that we latter found out were off limits) and just basically talked and joked around....saying things like wouldn't it be cool if we would of thought to bring a little buddy Christ and set him up at the alter over there becuas it would just pop at ya.... or hey did you notice there is no cross on that statue...it just kinda looks like Jesus is jumping up in the air to give a couple of buds high fives...then that leads to oh we should get pictures of us jumping up to give him a high five or what if we could get someone to take a picture of us like he's just been out parting to much and he's being held up by the two of us...and we ended up looking at the names in the stain glass windows and tried to link them to people we knew...after about half an hour a dude came in smiled at us and walked around the back of the little wall separator...this we found out latter was the deacon...and shortly there after people started milling about out side. Now I am not sure if we were supposed to be waiting for something outside or not but the my rule of thumb was where ever the aircoditioning was that is where I was going to be. We had people come in and ask us if this was the right place for the wedding (now get this they used real names not Shea and TJ like they should of) so we could only answer them with a "umm sure hope so". I think people thought we were Users or important people because we were standing near the door inside when most everyone else was outside...so we kept on getting asked questions and got many strange looks when we answered with "have no idea" "sure why not" "beats the heck out of me" "if it makes you happy" and so on. Eventually people from outside started coming in and sitting down on either side of the church...Now I am guessing that the grooms people sat on one side and the brides on the other....now sense we had no idea where we should sit I just picked the back row and we finally sat down again right before the wedding right behind the photographer. We saw Clive and Amy+ come in and I tried to get Clive's attention but I don't think it dawned on him who we where until they had been sat down for a min then turned around and waved or something. We had heard from TJ's brother about someone forgetting to pick up TJ and we were relived to see that he had made it and had taken his place in the front of the church. Now all we needed was a bride and this shindig could get started. I would like to point out at this time that they handed out some kind of little pamphlet to the people as they came in which because we didn't know what it was we didn't bother to get one. Evidently this piece of paper contained the instructions for the quests like what they should say in response to certain things and words to songs that would be sung. If you ever happen to be at a wedding or some such event and they hand out a little pamphlet before hand then I would advise you to pick it up...it might have important information.

The Wedding
So the guests are all seated and all is actually quieted except for that wedding type music in the background. In comes the bride maids and umm grooms men I guess one couple at a time and they take their places at the front of the church...and the moment everyone has been waiting for with all expectant eyes on the door...Shea walks in looking stunning in her wedding dress....and thousands of flashes go off as people try to snap the perfect picture...now I have the perfect view and have my camera pointed and it is at this time right after I push the button to take a great picture that I find out the battery has gone dead in my camera and that it's not going to work to good now is it. About the time that I stop cursing my luck that the bride gets to the front of the church for the start of the ceremony. There is many parts to a wedding ceremony I didn't know anything about and it didn't help that one I am not Catholic so I didn't do the little cross-thingy at the right times or that two I didn't have one of the little programs so I had no idea when we were supposed to stand sit what to say or what so like always I was completely lost. I think Aaron faired a bit better then me because he at least had the Catholic thing going for him. Even though I was completely lost for much of the ceremony I thought it was beautiful. Of course we cheered when it was all over and yes I did cheer YAAAAAAAAYYYYYYY SHEA AND TJ GOT MARRIED YAAAAAAAYYYYY but I didn't think other people other then Aaron heard me...I might be wrong though ....So now it's time to do the meet and greet on the way out the door...while we are waiting the Photographer strikes a conversation with Aaron because of his blues and it's quite entertaining...because we are in the back of the church we are some of the last people to leave...So I get to surprise Shea and TJ with the Identify of my guest and meet TJ's mom who actually says...oh these are more of those axe murderers with a simile on her face and Shea's mom and dad...then it's time to stand outside and try to figure out how in the world we are getting from the church to the reception. Luckily we meet up with our original ride from the train station Shea's brother in law and he agrees to get us over there. There is much picture taking and such in front of the church then we head off to the reception.

The Reception
I am glad that we got a ride because there is no way we would of not gotten lost on the walk over without it. We arrive and once again we are some of the first to arrive. Once again our inexperience shows it self when we notice some people bending over and looking at these little picture frames. We wonder over to figure out what they might be doing and low and behold they are little picture frames that tell you where you are supposed to go latter...like mine said Donald E. Jones Table 12. We are instructed by another guest to take it with us when we leave the little table which I do and we are pointed into this really big room with lots and lots of food. I start looking around for table 12 but none of the tables have any numbers on them. I ask a worker where in the world table 12 is and he laughs at me and says that this isn't the dinner this is the cocktail hour, after this we would be brought into another room with our assigned tables. Now I don't know about you but we haven't ever had that much food in front of us and been told that it's not even the dinner that's crazy talk but we believe him. I of course decide it might be a good idea to get something to drink and head over to the bar where to my delight I find out it's an open one and start my first of many jack and cokes. I had left Aaron on the other side of the room and I when I make my way back to him he decides there has got to be a coat room that he can put his hat so he doesn't have to carry it around...15 mins latter after circumnavigating the whole place he finds the coat room about 20 feet from where he started his quest (what can I say, you can't spell lost without the L and the T) and makes his way back over to me. I let him know the bar is open and he heads off with the specific purpose to just get a water because he doesn't want to drink anything yet. He comes back with his first of many s and said the bartender actually twisted his arm. We decide that sense we won't actually know anyone that it might he a good idea to find a seat that isn't out in the open and we sit down. Amy+ and Clive join us shortly there after and there we waited till the banquet hall was opened up. After chatting for a while and basically having a good time it was announced that we should make our way to the banquet hall. We got in and found table 12 with little problems sat down and found that the table arrangements where set up almost especially for us with smiliess from the site in the arrangements. The reception went by in a blur...there was dancing (not by me) and speeches and singing and drinking (ok I took part in that) and much Yaying (that was me and Aaron)...We talked with all at our table and many others around...we never did find out who some of the very hot guests where but it's probably better that we didn't talk to them at that point (yes some of the Yaying was about that). One thing I did notice and I thought I was pretty lucky was that there was a small disposable camera on each table. Now seeing how my camera's battery died we decided to use this one...we took some pretty cool pictures even one of me giving Shea the bouquet of loo brushes...but we didn't realize that we were supposed to take pictures then leave the camera on the table when we left. Basically fun was had by all, well especially by me and Aaron. At some point it was time to leave...I am not really sure when but I would say about 3 or 4pm. We called a taxi and went back to the train station. We rode another double decker train back most of the way to Penn station but because it was so crowded we couldn't sit down. In Jamaica (somewhere in Queens) we changed over to another train that ran express back to the citty...there was only room for three in the one seat so I let the others sit together and I sat with two strangers...now the open bar and my lack of sleep kicked in and I fell asleep on this train...waking I was supposed to guide Amy+, Clive, and Aaron back to the right trains to get them to my house...the problem was that I forgot to pick my Camera and the disposable camera up off the seat in my rush to get off the train. I do want to report that I got everyone safely where they were going...but once again failed to get to sleep on time...and ended up staying up till 4am

And that's the end of that story.

And where was I when all this happened!!

I don't remember it happening that way!

Dear Tac,
Fantastic account. I loved every minute of reading it. Very sincerely, AR1

TJ I think for the most part you had your mind on other more important things

and thanks AR1


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So Tac and Aaron were mistaken for users?
Oh, mon Dieu!

I'd like to see pictures of you in your new suit,
Tac.

I have to confess that I have been at Catholic services
and funerals, and even with the instructions I usually
don't have a clue what I'm supposed to say or sing next.
It's not just Catholic services either. I am equally
lost in Episcopalian and Lutheran services.

I don't usually get lost in Unitarian services, but
that's because I don't pay much attention during them.

I don't know if there are going to be any....with the loss of my camera...but I did by one disposible one on the way home and had my landlord take a couple shots of me and Aaron while we were still all dressed up...with of course an in hand...not really sure where that camera is but i am pretty sure it's in the house somewhere..just a matter of finding it


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You have an alarming tendency to lose cameras, don't you Tac?

You haven't turned up in any of the pictures I've been given yet, but there's one of Aaron with his hands firmly clasped during the garter toss! I think you're hiding behind TJ in that one ...

yes I think I was...we timed it so we could take a step back and get out of the way as soon as he started throwing and what not....


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I used to stand way at the back with my hands clasped. It always worked until my cousin's wedding. His teeny, tiny wife (all 4'10" of her) whaled that thing right past my clasped hands, and onto my feet. Everyone just turned to look at me, and I had no choice but to pick it up, since it was sitting there (guess I should have given it a boot). Anyway, see where it's gotten me? All happy and content ...

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I guess I'll have to help find the camera when I'm there...

na I am going to find it before the weekend is up...that way I can take pictures with it at the meet...might want to tie a string around it and attach it to myslef somewhere though


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Well, if you don't find it this next week, if I help look, you'll still have it for the meet...

Perhaps I should offer to keep it in the Bottomless Purse while you're not actually taking pictures...

if the purse has no bottom how does stuff stay in it


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It's kind of like the Hole in the pocket...

ok


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Hi Tacsatduck,
In spite of TJ's memories being different to yours, your account was a very earthy account of what went on.!! I am sorry that there is no permanent record of either you or your friend Aaron. We shall have to brief Amy P. to take official photographs of you both so that we can see who you both are.
Again thanks for your contribution which amused me mightily. Have a good weekend AR1

"Hole in the pocket" reminded me of an old
song (an incredibly silly song) called
"Hole in the Bucket," which I will now inflict
on the rest of you so you'll become as deranged
as I am currently :



There's a hole in the bucket,
dear Liza, dear Liza,
There's a hole in the bucket,
dear Liza, a hole.

Well, fix it, dear Henry,
dear Henry, dear Henry,
Well, fix it, dear Henry,
dear Henry, well fix it!

With what shall I fix it,
dear Liza, dear Liza,
With what shall I fix it,
dear Liza, with what?

.....And so on ad infinitum

hmmm ad infinitum = how long the comercials seem when there is a break in a very good tv show


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