Wonderful Wedding Number One

Last Wednesday I went down to Wales for my friend's wedding. We met at uni - wargaming, naturally - but since he lives in Swansea, and I in Cheshire, I tend not to see Mark that often. I couldn't turn down this invitation, mind, as I was the (Co-)Best Man! On the Thursday we trundled over to Cardiff and had a couple of games of Flames of War. There was Mark, Jay (the other Best Man), Mark's dad and a couple of his friends, and I - and Mark's younger brother popped in to say hi. It says how very rusty I am that I got outflanked by the same unit commanded by the same opponent in the same terrain in both games I played. Clearly, you do have to tell me twice! We had a nice time, and had a full day.

On the Friday Mark's affianced, Marie, was doing last-minute wedding stuff, so Mark and I got to take care of their baby, Lily. She's usually good as gold, but was teething. I know very nearly nothing about babies, and my dramatic reading of video titles failed to distract her from her primary purpose of crying. Mark was hoovering, and so couldn't help. Thinking back, we really should have done that the other way round. She's very fond of her dad, and doesn't cry if he's holding her. Well, she certainly cries a lot less, anyway! She seemed phlegmatic when Mark popped on The Walking Dead, and lots of chaps wandered about missing bits of faces and trailing their innards. I'm not much of a zombie fan. I heretically find Romero's original Dawn of the Dead something of a yawn-fest. Nonetheless, I quite enjoyed the show. Given my love of wordplay, my favourite bit was the appearance of a doctor called Jenner who worked for the CDC and even mentioned smallpox. Simple things for simple minds!

Come the Friday evening, we trundled out to TGI Friday's, where they kindly knocked up something vegan for me. Then at the end of the meal, as it was a special occasion, they gave Mark a glass filled with cream and three cherries. The idea is that one stands on a chair and tries to eat one cherry. Something got a bit lost in translation, and he ended up eating all three cherries and drinking all the cream! The truly remarkable thing was that his stomach did not then rebel against this alien incursion. I'll draw a veil, as is only proper, over the events of the rest of the stag evening, as is right and proper. Suffice to say that even Mark's ironclad stomach was eventually defeated.

The Saturday was mainly a day of rest, and saw us watch most of the second season of The Walking Dead. When Channel 5 catches up, I shall have to watch the last two episodes, as that is all I missed. The Sunday was the big day, and we all pottered about, preparing, putting on suits, gathering buttonholes and so on. Needless to say, there were hiccups. The bride had the rings at her parents' house, and had meant to bring them over on the Friday or Saturday. Having forgotten, Mark was to pop over on the Sunday to pick them up. But when he got there, only Matt was left in the house,the others having gone out, and they'd not told him where the rings were! Happily, they came with the bride to the venue, Sketty Hall, and we didn't have to come up with some crazy last-minute plan!

The bride looked lovely, the groom very smart, and both were brimming over with happiness. The marriage went off without a hitch, and then we adjourned for the wedding meal. After two very nice courses we paused before dessert for speeches from the Bride's father, Paul, from Mark, and lastly from me. I was a little nervous, but all seemed to go well. Then there was dessert, followed my merriment, revels, dancing and a teeny-tiny amount of drinking! I shared a taxi back to Mark and Marie's place, as they were spending the night at a snazzy hotel. All in all, a lovely time!