Just a warning, this will probably be a long, long post. The wedding was somehow so much worse than I had thought it would be.
For anyone who doesn't "know" Brad, he's H's childhood friend who's super rude and was a HUGE pain in the ass to me while we were planning our wedding, plus his now wife is kind of horrible. If you're bored,
here's a Brad post.
So, first there was the
cash non-shower, and then the rude wedding invite to set the tone for this nonsense.
I was close to not going at all but H wanted to be able to spend time with me and I didn't really want to stay in our new house alone yet. It just feels weird there right now. So I went...
Friday:
Brad never told us what time the rehearsal dinner was until about 3 hours before it started, and we live 2 and a half hours away. [There was no actual rehearsal; just a dinner]. So on Friday, H and I both had to leave work early with no notice to run home and change and finish packing. As we're walking out the door, H gets another text from Brad letting us know that "business casual attire is required" for the RD. Ugh. So I had to run back in and change because wtf is business casual attire for a non-business event?!
We get there and all the appetizers are already gone. There were only 3 small plates for 30+ people, and no one ever brought out more apps. H and I were starving by the time we got there, but we had to wait 2 more hours till dinner was served.
Crazypants was a drunk mess. Yelled across the room for a waiter to bring her more whiskey while she's holding a full glass, and also snapped at a waitress. Her mom was also a drunk mess and cornered Brad demanding to know whether or not he was gonna show up for the wedding. It was super awkward and I kind of just slowly strolled away from that one.
We then had to sit and watch each WP member open their gift, even though they all got the exact same thing. Brad got all the GMs knives.
The food was good, though, and it was fully hosted so that part was a lot better than we expected. (Dinner was served family-style even though Crazypants had told us at our wedding that we were trashy for serving family-style).
Saturday:
H's parents drove in from out of town and ended up getting there about an hour early since there wasn't as much traffic as they anticipated. The site was closing (only one room was staying open as private event space) so there was nowhere for them to go besides into the reception space. They walk in and the bride's mom yells at them to get out. She said "This is all supposed to be a surprise and you're ruining it!" So his parents had to just stand in the hallway for an hour. That's some good hospitality.
I rode over to the venue with a couple friends since H took our car to go early for all the WP stuff. The venue was actually at a huge historical site with a bunch of different parking lots and tons of different buildings. The invitation didn't say anything about where to go, there were no signs, and no one directing guests. One of the friends finally asked a lawn maintenance guy and he told us to park at the visitor center and go in there to get to the path to walk out to the barn where the ceremony was. So that's what we did.
It was a long, long, long walk out there. Again, no signs and no one directing people, and tons of paths going every direction, so we just had to guess where to go. Luckily we saw some other wedding guests wandering around and just followed them.
But by the time we got into the barn, there were no chairs left, so some of us had to awkwardly stand in the back the entire time.
The barn had no AC, no fans, no airflow, and it was hot.
**ATTENTION LURKERS! Here is exactly why you DO NOT ever put your vision ahead of the comfort and well-being of your guests!!!**
Just as the ceremony was about to end, a BM passed out and hit the ground. Apparently she was only 17 so her mom was also there, and the lady got up so fast that she threw her chair into the wall and ran up the aisle literally screaming.
Luckily there were 2 army medics, I think 2 or 3 nurses, and I was standing next to a doctor. The girl woke right up, sat up and was talking, so she seemed fine but her mother would not stop screaming so multiple people ended up calling 911 and the whole site got flooded with fire trucks, an ambulance, paramedics, etc. In the midst of all this the pastor decided to just go ahead and pronounce Brad and crazypants as husband and wife so they kissed, and crazypants literally stepped over her fallen BM in order to make her grand exit.
Then we find out the reception is back in the visitors center, so we get to make the long trek back.
There was a head table, so I did not get to sit next to H. I did not get to sit with his parents, or with any of our friends. I was put at a "Significant Others" table with a bunch of random strangers (the SOs of everyone in the WP).
Our table wasn't sent to the buffet until over an hour after the WP had already eaten, and they ran out of food. They ran out of damn food! So I got a little bit of mashed potatoes (which I had to scrape from the bottom of the pan) and a roll.
But even if they hadn't run out, I wouldn't have been able to eat anything since I've been having medical issues and two of the things I can't have are pork and dairy. The only 2 main courses were chicken wrapped in bacon and smothered in cheese, or pork loin stuffed with bacon and cheese. H had called Brad weeks ago to ask about the food because we weren't sure if I'd be able to eat anything, and Brad assured H that there would be "lots of options" on the buffet.
Apparently I didn't miss much, though, because our friends said the chicken and pork were both cold, hard and dry and even the bacon tasted bad. Oh, wedding food.
The cash bar had like 7 different kinds of beer but only 2 kinds of wine (muscato and chardonnay) and then a few kinds of liquor which seemed odd but I guess I can't complain since I can't drink right now. Boo!
The DJ was bizarre. A few people were referring to him as a "strip club announcer" (whatever that means) and even though the space was tiny, the music was so. Damn. Loud. People kept walking outside to take a break from it. Even Brad commented to us that it was way too loud (yet he didn't think to ask the DJ to turn it down a bit). The DJ would randomly stop a song right in the middle and would yell strange things into the microphone, plus the songs he was playing were kind of awful. The dance floor was pretty much empty the entire night, aside from a few little kids.
Then they do toasts and someone comes out with champagne glasses and makes a big show of pouring champagne for the B&G... but no one else was allowed to have champagne.
And right when I thought I already had a HUGE list of tacky BS to report back to TK, the DJ said the magic words. Dollar Dance. Yep, that happened. And at that point, all I could do was cheer.
As soon as dinner was over and people could move around, I got to hang out with H and our friends so that part was fun. These friends live in other states so we hardly get to see them, which is the ONLY reason I stayed at the reception. It ended pretty early, so we all went out to get something to eat because no one had eaten much of the gross food (and I hadn't eaten anything really) so we ended the evening on a high note at least, and then went back to the hotel to try and sleep off the trauma lol.
During the dollar dance H even leaned over and said "You'll have so much to tell your friends on TK." Yes. Yes I did.
ETF too many words to not mess one up!