July 1, 2017

 I slept horribly last night. Our suite for four grown men consisted of one queen-sized bed and a pullout loveseat. It was not very sweet. I ended up on the pullout with my friend who is getting married. Two grown men on a loveseat pullout bed is a tight fit. Along with that, the other three guys were having a snoring contest. I may have been a participant but I can't actually judge that. I just know that I can't fall asleep when snoring is happening. It was also freezing in the room, which would have been alright if I was asleep because I usually like it cool in my room at night, but it wasn't working for me last night. I probably only got a few hours of sleep at most. It was a long, short night.

In the morning we hung out in the hotel room for a little bit, I took a shower, and we headed to my friend's house sometime after ten o'clock after the bride and bridesmaids had left. I spent some time working on my journal entry while trying to stay awake and then we went to meet the other guys for lunch. Afterward we went across the street so my friend could show us the building him and his crew have been renovating. It is a really cool old building, built in the early 1900s or late 1800s and was originally a department store. He said the biggest project they had worked on before this was around a thousand square feet. This place is around 10,000 square feet. It's huge.

Around two o'clock the photographer showed up at the house and we got changed into our tuxedos. My friend left with the photographer after we got dressed so he could take first-look picture with the bride. I can't remember if that is actually what they were calling it but instead of seeing her for the first time at the wedding, they did it at a park so they could take pictures. At that time I went to the hotel with the best man to drop off my car and the other two groomsman took my friend's car to the car wash. They dropped it off at the park for my friend and then we headed to the wedding venue.

When we got to the venue it was a hurry up and wait situation. The wedding was supposed to start at four o'clock and I think it was only about five minutes late. Instantly one of the most memorable parts of the wedding was my friend's rental shoe falling apart. He was the first groomsman to walk down the aisle and about halfway down the aisle there was a sound like metal clanking on the ground. I thought maybe he had accidentally kicked one of the candles that lined the aisle. I was second to come down and when I stood next to him he lifted up his shoe a little bit and showed me that the heel of his shoe had completely separated from the top of the shoe. It was just flapping there. The metal clanking sound had apparently been a piece of metal inside the shoe falling out when the shoe exploded. I thought it was hilarious and it was a bit difficult to not laugh throughout the rest of the wedding because the thought of how ridiculous it was kept coming to mind.

My friend pointed out later on that those shoes had been a sub-plot throughout the wedding process. Earlier in the day we had gone back to the house specifically to find the shoes. This was apparently to take them back to the rental shop before they closed because my friend had decided not to wear them. My friend and I didn't actually realize that was the point of of going there. We thought we were just trying to find them for the sake of knowing where they were because they had been moved the night before when everyone was a little tipsy. So we got halfway across town and realized when our friend was on the phone with the best man, that we were apparently on our way to drop the shoes off. Awkward. We ended up not dropping the shoes off, which is good because he ended up wearing them. But I guess that is also bad because they ended up breaking. After they main wedding stuff the DJ used some of his black tape to put the shoes back together.

The ceremony itself went fairly fast, which was nice compared to the other weddings I have been to. After the ceremony we went outside and took more pictures. And then, we piled into a couple cars and headed back into town to take pictures at a bar and in the street. It was pretty fun.

There was still time to kill when we got back so my friend and I started playing a game of washers with a couple of our friend's young nephews. The game consists of throwing washers and trying to make them into a square box, that has a piece of pvc pipe in it. You get one point for getting it into the box, two points if it is leaning against a wall in the box, and three points for getting it into the pipe. The game started with the kids destroying us. They quickly pulled ahead and I think the biggest gap was a 15 to 6 lead. We had to take a break for dinner but after dinner we went back out and we ended up destroying them, mostly thanks to me. We managed to catch up, pulled even at 19 points, and in the last round I was able to put us over the top. It was funny because the whole game I was giving the kid on my side crap saying that we were going to make a comeback, and then we did.

Going back to dinner, it was more tasty than the reception dinner but equally limited in choices. I had cheesy potatoes, which were delicious, and rolls. There were a couple different meat options, baked beans with meat in them, and salad with bacon. I was impressed with the inventive use of meat. I'm just glad there wasn't any in the potatoes.

As the night progressed the music got louder and louder and I found myself spending most of my time outside watching people play the giant Jenga game. The music was much more bearable when not in the reverberating building. I didn't actually play Jenga but it was entertaining to watch. I still want to make one for the library. The Chicago Public Library mentioned at ALA that they used it at street fairs and it was a big draw. And it was a big draw at the wedding. It might have to happen at some point.

After the wedding we helped pack everything up. There was so much alcohol left over. They've gotta be set for at least the next year. But when we were done with that, we went to a pub. It took me a minute but I eventually recognized it as the place we went to the first time my friend and I had gone down to visit our friend, which was a long time ago. My friend curated a playlist on the jukebox, we played pool, a quick game of cornhole, and sat around and talked. After we left, the occupants of the car I was driving (my friend, another groomsman, the best man, and his wife) voted to stop at another bar. The bar has a lot of history. Our friend had met his wife while working there, the best man met his wife while she was working there, and the other groomsman and our friend had both worked there and used to hustle pool there on their days off. I also feel like we go there every time I have been in town. It was much nicer tonight because there weren't a lot of people and the music wasn't loud so we could actually sit and have a conversation without shouting at each other.

On the way back to the hotel we stopped at Taco Bell. Nothing inappropriate was said and we got all of our food, in two heavy bags. When we got back to the hotel we at in the lobby and then parted ways for the night. I finally made it to bed at three o'clock in the morning.