The Wedding

well, everyone, it's just me today. no pablo, no dr. ghosh, just yours truly, sitting here at work wondering what she is supposed to be working on and hoping the day goes by quickly. and by day i mean seven in the morning to seven at night. it's true, it's not as long as the fourteen or fifteen hour days i used to work when i kept stats for the hockey league, but these twelve hour days are supposed to be every day. pablo and i and supposed to pull in sixty hours a week. it's harder than it sounds.

but i didn't start this to complain about my job (there is much to complain about, but i am thankful for it). i wrote this morning to tell you that my little carmelita, my best techie girlfriend, got married on saturday. and i cried!

on thursday night we had the bachelorette party, and carmen, rachel, vanessa, and my sister and i dressed up in silly prom dresses and mardi gras beads and broaches and fake flowers and silly hats and cat ears and tiaras. oh, and sneakers. those were mandatory. we went out to eat at the restaurant where my brother is a chef (impressed, girls?), bountiful bakery, and then went and had a scavenger hunt at the mall. then bowling, coffee, and the karaoke bar! we all sang, but carmelita showed us all up with "material girl." it was even funnier for her to sing it, since the whole bar knew she was the bride-to-be. i was really glad that no one came up and did anything inappropriate, like give her a lap dance or anything like that. one guy did come and hit on rachel... but he left before the rest of us got too defensive.

after the party in cruces we headed to alamogordo to decorate the church and the reception hall and meet with the guys. we had a lot more fun than they did at the bachelor party! ha ha! the guys were a lot of fun though! the groomsmen were jd, harley, and micah, and cody the camera guy was hanging out the whole time, getting everything on film. he was my favorite! he's funny.

we all stayed in the same hotel, so it felt like high school again, like we were all on a club trip, but this time there were no chaparones and we could stay up all night and now we're over 21, so we could drink. we bought alcohol and played mafia. i didn't drink very much at all because i really don't like the taste of alcohol, and i certainly didn't get drunk. i mostly drank a few cream sodas with cody, who is eighteen. but playing mafia when most of the people present have a buzz is funny! conversations went something like:

"i think rachel's in the mafia."

"why?"

"because she's drinking!" (ridiculous laughter)

"rachel? what do you have to say for yourself?"

"i'm not in the mafia! i'm a happy drunk, not a mean drunk!" (more laughter)

the next morning carmen woke us up at dawn to go get beautiful. the makeup and hair ladies went to town on us. one of the first things that happened was that somehow everyone found out that i don't know what moisturizer looks like. that very quickly turned into "holly doesn't know anything about beauty or makeup." so, everyone felt the need to primp me and practically put on my clothes and explain to me what mascara is for and especially to tie the stupid bow on the front on my dress. everyone thought that it couldn't be right because they assumed i had tied it, which i hadn't, but they came along and tied it for me anyway. once, vanessa tied it and half an hour later or so told me she had to fix it, when she was the last person that had tied it!

i was wearing so much makeup and bronzer and had a loopy hairdo that is so not like my usual ponytail. and i wasn't wearing my glasses, which have fairly thick rims and are very noticeable. nicki, my own roommate, didn't recognize me. scuba and curtis had some real trouble recognizing me. the worst part was that everyone was making such a big deal out of it! i hated it. i was really miserable. but i had to suck it up, like a good maid of honor, and concentrate on carmen. i like her.

rachel and vanessa and i sang going to the chapel for her before the processional. carmen was beautiful! she was so sparkly! i really tried not to cry during the ceremony, and micah said i was making faces trying to hold back the tears. well, the good thing is that everyone could SEE me making faces, since my features were so well highlighted. blast that bloody makeup.

the reception was a great time and we all danced and had fun. we saw carmen and steve off at about seven. steve, if you remember from last summer, is the king of too much information. the girls were teasing carmen, saying that we were going to call her in about three hours and ask what she was doing. she said, "i'll just give the phone to steve." that put an end to our plans.

what a pretty wedding! it's a lot more fun when it's three days long and you can hang out with the groomsmen and go to white sands and bring all your silly hats. oh, and i had my mom's 15-passenger van, so i could drive everybody around. i was the cool kid. woo!