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R. Linda:
(What is it with Chapter Sevens and me? I never get beyond them.)
The day of the wedding dawned as it usually does in the highlands of Scotland, foggy. The mist floated about so thick, that if you put your hand out in front of you, your forearm would disappear. But as it usually does, the fog wafts off into the hills and mountains, where you have to look up to see it, and looking down you will discover you still have an arm after all.
There was a gigantic breakfast for guests who were lodged at the groom's father's house. Yes, the lord of the manor owns an ancestral hall complete with longboard, armoury, and a small dungeon in the bowels of this Elizabethan luxury palace. (I wondered if Weasil had lounged in the dungeon when he was bad.) In the great hall was the longboard, set for what looked like 200 persons. The groaning boards along the western wall were "groaning" with food. And what food it was, every bit a Scottish breakfast if ever there was one.
The ever-popular porridge (wouldn't be a Scottish breakie without it), Weetabix, black pudding, bangers, eggs, loose tea, melon slices, Arbroath smokies, boiling bree, heckle biscuits with butter dripping, what more could one ask for? Scotch. Yes, there was that too, many popular and regional brands all Scottish, none of that Irish stuff.
Begorrah me, I was stuffed to popping and my wife was doing "the face." Yes, she has this way about her, if she doesn't like something she does THE FACE. The face consists of squishing her nose into many wrinkles as if something smells bad. Her eyes are mere slits in her head and her facial expression overall is, sour. So there we were going along the groaning board, plates in hand and there I was explaining what this dish and that dish is, and of course, they all sounded bloody awful to her. Thus, the face.
I sat through my breakie with THE FACE across from me. To say I enjoyed my breakfast of Scottish delights would be a lie. How can one enjoy anything remotely tasty with THE FACE looking back at you from across the table?
About ten that morning we were all requested to get ready for the wedding. I walked me wife back to our room, a comfy affair in the turret. However, it wasn't one of the more well-appointed rooms I found out later. I think it was Servant's Quarters actually. That's right the Scots put the Irish in the servant's rooms. Begorrah! Our host did provide us on our arrival with a bottle of champagne and a box of chocolates, probably did that so we wouldn't be too offended by our accommodations. Hurrumph!
I left my wife to dress and went off to a large room below where the groomsmen were getting kilted out in full kit with fly plaids. There was much foolishness at getting kit on and such, but I won't bore you with manly kilt jokes since I know they wouldn't be appreciated.
After we were properly attired, I ran up to make sure the wife was ready and then escorted her to the carriages waiting to take guests up to the gazebo area. The day was a wee bit overcast it was, but there was no wind to speak of and so we assumed wrongly we would have no weather to speak of.
It was a good 30 minutes of carriage hauling the guests out to the wedding area. When finally it came the groomsmen (some were acting as ushers and were already doing their duty seating guests) turn to escort the condemned man, I mean the groom to the gazebo area. The sky had clouded up ominously, making the groom's mood even more sombre than it was to begin with. The five of us stepped into the large carriage just as a sprinkle of rain began to mist around us. There we were in a red and black shiny carriage, two sturdy black Friesen horses harnessed in gleaming brass and polished black leather strapping hauling our kilted arses through the meadows and fields to the bridge across the pond to the gazebo. There we alighted, but not before a few of us had to prey the groom's hands from his seat and together pull him from the carriage. At last altogether we made a photo op by two of six photographers and to our places we did go.
The bride must have been rethinking her participation in the scheduled ceremony because she was none too prompt. In between all this, the mist had become a light rain. We scrambled for bumbershoots and got a few of the golf kind just in case. Suddenly the pumpkin bridesmaids were seen in their three carriages on the horizon. Hark the bride cometh Mr. Weasil was told as he stood up in the gazebo. He turned three shakes of pale but said not a word, just gulped loudly.
The bridesmaids alighted and took their places but someone (the best man it was) forgot to light the crystal chandeliers hanging from the gazebo ceiling. If he had, there would have been more light for the photographers, but instead only added to the gloom of Weasil's mood it did.
I stood around for a while more, everyone silently wondering where the hell the bride was. Suddenly out of the gloom and mist, a white carriage appeared, but this time it was carrying the maid of honour. She was dressed in deep blue which my wife had a great deal of difficulty with. She insisted to me that blue and pumpkin clashed and she was wearing THE FACE when she said it and now I could see THE FACE was activated as the maid of honour stepped from the carriage. Four of the photographers were busy talking and no one was shooting the maid of honour and a good thing only one, because directly behind her in the background was Tonya wearing THE FACE.
I did notice that my wife was quite the shutterbug, we have a lot of pictures of the livestock in the next field over because she'd never seen Scottish long-haired cattle before. Who in their right mind shoots cows at a wedding? Don't answer that we know who. I won't subject you to the cow pictures in fear you'd lose your sanity just like I did when I saw them. I tried to tell her that no matter where in the UK you go, you either see sheep or cows. And yes, sometimes they come to weddings. I got the face for that.
Anyway, it was soon after the pumpkin-shaped white coach arrived pulled by four white horses, white harnesses jingling, and white ostrich plumes as headpieces for each magnificent steed, looking like Cinderella arriving at the ball. There she was, helped out by her smiling kilted father, in a beautiful long gown with crystal beads that winked in the camera flashes. The piper began the Wedding March as she seemed to float on air up to the gazebo. I will say, for all his trepidation, as soon as he turned towards his bride, Weasil became a new man. He looked with pride and love at his lass and it warmed me heart that he had a good heart underneath all that devious nonsense he parades to the rest of us.
The short version, they wed, and we were soaked to the skin, but by the end of it once at the manor house, and the champagne was uncorked, we soon forgot the wet and it was the best damn wedding party I had ever been to.
Gabe
Copyright © 2005 All rights reserved
R. Linda:
(What is it with Chapter Sevens and me? I never get beyond them.)
The day of the wedding dawned as it usually does in the highlands of Scotland, foggy. The mist floated about so thick, that if you put your hand out in front of you, your forearm would disappear. But as it usually does, the fog wafts off into the hills and mountains, where you have to look up to see it, and looking down you will discover you still have an arm after all.
There was a gigantic breakfast for guests who were lodged at the groom's father's house. Yes, the lord of the manor owns an ancestral hall complete with longboard, armoury, and a small dungeon in the bowels of this Elizabethan luxury palace. (I wondered if Weasil had lounged in the dungeon when he was bad.) In the great hall was the longboard, set for what looked like 200 persons. The groaning boards along the western wall were "groaning" with food. And what food it was, every bit a Scottish breakfast if ever there was one.
The ever-popular porridge (wouldn't be a Scottish breakie without it), Weetabix, black pudding, bangers, eggs, loose tea, melon slices, Arbroath smokies, boiling bree, heckle biscuits with butter dripping, what more could one ask for? Scotch. Yes, there was that too, many popular and regional brands all Scottish, none of that Irish stuff.
Begorrah me, I was stuffed to popping and my wife was doing "the face." Yes, she has this way about her, if she doesn't like something she does THE FACE. The face consists of squishing her nose into many wrinkles as if something smells bad. Her eyes are mere slits in her head and her facial expression overall is, sour. So there we were going along the groaning board, plates in hand and there I was explaining what this dish and that dish is, and of course, they all sounded bloody awful to her. Thus, the face.
I sat through my breakie with THE FACE across from me. To say I enjoyed my breakfast of Scottish delights would be a lie. How can one enjoy anything remotely tasty with THE FACE looking back at you from across the table?
About ten that morning we were all requested to get ready for the wedding. I walked me wife back to our room, a comfy affair in the turret. However, it wasn't one of the more well-appointed rooms I found out later. I think it was Servant's Quarters actually. That's right the Scots put the Irish in the servant's rooms. Begorrah! Our host did provide us on our arrival with a bottle of champagne and a box of chocolates, probably did that so we wouldn't be too offended by our accommodations. Hurrumph!
I left my wife to dress and went off to a large room below where the groomsmen were getting kilted out in full kit with fly plaids. There was much foolishness at getting kit on and such, but I won't bore you with manly kilt jokes since I know they wouldn't be appreciated.
After we were properly attired, I ran up to make sure the wife was ready and then escorted her to the carriages waiting to take guests up to the gazebo area. The day was a wee bit overcast it was, but there was no wind to speak of and so we assumed wrongly we would have no weather to speak of.
It was a good 30 minutes of carriage hauling the guests out to the wedding area. When finally it came the groomsmen (some were acting as ushers and were already doing their duty seating guests) turn to escort the condemned man, I mean the groom to the gazebo area. The sky had clouded up ominously, making the groom's mood even more sombre than it was to begin with. The five of us stepped into the large carriage just as a sprinkle of rain began to mist around us. There we were in a red and black shiny carriage, two sturdy black Friesen horses harnessed in gleaming brass and polished black leather strapping hauling our kilted arses through the meadows and fields to the bridge across the pond to the gazebo. There we alighted, but not before a few of us had to prey the groom's hands from his seat and together pull him from the carriage. At last altogether we made a photo op by two of six photographers and to our places we did go.
The bride must have been rethinking her participation in the scheduled ceremony because she was none too prompt. In between all this, the mist had become a light rain. We scrambled for bumbershoots and got a few of the golf kind just in case. Suddenly the pumpkin bridesmaids were seen in their three carriages on the horizon. Hark the bride cometh Mr. Weasil was told as he stood up in the gazebo. He turned three shakes of pale but said not a word, just gulped loudly.
The bridesmaids alighted and took their places but someone (the best man it was) forgot to light the crystal chandeliers hanging from the gazebo ceiling. If he had, there would have been more light for the photographers, but instead only added to the gloom of Weasil's mood it did.
I stood around for a while more, everyone silently wondering where the hell the bride was. Suddenly out of the gloom and mist, a white carriage appeared, but this time it was carrying the maid of honour. She was dressed in deep blue which my wife had a great deal of difficulty with. She insisted to me that blue and pumpkin clashed and she was wearing THE FACE when she said it and now I could see THE FACE was activated as the maid of honour stepped from the carriage. Four of the photographers were busy talking and no one was shooting the maid of honour and a good thing only one, because directly behind her in the background was Tonya wearing THE FACE.
I did notice that my wife was quite the shutterbug, we have a lot of pictures of the livestock in the next field over because she'd never seen Scottish long-haired cattle before. Who in their right mind shoots cows at a wedding? Don't answer that we know who. I won't subject you to the cow pictures in fear you'd lose your sanity just like I did when I saw them. I tried to tell her that no matter where in the UK you go, you either see sheep or cows. And yes, sometimes they come to weddings. I got the face for that.
Anyway, it was soon after the pumpkin-shaped white coach arrived pulled by four white horses, white harnesses jingling, and white ostrich plumes as headpieces for each magnificent steed, looking like Cinderella arriving at the ball. There she was, helped out by her smiling kilted father, in a beautiful long gown with crystal beads that winked in the camera flashes. The piper began the Wedding March as she seemed to float on air up to the gazebo. I will say, for all his trepidation, as soon as he turned towards his bride, Weasil became a new man. He looked with pride and love at his lass and it warmed me heart that he had a good heart underneath all that devious nonsense he parades to the rest of us.
The short version, they wed, and we were soaked to the skin, but by the end of it once at the manor house, and the champagne was uncorked, we soon forgot the wet and it was the best damn wedding party I had ever been to.
Gabe
Copyright © 2005 All rights reserved
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