Mexico is for lovers (Respete el límite de velocidad)

A Wedding Every Spring

What appears below is my recollection of the week leading up to Meagan and I’s wedding and the day of the wedding. I’ve been thorough for my own sake. It would be easy to forget a day or two of happenings when so much happened, I want to prevent this from occuring.

It would be great to hear your recollections,  so, please, please, please add them in the comments.

The Wedding Week

The week in South Dakota leading up to Meagan and I’s wedding was pleasant. Sunday I went walleye fishing with my dad at the Platte Creek recreation area and realized one of my favorite things is watching the prairie grass blowing in the wind. Being on the river in the early cool morning is so quiet. Later a good old friend and I made first contacts in a over a year. Wednesday for my bachelor party, Mike had arranged camping and rock climbing in the Palisades State Park. Other than a racoon eating a few of our tortillas it was a wonderful time. Rock climbing is so exciting. Thursday, we had a suprise birthday party for my mother. All 10 members of our immediate family were there. Finally on Friday, we had a rehearsal at the winery and ate at Mexico Viejo in Vermillion for dinner. Robbied hosted a poker game which I attended but lost badly. As we played in Robbie’s three-season room it began to rain, hard. Given our wedding was to be outdoors the next day I was quite concerned.

The Wedding

Meagan had spent the previous evening in Sioux Falls, so I arrived alone in Vermillion about 10:30 and went directly to the winery. The venue was quiet, I had no idea what to do. Ryan came down the elevator and said he was going to the USD bookstore so I went along. Later we met with my parents at their hotel room and decided to get lunch at Mr. Smith’s Bakery in Jones’ Food Center (some of the best sandwiches on the planet). On our way Jones, Meagan called and asked me to meet her at the Winery, we had to make the decision, was it to be an indoor or outdoor wedding?

A year ago, we planned for an outdoor wedding but also had a contingency plan. The week prior to the wedding was absolutely beautiful, sunny, clear, light breeze, and warm, but looming in the 10-day forecast was a 70% chance of rain for our wedding day, 6/6/09. When I met Meagan at the Winery about 11:15 we had to make a decision, it had rained all night and into the morning but it wasn’t currently raining, although it probably could have started any second. It was also a brisk 50-something degrees, it felt more like a Fall day than a late Spring day. Despite overcast skies and the possibility of rain, we decided to carry on with the outdoor ceremony.

Meagan left for the salon again and I stayed at the winery to help with the preparations. My dad and I finished setting up the chairs and Gary brought truckloads of decorations (e.g. flowers, vines, etc…) down the hill to the ceremony site. Meanwhile, my Mother, Meagan’s grandmother and other relatives kept busy with the indoor decorations.

Around 2:15, I was standing on the front deck of the winery and saw Meagan and her Mother enter the parking lot. I knew I wasn’t supposed to see her so I went inside and up to the room where we (the groomsmen, fathers, and I) would all be getting ready. As we got ready, the photographer’s assistant snapped photographs (I’m sure they’ll be some of the dullest photographs on record.)

Afterward, the men all migrated to the 3rd floor deck where we could view the Missouri River Valley. It was passed on that Meagan was ready and would be coming out shortly. I stood in waiting, oh the anticipation. She walked out of the French Doors and looked stunning, it was wonderful to see her and know the day had finally arrived. The photographer said we matched perfectly, perhaps she was referring to our coordinated clover accessories, her sash and my tie, but maybe she was referring to our Gestalt. I think the latter, Meagan and I make a good team.

After pictures on the 3rd floor deck, we went down to the cermony site for pictures with the bridal party. When we were done with pictures we returned to the winery and stood near the back door. Now the ceremony starts, mostly everything went as planned. The music was nice, and the readers Shannon and Meagan’s grandmother Marge did a great job. Each reading had infinitely more impact on me standing with Meagan on the day of our wedding compared to when we chose them.  The one thing that went awry was our candle lighting, I was able to light the candles but they almost immediately went out. What can I say, it was windy.

Following the ceremony and receiving line we took family pictures and went to the reception area to take a picture of Meagan and I fake-cutting the centerpiece cake. The dinner was good and included: dinner rolls, lettuce salad, rice pilaf, mixed vegatables, pasta salad, turkey, & roast beef. Of course there was cake for dessert.

Following the dinner we were introduced as the new married couple and danced to Phil Phillips and the Twilights do Sea of Love. Meagan and I had taken a few dance lessons  and were comfortable doing the foxtrot. The dance went great, we definitely made mistakes but we were both enjoying it. Then the bridal party dance to Eli “Paperboy” Reed’s I’ll Roll With You and finally the Mother-Son, Father-Daughter dance to Bobby Darin’s Mack the Knife.

People  were slow to get to the dance floor but within an hour or so the dance floor remained populated until the very last dances. We all danced to an interesting song by MGMT and at one point all of our friends and family (that were still there) surrounded Meagan and I while we danced to Garth Brooks’ Friends in Low Places. Periodically the DJ instructed the circle of people around us to take a step in. It was really nice.

As we exited the winery, our friends made a line of sparklers for us to walk through (a total surprise). I’m still not sure who was responsible for that…

Gift opening occured the next day. Meagan and I were both pleasantly surprised by the generousity of our friends and family. We received many thoughtful gifts.

Thanks everyone!

Le Tour 2009

Back from Vermillion, got married you know.
Back from Playa Del Carmen, had to honeymoon you know.

Great News. Got connected to the internet and was a offered a free month of cable TV coinciding perfectly with the Tour de France 2009. I’m so excited. Don’t try to reach me from July 4th to July 26th.

Too Bad Vino was banned.

Brad Pitt Angelina Jolie Lindsay Lohan Britney Spears Nadya Suleman Miley Cyrus David Carradine

I love looking under the hood of Blogger5000.wp.com. The statistics available on the Dashboard of WordPress are great. I can check active posts, recent visitors, search terms that directed people to my blog and all kinds of other statistics.

Until recently, my most active post was Poker 5000 with 58 views. The search term that directed users to my blog the most was “nature girl,” (try it in google images and you’ll see a picture of Meagan). But recently I wrote about seeing an Elizabeth Taylor impersonator and my “hit” statistics went through the roof. Check it out:

The Elizabeth Taylor post is wildly popular. In the picture above on the right you can see sustained growth in daily hits shortly after Taylor post was published. The search term “Elizabeth Taylor” has directed users to my blog 201 times and that does not include incorrect or abbreviated spellings of the her name (e.g. Liz Taylor has been used 11 times). The post about Taylor has been viewed 240 times since 5/21/09, by far the most popular post on Blogger5000. 

If the site were used for advertising revenue, I suppose I would only write about celebrities. For fun, I’ve titled/tagged this post with several celebrity names. For validity and to avoid conflated results, I did not include celebrities names that happen to be in the news today but are not usually (e.g. David Carradine, who was found hanged earlier yesterday in Thailand, or Eminem and Bruno who made a scene at the MTV awards). I’ll give readers an update soon about the impact of celebrity-name tags. 

UPDATE: Just read Elizabeth Taylor was in the hospital shortly after my post was published. That might explain why there was a lag between the time of publication 5/21/09 and the appearance of more blog visits… Given this new connection, I’ve added David Carradine to the title.