Hoppa!

My cousin Matt got married this weekend up in Fresno. He decided to be like his sister and have a wedding out of the blue (although he wasn't pregnant), but it wasn't quite as rushed as hers. My brother, dad, and I went up there on Saturday because they guys were going to play golf (I wasn't invited), and I went along because I knew much of the family was going to be driving up on Saturday.

Karma intervened and it rained on Saturday, so the guys only got about 7 holes in before calling it quites (take that!), so we all went over to the hotel where everybody was staying. This was a large hotel, but when my whole family went into the bar, we completely took over the place. Some had to leave for the rehearsal dinner, and the rest of us went to The Cheesecake Factory, which was a couple blocks away (and I was completely bummed - who wants to eat cheesecake?). We discussed Snowcrash (which I need to reread), clairvoyant dreams, and blogs, among other things. It was a very fun discussion with the three generations that were present.

On Sunday was the wedding, and it was being held at a Serbian Orthodox church in Fresno (my cousin is Greek Orthodox and his new wife is Serbian Orthodox). My family is rather large, and the church it was at was really small, so it was standing room only for the ceremony. Luckily, the reception hall was plenty big. It was great to run around with my cousins, corrupting them by telling them to dump a whole basket full of birdseed on Matt and Chrissy's (his new wife) head (and of course they did it), and telling them to call my other cousin fat (she's 9 months pregnant).

Many people think I hate weddings, but I don't really mind them when it's a family one because we manage to have fun no matter what. Some cousins and my uncle (who's son was getting married) were worried that the wedding might be dry, so they brought a water bottle full of Ketel 1. There was wine at each table (Merlot and Chard, so I didn't really drink much, at the wedding at least), but they still managed to find some punch to add "water" to. We joked that the people from Fresno would think we didn't like their water because we kept adding our own to the punch.

Of course after the wedding we weren't done partying, so we headed back to the hotel and invaded the bar again. Then after we got kicked out of there we went to a hotel room where there were cigars (and other unmentionables) to be smoked (but not by me) and our own bar to use. Then after getting too many complaints at that room, we took it to another. So all in all it was a great weekend, full of family, good food, and good drink.