Ding Dang go the wedding bells

It's wedding day and Inga is up early to have her hair done and put of the layers of war paint that seem to be required for an event of this magnitude. I, on the other hand, shower, shave and sling on a suit. Damn, there are times it is really good to be a bloke :-) Ok, so we had breakfast first before getting ready but if I relate every little detail we'll be here forever! The wedding was scheduled for early afternoon so we had plenty of time to get ready. Eventually everyone started to emerge and hang out the front of the guest house waiting for the off. I felt a bit out of place as everyone else seemed to be in different sorts of traditional costume. This is Thomas (the groom), Inga and Florian, under starters orders and all looking very smart. Eventually we all set off for the small Alpine church on the edge of the village and an hour of wedding of which I was going to be unable to understand a word. Never mind, I'd been promised beer when it was all over. The church was lovely and they couldn't have picked a finer spot to take their vows before God (they'd already signed the paperwork the year before, remember?). The guests congregated, milled about and generally did what guests do which is chat, gossip and get in the way of each other and alot of the girl's wore Drindls. This is a traditional dress and apron combo that makes them look like they're all about to start serving beer at a festival somewhere. the best thing about them though is the fact that an awful lot of very nice cleavage is on display - nice. In time we were bodily shoved into the church and forced into our seats for the big moment. The ceremony was great and would have no doubt been better if I'd known what was being said by everyone - note to self, I really must learn more German - but it was still very enjoyable. There were speeches, songs and the usual boring bits and the vicar did quite alot of singing in Latin, which was different for me.
We gathered outside and took loads of photo's - I wasn't the only one going snap happy that day but, after all, you only get married once, maybe twice if you're a bad evil person destined for hell (I've already accepted the fact that I'm going to fry). Pictures taken, we set off for the reception. Ok, I'll show you some pictures - you're so soppy at times! This is Inga and Antje (the bride). She's a big girl and very lovely and this is Antje and Thomas realising that they were about to miss the fleet of taxi's taking everyone to the reception. Mind you, we were still stood by the church but did have the advantage of a car. . The reception was in a moutaintop restaurant so we had to ditch the car and hitch a lift in one of the taxi's. Ordinary people aren't allowed to drive up the mountain road and I can well understand why! It was a rocky switchback that went up and up and up, crossing streams (luckily they were dry) before the restaurant emerged from the clouds. Yep, our friendly cloud from yesterday had decided to come and visit again so the view was blotted from sight. We drank drinks and went inside where it was a damn sight warmer to lay out our wedding cards on the tables along with some pens for people to write with. Everyone had come up with different ways to mark the occasion; we'd nicked the wedding message idea from Jason and Dani's wedding (cheers mate), there was an empty wine rack and everyone had prepared a bottle with a personal label on, a cut up picture that was recreated by people in crayon and then framed (that was great fun) and the normal gifts and stuff. There was also food. Lots of food. Too much food. And a free bar. We ate, drank, rested, ate, rested, ate, went for a walk, rested and almost exploded. How do people eat that much? At one point the cloud went off to look at another mountain top and we were all rushed outside to have some photo's taken with a glorious mountain backdrop. It didn't last long, the cloud thought we'd come out to say how much we were missing him, so he came back again but not before the group photo's were done. There was dancing too, lots of dancing with the vicar as the DJ - He was so cool and, I'll confess, if all vicars were like him (sinking the beers, dancing and rocking out) then I would seriously consider taking up religion. Eventually we managed to catch a taxi at 3am and headed back to bed. Oh, there was one other thing that I suppose I ought to mention. The Bouquet. Inga was under strict instructions not to catch it and she didn't, the first time. It was caught by a bloke. So Antje threw it again and it fell short. Now it's bad luck for the thrown bouquet to land on the ground so Inga flung herself forwards and caught it. Somewhere there is a picture of the look on her face as she realised what she'd done. The girl was in big trouble and she knew it! If you come back tomorrow I might even tell you what happened afterwards. Maybe.