Written waiting for the plane (9/25/2006 at 5:AM or so).
So on Friday, September 22, 2006, We ran around like madmen. I got up a bit before 6:AM and basically went all day, with only a little break, until when the rehearsal dinner ended around 9:PM
The first thing of the day was taking the kitties to Jordan Creek Animal Hospital (Shannon's Work) to board. We were planning on doing it later then we did, but when Gracie came up to join us for breakfast, it seemed an opportune time (since she is generally the hardest to get). So we stuck Gracie in her new carrier (only used once before), and George in the carrier that Shannon's had for quite a while and took Shannon's car over to JCAH. Gracie hunkered down to "hide" as she normally does. Her carrier was sitting on Shannon's lap and she could see through the top at Shannon, so I think she was comforted by that. George was in the back, and had little mews every 5 or 10 seconds the entire drive.
It was uneventful enough.
Then we took 'em in. Gracie went in her place with little problem, again, hunkering down to "hide" like she does. But when George went in his cage, he freaked out. Now if you've ever taken a behavioral psychology class and have seen the films where they have the mice or rats or something in the electrified cages, and they play a sound before they electrify the floor, then you can understand how serious George reacted. This was quite the surprise, since George is generally the more friendly kitty. He was jumping all over the cage, off the walls and then he pissed over everything in there...it was Stunning to watch. I mean absolutely shocking.
He got out of his cage into the cat room (they had lots of toys there), and he went to hide behind one of the toys, near the door to where the dogs are kept. And sounded quite pissed. I went to pet him, but he was having none of that. His pupils were huge. We went out and picked out a toy for him and I tried to play with him...and he calmed down a little.
While they were cleaning out the cage, two students from the West Des Moines School District came in to pet him and we left him in their hands.
I have to say that it was harder to leave them then I thought, especially since George freaked out.
After we left, we headed down to the capitol building.
We traded Shannon's 2001 Toyota Corolla for my Boss's Audi A6...certainly a fair trade in my book. :-) We met Chad (Proctor's boyfriend) down there and gave him the keys to Shannon's car and we took the Audi.
Then Tuxedoes in West Des Moines. We picked up all the tuxedos for people...and I tried on me. Then we found out that they got my tuxedo right, and Shannon's Dad's, but no one else. All the ushers and Best Man's tuxes were supposed to have Silver vests, and they were black. The Ring bearer's was white (like mine), where it was supposed to be silver, and Shannon's dad's was silver...like it was supposed to be. Randall's told us that they could have the vests to us by noon on Saturday, but since we were to start taking pictures at noon, it didn't make much sense. It also didn't make much sense to get angry about what was going on, since there was nothing we could really do about it. I'm still deciding what we want to do...but this is the first part. If you rent tuxedos, don't go there. Not that a ton of people read this, but enough do that it'll be something I guess.
We loaded the tuxedos in the car, and I took Shannon to her nail appointment at Jordan Creek Mall in West Des Moines. I dropped off the tuxedos at home, and went out to Mr. Carwash to get Proctor's car washed, waxed and cleaned inside and out. I had brought along my book to read. Now they don't do an awesome job, but they do a good job, and you don't need to make an appointment. I got their top package, which includes conditioning the leather, cleaning the carpets and etc. Normally this takes a while, but since they weren't very busy, they had two and sometimes three people working on it. Nathan (best man) called and told me that they were near town and asked if we wanted to have lunch together, I said sure, but I wouldn't know for certain until they got into town, since they were working on the car.
Lucky for me, they finished up, just as the Mattas pulled into Mr Carwash. Shannon had called me and told me that she was done with her nails, so we headed out there to have lunch at Jordan Creek. Shannon and I had lunch at Chik-ful-Lay (sp?). So we had a nice lunch with Nathan, Jenny, Taylor, and Cali. The Mattas then headed off to get settled into their hotel and we headed over to pay for the PA (Brandon was picking it up, since it wouldn't' fit in our cars). We were running a bit late, so Brandon had to wait for us a bit (sorry :-/ ). There were just setting up in their new place, so they didn't even really have a card machine yet, so they wrote down my numbers, and we loaded the equipment in Brandon's Scion xB. We then Headed home.
We kept thinking that we had more things to do, but we read the list that I had posted, and we were pretty much done with the errands. Ben called, and he came over. Shannon's Parents came over too.
Ben and I took off in the Audi, so he could get a ride in it. We headed east on Hickman, and I saw a few things that I knew existed, but wasn't really sure where they were. We drove by a QuickTrip (probably the closest one to our house), then by Broadlawns Hospital (no clue that it was over there), and we decided to head back and got lost in a fake hood sort of Des Moines place. We were driving up a street, and saw a gaggle of kids, and then one ran off. As we passed the kids we both got a huge smell of weed smoke...Just traveled right through the car...it was quite funny. We decided that we were...not in the right place, so we quickly found out where we were and headed back to my house.
We had Ben help load the stuff going to the Chapel into Shannon's Parent's car, and then they headed off to the hotel.
A bit later, we all headed to Candle Lit way for the Rehearsal.
The Audi A6 is quite the car, and even though it's not sporty like my RSX Type S, it's still a lot of fun to drive and has a lot of get up and go (not that I can really test that, since I have been on my best behavior, since I've been pressing my luck on that third ticket this year). But the ride is smooth, the stereo is great...The only thing that took me a bit to figure out was how to set cruise control (I didn't figure out how to resume and accelerate on the cruise until shortly before I gave the car up on Sunday).
We went through the rehearsal pretty quickly and easily. There really isn't much to it. Sit some people down, get set yourself, follow the pastor's guides and that's about it. I told Dan of Candle Lit Way how the music would work. First CD for people sitting and bringing in the parents. Second CD for wedding parts (Wedding march, Always with You, Always with me for the lighting of the unity candle). Third CD for our exit and the exit of the people.
The church got all the decorations setup and we headed over to Raccoon River Brew Pub for the rehearsal dinner. We were tailed by my parents and Shannon's Parents and drove down towards downtown Des Moines. There were quite a few cars parked down there (being a Friday night, and also Oktoberfest weekend (the first time I've missed it since it began in Des Moines).
We ended up parking pretty close to RRBP, and the parents parked in the parking garage just down the street.
We grabbed the presents for people and waited for our parents.
We headed in and had appetizers and drinks. I had already set it up so that my dad would get the food and non-alcoholic beverages (as not to trample on their beliefs), and I would get all the alcoholic ones. They were very nice about setting that up.
So we had 3 choices for dinner, on the limited menu. Niman Ranch Pork Chops, Marinated Chicken, and Yankee Pot Roast. We had also selected to have the New York Style Cheese Cake and white chocolate brownies as the desserts. I think they went over really well. I was happy with how the food tasted. Josh told me that he liked it too.
Before dinner came, we passed out presents. Alcohol for my friends (except Ben, who's dry right now (giving the liver a break)). Rum for Josh (I bought a bottle of the same rum for myself), and then scotch for Brandon and Nathan. They discussed who should get what, and left me with the Oban 14 year old (which was probably the best reviewed, Nathan had heard good things about it too).
I actually tried the Oban last night. It was really good. It's not peaty like the Laphroig (which I love), but it was warm and comforting in an entirely different way. Starting of with flavor and slowly warming on the tongue. Not an instant blast of heat, like some alcohols. Quite something.
There weren't any real speeches cause I didn't really ask for them...I just wanted people to have a nice dinner.
So we went home.
We were both tired...so we headed home, washed up the pewter for the wedding and went to bed.
I had a bit of trouble falling asleep, but not too much, and we set the alarms to go off early.