... weddings, parties, anything

i'm a hopeless romantic. i'll admit it. i am. (most would agree i'm hopeless, at any rate!) but the closer you get to the nitty gritty of a thing, the harder it is to feel romantic about it, i think.

i was proud and very privileged to have been a part of anthony and taminda's wedding on saturday just gone. right now (hopefully) they are honeymooning without care somewhere in the wide-open yonder, while the rest of us who were at the wedding have returned to our day-to-day existences. i was the third man in the groomsmen, and anthony and taminda asked me to be m.c. at their reception. i thought about it for a while before i said yes. i think i'd do that again if i were asked again.

i was surprised a bit at how much pressure i felt as i performed my duties. when i was a groomsman for my friend andrew and fiona, i didn't have a great deal to do. wear the suit, make sure my shirt was tucked in, smile for the photos... that was about it. yep. that was about it.

being the m.c. meant i had a few more things to think about. i not exactly reknowned anymore for my punctuality (back in the bad old days i was five minutes early for almost everything), so i was rather keen to outdo myself in sticking to the timetable... but while i thought at the time i was running late, so was the bar staff, and when the first toast was ready to be raised, the grapetise fizzy grape juice we were to be drinking hadn't yet made it to all the tables. other items included, in no particular order:

• i didn't realise the cake-cutting knife was already on the table...
  
• i was thanked when i didn't expect to be...
  
• a speech was made when i'd been told it wasn't going to be...

so here's a note to anyone who might ever ask me to m.c. for them:

i'd love to. but don't be surprised if i stress about it, because i want your day to be perfect. because i'm a hopeless romantic. and just plain hopeless.