Tuesday, 28-April-2026 through Saturday, 02-May-2026
Andrea’s friends got married! We hopped on a plane to go visit! It was an excellent adventure!
I’ve just been a little globe-hopper, now, haven’t I?
To be honest, that’s exactly what I’d hoped for when I first started imagining this move to Europe. Ryanair flights are cheap, security is efficient, and air-time is short… I’d had all these dreams of spending weekends away at various exciting locations throughout the continent.
It hasn’t happened that way, unfortunately, and that’s one of the many little things I’ve been frustrated by. Classwork took up weekends during the MBA, and job applications (and their attendant anxiety) took over the weekends afterward. Events and sales for Hurley Ceols took over after that, and now…
Well. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. For now – there’s a wedding to go to!
To be fair, this wasn’t a traditional Bulgarian wedding – I don’t know know what they’ll look like, but this was a beautifully chic wedding for two amazingly chic friends. A penthouse restaurant, excellent food, amazing drinks, and beautiful views were to be had. A lovely ceremony, and an exciting afterparty!
So, while the wedding was our main reason for going out, we did get up to some other adventures throughout:
– We got to visit Andrea’s Grandma – whose home always brings back fond memories of my Maternal Grandparent’s home.
– We explored the city a bit, seeing more of the beautiful views that Sofia has to offer.
– We visited with a few friends, grabbing a lovely dinner and sharing exciting stories… and even seeing a whole host of new hot sauces that one of them is working on! (I don’t have pictures from this one, because we were too busy hanging out.
And then… Well, and then we flew home, had a delicious breakfast, and a lovely cheeseplate lunch.
I went back to Massachusetts! My friend Allison was getting married! I’d get to dance, see everyone, and have a great time!
It was a near-thing, truth be told… Looking at flights ahead of time, this whole “gas is expensive and the world is falling apart at the seams” thing is definitely happening. Or, at least, the airlines are using it as an excuse to jack up prices? Either way – a normally $600 round-trip flight was looking more like $1,800, and my attendance at the good times, delicious food, and awesome dancing was looking unlikely at best.
Then, miracles! Two days before I had to make the call about whether to bite the expensive bullet… flights dropped! I found a round-trip ticket for $800… not the cheapest, but also not nearly as outrageous as the previous costs had ballooned to. I booked it, locked in a hotel, and launched my excited RSVP out to the bride and groom.
See… Allison is a swing dancer, and a DJ. Most of her friends are dancers, or DJs. When you combine that with excellent taste, a good palette, and a drive to rock every event attended… well, I was psyched for the wedding.
Weddings are a lot like hikes. Bear with me – the metaphor will make sense in a second.
They’re awesome, and enjoyable, and give lasting excellent memories.
But they don’t transcribe well to paper. I could type out about the food (delicious), the dancing (fun), and the company (stellar), but it wouldn’t come close to expressing the details and minutia of the event.
So I won’t type it out. I’ll just leave you, my dear readers, with this photo of myself, taken by Daniel, after I commandeered his sunglasses. Because obviously Daniel brought sunglasses.
I’ll also briefly mention the excitement of the evening afterward… we’d all made our way back to the hotel, after an excellent evening. We’d chatted, wound down, and had all retired to our respective boudoirs.
I was awoken to a distant chirping.
The chirping approached quickly, gaining volume and intensity, until the fire alarms in my room ignited into sound and light. Groggily, I threw on clothes and grabbed my wallet and room key before heading toward the stairway. Meeting Daniel and Erin on the way, we quickly learned through the grapevine that someone had lit something on fire in their room… but no one really knew any other details.
An hour, and a few fire trucks, later… we were back in bed. Fun times, but nothing too significant aside.
It made for some good groggy morning conversation at the diner the next day, though. I’ll tell you what.
Wednesday, 03-Nov-2021 through Monday, 08-Nov-2021
My friends Dillon and Liz are getting married!!! It’s been on the books for a while now, so it’s kind of strange to think that it’s finally happening… but this is the weekend! This is the day!
The bachelor party was a hit, the suit was tailored, and anything that I needed had already been bought. The photobook was made, and I’d checked in with Dillon and Liz to make sure there wasn’t anything else left that I could help with. My speech was mostly written, and I was as ready as I’d ever be.
All that was left was to show up, and help out in any way that I could!
Friday, 05-Nov-2021
“Remember, Remember, the fifth of November”
I’m more than half convinced that Liz and Dillon chose this date specifically to make sure it’s easy to remember. I mean, there’s a whole rhyme about it and everything!
The wedding went amazingly.
The day started out identically to the previous – cold, crisp, with shining blue skies.
As strange as it sounds, I love the smell of the cold air in New England. It’s the low humidity, coupled with the wind and the latent threat of snow… regardless of how clear the skies are at the time. The Pacific Northwest simply doesn’t smell the same, until you get up into the mountains that is. And I haven’t spent enough time in the South to really compare… so for now, I’ll assume that it’s just a uniquely New England / Mountains thing.
Our job for the morning pre-ceremony was to stay out of the way, keep Dillon from seeing Liz before she was ready, and to run any errands that may come up.
Frankly, it was a gloriously easy job, thanks to them having planned everything out ahead of time… nearly to the minute. Dillon and I grabbed some last-minute grocery things for the bridal party, then took the rest of the groomsmen and various family members out to brunch. Close enough that we could return at a moments notice if anything went wrong… but far enough that we were safely out of the bridal party’s hair.
Soon enough though, we reconvened in my hotel room and started getting ourselves ready for the big day. Dillon and Liz had been amazing (as always), and had gotten my room upgraded to a full-size suite for the occasion – you know, since the groomsmen were going to use it as a base of operations to get ourselves prepped, primped, and ready to roll. Which took all of half an hour for five of us. Yep, advantages of being guys, you know?
Into the shuttle we went, and to the venue we travelled!
I don’t have many pictures from the day of the wedding – Frankly, we were a bit busy… and honestly? While I’ve gotten very proud of my photography, I’m not a professional. Well, I sort of am, since I did that sales video for Laurel when she was selling her horse, but… The wedding photographer was the expert on site.
The wedding itself?
It went beautifully, obviously. Liz and Dillon teared up during the first-look, the group photos went smoothly, and their vows were amazing. All exactly as one would expect from planners like them 😛
The ceremony was awesome, the dinner was delicious, and the speeches went gloriously… if I may say so myself. I’m particularly proud of mine – I was pretty nervous, as one would expect, but got compliments on it throughout the rest of the evening… so I think I did pretty well. No one even mentioned how much my hands were shaking while holding the paper I wrote it on, so… go me!
Dancing? Ohh yeah. We danced. Fueled by an amazing open bar and a ton of mouth-watering treats we danced deep into the night, pausing only to get water and rest our legs between songs. I even got to slow dance a bit! Which was super fun, but frankly reminded me that I really want to take some dancing lessons when I have a moment.
I did get to do some best-man duties later in the evening as our time limit in the library was starting to arrive… the DJ was excellent, and super enthusiastic, but the “last song” pretty quickly turned into multiple last songs. And, while Liz and Dillon were in pretty good party mode, I could see them starting to worry about us overstaying our welcome at the venue. Being the excellent executive-officer I am, I confirmed with Dillon and then politely reminded the DJ to cool his excellently energetic jets and send us home.
We packed up, stuffed Dillon and Liz into their ride home, and enjoyed the cool air as we walked the half-mile back to the hotel.
We’d debated an after-party in my room (since I had the huge place, after all), but frankly we were all pretty burned out afterward. Brian and Clara did come hang out for a bit, but overarchingly we took it easy and enjoyed a good cooldown after an amazing day.
