Pile of Dross

Its been 1 month since Annabel and Graeme‘s wedding, so I thought I’d mar[k] the occassion by digitizing my bestman’s speech from my cuecards for those of you who weren’t there/couldn’t hear me clearly/want to relive the agony.

Ladies and Gentlemen, my name’s Derek
and I’ve the honour of being
Graeme’s best man today.

On behalf of the bridesmaid, Zoe
and Laura, I’d like to thank Graeme
for his kind words. I’d just like to
say that both are looking lovely today
and are only outshone by Annabel
herself, who looks absolutely stunning
unlike Graeme who just looks stunned.

I’d also like to thank the ushers:
Colin, Andrew, Mark and Jon, who
have do a great job shepherding
people around and generally making things
happen.

Its traditional in best man speeches
to maock the groom, however I’ve been
doing that since I first met him in
ab Edinburgh University Lecture theatre,
so I thought I’d give him a break
on this day of all days and try
and say nice things about him.

No easy task!

Firstly, I’d have to say that he’s very
good neatured, he’s put up with 8 years
of jokes, sarcasm and ridicule
with good humour and grace
and still thought well enough of me to askk me to be
his best man.

Or perhaps since he knows of my _love_ of public
speaking, this is his way of getting revenge.

he can be very enthusiastic and energetic
though for soeone whose daily consumption
of coffee is measured in litres (not cups)
this isn’t too unexpected.

He can be stubborn and determined too, pity
the person who tired to convince Graeme that
staying out drinking till 3am, when there was a
9 am exam was a bad idea. I still have
the scars!

Graeme does have excellent taste as
his choice of wife clearly shows
(as I’m sure you’ll all agree)

Graeme, you’ve married a beautiful,
smart , caring, witty person in Annabel. I
hope you realise just how lucky
you are.

Annabel, you’ve married…. Graeme
Well he has plenty of potential at least.

So I’ve tried (and possibly) failed to say
nice things about Graeme. I hope I
haven’t scared his new in-laws too
much.
But seriously, I wish you two all the
joy and happiness in the the world in
your new life together.

So Ladies and Gentlemen, if I can
ask you all to be upstanding…
and join me in
a toast to Annabel and Graeme

- THE BRIDE AND GROOM!

Right, done, you can stop cowering behind the sofa at the sheer cringeworthyness of it.

[update - Uggh and 101 typos fixed too]

Things to do this weekend:

Haircut
Binbags
SPEECH

But first ….. PIZZA!

Hmm, the 1 Abbot ale I had at the Oak appears to have affected me more than usual.

Yay,
Long weekend booked 25-28 November.
Stupendously long Chrimbo holiday booked 16 December-6 January.

Took Friday off sick. The first day I’ve been off work through illness in over 3 years – i.e. since starting there. A particularly nasty cold it was, spent Friday in bed reading and filling the contents of handkerchiefs, recovered enough on Saturday to play Quake 4 when it popped through the letterbox and was sufficently recovered to make a supply run to Sainsburys on Sunday.

Quake 4, by the by, is definately better than Doom 3, flashlights on yer weapons – need I say more. No “monster cupboards” either.

Work is work, was in a meeting last week where the outcome was that we plan to ditch months of (my) work and move to a different system, for the best of reasons, though its a very tight timescale, so the status quo may continue. Difficult to pin down how I feel about this – a weird concotion of relief at not having to run the bugbear for ever, frustration that I oculdn’t get it to a state where I could leave it and a numb feeling that if I’d twiddled my thumbs continously for the past months we’d be in some ways in a better situation.

And I note that Caity is worryingly demonstrating traits normally found only in my blood relatives, in particular the continued mocking of myself for a minor linguistic gaffe. Scary.

Also,my letting agents haven’t yet cashed the cheque I sent for the admin costs of my lease renewal, I’ll prod them tomorrow to make sure they got it.

Oh Joy, about to head out to the pub and the thunderstorm, which someone in London mentioned was heading this way, has arrived