Vacation, again. And wedding stuff.

So I was on vacation again - one of my best friends got married, and I was the maid of honor and had to go down to LA and do that. Threw my first bachelorette party (I think it turned out pretty great - it was small but fun!) at the Mission Inn hotel - which since it is historic and amazing, and I am poor and have zero fancy-hotel-staying experience - happens to be the most fab hotel I have ever stayed in. We did tapas and sangria for dinner, then we retired to our suite where I had made some mini-cupcake bites and a slightly more graphic cake for afterwards. We did presents, a game and even a champagne toast, it was really fun and low-key and hilarious to hear people's stories and reminisce about the bride.

Detail: Mission Inn Hotel 

After that, then we did the whole wedding thing - rehearsal dinner (taco truck FTW!), making our own bouquets, bride curling iron drama, etc. The usual =) It was great, and it was also great to have fellow friend Miss Michael be one of the bridesmaids (the friend that got married is the same friend who introduced us, yay!) so it was a ton of fun just to hang out, even when we were stressed. We tend to have a really good have time (I hope she agrees, LOL).

 Understatement of the week: Weddings are a lot of work, and a whirlwind of drama, high emotions, and stress. 

But important, because we typically are involved in the weddings of people we love. Whether or not we like the concept of marriage, or all the elements of the wedding,  or all the people involved, or even despite fears that we will end up alone in a house with 42 cats - we do it for the people we love, because it's important to them. And when we see them happy and satisfied, it's worth it. (Note: I'm not saying those all apply to me, hahah, but we've all sat through some terrible weddings, right? That's my point - we endure a lot for people. This particular one wasn't terrible!)

We made these!

And it was worth it. I am still kind of exhausted by the whole thing though. Especially because my trip back home to the Pacific Northwest was fraught with travel delays and mechanical issues and not getting to have my luggage for a day... too much drama for one week. I am ready for some nice soothing boring routine living! But I wouldn't trade the experience for the world.

So here's a musical taste of my vacation week.

First, I was in San Diego, where I spent a few days with my parents, and got to hang out with my friends from high school, who are hilarious nerds. On Friday night we even watched one of the guys' Tekken movie FANVID. Not kidding. It was rather epic. I wish I had a copy of it to post, it's that terrible and wonderful. But I mainly tried to get in time with my friend A (source of hilarious quotes like "the taller his hair gets, the more of a douchebag he becomes"), who I love and miss a lot. I try to see her as much as possible when I am home. We are very different people and we do not like the same music at all - she once characterized my taste as being for "sad & depressing" or something along those lines. She is more upbeat - hip-hop, rap, pop, dance-able club stuff.  But the one thing we do agree on is that we like Adam Lambert. There are very few men in this world that I think could pull of the top-hat look he rocks in the video below (also: the white pants, the sparkly eye-shadow, the whole I-wannabe-Bowie glamboots look in general), but he is one of them. (And you know the White Town song I posted about earlier? Couldn't you just see a super over-the-top version of that done by this fine fellow?  I could.)

"If I Had You - Adam Lambert" - Yeah, it's basically just him frolicking through a weird folksy goth glitter forest debauch, but what did you expect? I would like him to go even bigger, personally, but if you're going to do a party video (usually I find them dull), at least this is pretty colorful. 

Secondly, during the pre-wedding days, for one of the days the bride had this song stuck in her head for some unknown reason, and then when I took her to lunch on the big day, this song played, and she was very happy about it, it's kind of a good omen when your current earworm plays? IDK. But it was fun that it came on during her last meal as a single lady. (I would say it made her day, but I think getting married a little later did that, hee.) Apologies for the poor video quality. 

"Always Something There to Remind Me - Naked Eyes"

Naked Eyes - Always Something There to Remind Me
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It was also kind of fun and nostalgic, because quite honestly, this song makes me think of the mid/late-90s version by The Hippos - which makes me think of high-school, and also the summers I spent with the bride back in the day as teenagers, and also one of her first boyfriends who we hung out with at summer camp. And  while I couldn't find a video of the Hippos cover of that one (which I like better than the Naked Eyes version), I did find the video for their other song that takes me back to those times.

"Wasting My Life - The Hippos" - Ohhhhh the 90s. I happen to love this video, because they aren't really cute, and his fantasy involving a pink furry amoeba lady. COME ON. You have to love that! Genius. I also love that it's filmed at a school - was this filmed at their school? That's kind of the authentic vibe that I get, hehe (a cursory Google didn't answer that, sorry). And  I love the clothes - especially towards the end when everyone is dancing, and there's like the kid in the Black Flag shirt, and then also a girl in unflattering 90s khakis and so on and so forth. 

And finally, to end this on a more sweet note, the bride walked down the aisle to the following (piano-only, played by her talented cousin). While I'm not really a Beyonce fan, I have to say that I do think she is super talented, not to mention exceedingly beautiful.

"Halo - Beyonce"  - which sounds amazingly lovely as just piano, very nice for a wedding: