Weddingbee

Getting married on a Sunday on a holiday weekend has its benefits. One of the biggest was that Mr. Lollipop and I had a chance to have our bachelor/bachelorette parties the Friday before the ceremony while most of our friends and family were in town. Perfect.

My party was planned by my Maid of Awesomeness, Saralinda. She borrowed a giant SUV and stocked it with water and snacks and drove us all in one car. I requested two things from her: to go to Friday Night Improv, and a total ban on all penis-related novelty items. Both of my wishes were granted.

Friday Night Improv is a weekly show held at the Studio Theatre in the basement of the Cathedral of Learning. The format is similar to the show Whose Line Is It Anyway?, but audience members are invited to participate in sketches. August 31st happened to be opening night for the season, so the show was extra packed and we ended up sitting on the floor in front of the bleachers. It was extra convenient for those times where we held each other and laughed so hard that we rolled on the ground.

A shot of us with our amazing host, Ben Mayer.

Plus, we were their first bachelorette party, ever! That somehow gave the Maid of Honor license to yell “Take it off!” at most of the male performers. Still, we mostly behaved ourselves and I got to be the bachelorette in a Dating Game sketch. I left the theater as the bachelors and their quirks were chosen. My job after I came back in was to ask three questions and guess what was wrong with each. An example:

ME: If we went on a date, what would you write in your blog afterwards?
BACHELOR #1: (In a falsetto) Well, we would ride horses and then we would almost kiss, and then we would siiing and then siiing some more…

Then bachelors #2 and #3 would answer, and so on. Below is a picture of me with my potential “dates”: a Disney princess, a man obsessed with English literature, and some one who was molting. Guess which one was Bachelor #1.

The MOH also did a sketch of her own. It was a Shakespeare themed sketch where one of the other performers was stabbed and died on top of her. That was the most action any of us got that night with a stranger.

FNI ended at 1 am so we ran over to my favorite bar, the Library on Pittsburgh’s South Side. I managed to get myself tipsy rather quickly, but there were few boys to flirt with. Well, there were a few on the second floor patio, but they were related to one of my ’maid’s ex-boyfriends. Hmm. Awkward.

Then, at 2am tragedy struck. Noo! Not closing time! I hadn’t made out with random boys or at least had a chance to talk about it before chickening out! While we stood outside trying to decide what to do next I saw my brother in law come out of the bar across the street, and then another brother in law and then Mr. Lollipop and the rest of his bachelor party. The South Side flats has over 80 bars in an area a little less than one square mile, and we coincidentally picked two across the street from one another. Yay! So, instead of awkwardly, drunkenly hitting on strangers I made out with Mr. Lollipop in the middle of the street. There is a distinct possibility that I traumatized my younger brother, but it was a happy ending to the nightlife portion of the party.

We separated from the boys again and went to Saralinda’s house where we drank my favorite kind of liquor, which is anything packaged in a tiny bottle. I fell asleep almost immediately while everyone else stayed up late and watched the BBC Series Footballers’ Wives, which is for the best because I have a hard enough time following that show while sober.

So, I had a great night on the town with my ladies. Three cheers to Saralinda for organizing it all!

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