Coco's Wedding

The primary reason for my long detour to Seattle (along with general visiting and stocking up of supplies from the mainland) was to attend Coco's wedding. I arrived in Seattle last Wednesday evening and casually strolled out of the airport with my carry-on while everyone else crossed their fingers that their suitcase made it through. Proceeding into downtown a la bus, I was miraculously able to meet up with Kari and Coco at Fado. I was slightly taken aback at the price of beer, but that might have just been because I'm accustomed to happy hour prices. Note to London: have more happy hours.

On Thursday and Friday (through early afternoon) I ran around town doing some shopping, visited Kelly's bakery and enjoyed a delicious rhubarb almond muffin cake situation, wondered why there were no simple black work pumps available for sale, ate Mexican food for lunch, and got my haircut. This was all well and good. I was pleased to be able to talk to people without worry of them discovering my foreign-ness, mainly because I wasn't foreign. The people were all oh-so friendly and nice, nobody pumped into me on the sidewalk, and I felt a) that being friendly to people was a viable option without people thinking I was slightly off and b) that being friendly to people was a good time.

On Friday afternoon, Kari and I headed up to the location of the wedding for the rehearsal. Whilst the others were practicing, I read and checked out the place. The place, being 'The Quarry' was a scenic little oasis in the middle of Skagit County with a big rock face and a whole lot of sculptures. Some of these sculptures were fine, in fact, most were. Only two really disturbed me: the series of bathing suits descending into the water and the rusted mechanism containing naked dancing barbies (we put a shrimp on this the next day at the wedding so there would be shrimp on the barbie). Afterwards we headed down to Everett for the rehearsal dinner, taking a slight detour as we were looking for a non-existent exit. We ate Italian food. I particularly enjoyed my little salad.

The next day we were due back at the Quarry quite early so Kari could prepare with the other bridesmaid. We got there just a little bit late (this place is deceivingly far). Nikki and I tried to stay on the DL until it was time for our assigned setting things on tables tasks while much was aflutter. There was a videographer present who seemed to enjoy following people around when they clearly did not want to be filmed. He is not my friend. Anyways, so we eventually went to set things up, watched Kelly set up the cake and cupcakes, and then settled in for the ceremony. We waited a little while in the seat grabbing and as a result were a bit to the side (as can be seen above).

The reception was a festive affair with chicken and potatoes and other things I've forgotten. I want to say Caesar salad. But truth be told, I was saving a bit of room for cake and cupcakes (while theoretically only enough for everyone to have either/or, our inside baker source told us there was a little extra). The cupcakes had coconut, the cake was lemon. It was a tough battle, but my vote went to the cake. A band played that was very good, but sadly they claimed not to know the song 'Shout'. The overall crowd pleaser turned out to be 'Brown Eyed Girl'. A classic in it's own way but I've heard that Shout is at the top of the heap for weddings these days. In all, the wedding was a good time and the weather seemed to be just holding up, but alas it did so all was well on that front.

On Sunday we did a bit of shopping and enjoyed a fine happy hour with Matador's nachos. I went a little crazy and had two Shirley Temple's. It was then about time to head to the airport, which, alas, was pretty much where yesterday's blog picked up (this backwards thing is somewhat intriguing). Tomorrow I shall get cracking on Paris!