The Wedding: Part 1 - The build up to the big day

**The following was written last November in the presence of a warm soft breeze, a soothing environment and several cocktails in what can only be described as luxury. Having been broke for 2 years to make it happen, we were still feeling so very lucky to be chilling on our amazing honeymoon in the tropical wonderland of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean... more of that to come later**

Sat here writing with pen and paper in a pad rather than typing from my laptop, let me take you back 6 days, rewinding a 12 hour flight, a 3 day break in London and our wedding day. We've landed back in time the day before the big day. My best man and his girlfriend are present and staying over, they arrived on Saturday and the nerves or anticipation were starting to get to everyone was having to give a speech the next day. The big day was almost upon us.

Within hours of landing on the Saturday we'd disappointed both my best man and his girlfriend by taking them to a less than impressive game of football when we went to watch Crusaders Vs Glentoran, not a regular occurrence mind, just one of those games, it ended 1-1. Thankfully things picked up quite quickly.

It was soon Sunday and Norn Girl had been picked up by her mum and driven away to the Clarion Hotel in Carrickfergus (the location of our reception) where she was to hide out near Carrick Castle, the location of our wedding ceremony on the big day that was now just a day away. My best man and his girlfriend had taken the chance to head into town and see the sights. So there I was, all alone with my laptop, my new shiny shoes eager to be worn the next day and with my fish noming the surface of their water hoping for an extra sprinkling of pellets. My mission, with less than 24 hours before the event and the speeches to be given, was to write my speech for the reception.

I know, I know, I should have had it done ages before and I had tried so very hard. I had even taken my pad over on my stag party but time and events got away from me. On my return work was very, very, very busy (as it still is to this day in March 2010!) and I was rushing until the last day to meet future deadlines to ensure that I'd not miss them whilst I was away. During that same time in the weeks building up to the wedding day, Norn Girl and I were nervous wrecks operating on a mixture of adrenalin and auto pilot, always trying to think about what we still had to do and what we might have missed. Everytime I had assigned time, the time had somehow got away from me and so, with only a couple of hours to myself before it was too late, this was my last and only opportunity!

So I set my head to the task again, a task of trying to write something both personal and impersonal, affectionate (or as I had written at the original time of writing this - Effectivate, now there's a word - send your meaning on a postcard!) but not sickly, not overly waffley but also not too direct. This task worried me for about 10 minutes until in a moment of inspiration I came to the conclusion (aided by everyone I'd asked about this sort of thing too) that it probably wasn't going to make the slightest bit of difference. Sure, by chance I might have been able to write the perfect speech but this was me, even if I was to have had the perfect speech written down word for word it wouldn't come out of my mouth that way! It still had to be written though so what was I going to put in my speech?...

...To be continued...