Well, Jim and Claire's wedding has happened and was a wonderful success. The manly side of it started in the usual way with a 9PM breakfast at Mum's café. Jimbo managed to eat about half his breakfast which was about the same amount as I ate on the morning of my wedding. After this, most of the men came back to our house and chatted and got ready. I got to the wedding about 3 hours before it started and set up all the chairs and generally tried to get things ready. It was quite scary in a way because everyone kept asking me a wide range of questions about what needed doing about a wide range of subjects. Most of these were quite unanticipated but after a while I got used to this and just did the best I could.

When it came time for Claire to arrive Jim and Joe and I were all waiting at the front. Jim was crying buckets and even I had a few tears in my eyes. It's interesting, it was an emotionally charged day and there are several expressions on peoples faces that I don't think I will ever forget. The first was Jim's, and the second was Roger's when he saw Jim as he and Claire got close to the front. It must be strange for a Father who's giving away his daughter, I could see a funny mix of feelings in his face. A little sadness that his daughter was growing up and leaving home but great pleasure that this young man at the front of the church cared for his daughter so much and that she was going to be starting an exciting new life.

The wedding service was really moving and Claire looked radiant the entire time. Her dress was absolutely beautiful and her hair and make-up looked perfect (wow, I feel like such a girl noticing these things). Dave Lambert did the service wonderfully and it was done in a kind of Church of England style. Jim's brother in law, Jim Partridge gave a talk about marriage and that was really good too. It was quite funny but had some excellent practical points in it about how great marriage is and how to keep a marriage fresh and healthy. I imagine he has a pretty good marriage himself and a lot of what he said struck me as true and good given my experience of marriage over the last three years.

After the service we milled about and photographs were taken. It was at this point that the only negative thing happened (and even that turned into a positive by the end of the day). I went over to the marquee to check that everything was ready for the guests when Liam came and told me that the 36 bottles of white wine and their chillers were missing. We quickly worked out that they'd been stolen and I dispatched a couple of likely lads (Dave and Rob you wonderful guys!) to go and get some more. I'm told that Jim wondered what was going on when he saw one of the ushers and a guest squeezing past the wedding car in a great rush but he was too busy getting married to care that much. Dave and Rob returned quickly with the wine and the day was saved. Later on, my heart was warmed by so many guests wanting to pay for the wine. I couldn't work out how so many had found out but I guess that sort of news can't be kept in.

Then came the time for the speeches and the 3rd facial expression that I will remember for the rest of my life. Roger and Joe had given their speeches and I went to one end of the marquee so that I could be near the projector. I'd decided to start my speech with a bit of a tease, claiming that I was going to do a comparison between Claire and one of Jim's ex-girlfriends. I was then going to show them a picture of Jim with his old skeleton buddy "Vera". The idea of this was that really to create a bit of dramatic tension so that people would laugh when I showed them the photo of James with the skeleton but I don't think I realised just how much dramatic tension I was creating. As I said the word "ex-girlfried" I saw the colour drain from Claire's face and saw an expression there that I don't think I've ever seen before on someone else's face. She clearly believed, that despite the fact that we were close friends, I was about to say something utterly awful. In that two seconds between uttering the words and showing the photograph that made it all ok again, I saw what it must be like to be a horrible betrayer. Claire was laughing by the end of the speech and everyone seemed to enjoy the email I read out from Jim when he was thinking about asking Claire out, but I can still see that expression in my head. Apparently one of the ladies from Church, Jan Lambert was heard to be repeating, "he won't say that!", "he wouldn't". She was laughing too by the end and everybody said nice things about my speech but I still get a bit of a cold chill when I think about that 2 seconds.

After the wedding, there was a bit of barn dancing, a bit of line dancing (Thanks Rob it was awesome) and then a bit of a hip and cheesy disco. I danced with vigour at all three and did my special "Dad" dancing of which my wife is so proud. It was very silly and more than one person clearly came to the conclusion that I'd had too much to drink. This wasn't in fact true and I attribute it to the fact that they've never seen me dancing before! I tend to go a bit nuts which is not quite my normal sensible self. Claire and Jim looked as happy as can be and both had lots of fun with the dancing. We all did lots of silly moves and much fun was had by all. Sarah Wallis did a particularly good barbie girl which amused me muchly. At the end of the evening, everyone made a big arch throughout the whole marquee and Jim and Claire passed through it into their new life together. They drove off in Jim's little red golf with can's rattling behind confetti showering from the exhaust pipe. Ahh, the start of a wonderful life together :-)