The Long-Awaited Wedding Toast

I know all my readers have been sitting on the edge of their seats for the past few months, just waiting for me to post some clips from Trian's wedding. I may add a few later - but the most important video was my wedding toast (obviously). I've embedded it below. But first, a few words on a toast.

For those of you who dread the idea of standing in front of a large audience and giving a speech about your friend, then here are some tips to help:

1. Drink alcohol first - no, seriously. Don't get wasted or anything... but 2 or 3 drinks will begin to loosen you up a bit. Nothing ruins a toast faster then a guy whose voice is cracking more than when he went through puberty.

2. If you're not giving the only speech then write more then one version. Consider the following situation: You write a funny toast. But at the wedding, someone else gives a toast before you and they are much funnier than you will ever be in your lifetime. If you try to follow that act then you'll be ridiculed for the rest of the day. So write a funny toast, and a serious toast. That way you are prepared for anything. Luckily, everyone who went before me was very serious so I was allowed to bring the funny.

3. Consider your audience. You need to speak in a language that they understand. If there are a lot of old people at the wedding then don't bust out any ebonics. Likewise, don't go making sex/alcohol jokes to a bunch of bible-thumpers.

4. Memorize your speech (or at least most of it). Having note cards is fine, but don't stand there with your face in a book the whole time. Talk to the crowd.

5. Practice your speech to other people. This will let you iron out the kinks and make changes. I spent 2 weeks writing my speech and must have told it to 10 different people to find out what parts weren't funny enough.

6. Be careful of the content. This relates to #3. If you're a guy, you can make fun of the groom. If you're a girl, you can make fun of the bride. The closer you are to the person, the meaner you can be. But be careful not to cross the line. And be careful not to bring up that story about the hookers in Tijuana... because no one wants to hear about it.

And without further ado, here is my semi-acceptable wedding toast. Let the insults begin.

NOTE: The first 8 or 9 seconds have a still-image... then it fixes itself

Your best friend Harry has a brother Larry...

Bonus points to any non-Shawneegroup member who knows those lyrics...

The past few weeks of my life had one overriding theme: Wedding. As in, I was going to be in one (not as the groom... and no, not as the bride).

But, as any red-blooded american knows, you can't have a wedding until you've had the bachelor party. So let's talk about those. I've always been of the opinion that a bachelor party can come in two basic forms:

One, it can be filled with a combination of booze, gambling, and strippers. The goal here is to have one last wild night before clamping the "very realistic" ball-and-chain to your ankle. You hope that when you start to get bored with married life, you can sit back and remember that crazy night.

Two, your bachelor party can be about male bonding. You spend a night (or weekend) with the guys doing something manly, and eating something manly, and waxing manly poetic (hmm, that sounds dirty). A great example of this was a bachelor party I went to a few years ago where we played Paintball up in the mountains of PA and rented a cabin to stay the weekend.

Well, the bachelor party I attended last week was neither of these things. We went to Medieval Times. Yeah, I know... it isn't the first choice for most people. But ya know what? It was a lot of fun. We ate food without utensils. We called women "wenches". We even got to scream things like "Kill him!" And then we ended the night with some poker back at someone's house (for fun... not for money). All in all, a good way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

So let's fast-forward to the wedding. I wasn't the Best Man, but I did give the first speech (a few of the groomsmen stepped up for this).

I'd been thinking about that speech for months... seriously. It's really difficult to write one of those. You need to be funny, and also have a point, and also be sentimental.

The first part of your speech has to be the opening joke. I chose to say something which spoke highly of the bride, and made fun of the groom. That's usually a safe bet.

Then you need to either give advice or tell a story. I went for the story. I told everyone about the exact moment that I knew they would get married. I didn't think it was a nice story... I thought it was kind of insulting (they both messed up in a similar way one evening)... but 2 different women assured me that it was a cute story.

Lastly, you have to close with something sappy. Say something like "I just know you two will be together forever" (yawn).

And that's it. Easy.

Wait, I said earlier that it was really hard to write mine. I think I just insulted myself here. Crap.

Oh well, this has been another installment of Rob's randomness. Enjoy.