From Her Perspective

This weekend I attended a Wedding Expo with my girlfriend who is getting married later on this year.  Now, we are talking about a girl who is as anti-bridezilla as one can get.  She picked out her wedding dress (which is perfect, by the way) in less than twenty minutes with nary a sparkle or a puff in sight.  My maid-of-honor dress is something I can wear again without shame.  There are going to be cheese fries.  My only complaint thus far is that she won’t let me have a spotlight dance to “Rumpshaker”.  When she initially asked me to go, I was very surprised that she was even interested in attending something so outwardly “bridey”.  But I was intrigued.  I mean, I’m not anywhere near to getting married, but I heard that they give away free stuff, so I was definitely on board.

I figured that this whole thing would be full of smug-looking, unattractive girls who thought they were the first people ever to get married and I was right.  Well, mostly, anyway.  But I was prepared, as I had borrowed a girlfriend’s fake engagement-looking ring so I could get a more in-depth experience.  And yes, more free stuff, okay?  Sue me!

Armed with wine and snarky attitudes, my friend and I entered the Land of Bridal Hell.  There were high school girls walking around in “wedding dresses” (it was more like a bad prom) and handing out bubbles.  People were scrambling for good seats for the “fashion show”.  Everyone was laden down with bags from various vendors and drinking teeny cups of champagne.  Women with comb-overs and middle-aged men who were beatboxing (seriously) roamed the crowd.  Since I didn’t really have anything to pay attention to, I had time to notice several things about these affairs that may prove helpful to you in the future…

Okay, first of all, they make you do stupid stuff in order to win prizes that generally aren’t that good, anyway.  They sound good, but then you realize that the “free honeymoon” is actually a long weekend and they don’t even include airfare.  I know, I know, free is free and it’s nice to win anything, but I don’t think that it is necessary for one to completely give up all sense of dignity in order to win some place settings.  Because that’s what they make you do.  There were couples embroiled in a dance-off to rival anything I ever saw on Dance 360, and it was humiliating.

Second of all, if you are a guy and you attend one of these things, you are completely whipped, completely lack testicles, and should hand in your Man Card immediately.  A wedding expo is no place for a man, no matter how “involved” you want to be.  A wedding expo is for unattractive women who want to brag about being engaged to someone ugly and for attractive women to go and make fun of everyone else.  So guys, stay home.  Watch football.  Scratch.   Do anything but attend one of these things.  And if your fiancée gives you a hard time about skipping out, seriously consider breaking the engagement.

Thirdly, heckling the poor college kids who are modeling awful dresses on the “catwalk” is very poor behavior.  Especially if they can hear you.  It is also not recommended to laugh at the people around you who say that they think the dresses being shown are really pretty.  Because, again, they can hear you.

Lastly, if a photographer’s display includes erotic pictures of brides, skip it.  That is totally creepy.  And don’t let them trap you in a conversation about it, because it’s really hard to keep a straight face while discussing a random woman’s boobies and visible stretch marks.  Just trust me on this. 

Basically, unless you are one of those women who are totally obsessed with the “perfect wedding”, you are better off buying one of those ginormous bridal magazines and making fun of the awful dresses in your living room with your girlfriends than schlepping all the way out to one of these things.  I mean, they offer a lot of information, but it’s nothing you can’t just figure out yourself. 

That said, I’m definitely going next week.  I’m shining up my fake engagement ring as we speak.  What?  Mama needs a breadmaker!