Yes. Yes you can.
Quick side tangent (is it possible to even have a side tangent when you haven't even started a topic yet? My vote is yes.)
Back in the day, my 6th grade girlfriend and ADawg's 6th grade girlfriend were best friends, and so naturally we went on a lot of 'double dates' together. Dates, of course, consisting of ADawg and I meeting the girls at a movie theater, speaking around 17 words to each other, then going home, firing up some Streets of Rage on the Sega, calling them on the phone, and talking for 6 hours.
They bought us R.L. Stine books for Christmas, and even came up with a little dance routine that they used to perform for us while blaring some Crystal Waters. I probably heard that song around 400 times in 1994-1995. I don't know if I've ever seen ADawg happier than those days. I always secretly hoped we would reunite with our 6th grade loves. Alas, I have no idea what happened to his, and the last time I saw mine, about 4 years ago, she tried to cut in front of me in line at El Roco. When I told her how I felt about that, she let loose with a verbal assault so vicious that I'm fairly convinced she had been practicing in front of a mirror for 9 years, waiting for exactly that moment. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, especially if she is scorned in front of everybody during recess. When I eliminated her in four-square by spiking a waterfall in her face, she knew it was over between us.
But now I can see that I have to leave the past where it belongs: in the past. The only thing from 6th grade that ADawg still needs are all his clothes. Bobbi loves him for who he is. He doesn't have to be the wolf around her, just like when he dated Boof in high school. OK, obligatory Teen Wolf joke out of the way. Now on to the wedding festivities:
I don't know why I talked shit about going to a small podunk town for the wedding. I forgot one of the cardinal rules of North Dakota: the smaller the town, the more you drink your face off. There was initial concern about the meeting of the two wedding parties. Virtually none of the groomsmen had even met any of Bobbi's bridesmaids, and although the vast majority of people that meet us Grand Forks kids enjoy our shenanigans, well...there's always that chance. It's either "Oh man, those guys were funny! I loved them!" or "I hope we never hang out with those douchebags again!" There really isn't a middle ground.
However, it was established within about 2 hours after meeting these small-town ladies that they were at least as crazy and outgoing as we are, if not more. They put down the gauntlet right away that they would outdrink us, and they weren't shy about calling us names the entire Friday before the wedding, trying to intimidate us. Don't worry, we outdrank them. But it was a stellar performance by the females. This is my impressed face.
We were also re-united with Chris and Tim, a couple of ADawg's buddies from NDSU that I hadn't seen since the drunkest night of my life back in the summer of 2004 (a story for another time.) The last time we partied together, Paul almost choked to death when he bragged he could gargle Southern Comfort, and I literally fell out of my ex-girlfriend's car and puked in the middle of the busiest street in Grand Forks. We quickly picked up where we left off.
Napoleon has a pretty sweet golf course, so we were able to get in a quick nine holes both mornings. We played teams, ADawg and I vs. Bergman and Fundy the first day, then Paul and I vs. Bergman and Fundy the second day, since ADawg had pictures early that day. Both matches were birdie-filled, exciting affairs, and both came down to at least the 8th hole. The course was filled with strategically laid out par 4s and reachable par 5s; it was perfect for team match play. It was one of the courses where you just grab your own cart and go, there aren't any employees on the course. So we had Timmy fill up a cart with beer and drive all over the course being everyone's beer bitch. Score another point for small towns.
The worst thing about small towns, which we encountered Friday night: the attitude of all the regulars and bartenders in their bars. Sometimes I don't understand how North Dakota has a reputation for being the friendliest state in the country. One on hand, what the hell is the big deal if out-of-towners are in your bar? We spice things up a little bit, we usually have good-looking ladies with us, we tip well, and it's not like we'll be boozing there every single night for the rest of your life, like 75% of the people drinking in there will be. On the other hand, if I was at my normal bar, and a bunch of douchebaskets with striped shirts and product in their hair strolled in acting afool, taking over the shuffleboard table, making up names for different drinks, playing MC Hammer on the jukebox, and then laughing about how awesome and hilarious they are for playing MC Hammer.....I might be pissed too. So I guess I can't entirely blame the small-towners. (But I did redeem myself on the jukebox by feeding the locals a steady diet of Eddie Money, Journey, and Styx the rest the night.)
The wedding the next day was an absolute booze-a-thon. Immediately after the ceremony, the entire wedding party piled into someone's Winnebago and spent the next 45 minutes or so cruising the streets of Napoleon pouring alcohol down our throats. I don't think I've ever had so much booze in such a small time frame before, nor have I ever been peer pressured to do so by girls as much as by guys. For real, those girls were badass. By the time dinner was about to start, and I suddenly found myself in the middle of conversations with a bunch of parents (including my mom) I was struggling to stay coherent.
Another negative of small towns (we're at 2-2 now, by my count) is the amount of good-looking girls who are dating trash dudes, simply because their options are so limited. The wedding photographer was pretty cute, and- let's be honest here- stacked. So we had spent most the afternoon blatantly hitting on her, only to watch in dismay as her husband sauntered into dinner in a dirty baseball hat, tucked in flannel shirt, and Wranglers. To a wedding dinner. Keep it classy, guy.
The dance was a shitstorm. I would guess that there were around 600 people at dinner, and by the end of the dance it was close to 800. It was an absolute madhouse in there. Towards the end of the night, I was growing frustrated with the deejay continually telling me that they didn't have any of the songs I was requesting, even though I knew he could search for songs on the internet and play them easily. On top of that, he was playing polka after polka after polka, which the locals were loving. Finally, I gave up requesting songs, and announced I was boycotting the dance. (Just a little tidbit for future reference: when I start getting irrationally angry over trivial things, then you know that I am borderline blacked out. I refused to get back on the dance floor, until Bobbi went up and pulled some strings and got some songs played. After SexyBack came on, I had to be almost literally dragged out to the dance floor. Probably around 45 seconds later, I am dancing away and loving life. What can I say, alcohol's a hell of a drug.)
The rest of the night passed without incident. The drive home the next day was probably the worst road trip since those kids' car broke down in Texas Chain Massacre.
We don't have as many awesome pictures as last time, mostly because we didn't have Chelsey running around snapping away (Chelsey, I think we know your true calling in life.)
The wedding party, the only time all weekend where we were all sober.
A tip of the cap to the ladies. They brought their 'A' game. Watching our drinking competition would be like going to a Battle of the Bands between Pearl Jam and Nirvana in 1993. There's really no loser, and the people who get to watch it all go down are the real winners.
Here is the wedding party ruining ADawg and Bobbi's first dance as husband and wife. I don't know whose idea this was (I'm gonna go ahead and blame the girls) but somehow it became a good idea for us to gather around the newlyweds and sing and dance while people are trying to take pictures of them. That picture looks familiar, where have I seen something like that before.....
....oh, OK, we're stealing ideas from the Who's in Whoville now. Word up.
Here's Bergman and I trying to console a little girl who was throwing a tantrum after being accidentally squeezed out of the dollar dance. This is not to be confused with the tantrum I threw after the deejay told me he didn't have Whoomp! There It Is on his computer.
Here's Paul with his new wife, Mandy. Oh wait. That's my girlfriend. Then how come.....
Why....
What...
Wow you two are camera whores. With each other. Luckily Mandy and I aren't the jealous type- as in, we don't like spending our entire evening in front of the camera, so you two do what you want.
It took most of the evening, but finally we got ADawg and his siblings together in front of the camera. But wait! ADawg, your brother's head is faded out! You know what this means.
Where we're going, we don't need roads.....
