The young woman sitting across from me at work is getting married on October 6th. Unlike me, she can speak of nothing but marriage---which may explain why the company is throwing a bridal shower for her, and not me. The squeaky wheel gets the grease... All day I hear her lamenting over earring styles for the bridesmaids, problems with the hotel in Ireland (where she and Paul are honeymooning), the availability of pussy willows for her reception table centerpieces... Best of all, I have heard the following sentence at least 18 times: We're getting married in a castle in upstate New York.

Jeff and I are trying to figure out how to work some of the lyrics from Pour Some Sugar On Me into the reading his brother will be "performing" at our ceremony. Something like Pour some sugar on me, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. I can't get enough. I'm hot, sticky, sweet chariot. Comin' for to carry me home.

I went to Bevo Mill to order the wedding cake. As I sat sampling different icings and cakes and what-not (Oh! How I prefer cream cheese icing over butter cream!), I looked up and noticed several deer heads hanging on the walls in my reception room.

"I'll go with carrot," I said as I wiped the cream cheese icing from my chin. "And what can we do about those deer heads?"

My Bevo Coordinator said "Lots of brides put top hats and veils on the heads."

"No," I said. "I mean, can we remove the heads altogether for my reception? I'm sort of against the dead animals on the wall thing."

She stood up and walked over to one of the deer heads. She grabbed it by the antlers and tried to remove it from the wall. "Nope," she said. "Those heads are bolted up there for good."

"Can you tell the bakery to leave the raisins out of the cake?" I asked.

"Nope," she replied. "It's a mix."