Eating for two

I’ve matured as a wedding goer.

I’m 35. I don’t turn the radio up too loud any more and would much rather shoot the shit with friends at a bar than mosh with younguns to music that would make my ears bleed and split my skull. If that’s what getting older is, then I’ve jumped into the pool head first.

And now, age is affecting my wedding habits, as well. First, it was about tearing up the suit mom and dad bought you a week before by playing hide and seek with other 8-year-old parental hostages. Then, it was about finding the single bridesmaids who were looking to hitch up just like their newlywed friend, making them easy marks for a roll in the back seat of a 1976 Nova (don’t laugh, that Nova was very-VERY good to me – OK, so my line “you’re the prettiest girl here, wanna hump like bunnies?” didn’t get me much tail, but it wasn’t for a lack of trying). Next, when Wife dragged me away from Dodger and Charger games for unionization ceremonies, it was all about free booze. Now, it’s free food. “What are they serving?” Is my only question. If it’s plain chicken and veggies, I’m apt to visit an infectious disease ward at the hospital hoping to catch a little something to get me out of the shindig, but throw in a slab of beef, a nice glaze for the chicken and some mouth watering sides and I’m sleeping in my suit three days before the gig. I don’t want to miss the good chow because I don’t know when I’ll eat that well again. Wife’s a good cook and all, but airplaning veggies and rice into my gullet gets old after a while. A little variety and exoticness makes dinner (among other things) exciting.

Wife’s cousin unionized during the week and were kind enough to shove free chow in our face and get us liquored up halfway across the state – east of east Mesa. Hey, when the drive is an hour and a half, it might as well have been in New Mexico.

We’ve become sort of wedding experts this year (or snobs depending on who you talk to) since this is our sixth or sixteenth wedding this year (I lost count after April). I’m a notebook and stat sheet shy of scoring each reception and developing a ranking system similar to college football. Lobster with 18-ounce prime rib and after dinner drinks of 45-year-old cognac would be the LSU (No. 1 in college football polls) of wedding receptions. Burgers BBQ’d by a drunk uncle who looks like Cousin Eddie from the Vacation movies, a flat keg of Natural Light and bluegrass music playing off a tape from an 8-track player inside a beater El Camino would be the Northern Arizona University of receptions.

This one was like an Ohio State (No. 4) or Cal Bears (No. 2).

The ceremony was a splendid gig atop a burgundy-adobe roof flanked by wood lattice overhangs at a tony Mesa country club – I fought to bring my golf clubs because I knew there’d be a break between the service and reception where I could molest a few holes but Wife poo-poo’d that thought (I think since she can’t have any fun, going through that “pregnancy thing” and all, I’m banned from fun as well … just kidding sweetie (my you look lovely today, you’re positively glowing)). We were surrounded by Arizona foothills to the north and east, and a southwest sunset bathed the sky in oranges and purples and reds. I couldn’t have painted a better scene, even if I chopped off my ear and spent some time in a booby hatch.

But that was all just foreplay to the tummy sex we had at the reception. The bar was open, and the bartender knew how to mix more drinks than Judy Garland. I downplayed my intake and stuck with Coors Lights, but when my table buddy next to me returned with a Lynchburg Lemonade, well, let me just say that drink is a little slice of heaven in your mouth. I ordered one after my second dinner plate.

That’s right, second dinner plate.

Our table sat nine, but when the serving crew started schlepping the courses out, we were seven. And Gold bless those two empty spots. As me and my new buddy (we had many things in common – we enjoy making fun of the Cardinals (easy target, I suppose), we like to drink and we like to eat our weight in free wedding grub – slowly chewed through our first plate, we eyed the door like wary vultures searching for predators that might rip our legs from their sockets. No sign of our 8 or 9.

The chicken with mango salsa – Yum – went down. Still empty. One shrimp in. No one. Two shrimp down. Nada. Third shrimp and my new buddy and I almost did a victory dance around the tabled, all set to bow down to the empty seats. We still had to throw down the pasta. We couldn’t wait anymore, the shrimp was positively orgasmic, and swirled the pasta into one humongous bite – so big I thought I’d need a forklift to get up to my pasta-hole – and downed it all in one gulp. Still vacant, we accepted our bounty with smiles big enough to slide an apple pie through.

What were we supposed to do? I’m eating for two these days, and the other dude was getting married, he had to try the dinner to see if it would work for his shindig in a few months. And the dinner was just as good the second time around. Chicken with mango salsa, shrimp scampi over fettucini alfredo and a petite fillet (I only had one as I gave my first fillet to Wife in exchange for her shrimp and pasta, fair enough I thought especially since she she can’t have seafood – yes, that “pregnancy thing” again), it all spelled tasty and made Mikey’s stomach extremely happy, content, post coitalish.

So, if you’re inviting Wife and I to your unionizing, where do you want to rank? Do you want your party to be like exciting football powerhouse Oklahoma University or crummy University of Nevada Reno? If you need help, my taste buds can be hired out.