EEEeee only a few days left till the wedding! Married! And I’ll be a different person. Well, I’ll have a different last name anyway, still the same person. But the same person with a mysterious and beautiful last name! Heh.



Wow, a good deal happened this weekend. Friday afternoon I ate lunch with Frank at his apartment. We played some vintage 8 tracks, and talked about his move to Vegas to work at the same place Dan is. He tried to push some Vinyl Museum rejects on me, and I don’t even have a record player anymore. Of course, I had to take that Starfleet technical manual off his hands, because even though he’s attempting to shed his geekiness by ridding himself of geek paraphernalia, I am heartily embracing my own. After all, I was busy embracing my geekiness when I met Carlo.


Carlo and I took some time out to go down to state street on Friday night. We searched around for some pretty fountains to put under our cake, but found none that appealed to us. Then we headed down to Doty’s Dumpling Dowry, which according to this list has the third best burgers in the world. It’s not just the awesome burgers that keep us coming back to Doty’s, or even their equally awesome teriyaki chicken sandwiches. It’s the place where we met first, face to face. I was 15, and had practiced parallel parking all around the capitol, with my Mom. She finally dropped me off at Doty’s, where I went in and attempted to find people from Starfleet Command BBS, who were meeting there. Of course, I hadn’t told anyone that I was going for sure. I spent at least 20 min, wandering around the narrow restaurant(feels more like a pub really), asking people if they knew me. It has a lofted area in the back, I remember venturing up there and gazing around, but not recognizing anyone. There was no reason I should, I had never seen any of these people before, and only had a vague description of Talon(Carlo). I even thought perhaps I would give my online name (Irissia)to the cooks, they yell out your name when the food is ready for you to pick up. So I stood, back down in front of the big menu sign, first time I’d ever been in a place like this by myself. The door behind me opened, and a very handsome, dark haired man walked in wearing a green shirt, and a black vest. I actually called out Talon as he walked past me, he seemed to pause, gave me a big grin, and past me by on his way to the lofted area in the back. I felt at a loss, how was I going to find the people I was supposed to meet? I’d already been there for about 20 min, asking complete strangers if they knew me. Several hopeless minutes later, the dark haired man returned, and asked me if I were Iris, I was so relieved to see him, I gave him a hug right there. Then he led me upstairs to meet the rest of the gang. Of course, they turned out to be the people upstairs that I didn’t recognize at all before. (I hear they had a picnic once, and someone brought a stand up Spock, that might have been easier for me to find)
I spent the rest of the night being pretty shy, and flirting with Talon as much as I knew how, stealing his milk, eating his fries. Later on, the whole group moved downstairs to the booth by the front window, and I marveled at how not like Ben Sisko, the man with that handle was. My mom came to pick me up in what seemed far too soon. She got to meet Carlo that day too, the same day I did. That night seems so long ago now.


It’s kinda sad though, the state is forcing Doty’s to shut down, so they can build an art’s district. Or something. It’s like they are stealing an emotional touchpoint away. It was very nice though, for he and I to revisit the place we met in real life, a week before our wedding, felt like a full circle. And wow, did we gorge ourselves, cheeseburgers, fries, onion rings, and we shared a yummy shake! Plus we wer all cutesy, which we’re not usually to horrible with, but, well, place we met, wedding a week away, we felt we were entitled a bit.


After that we wandered down to Williamson street, to Jolly Bob’s Jerk Joint, to find Frank again, and his going away party. We’ll he wasn’t there, apparently the party had moved down to the classic Sonic hangout, the Crystal Bar. It was only about a block away from Bob’s. Got to chat with Frank some more, and saw more ex-sofo people than you can shake a stick at. Played Mars Attack Pinball with Adam, I love that Bally game, the little green Martians move around sometimes, and there’s even a little space ship to attack. I had such a great time. I’m really gonna miss Frank, but I plan on visiting him and Dan in Vegas sometime soon.

Saturday, Mom and I finished the rest of the candy favors for the wedding(yah!), and then Carlo and I went over to his dad’s for dinner. We ate with Talia and Danny( Victor’s girlfriend and her child), and David (Carlo’s cousin) and of course Victor. We tried several times to convince him that yes, he should be at the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner on Friday night. Who knows if we got through. After dinner we got to hear him sing, he’s got a wonderful voice. It’s so hard to be angry at him when he sings. We also tried to convince him to sing just Spanish songs, and to try to show up at the rehearsal so we can figure out his sound system stuff. (at this point Talia turned around to him, and gave him the look) It was a pleasant time, and David was funny, harassing his uncle in Spanish. I kinda feel left out though, I only understand about one word out of 6 when they all speak Spanish. Talia is a professional translator. I should get some tapes…


After that, even though it was about 9:30, Carlo and I drove to my old high school, to catch the tail end of my 5 year reunion. I was surprised so many people showed up, and we got to chat a bit, and take an extended tour of the new additions at the school. It’s gotten so huge!


Whew, what a weekend, Sunday Carlo and his buds went out to Apocalypse Paintball for his bachelors party. I got out of the house from 3-10, hung out at Heidi’s and wrote even more thank you cards for my bridal shower gifts. I’m trying to get those done and sent out before the wedding, if that’s possible. Then Wendy and Drew brought us all dinner, and the Shaft DVD. And Wendy took the wings home, to sew them together, yah! Pretty good night, though a bit annoying I couldn’t be home to do laundry.


Eee!!! Wedding!!!