minus a brother, plus a sister and family of Mediterraneans

so Friday I didn't even go into wits. Instead I delivered wine to the reception venue, then went to the church to practise walking down the aisle in my shoes. Halfway down the aisle I thought 'Hey, I can DO this!' and took a confident step, only to slip and hold onto a pew to keep from falling. the guys polishing the floors managed to keep straight faces which was impressive! after that I went makeup shopping - I wear makeup quite often, but I hardly ever wear heavy makeup and the colours I needed I didn't have and so on. From there I had my toenails done, my nails done (they are currently about 2 inches long and I have gouged my eyes from trying to remove my contact lenses), and my eyebrows done. All this while rushing home to help pack cars with all my brother's stuff to take to the new house and battling with the 'I'm not at wits!' guilt.

After all that I went home and collapsed, waiting for 4:30 to arrive so I could go and collect Carla's honeymoon luggage. My brother decided to move some more stuff accross and I joined him. their house is HUGE! It's a double story with 3 big bedrooms, 2 bathrooms (2 baths AND a big shower and a whole load of other rooms. from there we went to get the luggage from a highly emotional Carla and then my family (my parents, my brother and me) went out for dinner.

This morning I rushed out early and got my hair done, amid frantic phonecalls from Carla and then calm and then frantic phonecalls... they did my hair really nicely, so of course it rained like crazy and I had to do the whole jersey-above-head-rush-to-car thing, rush home, do my makeup, have lunch (at 11:30) and then go off to Carla's house to change and help her get ready and so on.

The wedding (after a good 3 hours of preparations) was really beautiful. I didn't trip or slip on my way up the aisle, my brother did a happy-dance (literally) when he saw Carla, they both burst into tears in the middle of the first hymn, she cried in the middle of the vows so he had to pull faces at her to get her through them , and the 2-year old flowergirl/ringbearer who had flat-out refused to walk down the aisle or sit still at all at the rehearsal, sat on the altar cushions quite happily eating the jellytots that had been hidden in her basket.

From there we went to the reception, where all the trouble started. We were having photos in the garden, but as it had been raining we kept getting stuck when the heels on our shoes sank. I had a list of all the photos that needed to be taken, but it turned out that the photographers didn't so they took mine and sent me off to fetch petals. In the meantime I was needed in pictures and got yelled at and then Carla yelled at me for not organising people for photos because I had no list. When I said that the photographers had it she got even angrier and kept screaming that it wasn't my list, it was theirs. And that ruined my day a lot.

The reception was also really annoying. For starters, I was at the main table,which is a long table where you only sit down one side, facing the room. I was almost on the end, next to my dad (not exactly renowned for talking at family functions) and the best man, whose girlfriend was 2 tables away. Every time there was a speech the video people put these BRIGHT lights on us and the photographers were everywhere. It really annoyed me. Like after the first dance it was the father-daughter/bridal party dance and I was dancing with the best man (neither of us knew what we were doing) and we kept bumping into the video guy. It was so irritating!

I'm sorry, but I think a beautiful day was slightly marred by the need for 2 photographer and a vido guy. I have big problems with people who spend so long trying to save bits of memories that they don't actually live them, and I felt that that was what was happening tonight. That and getting screamed at by my new sister-in-law was fantastic. She was still 'not speaking' to me by the time that they left. which really upset me.

The other thing that upset me was the way that everyone thought I'd had my makeup donw professionally. When I said I had done it they got all shocked. I felt like saying 'YES! I KNOW WHICH END OF THE LIPSTICK TO USE!' Just because I don't plastr on makeup like that doesn't mean I can't...

and not I'm tired and grumpy and I'm going to bed.

SUPERMOM!

I told my parents about my run-in with Creationist-girl and the Christians. My Dad and I had a good laugh about it once I'd calmed down. My mom went on the warpath. This all unfolded right before she started a sermon-series about New Age theories and beliefs. So she's been working in how fundamentalism can be harmful and that evolution is actually ok.

It's really sweet to see her protecting me like this, but I sit through each sermon dreading the moment when she tries to explain evolution. We've got a protocol whereby she comes and runs a fact-check by me ebfore she preaches, but she can get carried away. Does anyone know a good layman's book explaining the basic principles of evolution? It's her birthday tomorrow...

In other news I just sat down and outlined a potential project and various questions I want to answer in the next 3 - 4 years. Suddenly it's not so scary anymore, I'mjust really excited about all the cool stuff I can do. Once I see my supervisor (over coffee?!) it'll probably be all shot down and back to square one, but for now I'm ok!

Growing up

I was going through old photos yesterday afternoon. I realised that a big part of growing up is losing things. Yesterday was my brother's birthday, his last birthday at home considering he's getting married next month. He was hardly at home at all.

I found an old photo of me holding a lizard. I was about 4 years old. I remember chasing them a lot (they lived under our wisteria which grew around the front of our house) but I don't remember catching more than one or two. It was in a pile of photos of old friends who I used to spend all my time with. I see two of them about once a year, but even that is awkward. It makes me wonder how long the friendships I have right now will last.

I went to the vet yesterday. I used to work there (as a potential vet-student) and loved it more than any other place in the world. It was nice, I had a long chat with the vet who has been incredibly supportive of me in all my studies. I also realised that I won't be hanging out with the vets during surgery again.

I went to a church function last night. It was fun, we all dressed up (except me and my friend Sarah who read the 'smart-CASUAL' on the invite and wore jeans). when I was youger I was super-involved in the church but over the last few years I've pulled more and more away frlom it. I was wondering why, I had a lot of close friends there at one stage. Then last night Brian had an eye-patch that was too small and gouging his eye so he decided to move it to where there might be a third eye, so I suggested the top of his head cosidering the whole 'pineal eye' thing. Someone turned around and attacked me verbally because I was 'taking evolution into account.'

It wasn't that they were uncomfortable with the idea, I'm used to that (although the general response is 'lets not go there' which really annoys me). It was the fact that someone I'd never even met before about a week ago felt comfortable speaking to me like that. There was no opening for me to explain what I meant or the fact that I am an EVOLUTIONARY biologist which means that believing in evolution is as much a part of my identity as the fact that I was sitting at a church. Instead some little kid who's just left school and has never really looked at evolution felt comfortable giving me a 'talking to' about it.

Just to round off the incident when I left the little group to find someone to talk to who wouldn't attack me and not allow me to answer them, one of my friends who had seen the whole thing took me to one side and asked me to be more 'sensitive' about the way I talk about evolution.

Anyway the evening ended with dinner and watching 3/4 of the 'Phantom of the Opera' (scratched DVD, not mine) and little creationist-girl had to leave because she thought it would be too scary for her. That's right. Don't look at things that scare you.

I'm tempted to throw the whole 'growing up' thing out the window and follow her around muttering 'Darwin! Darwin!'

But I know that the only response that I'll take is to avoid the church functions in future. Because that's what I always do.