adventures in America

Wedding photos are up! They’re on the travel blog.

We got back from the US last night. Of course, even though my only brother’s only wedding is a very big deal to me, being us, we couldn’t
just go and do one thing – we stayed in 5 different hotels in a week
and a half. (Would be 6, but we stayed in the same airport hotel on the first and last nights of our trip.) We actually flew into DC instead of Phliadelphia, because
we were planning to take my uncle to and from the wedding. We flew in, stayed near the airport, drove down to North Carolina for a couple of days to check out some property we’re considering for eventual retirement, saw 15 (!) lots in one day
(trees, grass, water – they all blend together after a bit). Then we went back to DC, but unfortunately my uncle really didn’t feel up to going to the wedding. It’s not so much the cancer that’s laying him waste at this point as the chemotherapy. Brutal. At least we got to spend some time with him and take him out to dinner – the only time he’s left his apartment for a week.

Then we went to Philadelphia. My brother’s stuff is all over my parent’s spare room, so we had an excuse to stay in the very fancy Sofitel downtown – free, because it’s the same chain we stay in on business trips to the Netherlands and Ted and I had tons of points.with them. There were two high points to that stay. We got to go rowing on the
Schuylkill river – it’s been killing me for years that even though I grew up in Philadelphia and went to a college with a famous rowing program, I’ve never rowed there because I didn’t learn until the year after I moved away. I contacted some people through the Yahoo rowingmasters group and we went out in a quad from one of the very famous rowing clubs there. Gorgeous place to row! Funny, because there’s a great view of downtown but it totally isn’t the view I grew up knowing: almost all of the visible buildings went up in my college years (and Penn does have a view of downtown) or after.

Then we met up with a bunch of old friends I hadn’t seen since high school, thanks to Facebook. (Have I mentioned how I love the Internet? I love the Internet.) I mean old friends: people I met anywhere from age three to about fourth grade. So that was fun, though it was a bit disturbing when a few people sent me a link to a news article two days later saying the restaurant where we met had been closed after someone died in the building. (Two people fell from a fourth-floor apartment when a fire-escape railing collapsed – the restaurant is on the first floor, so where we were is safe but was closed until the building can be fixed.)

And then there was the wedding! I met my brother’s now-wife Vicki on Wednesday night for the first time, and though I was going to like her anyway because she makes my brother happy and is nice to my parents, I’m very pleased that she’s someone I’d have liked for her own sake. The wedding was beautiful; she’s got a big extended family so there were 7 attendants on each side! The women wore strapless dark-red dresses with white bands around the top, some of the better bridesmaid dresses I’ve seen, and the men wore black tuxes with red vests and red “jewel” studs in place of a bowtie. They did something I’ve never seen, coordinating the father’s vests and boutonnieres to the mother’s dresses, so my dad had light blue and her step dad had light green. Vicki’s dress made the most of her height and graceful figure – sleeveless with a v-neck and enough beading and embroidery to make it very special without just looking encrusted, and my brother was in a white tux. For the reception Alex changed his shoes to red Chucks 🙂 I read a poem during the ceremony and can report that I had both Alex and Vicki sniffling, though they weren’t far from it to begin with anyway. (I think I could have said “I love you man!” and had them sniffling.)

And the flight home was long, as expected. I couldn’t really sleep much after 3:30 AM, but I got a little sleep on the plane; hopefully jet lag won’t be too bad (it’s usually worse going the other way, and in fact I had to call a halt the day we were seeing the property because I was fading fast).