aah, pittsburgh! my hometown! i went to visit this past thanksgiving weekend for my cousin, troy's wedding. i had to fill in for my dad as best man since dad recently had a heart attack (more on that later).
first off, i got to finally meet my friend rashida's husband ray and their youngest son, rowan. their oldest son is named ray, jr. and i hadn't seen him in over five years. i got to stay with them for a couple of nights and i had a blast.
both boys (shown above) are huge star wars fans so we had an immediate bond. i brought my "clone wars" dvds and they would not stop carrying them around the house. then they pulled out their action figures and were in awe as i proceeded to name all of the characters, all the way down to momaw nadon, the hammer-head and bib fortuna, jabba's vizier.
now, the wedding...
where do i begin?
i suppose first off, i should mention that troy is a pittsburgh city boy and his wife, magaly is an immigrant from peru. oh, so many comedic cultural miscommunications!
before i had to pinch-hit as best man, troy had asked me to deejay the wedding reception.
i readily complied. i had done a few weddings in the past and i also love latin music so, why not?
i soon learned that what i didn't know about latin music is a lot.
to my gringo ears, salsa, merengue and cumbia all sound the same.
on top of that, the music that was given to me for playback was all bootlegged and or custom burned mix cds. so i had to key in all the titles. none of which were in english
aye, aye, aye!
but i do have to admit that i laughed out loud when i was handed the mini-CD below.
in spanish, jorge, magaly's brother, told me not to look at the cover just to copy the files.
the next day at rehearsal, i discovered one of the deluxe features that the hotel offered along with the rental hall.
the amazing throne seen below.
and! troy and magaly actual got married in them! AWESOME!!!
now the actual wedding...
we arrived at tony and miriam's house to change into our tuxedos that morning. the house was completely crowded with people and troy and i were running late after having to retrieve 300 2-liter bottles of soda from the super-walmart.
in the rush, i lost my wallet and went into a full-blown panic attack. thankfully, tony found it later that night and had it fedexed back to me.
below are pics from tony's house and the limo.
while in the limo, miriam asked troy how he directed the driver to their house. i apologize for the phonetics in advance.
she asked "troy, did jou tell the driver to look for the jellow house?"
for a long while i seriously thought, "jello house? is that like waffle house, only they only serve jello?"
then it occurred to me that she was actually referring to the color of her house and i was simply mis-hearing her.
i almost forgot! in tony and miriam's yard, there was a dog statue that was supposed to look like it was ready to play fetch. however, half of the stick got broken off and now it just looks like he's doing his best triumph impersonation.
then we went up to mt. washington to get our pictures taken.
see below... magaly, troy and aunt becky.
this picture was taken by the flower-girl arianna. i think it's an amazing composition.
and here's the photographer herself. what a cutie!
magaly's sister, miriam.
my cousin's little girl, cassie.
marissa, silvia, magaly and miriam
tony
magaly's mom. i don't know her name but everybody called her "mamita"
then there was this african dude who was also getting his picture taken. first he posed leaning against OUR limousine then overlooking the city, then he asked me if i was the groom and if he could get his picture taken with magaly. i'm a little concerned about the stories that he will be taking back to his village.
besides my siblings, here are the rest of the medlen grandkids.
alyssa. what a goofball!
me and my black mom, patterson.
me, kalyn & alyssa
at the end of the night, i invited aunt pat, betty ann, the girlies, the volunteer deejay, phillip and his ladyfriend, lisa to go sing karaoke in the bar upstairs.
we didn't get a chance to sing but this lady sang tanya tucker's "delta dawn" without ever having to refer to the screen for lyrical assistance.
yikes.
i elbowed alyssa and said, "take a good look. this is what you will look like if you start smoking or you date before you're twenty-five."
what a weekend.
congrats, troy and magaly!
