February 13, 2010.
Today was the wedding of my brother and his fiancée (well, now his wife!) Mandy. After spending a couple hours chiseling ice off of drain spouts around my building and shoveling snow off of our flat roof (by the way, flat roofs in regions where snow is prone, not a good idea), I headed over to meet my dad and brother for a shave at the Grooming Lounge on L Street in DC.
If you have never gotten a professional shave, I recommend it…at least for you men out there. Matt gave me my shave. He did an excellent job and I recommend him if you want to check this place out. Your face just feels amazing afterwards. I do kind of wish they would use the straight edge razor…the one that you use the strop with. But they use safety razors…the same kind I shave with at home and claim that you can get as good of a shave with the modern safety razors as you can with a straight edge razor. Any opinion on this?
I then hurried around, picked up my dry cleaning at Georgetown Cleaners (they are pretty good) on Florida Ave., reviewed my notes for the ceremony and headed down to the Hotel Monaco for the wedding.
I think I have mentioned in other posts that my brother and Mandy asked me to perform the wedding ceremony. This is not something that I have a lot of experience doing. In fact, I didn’t have any experience.
I think it went well though. I did forget to tell the guests to sit after the bride and groom came in though. So, everyone stood for the ceremony! Oops…good thing it was only about 12 minutes long.
Mandy and Ryan (photo: Maureen Buckley)
The reception was wonderful. The hotel setting was beautiful, the food was fantastic, and all the other details were perfect. I got to see a lot of family and friends that I have not seen in some time… only wish I could have spent more time with them all.
I sensed the reception was coming to an end…could it have been the Neil Diamond tune that clued me in? Who knows? I found a hotel staff member cleaning up and thought I should offer him my $10.
Issa is a 50 year-old-man originally from the West African country of Sierra Leone. He is a Banquet Captain at the Monaco and has worked there for about 7 years…pretty much since they opened in 2002.
He is tall and slender and was very appreciative of the gift. He said that he would use it to put gas in his car and buy some juice. Issa was busy and I let him finish his work so that he could get home.
Several of us headed to the hotel bar, Poste, for the penultimate drink.
Congratulations Mandy and Ryan! Your wedding was beautiful and I am very happy for you both. I love you very much.
Year of Giving 