chothena wedding weekend, complete with pictures!
For those with ADD, you can cut right to the pictures via the lj-cut on the bottom. ^_^
This past weekend, I took a trip down to Omaha along with Dave Kitsberg. We were attending the wedding of our dear friends Cho and Athena, and we spent a little over three days there. It was good times, and I wish them a great time on the honeymoon! Major thanks to Scott, for being a wonderful and gracious host. Many thanks also to Justin Richardson, who co-hosted us and was our means of transportation on numerous occassions. It was so nice to see ALL the Omaha people for once, rather than only a couple of you at a time (like at cons). The last time I was in Omaha myself, before this, was a couple years ago. I love you guys to death, and I already miss you again! I need to make my next trip back there a lot sooner this time! Anyhow, onto the story:
FRIDAY
I headed down to pick up Dave at his place on Friday afternoon. I was already exhausted, as I had only slept for maybe an hour the night before (like before any trip outta town, haha). We had some awesome sandwiches at a shop right by him, before heading back to prep. We got directions to Scott's house, burned some MP3 CD's, and were finally ready to go. We ended up leaving a couple hours later than we'd wanted, and got caught in evening rush hour -_-; I was driving my own car on this trip, since Dave usually drives his car on our long roadtrips together (and I definitely owed him). It was interesting driving my own car for such a long distance. Usually when I'M the driver on a long roadtrip, it's been in Nick's or someone else's car (because everyone but me usually falls asleep haha).
We stopped numerous times during the latter part of the trip trying to find food. It seems like every time we pulled off the highway and got to a place, they had closed their indoor dining room not more than fifteen minutes before we got there. In the end, we got to Omaha around 3:00am, and just drove through Burger King so we could eat it at Scott's. Dave fell asleep soon after getting there, but Justin (Richardson) had just recently woken up (thanks to his goofy work/sleep schedule lately). Since we were both pretty well awake, I decided to join him for some shopping at Wal-Mart (theirs are all 24 hour ones over there). After that, we stopped by IHOP and chatted about con matters a bit. I just had a ton of coffee, no food yet (since I had recently eaten).
SATURDAY
Got back to Scott's at around maybe 8:00am. Dave was just waking up, so we sat down and gabbed with him about industry work and stuff for a while. I was surprisingly not very tired, even after two straight days awake. Maybe it was the pot and a half of coffee that I had at IHOP ^_^;; Before it was too late, we walked over to McDonalds to get some breakfast. Man was it hot out, even walking down a few blocks was killer. Sometime later in the afternoon, I decided to get a nap in for an hour or two. Dave and Justin headed out to have lunch, and to visit Scott at his work.
Just before 5:00pm, and after us three had gotten ready, we headed to the wedding. We ended up getting there like ten minutes late, but it wasn't too bad. Lots of relatives were getting there at the same time we did, haha. The ceremony was short but sweet, Athena and Cho both looked amazing! This was one of the first non-Jewish weddings for both Dave and Me, and when everyone recited the lord's prayer at the end (from memory), we both just sorta nodded along ^_^;; I took lotsa pictures outside while we hung out, and got to meet up with everyone else. Danye, Gabe, Emily, Jesse, Jon, Randy, Pillow, Ashley, Grono, and etc. After the bride and groom made their exit, we all headed out to drive to the reception.
At the reception, we tried to fit all of us at the same table. There were so many of us friends there, that we ended up having to split into two. But people kept wandering over to our main table, as it was like "the cool kids spot" haha. Lotsa good food, good drinks, fun dancing, and great random pictures. Later on in the night, some folks turned in early. Dave, Scott, Justin, Gabe, and Danye all decided to head back home. I was still up for doing stuff, so I joined all the remaining people (along with Cho and Athena) at the cool bar across the street from the hotel.
I had to pay a couple bucks as an entry fee, but that was okay (even for a broke person like me). And thankfully, both Pillow and Grodo bought numerous rounds of shots for whomever wanted them. So in that, I was able to get nicely toasted at the bar ^_^ After they closed, we headed back to Cho and Athena's suite at the hotel. It wasn't the honeymoon suite, since their actual honeymoon was going to be in Scotland. They just got the suite for free, because of the reception, which was awesome! Hours and hours of crazy drunken hijinks, some of which we photographed. We were out pretty late, I didn't get back and finally to sleep until maybe 7:00am.
SUNDAY
Dave and Scott got up pretty early, around 10:00am. I was crashed on the love seat, and dozing off for short bits here and there during the day. Too uncomfortable to properly sleep, though. They went out to eat breakfast at Village Inn, and I was still dead when they got back. I finally got up and active in the late afternoon. We watched some Fist Of the North Star, played some games, and etc. Randy and Ashley would both eventually come by in the afternoon, and then Jesse and Emily came by in the evening. After lots of doddling, we all finally headed out to Family Fun Center. We stopped at Taco Bell first, though, to get a nice dinner. We ended up making it to FFC with only about an hour before they closed. It was Dave's first time there, and my third time. We definitely had fun, even if our time was limited.
Afterwards, we stopped by the HyVee (the local grocery store chain). Jesse, Emily, and I all grabbed some various boozes to drink back at Scotts, and again took some funny pictures. We headed back, and ensued to hang out with everyone. Dave and Scott fell asleep eventually, but the rest of us stayed up. Had some drinks, and played Pocket Fighter and even SonicR! (on the Gems Collection). It had been like eight years since I'd played that game! Great music, aweful play control. ^_^ We realized that it was now past 3:00am, and that I would hafta be up by 6:00am to drive home. With so little time left, I decided to just skip sleeping altogether. I'm a machine, and have a higher sleep tolerance than anyone we know... so I knew I could handle it.
MONDAY
Before leaving, I figured we should get some breakfast. Cho and Jesse were still there, as they had stayed up with me all night playing games. We woke up Dave since it was now time to go. Since we had been playing a Sonic game all night, I realized, "Wait, we never got to eat at Sonic Burger while we were here! Do they serve breakfast?!" It turns out they do, and so we decided to eat there before Dave and I headed out. As with their lunch items, their breakfast food is heaven on earth. Cho was nice enough to treat us all, and one of the items we got was the "breakfast sandwich on toast." That reminds me of a certain fast food restaurant in our area, and so I told Cho that I owe him a breakfast at White Castle next time he comes to Chicago.
We said our goodbyes, hopped on I-80, and headed home. Dave fell asleep for most of the trip, but that was fine since he had to take a test at school that evening. He needed the rest, and I was fine to stay awake anyhow. I've driven much further (and on even less sleep) without anyone else in the car being awake, so it wasn't too tough. The trip back home was much faster, barely over six hours the whole way! I dropped Dave at home, and then headed home myself. Got home around maybe 4:00pm, and shortly after that I crashed hard. I had basically gone the last four or five days straight with only a couple hours of sleep the whole time. So I was more than ready for sleep. Ended up sleeping for about twenty hours straight ^_^
And now, without further adieu, I present the pictures!
There's parts to the story that I left out, to save for the pics!
Chothena Wedding: The Narrated Picturebook
Scott's systems and stuff. Most of the essentials are hooked up.
Even has an XBOX 360, which only a scant few of our friends can say ^_^
At the wedding, met up with the rest of our peoples:
Snapped some pics of the non-wedded couples among us:
Crowds and stuff outside the wedding, folks we didn't know:
At the reception, I was greeted at the front desk by:
Dave and Danye fight the temptation to eat our wedding gift:
Jon and Gabe, showing that they are truly pimps:
Our first drinks at the reception. Here's to many more to follow:
Speaking of which, everyone's fave place at ANY reception:
The cakes at the reception. The German Chocolate Cake was
absolutely to die for. It had a coconut topping and OMG *drool*
Danye makes a little monster face out of the stuff on her plate:
Then after, Gabe arranges his own artwork on the plate:
I couldn't finish my prime rib, too damned much.
So as we said many times, "Danye ate Jesus' meat." ^__^
As you can see by their eyes, I turned everyone into zombies.
Given this chance, I commanded them to all climb into the hot tub:
Cho then decides to re-create Gabe's patented "fish-eye" pose.
That or he's checking out his own ass, you decide:
Pillow, the Best Man, finds himself spacey by later in the night.
Seems that someone slipped a mickey into his drink:
Turns out that Randy was to blame. He wanted to usurp the title,
and to even take it further. To infact become the "Best Man, EVAR."
Only took a few pics at the bar Saturday night.
Cho and Pillow gettin' down. And one of the drink wall because it was purdy:
Drunken and back in the room, who knows what we're thinking:
We later convinced Grono to wear Athena's wedding gown. HAWT:
We then convinced him to give her a foot rub, while she relaxed.
She was eventually lulled into sleep, musta been good:
At Taco Bell. The manager lady was awesome, and when closing up...
She gave us free cinnamon twists. We convinced her to pose with us:
Sunday we headed to Family Fun Center:
Right to the music games, rock the fuck out:
Dave plays on no less than two different mixes of Drummania:
Their pride & joy, Parapara Paradise 2nd Mix Deluxe Cabinet.
One of the only two of these that exists in the world,
The two linked machines with the synched dance monitor in the middle:
Most of the other non-DDR Bemani stuff they have:
Their wall/door, paying homage to some of the classics:
Took pictures in most of the other areas in the place:
Stopped by the HyVee, freakin' awesome grocery store chain.
The lights in there are so white and bright, it's eerie.
Pictures can't possibly convey it, but I took one anyhow:
We'd noticed earlier in the day that Dave and Scott were "twins."
In other words, they were both wearing the same kinda GameStop shirt.
But then we noticed some similarly-colored drinks at the store, realizing
that we could take the best picture of it. "Geekiest twins EVAR!"
As with any grocery chain, you find those funny products:
And on the way out, we ran into Mr. Balls:
Playing games, and drinking the usual good stuff:
Farewell breakfast at Sonic, I can still taste it:
On the way out, I noticed a rock band performing at ARBY'S of all places.
I think Lauren Rivera once said that she's a member of the group ^_~
All throughout the trip, no matter how tired,
Dave managed to fight the temptations of the Spanish booze:
