Note - in the original version of this post, I cruelly used an unflattering photo of Cecile for comic effect. It showed her with a very curious facial expression. I have replaced that photo with a similar one of a well-known celebrity.
I went to Cecile's wedding, and wrote an article about it for her newspaper. (Here's a link to the article, but I'll put it at the bottom as well so that you can read this first.) I only had 500 words to work with, so there were some details I didn't have space to include.
1. In the morning we went to the registry office for the legal ceremony. Cecile told me it was going to be "just a simple casual thing" and then complained when I turned up in shorts.
Cecile told everyone to be at the evening service at 16:30 sharp. Sharp! Don't be late! At 17:15 someone turned to me and said, "Here we are, waiting for Cecile to turn up, not sure if she will. This must be how her students felt."
(Okay, I said that. Whatever.)
2. The ceremony was performed in French and English. Cecile tried hard not to mix the two up. "I take you Nick to be my usband... No, husband. Husband! With an H! Everyone heard me say the H! Stop laughing!"
3. When I met Cecile in the weeks before the wedding I asked what kind of cake they would have. "Shoe cake," she said. Obviously I laughed. When this made her angry I realised she was being serious and there really would be shoe cake served.
I genuinely thought it was going to look like a shoe right until the moment I saw the tray of profiteroles (which she smashed with her fists like some nuptial Hulk).
Turns out it's written 'choux'.
4. Me and my girlfriend had a mini-break in Aix-en-Provence then went to Nice. "Ah no you haff bin somewhere," said Cecile, "bwhut whahere hexactly?"
I replied, "Aix, Aix, baby." She did that puzzled, half-blank, half-stupefied face of hers.
She didn't know the song! Ice Ice Baby, the biggest song of the early 90s! Never heard it, never heard of it! She insisted that it was an obscure thing that was "only famous in Manchester." It became - with remarkably little prompting - the biggest running joke of the wedding, culminating in the dance floor being full of people singing 'check out the hook while the DJ revolves it' with Cecile in the corner, arms folded, while everyone laughed at her.
(Not true - she danced along with everyone else.)
5. We also had to endure slideshows showing Nick and Cecile's progression from baby to married adult. ("Slide 296: Nick gets 4 atoms taller"). Well, apparently I'm not allowed to complain about that, because it would be ungrateful, because Cecile organised for me to have a giant delicious tomato instead of a fish dinner.
Listen up, relatives of the newlyweds, you did a good wedding and everything, but I've prepared my own slideshow. Show you how it's done. Learn up.
CECILE - A LIFE IN PICTURES
BABY
FIRST GALLIC SHRUG
FIRST BIKE
ABANDONS VEGETARIANISM
PROPOSES TO NICK
HAPPIEST DAY OF HER LIFE
Anyhoo, here's that link to the article:
Click here for the best article ever printed in the southern hemisphere.
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