WE GOT 'EM A BLANKET

A CASE OF PREMATURE VOW PROCLAMATION

Nicole and I went to our first wedding as a couple Saturday night, and it was quite the pleasurable experience. And if you're good boys and girls, I'll tell you all about it. 

It was a dark and stormy night. Well, actually it did rain pretty hard during the wedding of Lauren Rita Gibbs and "Jackpot" Matt Charles Moore. 

Kelly was the maid of honor, and I've known Lauren for a long time. In fact, this was the second time I went to a wedding where I had made out with the bride. 

On a side note, I've been to 10 weddings as an adult. And so far, no divorces. 

Anyway, the priest began the vow process, but before he could get to rich and poorer, sickness and health, etc., Lauren jumped the gun. 

Priest: Do you, Lauren, take ...

Lauren: I do!

After the third set of vows -- no, I don't know why there were three -- the couple kissed, and we were off to the reception at the Civic Theatre. 

Not to be negative or anything, but the first half of the reception was a bit too fancy for me. A lot of older people all decked out, with the live band, Mojeaux, playing some slow tunes. 

I continued my streak of being the only dude at the wedding not wearing a jacket. Can't stand those things. Plus, it takes away, I think, from the shirt/pants combo. And that's where I look good. 

Then the cakes were cut, which somehow scattered the older crowd out of the building. Take a look at this towering delicious creation. 

And here's the groom's cake, equipped with chef's hat and construction tools. 

After stuffing our faces, the party was so on. The music got hipper, the crowd got younger, and well, it was a good time. 

Bert and I danced on Lauren a bit, in the tradition of our group. Since Joe wasn't there, I did the finger pointing twist dance in his honor. There was also wobbling, backing that ass/thang up, and Nicole and I got down to "Suit and Tie," which I had to change to shirt and tie. 

No, there wasn't any Journey on the play list, but there's always the next wedding -- in Illinois, no less -- for those sort of shenanigans. 

The couple's first dance. 

The bride was radiant and had that youthful enthusiasm a gal should have on the happiest day of her life. I don't think a smile left her face the whole night. 

Here's how the live artist saw the first dance: 

If you look a little to the left of the bride, you can see an outline of Kelly's face. 

Nicole and I split a room at the Hyatt Regency with Bert and Kelly, so we didn't have to worry about driving home drunk. 

That's the look from the hotel room. When we got back to our digs, Bert was ready to party. "Leon just texted me. He's at the Beach on Bourbon. Says his phone is about to die. We should meet him. Let's go. Beach on Bourbon!"

Ten minutes later, Bert was out like a light. As was Kelly. Nicole, however, couldn't stop yapping, so I was wide awake and decided we should go for a walk. 

She said she wanted cheese fries to deal with her drunkeness, so we walked the half mike to Fudrucker's at the casino. It was a lovely, romantic stroll down Poydras. We had our sleeping clothes on and didn't even take our phones. You should all try a date with no phone sometime. Nice change of pace. 

The fries did some of the trick, and Nicole was now tired, so we got a cab back to the hotel. 

In the morning we went to the Quarter for breakfast. 

They had the best grits I've ever had. The biscuit and omelette weren't too shabby either. And so ended a mighty fine wedding extravaganza. 

Before I let you go, here are my favorite photos we took at the photo booth. 

Bitching shirt, right?

MOM HASN'T BEEN CURSING

PAUL WAS NEVER A LADIES MAN

One of my favorite things about television is game shows. There hasn't been a good new game show in some time until the past two seasons of Hollywood Game Night, hosted by Jane Lynch at her house. 

It has six celebrities per episode and two contestants. Two teams of four play five games and then there's a bonus round for the winning contestant. Some of the games aren't great, but there's quite a few that I love. 

So much so that I stopped at Wal-Mart two weeks ago and bought the home game for a game night June 3. 

I had Paul, Joe and Greg on my team, and we got ransacked by Sarah (probably the MVP), Dave, Bert, Kelly and Jenna. Exactly. They cheated with their extra player!

The most difficult game and the one that produced the most laughs is called Do-Do-Do. One player must hum a song only using the word Do, and his teammates must guess the song. It's pretty hard, and I was particularly awful. 

I didn't come close to getting my team to name the song I was Do-Doing. And I never once knew what song other people were do-ing. 

Our team was a comedy of errors. In Take the Hint, we missed several makeable points. The word was basketball, and Paul's hint to Greg was ball. Cue the buzzer. The clue words to Joe were summer, sports, rings. And Joe couldn't get Olympics. 

Another highlight was me charading movie titles to my team. We eventually got them but wasted far too much time. It was pretty funny to watch I'm sure. 

Yet somehow we had a chance to catch up in the final round, which is one player tries to get his team to name as many celebrities as possible in 90 seconds. 

Paul was the cluegiver. We needed 10 to win. We got eight. We got stuck on Tim Meadows as Paul only could muster that he was on SNL a while ago and he's black. 

If only he had suggested that I put it in the butt. 

WALKING ON THE RIVER

Nicole and I went to the Riverwalk this past Tuesday. It is OK, but I'm not sure enough of the stores will do well enough to survive. We counted 11 places in the new mall to have dessert. Eleven. 

At Neiman Marcus, I bought a lavender shirt. This pic came out light. The shirt is darker. 

FIXING THE WORLD CUP

Been watching a lot of the World Cup. I think the worst rule in all of sports is the soccer penalty kick. 

OK, there's plenty of worse rules. If you accidentally write one wrong number down on your golf card, you are disqualified. But the penalty kick needs to be revised. 

Many times, the person fouled isn't even about to score, and yet his team gets a kick with no defense from only 12 yards away. Bullshit. How about degrees of fouls in the box, kind of like with murder. 

So, first-degree murder is the penalty kick we have now. That's when the person is definitely going to score and the defender commits a foul. A death sentence for the defense. 

Manslaughter is a tackle in the box when there's still 3 other defenders to beat and it's obvious that the foul didn't by itself prevent a goal. That gives you a free kick from outside the box with the defense in the way. Like parole. 

And in between those two, the player gets a penalty kick from farther away, say the top of the box, which is six more yards than it is now. That would give the goalkeeper a chance. 

Don't even get me started on penalty kicks after extra time to break a tie and decide a winner. That's even worse. Just keep playing until there's a winner. 

Soccer, you're welcome. 

LET'S MAKE A DEAL

Had an idea for a comedy skit show or a storyline in a comedy. 

One character becomes obsessed in the episode with bartering, just refuses to pay full price anymore. Think George Costanza. 

So he goes to a restaurant and tells the waiter "How bout I give you 20 bucks for this 35 dollar steak?" When the waiter says no, he explains that, "Look. Either you take my 20 bucks or you get nothing."

And the character takes that attitude to the clothing store, sporting events, etc. 

Imagine in the episode that it starts to work before the character eventually takes it too far and somehow feels the wrath.