A Quick Trip East

I’ve been meaning to post this for a while, but I kept getting distracted…

Having found my wedding ring I hopped a plane to Baltimore to serve in Jerry’s wedding.

I met Jerry back in college, when he had really long hair. He’s gone on to get his Ph.D. in statistics and now works for the Census Bureau. He now has much shorter hair.

Anyway, I flew in to Baltimore (arriving at some ungodly hour), tried to check into the wrong hotel, and finally got settled in sometime around 2 or 3 AM, if I remember correctly. It’s all a bit of a blur.

The next morning I visited the Edgar Allen Poe house, which was in the hood (this was somewhat fitting, as Poe wrote disturbing fiction and I was greatly disturbed after having had several people ask me if I was sure I wanted to be walking down the street). Interestingly enough, even I had to duck to get up the stairs. Poe must have been one short (or limber) dude.

After that I had the best crab cake I’ve ever had in my life at Faidley Seafood.

Then I headed down to DC. I looked at tons of historical and inspirational buildings/monuments/memorials. By far the coolest was the Library of Congress. No, really. If you’ve never gone on the guided tour you have to go and check out the reading room. It’s astounding!

Added to my before-I-die list: do research in the Library of Congress (anyone can do it, you just need to make time in your schedule).

By fortunate happenstance, Siew Ying (one of our Chi Alpha students) was in D.C. at the same time I was, so we got to hang out together for a bit.

I also had a chance to meet with Mark Batterson, pastor of National Community Church. He’s one of the most interesting and well-read pastors I’ve ever met (which is saying something). Props to Scott Aughtmon for hooking me up with the meeting!

Anyway, I headed down to Waldorf, MD to connect with Jerry and Elvira (his bride-to-be). I helped Jerry, Elvira, their familes, and Tina (the maid of honor) do some decorating for the reception. I also relearned how to tie a slipknot, which was an unexpected bonus.

The highlight for me was meeting Jerry’s friends (especially my fellow servers Daniel, Tina, and Bethany). Bethany put some photos online, so if you’d like to see me in a tux this is your big chance!

Incidentally, I have to take full responsibility for this shot of Bethany planting her face in the cake. Drunk people are so much fun to be around–they’ll do anything!

Side note: the reception was pretty fun, but I was reminded of how silly the Assemblies of God can look to some people. People were fine with me not drinking, but the whole not dancing thing was hard for them to wrap their brains around. For the record, I think our policy is a bit quirky (and not in an endearing way).

On a related note, I enjoyed meeting the ECLA pastor who was conducting the ceremony. Nice guy. He and I are light-years apart theologically, but I really enjoyed chatting with him.

Anyway, the wedding went off without a hitch (except the hitch that’s the point of the whole thing), and good times were had by all. I did make one faux pas, I didn’t realize that Elvira wasn’t changing her last name to Maples and said something like “How does it feel to be Mrs. Elvira Maples?” Oh well, worse mistakes have been made.

Before flying out I got to swing by D.C. again, visit the Daedalus Books Warehouse, and eat some more crab cakes in Baltimore.

Special thanks to Jerry for inviting me to share in his wedding, to Elvira for marrying Jerry, to Daniel for letting me stay with him, to Tina for doing such a great job with the decorations, and to Bethany for being such an entertaining person (even moreso when she’s sober). And a big thanks to Paula for letting me gallavant around the East coast like that.

Oh, while traveling I saw both Dodgeball and Harry Potter 3. They were both much better than I thought they would be.