Nuptial

Yesterday, the bastion of journalistic integrity, the Metro Herald reported that getting married and/or divorced can cause you to gain weight. Based on a study carried out in Ohio State University the article claimed that women weight just after the wedding while the male body is affected most by the stress of failed unions.

Having never been married I can’t really argue for or against this point but I do have a story about a wedding which actually caused me to lose weight.

Before I was doing whatever it is I am doing now, I used to work in the Mobile Communications industry and one of my employers was Vodafone Ireland. Vodafone’s base of operations was situated out in Stillorgan, a suburb of Dublin which unless it has changed in the five years since I left, has absolutely nothing of interest in it. Because of its situation in the middle of nowhere they used to bus staff in from more populated areas.

Head Office was a big glass building, not too dissimilar to an airport but with less chance of escape. They had abseiling window cleaners to make sure it sparkled inside and out. It was equipped with a gym and huge staff canteen, with subsidised meals and drinks, because there was nowhere else to get anything else to eat around.

What this usually meant was that you would lunch with your colleagues whether you wanted to or not, in a lot of cases, I did not. One such case was a girl whose actual name, for the life of me, I cannot remember. She will forever be known to me as Bridezilla.

This lady was engaged to be married and as such every conversation for an entire year revolved around the expense of hiring a band, the material for a self designed dress, wedding favours and whatever else she was doing before she frog marched ‘my James’ up the aisle. I often wondered if her James might have some sort of mental problem.

It got to the stage where I couldn’t take it anymore and the appearance of Bridezilla would quickly put me off my lunch. In a big open plan canteen where there is nowhere to hide, it’s hard to find a quiet spot to avoid the latest travesty of the two bridesmaids not getting on. So I went without food. It was good for my peace of mind and my waistline.

Getting married seems to be a lot of expense and hassle for what is essentially a bit of a party. Of the seven or eight weddings I have been a guest at, I’ve always tended to enjoy the ones done on a smaller, simpler scale. I wonder how much of that has to do with the people actually getting married being less stressed because they didn’t take on so much.

The institution of marriage is not something I’ve any real interest in. I don’t believe that a piece of paper is needed to show commitment to the person you love. You can do that with three very simple words. Even if you do tie the knot, there is no guarantee that it will last, especially with young couples. Ironically the divorce rate in the UK is at its lowest in decade because people are waiting until later in life before committing.

I don’t want to spoil the party, it’s a great day out for the family and apparently it’s the biggest day in a girl’s life. All I’m saying is maybe she needs to reassess her priorities.

Loquacious

I do like words, which for someone with my vocation is a good thing. There can’t be too many writers who have an aversion to a decent sized lexicon. Although I did hear there was a three syllable minimum in P.S. I Love You. (This is not true. I’ve never read any Celia Aherne and I am just a jealous bitter hack.)

Words are definitely one of my favourite things and the process of learning a new is exhilarating. The moment you hear a word and it you just have to know what it means. You look it up in the dictionary and its definition is just as cool as its sound so you commit it to memory until the first opportunity you get to drop it, either in a written piece or in conversation. It’s almost as good as some fairly average sex.

Unfortunately, a side effect of my love of language is a tendency to use it too much. I talk at inopportune times, sometimes getting so excited that it can seem quite rude if you are already talking. Especially if it’s something funny, I have to say it out loud immediately because it might not have the same impact if it’s not said at that precise moment.

It’s also been known for to head down a cul de sac of chat throwing out excessively flamboyant vernacular for the sake of it. I blame programmes like Beverly Hills 90210 and Dawson’s Creek for that. The verbose adult posing as an adolescent always got the girl in those programmes. Of course if I’d have known Katie Holmes was going to end up marrying Tom Cruise I probably would have stuck monosyllabic grunts.

Then there is the text messaging. I text way too much as my first real phone bill in eight years will attest to. Having worked for mobile phone companies since the early days of this century I was fortunate enough to get free or subsidise text and calls. Then when I left I got a pay as you go package which when you topped up twenty euro a month gave you unlimited free text. So to me it made a lot of sense to take full advantage of the offer.

A message from my provider on the one year anniversary of my pre paid usage informed me that I had sent, over the course of the year, the equivalent of twenty five free text messages a day. When I did switch back to bill pay I went over my allocation of 200 any network and 200 same network texts by twenty euro. That is a ridiculous amount of SMS for a grown up. So you’re probably asking yourself why or how?

One train of thought is that I work better in the written format. In fairness I’ve had enough practice. What some (ok, I) might classify as wit or charm come across better in text. When I speak my voice can go funny and there is no back space, so when I say something and it sounds cheesy and cornball it’s out there. No delete or recall.

But that’s not real; it’s like rehearsing for life. And there are no rehearsals as a really bad director once said. So from here on I promise to not text so much. I’ll pick up the phone and call when I want to communicate with you. You deserve it....and it makes more sense financially. It might also cut down on the amount of accidental flirting that I do. But that’s a collection of words for a different day.