The worst time of the year. Years and years ago Mrs FE conned me into buying a house with a huge garden. Mrs FE is a keen gardener.
She of course does the creative bits such as growing little plants in the greenhouse and carefully planting them out. Wonderful for her.
Of course the owner of this blog, me, has to carry out the more manly tasks.
I get the pleasure of cutting a 10 foot high, 300 foot long hedge on one side of the garden, and a fifty foot one on the other side. I spend a lot of my time as well, mowing the sodding lawn which with our climate of wet and dry, emulates the pampas of Argentina. Then there’s the Apple tree. This year there is an abundance of blossom which will mean a surfeit of apples. That means we will be infested with wasps, and those apples that are not eaten by said spawn of the devil will fall onto the verdantly mown grass. These are then hurled out of the mower causing your host to simulate an Irish jig to avoid serious ankle injuries.
Then there’s the painting to do on the outside of Chez FE. herself casually drops into the conversation that the barge boards are not looking too good and need a rub down and repaint. My immediate repost is, OK, up the ladder you go. That doesn’t work. just gets me banished to the living room sofa for a week.
Then there are the fences. Where there are no hedges there are fences. Now Mrs FE in her wisdom (Peace be upon her), has cultivated climbing plants to cover the panels. She will of course complain that the panels are in dire need of re-treatment. If I could get away with it I would spray plants and panels alike. However that would end up with me sleeping in the garden shed and not the living room sofa.
That’s the minor trauma dispensed with. This year is different.
The worst is. Wait for it. I HAVE TO MAKE A SPEECH.
My eldest daughter is getting married, and as father of the bride, I have to mouth platitudes, congratulate them, thank the attendees, and generally make a fool of myself. This fills me with a stark dread akin to jumping out of an aircraft and descending on a parachute. I’ve done that and believe you me, I’d rather do it without a parachute than make a Father of the Bride speech.
On the seventh of July I shall be standing up to explain why my daughter is so lucky to marry her sweetheart. Trouble is I have speechwriter block.
CAN ANYONE HELP ME? Any ideas?
Hedge trimming the easy way:
ReplyDeletePray silence for the father of the bride...
You could say she is so lucky because Mrs FE took away my rifle before I was able to shoot him.
ReplyDeleteHelp is always only a click away-
ReplyDeletehttp://www.sparklingspeeches.co.uk/
Have a man to man chat with your future son in law, explaining - at length - the many benefits of married life, and liberally illustrating the discussion with colourful examples of the household and garden chores with which his life will be enriched the moment the honeymoon is over. With a bit of luck he will emigrate before the wedding and you won't need a speech at all.
ReplyDeleteIt would fill me with dread too.
ReplyDeleteHaving sat through many wedding speech things, cringing, my advice is don't try to be funny, and in particular crude, if your dinner speaking ability in front of a crowd is anything less than Barry Cryer.
The age span of the crowd is about as broad as you will ever get, so you need to cater more to the dignity and standards of the upper end.
I have found the most pleasant and bearable speeches to be those that are straightforward, sincere and short.
Why not just paint an analogy of a marine engine being like marriage. Litter copiously with engineering terminology and stop talking when the guests start to fidget uncomfortably. Stick to what you know mate.
ReplyDeleteMy daughter is getting married in 4 weeks time and I have no idea what to say either. But if it goes well I'll send you a copy of my dribbling, woeful speech for recycling.
ReplyDeleteI had to make a groom's speech on my wedding day. I had no idea what to write, I kept thinking "tomorrow I'll start writing it". I still hadn't started by the time we sat down to eat, so I just stood up and wing'd it. I have no idea what I said, but everyone told me afterwards how good it was (but they have to say that, don't they?)
ReplyDeleteSo my advice is forget about it until you have to start speaking, mumble some platitudes and sit down as soon as you can.
Ian. I'm actually grateful to him for taking her off my hands.
ReplyDeletebollixed.
ReplyDeleteIf I start telling them stories about big thrusting pistons sliding in and out of well lubricated cylinders they might take it the wrong way.
Oh, dunno about wedding speeches, we banned them from ours (having attended some outrageously boring ones the previous year.) But the Old Testament lesson at the service was given by Mrs S-E's then boss. We got all the "duties of the wife" crap out of Proverbs and had him read it. Unfortunately, we weren't facing the right way to see who was sniggering.
ReplyDelete