Another ten minutes, and it wouldn't have been funny any more. Another ten minutes, and we would have started to panic. Another ten minutes, and I would have lost another stone in sweat.
Another ten minutes, and the groom, his two best men and one of his ushers would have been trapped in the smallest hotel lift ever devised, for a whole half an hour, contemplating exactly how the bride-to-be was going to react when she arrived at the church in just over an hours time to find her husband-to-be just wasn't there.
God, it was horrible. I knew something was up when the lift stopped moving. I'm intuitive like that, you see. We stood there in silence for a few seconds, each of us thinking 'it'll move in a minute, you'll see'. Each of us willing it to move. Move. You bastard, MOVE.
It didn't move.
Next was the mashing of buttons. That'll fix it. Mash the buttons good and proper. Press the bloody lot of them. Light it up like a Christmas tree. Nothing. This wasn't good.
The disembodied voice of the hotel manager came through the door. ''Is the groom in there?'' he asked, unhelpfully. ''Yes he is, and he's bloody boiling'' was the terse reply.
And it was HOT. I mean stifling. I was about to say it was like a sauna but I can't say I've ever been in one. If you have, and your experience of a sauna involved sweating profusely in a very confined space with three burly men, watching your reflection in the mirrored walls gradually disappear in a haze of steam, along with the hope of escaping any time soon, while four intense lights blaze down on your forehead, then it was just like a sauna.
Thank goodness for the Chelsea and Kensington Fire Service (at least that's what I think they're called - frankly it could have been Antony and the Johnsons for all I cared). They turned up with a big set of special keys, that the hotel inexplicably did not have, prized open the lift doors, and freed us from our sweat box. Then it was time for the quickest showers in the history of personal hygiene, get changed, and get to the church. In plenty of time as it turned out.
No sweat.
8 comments:
I know you live in Bristol and everything is a little bit ooh-aah and I understand that. But you've NEVER been in a sauna?
Of course Rob goes to saunas every day...
Tim you did well. You made it out alive, with the groom, and you did an excellent job of walking me down the aisle. Or should I say, back up the aisle, in the opposite direction to the usual direction, after the service, of which we were not a part (just to clarify. Don't want your fans to think that you're hitched). So well done.
I am sad it's over. Maybe they can get married again next weekend?
Rob - I generally don't believe in things that make you hot for no reason. Saunas, spicy food, exercise. All wrong.
Hats - I was talking about this with Sandeep. Do Hywel and Claire REALLY have to be there? Couldn't we just have a wedding without them? Like, EVERY weekend? I wouldn't even mind being trapped in a lift every time...
That party we had at the weekend? Someone got MARRIED?
What?! WHAT?! WHAT?
Why would you want us not to be there, you ungrateful bastards? Right, we're renewing your vows every year AND SANDEEP AND TIM AREN'T INVITED.
And obviously I mean our vows, not yours.
That was a fury-related typo
Well OBVIOUSLY we'd want you to be there...but you have to understand, we were staring in to the abyss that was the weekend after the WEDDING OF THE CENTURY (TM). You weren't there, after SELFISHLY going on honeymoon, so what else were we to do? Just GET ON WITH OUR LIVES?
Well, that's what we did in the end, actually. But it wasn't as fun. SO, we want another party please...
Okay. I may have jumped off the deep end a little.
I'm planning a little something in the summer. And by 'little', I mean A GINORMOUS BARBEQUE/PISS UP OF HOPES AND DREAMS.
Must get on that, actually. Expect emails soon, people.
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