Wedding weekend

We made it down to Airdrie OK on Friday - an hour before the 2pm start - just enough time to check in and change. With hindsight, however, it hadn't been a great idea to do the trip in one, as my leg was sore and stiff after sitting in a bent position for the duration.

Anyway - the wedding itself - Julie had purple hair but was otherwise a fairly conventional bride, and Kieran was also dressed in a traditional kilt outfit, but surprised a few with his pretty outrageous Mohican - probably one of the longest and tallest I've ever seen.

Luca was on best behaviour and was an exemplary pageboy. He posed for me afterwards sitting on the stairs:

The ceremony itself didn't take long and soon we gathered in the lounge for drinks and sandwiches:

The professional photographers spent the next few hours getting the wedding party to pose endlessly in different places. We finally managed to find out that the meal wouldn't start until after 5 pm, so this gave me a chance to retire to our room to get my leg up and stretch the knee a bit.

The dinner tables had island themes - we were Barra and were seated next to Barry & Helen, John and his daughter and son, and Dawn's friend Rona and her partner Ian Miller (whose son Lee is a professional footballer - ex Aberdeen). Kieran and Julie were clapped in and posed in front of the cake - all Dawn's work:

The top table was right behind us - here's a few shots:

Jordon, best man, Dawn & father of the bride

Mother of the bride and Michael

Michael and bridesmaids - Julie's sisters

The speeches were all done before the meal and then the floor was cleared for the dancing. There had been little bubble makers on each of the tables and Luca had made a friend, and the two of them spent half the evening running around together blowing bubbles everywhere:

Soon it was time for dancing - for most. Here's a fine rear view of that wonderful Mohican:

Later in evening, in between visits to my room to pop some more pills, we took a couple of posed photos of Gary and Carole, plus Jo and I:

After breakfast on Saturday morning, we headed over to Dawn's for a cup of tea, and were joined by Barry and Helen - and Luca, who we were taking back to Banchory, whilst Gary and Carole went horse-hunting locally:

When we did finally get back home to Banchory on Saturday afternoon, I had to go to bed to rest and stretch my leg, which felt like it had regressed by several days after the two car journeys. Luca came up to see that I was all right and then brought up a photo of himself to put beside my bed "in case I was missing him"!

Luca went back downstairs and then brought me back a pack of grapes. His next trip was a "special" glass of water (tonic juice actually) to go with my cup of tea, and his final bedside gift for me was something to remind me of Jo - a metal lady in a long dress, which doubled up as a bell ring - Luca said just to ring it if I needed anything. Here they all are:

Last night was not a good night - I didn't sleep at all well, and this was despite taking more drugs on Friday and Saturday than I'd taken for a few days.

I've had 2 exercise bouts today and one round of massages, plus I managed to walk along to the High St. to buy my paper - and all the way back, via the golf club, all without a break. So far so good. Bath tonight, plus some more of Jo's torture treatments, then tomorrow I'm going in to the office for a few hours for meetings.