Yesterday Fabulous Husband (tm) set up the aquarium in the living room and I went off to two weddings in a row. The first one (set in historic St. Lawrence Hall, good acoustics) was for an old friend from the publishing industry, a truly great editor who of course wrote (mostly) a 10 page ceremony that included readings from an array of works, including one that he edited. I helped out a little by printing up programs for him and including the 13 digit ISBN for each title from his company's website. The whole ceremony was saturated with meaning for the couple, and their rings were encrusted with heirloom diamonds from his auntie. I really like it when rings re-use family materials, its something very special and speaks of a present that moves forward into a future connected to an honouring the past. Also, lots of kids running around. At one point in the ceremony a 6 yr old with a digital camera stood very seriously next to the kneeling pro photograper in the aisle. They were the same height and too cute to ignore so I got the grooms to turn and look - two fingers clicked at once and hopefully got the amazed expression on their faces. The ceremony music was played by friends, and ended with a song from the couples first date called "Mirabeau Bridge" where everyone was invited to sing along on the chorus (I put that on the programs too - bookmarked size, not much room). So humming the chorus I was off to wedding number two. Wedding two was a funky couple - she'd waitressed at a venue where I'd done a bunch of weddings, so it was really nice to work with her on her own ceremony. Laid back and casual at the venue Over Joy at Queen and Booth, no walking down the aisle, just gather and go. She looked like a 40's film star goddess in a slinky white dress, and he looked radiantly happy with a funky lapel flower tied with bright green wire that brought out his eyes a little. During the ceremony in place of a reading two of their friends sang a song they wrote for the day, a perfect wedding song, and everybody got misty when the bride walked over on the second verse and joined in, her gift to him, her voice unwavering and clear. Best man's toast concluded with the line "may be today be the day, looking back from your old age, that you loved each other the least". Too fucking beautiful. Then they wanted me in the group photos, so I was a little late getting home but very honoured.

Back home FH had set up a most artistic and involved aquatic display, with one fish. Which is a Cooly Loach, which hides. New plastic plants, driftwood, clean stones...life lurking, but not visible. So this morning I was off to get fish from a store in China town east that also specializes as a gardening and bonsai centre. I like the older guy that runs the place...not so much the teen agers that help out. I got one of them and after some back and forth managed to get most of the fish on the list - platies, sword platies, neons and two corry's. I wanted ghost shrimp and was happy to see that they had some. Ghost shrimp are see through, so everything they eat is visible in it's transformation from flake to poop. Also, they will occasionally hold a flake in both tiny pincers and eat it like cartoon corn. Hours of fun for me. The fish, on whom Warner Bros cartoon humour is lost, will eat the shrimp within a month or so. We had one who punched the approaching fish and developed a wicked right-left-right who lived to old age of 1.5 yrs. So - me and ghost shrimp, liking. When I inspected the bag at the counter I noticed one was dead though, which resulted in the following exchange:

Me: I don't want this one, it's dead.
Teenager: Huh?
Me: I wanted six shrimp. Live ones,only.
Teenager: (heavy accent) There are six. One, two, three, four, five, six. What problem?
Me: The dead one. (holds up bag, begins to poke sad corpse through plastic) See how it's eye is floating away and it's untroubled? That's because it's dead. I don't want the dead one.
Teenager: You still have six in bag. Six other shrimp.
Me: And a seventh that's dead. I don't want it.
Teenager: No charge!
Me: Don't care! We (meaning FH) just cleaned the tank, I don't want to put corpses in it right away. We can wait for those.
Teenager: (grumbling) Okay. (looks at bag, does not seem to know how to proceed)
Me: Look, if it's a problem, I'll just take the rest of the fish. Okay?
Teenager: Okay, okay. (rings in the rest of the fish)

I know the corpse was in essence free food. But I didn't think FH would be impressed by the immediate addition of death to the nice clean tank. He's not really an embracing the putrified flip side of life kind of guy. Also, the knowledge of buying actively cannibalistic shrimp was disquieting to me so for now - no wee crawfish in the tank. But the rest are shiny happy finned things, zipping about with all manner of pleasure. When Lt. Ripley finally works out the litter box issue and is released from the prison of this office, she's in for a visual treat - TV just for cats.