Now if it was a portkey, I'd be all over that...

It seems like everyone and their dog is hooking up these days. Maybe its just my singles ward. Or maybe its just my friends in my singles ward. No matter what, its kind of amusing and depressing at the same time. Come to think of it, that's a pretty good description of life in general. "Life: Amusing and Depressing." ANYWAY...people are hooking up. This really is a cause for celebration--despite what the rest of this blog may say. I mean...Bryan and Nikki?! That's about as cool as love stories get. Eric and Amber, Heather and Jake, Bert and Ernie (just kidding...)--the list goes on and on. But as one who is not currently hooking up, nor has any real prospects to hook up with, my gut reaction is more along the lines of "WtF?!"

Now, usually these hook ups have little impact on me--let's be honest, I'm not really an emotional basket case who downs gallons of Rocky Road after my friend starts dating another girl. I usually laugh and move on. But when a hook up results in a wedding, and that wedding results in me standing in a hoard of other single women who are supposed to be fighting over a bouquet? That's the point when I feel things have gone a little too far.

I hate the bouquet tradition. Who started it?! I'm sure I could find the answer on Wikipedia, but I'll stick with throwing my anger into the great void. Better a vague nonentity than an actual person or culture. But really, who thought this was a good idea? I think Mormon culture only exacerbates the humiliation of catching the bouquet. When you're a mid-twenties, single Mormon woman, a friend's wedding can already be slightly awkward (especially when your ex-boyfriend is sitting across from you with his new girlfriend...OH MY...). But then they force you to group up with all the other mid-twenties, single Mormon women, tell you to try and catch a bunch of flowers that will magically help you be the next one to wed (yeah, RIIIIGGGHHHTTT....) and then they draw the entire room's attention on you so the crowd can watch what they hope will be a frantic scrambling of desperate women whose only hope of marriage is to get a hand on The Bouquet!

Humiliating.

Please understand, at this little wedding shindig I am referencing ever-so-vaguely, I did stand in the crowd of desperate singles because the bride's parents paid for my dinner and the least I could do was join in the "festivities." However, I was standing at the back, looking as disinterested as one possibly can. And when The Bouquet! was tossed, I merely stared.

My roommate, on the other hand, was standing front and center. And, as you can probably guess, she caught it. Granted, if she hadn't caught it, The Bouquet! would have hit her in the face. BUT STILL. Rather than accepting fate's cruel trick with the proper self-conscious mortification that requires slipping out the back door and throwing the bouquet out a restroom window, Roommate instead spent the rest of the evening LOUDLY retelling the experience or exclaiming to no one in particular, "I can't believe I caught it! I caught the bouquet!" This is the type of person you like to avoid in public places. Under no circumstance should you be forced to sit next to The Bouquet! and the exultant Catcher of The Bouquet! on a Trax Train for 77 blocks.

And people wonder why single women seem bitter.

And since it relates--I'm totally looking forward to this movie coming out January 11th. WOOT!