Off the record - Craig Box

The primary reason for my big trip was to come to my friend Sam's wedding, where I'd been invited to stand as his best man.

For the days leading up to the wedding, there was a bit of planning and preparation to do; I had to try on and deliver suits, learn how to move flowers, make name cards for tables, and jot down notes for a speech!

On the day, we had about 10 people get ready at our place, groom included, so lots of behind the scenes photos let you know what is involved. I've been told it was worse for the bridesmaids, because they couldn't reach where the dresses were hanging.

The groom was very nervous leading up to the ceremony and very happy afterwards. As the bride and groom went on a horse and buggy ride, we were left to entertain ourselves with some croquet.

The "wedding breakfast" started around 3:30pm, where speeches, drinking, dancing and entertainment followed. You can't exactly have a wedding for Sam without Tui and a band playing Exponents covers; unfortunately I could only fix one of these things, so James and I got up with the band and belted out a totally unplanned and unrehearsed version of "Why Does Love Do This To Me". I couldn't hear myself singing over the row of dancing Kiwis.

It had been a long day for many people by this point, so I didn't join the after-wedding party at the Crowne Plaza. I'm somewhat glad I didn't.

(WordPress gurus who can suggest a better way of aligning the photos in this post are especially invited to comment.)

We took Sam out for his "last single night" on Wednesday; we did OK for a quiet weekday evening!

We started off with some good old Antipodean park cricket (complete with rubbish bin as stumps), and then wandered down to the river for some "drunting". After a quick change, we went out to a Spanish restaurant for dinner, and then out to a club called The Fez for drinking, dancing and debauchery.

The pictures are here. Don't click if you're Zoe.

Sam's 10 Stag Party Challenges

The penalty for failing on the first two challenges is the Sculling of a Pint. Assuming the first two are successfully completed, there are three forfeits available of the final 7, where the groom may choose to Scull a Pint rather than accept the challenge!

1. Score a hat-trick in backyard cricket. Not hard for a stylish and graceful pace bowler such as yourself!
   Achieved, by way of us charging every ball.
   
2. Board (and optionally plunder) a punt full of woman (including the driver), or, if such is not available, two punts of mixed gender. Be photographed on all.
   Achieved (here and here: no punts full of women were found)
   
3. Have your photo taken with a woman on some grass, next to a "Keep Off The Grass" sign.
   Half-mark; they take the Keep Off The Grass signs away at night. We took a photo on the grass anyway.
   
4. Four Horsemen!
   Achieved: no Jim Beam or Johnny Walker, so we used Maker's Mark and Hennessey's.
   
5. Collect three lipstick kisses from three different women.
   Achieved: plenty of people willing to kiss, but only one tube of lipstick found in the entire club!
   
6. Because you're Never Allowed to See It Again, you (or one of your party) must successfully convince two women to make out with one another.
   Achieved, but not in a way we'd really want to remember...
   
7. Marriage is a wonderful lifelong tradition; so find someone who has been married for 40 years and have them explain to you how it works. Be photographed with them.
   Achieved.
   
8. Chat a lovely lady up till she gives you her phone number. This must be written on your back in permanent marker, and verified as being correct. (Bonus marks if said woman goes home with Cathy.)
   Everyone else seemed keener than Sam to help achieve this one; we eventually decided that only a barmaid would have a pen. She gave us a number on a piece of paper reasonably quickly, but we demanded it written on the back: after saying we'd only buy the Four Horsemen if she did, we succeeded!
9. The "I'm getting married, and it's my FAVOURITE SONG EVER, please play it" challenge: Convince a club DJ to play "(Hit Me) Baby One More Time" (or suitable other Britney Spears song). In the event that clubs with Britney Spears are unavailable, convince someone in the club to loan you their skirt, and do a Britney Spears-style dance.
   Half-achieved: apparently they played part of "I'm A Slave 4 U", but the song sucks and we didn't recognise it because we were busy working on #6.
10. Greig has asked that you "take one on your knees". Convince a bartender to pour you a shot straight from the bottle. If you are the bartender reading this list, please, it's a New Zealand tradition. Really!
    Achieved with style.