Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Practical Jokes Do Not Belong In Weddings...

A couple weeks ago, a groomsman (let's call him Joe) came into the shop to pick up his tuxedo for his buddy's wedding that weekend. Joe was meeting his friend (Sam) there but Sam was running behind so he took the opportunity and started conversation with the one of our tuxedo consultants. While talking, Joe came up with the brilliant idea of playing a practical joke on Sam when he came in. All the girls in the department were loving the idea as long as it was appropriate. What's the harm anyway?

Now, Sam was coming into the store to pick up a replacement coat from trying on his tux the day before so we were going to give him a coat that was obviously too small for him and say that this is what the company sent for him so, "There's nothing we can do...sorry." The plan went off without a hitch and Sam was dumbfounded when he stood there as a "Fat guy in a little coat!" That's when Joe came out of his dressing room roaring with laughter and we set everything right. It made for a great story....if only it ended there.

In the focused preparation of setting up the joke on Sam, I (yes, it was all my fault) accidently gave Joe the wrong tuxedo and he left the shop with someone else's tux from the same wedding party! Oops. My bad. I tried calling Joe right away but got an answering machine for his home phone so I called Sam and explained the situation. He laughed about it and thought it would be no big deal. He would just call Joe and have him swing back around to exchange for the correct tuxedo. Great! We hung up and all was right with the world.

A couple minutes later Sam called the shop to tell me that Joe didn't believe him! Joe thought that this was Sam taking revenge and playing a joke on him so he wouldn't have it. Now desperate, I ask for Joe's cell phone number so I can call him myself. I called and had to leave a long, annoying message about everything so shortly after that we got a phone call from Joe. It honestly took about 10 minutes of convincing for him to believe that I wasn't pulling a practical joke! Finally he gave in and we came up with a plan. Due to the fact that Joe had the wrong tux (John's tux), John was going to pick up Joe's tux and they would do a swap at the wedding. Even that would make for a good story....but it's not over yet.

When John came in to pick up Joe's tux, he was pretty upset about the whole situation (not really the practical joke type) so, of course, I apologized for the inconvenience and had to send him on his way regardless. About an hour later, I received a call from the extremely angry bride of that wedding party, blaming me for all the confusion. At first, she was furious about it but after I explained that all of this mess started out as a practical joke played by one of her groomsmen, she just about laughed it off saying phrases such as, "how typical" and "Oh! Those boys. What am I going to do with them?". In the end, everything was right as rain and fine in the world but If you're planning on pulling some stunt, avoid weddings!

1 comment:

Adam Perry said...

At the wedding I went to last fall.. Scott (the best man/brother) and Skip (the father) somehow got each others tuxes...

We kept trying to tell Scott that his vest was NOT Plum... we were trying to tell him it was more of a burgundy...

Well after the rest of his tux seemed a little big he started believing us..

He had to call his dad to see what he should do for the wedding (happening in two hours) but his mom picked up.. because his dad was having a hell of a time fitting into his small tux that did seemed to be more of a plum color..


They had to bring their tuxes and change last minute at the wedding.. it was funny to say the least

(just goes to show you should always just measure yourself with a towel and everything will work out for the best)