**Oops, mean to post this Friday but got caught up in all the wedding festivities**


I made it safely to America and then promptly got in a car and drove 5 1/2hrs up North. I arrived at my destination at 5:30am French time. And I then proceeded to go out & party like it was 1999 for the next six hours. Yes, I am crazy. And now also really tired. But I desperately wanted to attend my cousin's bachelorette party - I miss out on so much family stuff by being over in France.

Despite the tiredness though, I'm so glad I went - I had a fabulous time with my cousins and their friends. We've always gotten along well, but the older we get, the more fun we have.

Though what's a bachelorette party with out a little drama?

They neglected to tell me this, but one of the attendees had just been released from rehab and wasn't supposed to be drinking...but she'd been sneaking drinks all night and no one had realized it. By the time I started chatting with her at the third bar, she was already pretty buzzed. But so was everyone else, so I didn't even give it a second glance. People were buying us shots left and right, and I started giving her some of mine - given that it was around 8am French time and I had yet to go to bed, I was trying to pace myself.

The bars closed at 2am, so we moved on to a club to go dancing. I lost track of her for a while, and it turns out it was because she was practically comatose in the corner. When it was time to go, she could barely stand up, so I took her outside to get some fresh air. She sat there hugging a tree and shaking while everyone else regrouped. It was at that point that I learned she had a substance abuse problem. Doh. Her parents ended up coming to get her and her mother yelled at the bride and blamed it all on her. The drunk girl got upset with her mother and refused to get in the car. The two of them started yelling and caused a major scene, at which point the bouncer came out to see what all the fuss was.

Meanwhile, I was missing out on all of this because I was talking to an Irishman (I thought of you Miss Leyla!). What on Earth an Irishman was doing in Grand Forks, ND, I'll never know. We were chatting and he jokingly called another one of my cousin's a bitch - except she misunderstood and thought he'd called me a bitch and started chewing him out. Everyone else joined in and pretty soon the poor Irish boy was surrounded by the bridal party and had no idea what had hit him. At that point, my uncle arrived (my aunt was supposed to be the designated driver, but we had her doing shots all night) and all the girls started jabbering at him at once, and so then he started in on the Irishman too.

I'm not sure if someone called the cops or if a squad car just happened to be driving by, but the policeman took one look at the two scenes we were causing and promptly got out of his vehicle. At which point I decided it was probably best if we got out of there, so I started herding everyone over to the car. I'm pretty sure we got out of there just in time, because things were heating up between the Irishman and the policeman as we drove away.

I thought the whole thing was hilarious, though maybe it was just jetlag-induced hilarity. My whole family is usually so composed, so it was funny to see them all in such a drunken state. I can already tell it's going to become a family legend, and I'm so glad I got to see it firsthand instead of just hearing about it via email!