Wedding Stories

Universal Life Church

Food Count

So my caterer didn't want the final guest count until the Thursday before the wedding. I tried to give it to her earlier, but she kept saying, 'No, I don't want it until that Thursday morning, since you may have to add or subtract people at the last minute.' I guess that's good, since we would get a more accurate count that way and we'd be less likely to have to pay for extra meals or not have enough.

Well...everyone in the entire world decided to call me on the Thursday morning before the wedding. THANK GOD I took the day off, even though I didn't think I'd need it. My phone was RINGING ALL MORNING and I think I spoke to every family member and every vendor at least once. Anyway, the caterer called for the final meal count while I was doing three other things at once. I quickly pulled up my guest list spreadsheet, which had the meal counts on it, totaled my columns, and gave her the totals for each entree. After finishing up whatever else I had been doing, though, I thought to myself, 'Hmm, that count seems a little off.'

I had totaled the meal counts over the previous weekend and had a number in my head. We did end up getting calls earlier in the week that two couples who had RSVP'd yes couldn't make it at the last minute. So it would make sense that my total count that I gave to the caterer (that was on the spreadsheet, which had been updated) would be 4 fewer than the number I had in my head. The problem was that my counts were off by two. DO YOU SEE WHERE I'M GOING WITH THIS?

This was REALLY bugging me, so I went back to my spreadsheet for a recount. I totaled my columns again and got the same numbers that I had given to the caterer. I counted by hand and got the same numbers I gave to the caterer. I carefully looked over the spreadsheet to make sure I hadn't accidentally deleted someone, recounted, and still got the same numbers. I even took out my box of RSVP cards, counted them, and still got the same numbers. Finally chalking the whole thing up to me being bad at math and counting wrong over the weekend, I decided that the spreadsheet and the RSVP cards were not lying to me. 

Do you see the problem? I didn't. I went about whatever else I had to do that day and the next day, went to the rehearsal and RD...and then, just as we were being served at the RD, I realized THAT I HAD TOTALLY FORGOTTEN TO ADD OUR MEALS TO THE GUEST MEAL COUNT! And I kept getting the wrong numbers, since WE were not on the spreadsheet of our GUESTS!

It worked out fine. I called the caterer the next morning and asked them to add two more (fortunately, they prepared one extra of each entree, which is what we wanted to eat, anyway!). I just think that the whole thing was absolutely HILARIOUS, due to the way it played out. The waiter at our RD literally forgot to serve my DH...and as someone was running after the waiter to let him know that, I joked, 'Don't worry, honey. You'll get your dinner tomorrow. short pause, as the ironic truth dawned on me...Holy crap! No, you won't! I have to make a phone call!' :)

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