Kilted Groomsmen

You’re the per­fect woman.”

She real­izes this as she writes down my chest, waist, and hip size, then asks rhetor­i­cal­ly, “What are the typ­i­cal­ly ide­al mea­sure­ments?”.

Aaron and I could only look at each oth­er, as we had no idea.

36–26–36.”

Wow, so you’re a real­ly hot chick!”, says Aaron.

Hi-LAR-ious. Years of con­fi­dence I’ve gained, girl­friends con­vinc­ing me that I’m not too skin­ny, gone.

Reduced to a male fan­ta­sy, I’m my own dream girl.

And how much do you weigh?”

(Pause)…113”.

After he’s had a buf­fet”, Aaron adds. My friend the come­di­an. To con­sole me, he says, “It’s okay. Remember, you’ll be paired up with Jenn in the par­ty”.

My coun­ter­part. The tini­est girl I know.

Thumbnail: Aaron's wedding band

In the last few years I’ve been to wed­dings for oth­er friends, but Aaron’s the first out of my core group to get mar­ried (although Pat got engaged before him). To pay trib­ute to his cul­ture, he wants the wed­ding to be a bit Scottish — some­thing his Popa is espe­cial­ly pleased about.

As a grooms­man, I’ll be wear­ing a kilt. As a Chinese guy, I’ll be feel­ing a lit­tle out-of-place.

Thumbnail: Matching the sporran and kilt colours
Thumbnail: Comparing sporrans
Thumbnail: Ghillie Brogues
Thumbnail: Ghillie Brogues

He asked me to give him a hand in shop­ping for the regalia. What a cul­ture shock. Looking through cat­a­logues of claid­heamh, sporrans, Sgian Dubhs, Ghillies Brogues. I can’t even pro­nounce the names. My tongue was­n’t made for these kinds of inflec­tions.

It’ll take you guys longer to get dressed than the bride”.

Before we leave I remem­ber to ask, “Can we go tra­di­tion­al?”, with Aaron adding, “My Popa would be pret­ty upset if we did­n’t”.

Traditional. The euphemism for com­man­do. The euphemism for bear-ass naked.

Don’t wor­ry, every­thing is dry-cleaned”, say the woman reas­sur­ing­ly.

It’s only after we leave that I real­ize every­thing but the shirt is made of wool.

I’ll be scratch­ing my balls through the whole ser­vice.

26 comments

  1. Nah, a heavy sporran should do the trick as long as it’s not windy out.

  2. Hey Bro, I think you’re going to have the women all over you. These “macho” guys who say they won’t wear a “dress” don’t know what they’re miss­ing! And for what it counts, I think you’re not only a hot chick, but also a hot guy! :P I also think we’ll be com­pet­ing for the thinest legs!

  3. @Reno — I’ll be sure to fill my sporran with coins or alco­hol or some­thing. Thanks for the advice, I’ll put it to good use.

    @Aaron — We must wager mon­ey on this. $200 on mine being thinnest!

  4. wooot
    out­ta be a ‘hoot’
    Nice pay­ing homage to his scot­tish roots
    must be a hel­lu­val­ot more expen­sive than a tra­di­tion­al ‘tux’
    you may be curs­ing the woll, but if it’s a win­ter wed­ding you’ll be more than thank­ful
    just watch get­tin in and out­ta the car
    dont wan­na see any ‘brit­tany spears’ hap­pen­ings sans briefs
    and watch for gusts of wind too..those kilts are FULL kilts..they can real flair out when u spin around…
    hehe­he­he­he­he

    cant wait to see the pics and video

    cheers!

  5. The regalia is quite a bit more expen­sive. It’s amaz­ing how much the cost of things add up, for tiny items such as kilt pins and what not.

    It’ll be a spring/summer wed­ding, so I’m hop­ing the breeze will work in my favour to keep my cool. I nev­er even thought about the kilt being “full” and catch­ing the wind. With this in mind, I hope I can keep the pub­lic nudi­ty to a min­i­mum. I don’t know how women walk around with these things all the time.

  6. well most woman don’t go “tra­di­tion­al”.

  7. …And odd­ly enough it’s only those lit­tle flag­gy things that hang from your sock garters that are called the “flash­ers.”
    (Note: Be sure they’re turned 3/4 of the way out on the leg. I was warned with dire seri­ous­ness on that point by a Scottish shopown­er, they get rabid about stuff like that…)

  8. @ACG — That’s true. At least women have back­up.

    @Xibee — The woman in the store let us know how every lit­tle detail mat­ters. She said that there was one man straight from Scotland who rent­ed from her shop, and got every­thing but the Sgian Dubhs because she was out of stock. He was furi­ous when he found out, but went to the wed­ding with­out it. Afterwards, he was com­plete­ly shocked that no one noticed.

  9. The kilts are 16oz, which as far as I know, means they’re on the heav­ier side than the light side (where a skirt might be). Also, I’m almost cer­tain the sporran is meant as back­up or any … “over­ly excit­ed” men.

    At least, I’ve assured Rob that he’s safe with the weight and the sporran com­bined! :)
    I am right there with you when you won­der how women can wear dresses/skirts all the time … I don’t know how they do it so suc­cess­ful­ly. I think it’s going to be fun­ny to see how each grooms­man han­dles the extra respon­si­bil­i­ty to not flash any­one … more than once.

  10. Pretty fun­ny stuff! The ques­tions are a riot!

    ~Alex

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