Groomzilla exists!

Check out this article I found on the net.:

Lonely 'Bridezilla,' Make Way for 'Groomzilla'
Friday, June 17, 2005
By Catherine Donaldson-Evans

NEW YORK — The monster bride, the one who becomes demanding, spoiled and downright evil about her impending wedding (Star Jones, anyone?), is a well-known stereotype. There's even a nickname for her: "Bridezilla."

Now, with more guys getting into the Big Day brouhaha, brides-turned-scary-giant-reptiles have company. Meet "Groomzilla."

"They can turn into little tyrants," wedding expert Sharon Naylor, author of "The Groom's Guide", said of the new frantic grooms. "Even though it's about a wedding, it becomes very territorial."
The transformation from the "just show up in your tux" husband-to-be to the involved, micro-managerial, teeth-baring groom can be explained by the change in who's organizing and paying for that walk down the aisle.

More than 80 percent of husbands-to-be are full planning partners for weddings today, according to Bridal Guide magazine.

And 27 percent of couples are paying for weddings entirely on their own, Brides magazine reports — more than the 25 percent who still rely on the lady's family to foot the whole nasty bill.

Then there's the national average cost of a wedding, which rose this year to $26,327 for a 164- guest affair, according to Fairchild Bridal Group's 2005 "American Wedding Study" (Fairchild owns Brides, Modern Bride, Elegant Bride and other industry publications). Prices soar higher in urban areas.

"The groom is getting more involved and he's obviously paying for it," said Cynthia Hornblower, executive editor of Brides magazine. "He's getting more stressed out. There's a lot more on his plate."

Naylor said she's heard of angry grooms who have "flipped out and gotten rage-angry at the florist or cake baker."

"It's a really interesting time for grooms — they're kind of breaking new ground," she said. "The groom is in the bubble bath trying to relax and thinking, 'How did I get here?'"

Groomzillas in all their ballistic fury are still a small-but-growing breed. Perhaps more common than Scary Groom is Very Helpful to the Point of Excess Groom.

"I'm not going overboard. I'm not Groomzilla or anything like that," said one such fiancé, 26-year-old Jason Miller.

A curious-by-nature engineer, Miller has done the bulk of the planning (with wedding consultant Angela Alcantar) for his Kansas City nuptials because his bride-to-be, Angela Roberts, was an out-of-town grad student for much of their engagement. And truth be told, Miller kind of enjoys the involved groom role.

"I like knowing how everything works and what the schedule is for stuff," he said. "It kind of drives my fiancée crazy. Whenever we meet with someone, I ask any and all questions."
Among his top-of-mind concerns was the music at his reception. He was desperately seeking a laid-back spin doctor who wasn't jockeying for the limelight.

"One thing I was particular about is the DJ. I don't like pushy, game-show host DJs," Miller said. "We would go to every bridal fair — I went to more than she did — and I'd ask, 'What kind of personality does your DJ have?'"

Planning a wedding can be as stressful as a big presentation at the office, and unless they're colleagues already, it might be the first time bride- and groom-to-be are working jointly on a huge project.

In that vein, it might also be the first significant time they get to see each other's management styles and ability to handle deadlines and stress. And the bride is still usually the boss when it comes to throwing a wedding.

"All of a sudden, she's the CEO of you — so how's that going to work?" Naylor said. "You're seeing each other's working styles ... in a partnership on a big project that's emotionally and financially loaded."

Alcantar said the male half of one couple whose nuptials she's coordinating definitely falls into the "Groomzilla" category.

"I have one of those," she said. "He's so anal. He's been a bit of a challenge and we just need to hold his hand a little bit. He's very involved."

Her groom-from-hell wanted 100 hotel rooms reserved by month's end with only two weeks notice, even though his wedding day is five months away.

He was also having meltdowns over where the groomsmen will rent their tuxedos. And there was a change of churches because the guest list has been rising faster than the mercury on a hot day — it's now up to 475, and the original ceremony site could hold only 400.

But let's be frank. Bridezillas haven't gone extinct. They're still out there — and are often the force driving a Very Helpful Groom.

Andrew Gerth, 27, is doing a lot of his wedding planning (also with Alcantar) partly because, he says, he's the calm one while his betrothed, Tiffany Brauer, is the more high-strung of the two.
"I'm not too stressed, but Tiffany gets really stressed easily. That's one of the reasons I'm helping out," said Gerth, of Parrish, Fla.

To alleviate some of the headache over coordinating their wedding from out-of-state, he did contract negotiations on hiring Alcantar, and he's the one running interference between his mother and his soon-to-be bride. But is she a Bridezilla-to-be?

"I think there's potential — there's always potential," Gerth said, chuckling.

Among other reasons grooms are more attuned: Couples today are older (and thus, more opinionated), and over 50 percent live together before they tie the knot, according to Brides magazine, so the hubby-to-be can't help getting involved.

Modern weddings also require monstrous amounts of work, money and manpower for a pair to get hitched without a hitch — so both partners' input is needed. And couples function differently today, with defined gender roles fading.

"Increasingly, young couples see themselves as a support team. They support each other in whatever they're doing," said Charles T. Hill, Whittier College psychology professor and author of the well-known Boston Couples Study. "It becomes a couple's responsibility, not just a bride's responsibility."

Sometimes there are other things going on behind the stress about the reception hall, the invitations, the dress and the photographer. While they're blowing their tops over party-planning minutiae, there could be deeper underlying issues they're not addressing.

"The wedding is about the marriage, which gets avoided sometimes," Naylor said. "Focusing on the details of the party and not on the plans for the marriage — beliefs about kids, religion, money — is usually what's underneath the Bridezilla and Groomzilla behavior."

And sometimes these fears and concerns cause severe cases of cold feet.

Franz Wisner, 39, from Los Angeles, didn't have Bridezilla on his hands — he had the opposite: Aloof, Flaky Bride who Wisner said wore her engagement ring sporadically and only took on the job of mailing out the invitations, which were late.

"I picked up the ball and ran with it. I'm much more a list-maker and overachiever type, so whatever she didn't do, I did, with the hope that she'd come around."

She didn't. Instead, she turned into a runaway bride.

"She didn't do much planning at all — that, in retrospect was a huge red flag that I should have paid more attention to. I ended up doing more and more of the planning and footing more and more of the bill," he said. "Then, in the days before the wedding, I got dumped."

Wisner wound up holding the wedding anyway for his family and friends, and then taking his honeymoon to Costa Rica with his brother. His book on the adventure, "Honeymoon With My Brother," came out in February, and a movie based on it is in the works, he said.

Happily, more often than not, the only issue behind brides' and grooms' frazzled nerves is the milestone of going from singlehood to marriage and the job of pulling off the day that starts them on that journey.

"I wouldn't read anything into it other than the stress of the wedding itself," said Hill, the couples psychologist. "Marriage is a huge adjustment. [The wedding is] the first test of the marriage. If they can handle that, they're in good shape."
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'Nuff said about the groomzilla. Hahaha.

Food Tasting 1

Went for food tasting last night. The food was generally good in my opinion but what I was most afraid of was my mum and grandfather making comments that the food is not good. Luckily no major unhappiness with the food but we still end up having to change 3 dishes. The food tasting dishes are really ridiculously humongous in portions! For a table of 10, I think it's enough to even feed 12 or more people.

After the unpleasantness the previous manager made us go through, the guy yesterday was quite nice, in fact, I felt that he's probably afraid that we will be unhappy so he threaded on careful grounds hehe. Good for him, we are generally pleased with his services.

More food tasting this coming Sunday. It's the buffet one. Hope it's cool as well hehe.

p.s: I never notice that there's a count for number of entries posted on the dashboard page. Turns out that I have posted 101 entries and this is the 102nd! hehe

Late night in the office

I am blogging live from my workstation now at 7.40pm. I have to stay back today to take a call from the US at the ungodly time of 8.30pm to 10pm. My only fear is that by the time the call ends at 10pm, I'm the only one left in this level. *looks around uncomfortably*

The reminder email for today's call says that this is only the beginning of the calls. They want to hold 2 of these every quarter!!!!!! *faints*

In future, I shall make sure I invest in a bloody good corded phone so that I can take the calls at home instead of staying back so late in the office! In the meantime, back to work on more stuffs that's due tomorrow.

Memories are made of these

As I am clearing my room these few days, today I came across lots of old cards and letters kept from eons ago. There are cards dated all the way back to my primary school days! I know I'm being a sucker for hoarding all these useless stuff but they serve as a piece of memory of old friends that I otherwise would have forgotten and many more whom we do not keep in touch anymore as we move on with our lives.

The most cards came from my best friend since our secondary school days. Haha the things we write to each other when I read again seems so funny but it spells of friendship true. We've had our ups and downs but nonetheless still friends after all these years. Hopefully after we are married, we still stay in touch as best friends.

The next most number of cards come from the days when I was teaching. Being a teacher I received lots of cards, not just from students but also from fellow colleagues. I'm blessed to have known such great people.

Recent years, the cards I receive are mostly birthday cards or farewell cards or invitation cards. With the internet being so common now, there's fewer reasons to send a card just to ask how you are. Thus all the more I cherish the old cards that I received.

Lijuan & Jac's wedding

It's a fun wedding in it's own different way.

The day before I went with the bride for a manicure and pedicure and a massage too! Massage is good. I shall consider going on a more regular basis.

I was the official skirt puller/lifter for the first time as a jiemei. Not an easy job with a fast moving bride. Then have to help the bride to change clothes and remove and put on new hair accessories.

But the best part is I get to meet most of my vendors today! We engaged the same photographer and the same wedding band! It's great to get to meet them before our own wedding. I'm impressed with the photographer and I'm glad I made the right choice. The wedding band at the wedding today had the main male singer and he has a charismatic voice but being the only singer is a disadvantage as some songs are not suitable for him. But too bad we will not be getting him for our wedding as he's engaged prior to our request. Oh well, the other guy is just as good.

Anyway, congratulations to Lijuan and Jac!! May the both of you enjoy many years of blissful marriage ahead! :)

Goodbye Boon Lay, Hello CBP

Last Friday marks the last day I spend with the organization. It marks the very last morning I have to wake up at 6am to go for work! Woohoo~

I'm really pleasantly surprised that despite me being there for only a short time, everyone in the office still pooled some money together to get me a farewell gift. Actually it's quite a significant sum when everyone contributed $10 to it (I was told all except someone who had the cheek to give only $2!) and it got me a pretty decent gift which I otherwise will not have bought on my own.

It's only been a rather short-lived working experience there but it sure taught me a lot. I believe everyone that I meet and everywhere I go has its reasons and every experience is worth learning from. On to the next phase!

As quoted by a horoscope website: "You are a hard worker and expect others to help and do their share."

That explains why I can't stand this organisation.

Let the countdown begin

People asks why do we go through all that effort to hold our wedding over 2 days, worry about how we want to decorate the venue, worry about which caterer to choose for our dinner, design our own cards, go all the way in to JB for our gowns and photoshoot etc. Of course to others this is very troublesome and I do agree that we created a lot of unnecessary trouble for ourselves compared to if we had chosen to go with the norm of having dinner at a hotel ballroom with 30+ to 40 tables and settle for some studio here.

In fact, we spent the whole of yesterday at home just to decide on what to print on the card and he spent a lot of time making the necessary adjustments on photoshop before we can send them in for printing. We had to source for our own materials, own printers and later have to hand cut the cards into size.

But if you ask me, I would say that it is the process that is more meaningful than the deed itself, come 12 April. Through all this we get to know how each other works on things, we come to a compromise on different views and two heads are definitely better than one. We know that each other will be there to help out should one party be not free at the moment. I know that he can sometimes procrastinate and needs a bit of reminder sometimes. He knows that I am easy on certain things but stubborn on others. And to know that we share the same ideas on most things, including having a separate day just for friends as we want to celebrate friendship and not just us, as we believe our friends help to shape who we are.

It's still a long way more to go in the marriage itself and this is just the tip of the beginning. With close to 3 more months to THE day, let the countdown begin!

New bed

Today we just went to Courts to get a bed and just the mattress only cost $1700! But that's the cheapest price around apparently and plus we got free credits to buy more stuff in Courts and I won a DVD player in a lucky draw spin! hehe

New year, new life and new job!

Finally I can declare that I am changing jobs for sure. Before the appointment letter was signed, everything was still uncertain but now it has become a fact! :)

Yup I am going back to my old workplace! Sometimes things works in strange ways and opportunity do not come knocking all the time. I'm glad this time everything has gone well. I was so afraid that I wouldn't get the job but now no need to worry anymore. :)

arrgghh.... I don't want to work!!! I'm on leave!! At home!!! You understand?!?!?!?!! arrgghhhhh
I hate this job! 8 more work days to go is unbearable.

Faith misplaced

I really must get this off my chest. It's killing me. My boss is a b*tch!! I wonder, really, what kind of boss is she?

I literally risked my life when I was administering the short term scholarships. I was on 6 days mc, risking a lung infection, taking a $6 per pill medicine which was prescribed for patients during the SARS period and was not being reimbursed fully for medical fees AND at the same time, working from home.

When she asked me to stay for 2 more weeks because my other colleague will be away for Haj and they need manpower to generate report for an important meeting, I agreed to her request out of goodwill. Recently I just found out that the meeting will be postponed. So does that mean I can actually leave earlier than my stated last day???

And all this work and goodwill did not cross her mind when she REFUSED to do the reference check carried out by my prospective employer. What does it mean when she told them that I wasn't with them long enough to make comments about me? It is true I wasn't with them for a long time but I'm sure I definitely went beyond and over in certain aspects of my job during my stint there and as my boss she IS fully aware of it since she always want to be included in the cc loop.

Luckily I'm going in highly recommended by people who can testify for my working attitude and on top of it I found someone to replace her as my referee. Anyway the guy who replaced her as referee was damn cute la. He forwarded me the HR email and asked me to fill in the answers myself and send it back to him so he can send it back to them.

I hope she gets it right, that it doesn't mean she bad mouth me, I will still stay back. I was going to quit whether I found a job or not and this incident just shows that my judgment was correct. How can one work in such a terrible place?!!?! ARRGGHHH

There... I think I feel better already.

Lessons learnt

1. To relax and prepare everything beforehand so as not to turn into bridezilla!
2. Friends are forever and boys are whatever. :P

The ring pillow saga continues.....

Making ring pillow for close friends is a really satisfying experience, especially when they appreciate it so much and everyone says it's pretty. The greatest flattery was when my very first ring pillow had its photo taken and incorporated into part of my friend's invitation card to her ROM. Anyway here's 2 more that I have made for friends who got married this month.


I like this one because I love the beading, beading is very fun. And especially the centre ball of beads, I learnt it off the internet. That's when I realise that the internet is a really amazing tool, anything that I don't know, the answers can be found online somewhere. I love learning new stuff like this. Besides the bead ball, I learnt to make a star out of beads too, may use it in future projects. :)



I made this for my best friend's wedding because her theme for her wedding is yellow, orange and brown. We incidentally met a common friend with her boyfriend when I passed my best friend the ring pillow and it turned out that the guy's a jewellery designer. He's looking for a shop to set up his own business. He's impressed with my work hahahaha. He asked if I do this for a living, I say I just do this for a hobby. He say that it may complement his work and ask if I'm interested to do this on a freelance basis. Oh my, he must be kidding! I must admit that this pillow is not very well made because I had to sew the pillow together as I couldn't find a sewing machine to use and I was getting desperate. So actually the seams were not very good if you take a close look at it and the corners are not really sharp compared to those that came out from the sewing machine. But nonetheless, I'm proud to say that I sew this from scratch! I like the feel that the yellow bunch of flowers bring out, really look very real. Spotlight has good stuff like this! :) I intend to tie the rings such that they sit on top of the flowers, I think that should be very nice.

Wedding singers

It is confirmed! We will be getting a band of wedding singers for our wedding. :) I'm glad we caught them in the act at my friend's wedding last Sunday. It's simply a wonderful experience! Hope this will make the wedding more memorable.

This reminds me of the movie The Wedding Singer by Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore, two of my favourite actors and this is one of my favourite movie of all time. Of course, at the wedding there will not be any Adam Sandler or Drew Barrymore.

Great, wedding plans are getting more exciting by the minute. :)

Astrology prediction for the week

You may wish you were invisible this week or stowed away on your own island without any stress or distraction to keep you from your own private thoughts. You will have a strong desire to seek solitude and have the space to deal with your own issues, due to the fact that on Wednesday your ruling planet Venus enters privacy-loving Scorpio. You may shy away from interactions with others and seek out your own little corner of the universe for a while. On Friday you may go over your wish list and seriously upgrade it, or at least revise it considerably. The Sun in Sagittarius squares Uranus in your sector of hopes and wishes, and you might not be happy with your current agenda. You have a lot of quiet determination, endless patience, and you usually don't like change, but you don't like to get stuck in a rut, either. You may feel you've gotten too laid back in how you live your life, or that you're simply not experiencing all that life has to offer. The New Moon in Sagittarius on Sunday will help you revitalize your idealistic hopes and dreams.

Shanghai Trip 6 Nov to 11 Nov

I guess it's an ok trip. I've been to Shanghai before but that's years ago on a packaged tour with my mum who had difficulty walking then and my brother. It is definitely different to go on a free and easy tour. The city is definitely developing fast, I don't remember all those tall buildings except for the Oriental Pearl Tower.

The bummer of the whole trip is probably this: We spent a wasted half day stuck on the highway on the way to Suzhou and everything was cut into half the time because the tour guide die die wants us to visit the silk factory. I swear I will never join these one day tours ever again. Anyway they closed the highway because there was fog and they do not allow any vehicle to pass at all and worse still it's a one way road with no turning anywhere.

The only regret I have on this trip is not able to go to the 'water towns' as my friend had totally no interest. Sighs that's the problem when the Friend is a shopaholic and not really interested in sceneries. Travelling with friends is never an easy thing as getting along with each other for a few days is really an art, sometimes we just have to give and take a bit.

It's a girl!

Congratulations to Jess on the arrival of her baby girl, Esther!

I went to visit her at the hospital. Hearing Jess's description on child birth sounds scary yet amazing.Oh what a pretty baby. Anyway she's so active! Kicking and stretching her legs and arms. Who would have thought that she's less than a day old only. Her proud dad was nodding in approval when I commented that she has her dad's athletic genes hehe.

My cousin's great wedding

I just came back from my cousin's great wedding! Well it's just like any other wedding I suppose but the only diff is that this is my closest cousin getting married. I am only 5 more hours away from my plane to Shanghai. Oh well, heck, I will still go on and blog about her wedding.

Hers is the start of the many more weddings I have to attend in the coming months. It was great except that at the end of it, the groomsmen were drunk and so were the bridesmaid and so was the groom who got totally knocked out and probably didn't know he got stripped. My cousin was a little tipsy too and hopefully she still has it together after we left at 3+am. I hope she doesn't get a rude shock in the morning over the mess in her suite.

Anyway, Couz, I just wanna say, you have a great married life ahead and I hope you are happy with the man you married and stay happy!

Wedding venue

I've been complaint about for not updating my blog!

So here's the latest update. My wedding venue on 12th April 2008, Saturday, will be held at the Singapore Art Museum. Here is a sample picture of what it may look like but I don't think I want to set my tables up like that. I shall make all my guests stand around hahahahaha.