Marital bliss

June is the month for weddings, and so, I bring you an enormous . . . er, question of etiquette:

Suppose you're a bride who's getting married and, to save some money, you delegated to your sister-in-law-to-be the job of baking the wedding cake. And then, in classic Pillage Idiot fashion, she showed up on the wedding day with a cake in the shape of a three-foot tall penis. Replete with statuettes of the bride and groom, strategically placed on the cake.

Your first assignment: What should you, the bride, do?

A. Break down into an uncontrollable sob.

B. Call off the wedding.

C. Smash the three-foot penis into your SILTB's hideous little face.

D. Call up Miss Manners to ask for her advice.

If you chose D., I think I may be able to help you out, because if this column that Miss Manners published a couple of weeks ago (second item) is any indication, Miss Manners would advise you to act with considerable tact, even under these extremely trying circumstances:

Say "Thank you," whisk it into the kitchen, slice it in small pieces and serve it on a platter. Just please don't describe the slicing to Miss Manners.

Bring your own mohel.

Not so fast, you say. The question Miss Manners was answering had nothing to do with a wedding; it had to do with a dinner party for a 57th birthday. And all of us have had three-foot penii served to us at birthday parties, haven't we? So what would you do if this cake arrived at your wedding?

In an effort to answer this etiquette question, I decided to check out Sunday's New York Times wedding pages for some help. There, I found an announcement of a wedding between an assistant editor of the New Yorker and a fellow New Yorker staffer. His last name is "Peed," and he is, so far as I can tell, no relation to the Cincinnati Reds' rookie pitcher Mike Leake. Had I been in the bride's position, I surely would have kept my own name. She apparently will not. Sadly, there was no word in the announcement about the shape of their wedding cake.

And speaking of weddings, here's your next assignment. I want you to imagine that the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey has just gotten married. Then, I want you to imagine what the courtship, engagement, and wedding were like. You are required to engage in the most grotesque stereotyping of ACLU lefties you can dream up in that demented mind of yours.

And now, I'm going to complete my own assignment.

1. She would live in a grungy area of Newark. CHECK! "'I try to keep myself alert by living among people who are evidence of the need for social change,' she said."


2. Her workplace would be in an equally grungy area of town, and she'd come up with a politically correct justification for her husband to pick her up after dark. CHECK! "'When it gets dark he comes and picks me up from work,' she said. 'He understands that by taking care of me, he’s taking care of our dreams for social change.'"


3. The groom would be a veteran and peace activist. CHECK! "She met Michael T. McPhearson in October 1997 in a St. Louis bar where a forum was being held about police misconduct. Mr. McPhearson, a divorced Gulf War veteran turned peace activist, spoke out often in his friendly yet fierce way."


4. She would naturally have asked him out first. CHECK! "A few days later, he drove his red convertible over to her office to continue the conversation. Impressed by his intense eyes and opinions, she asked him out."


5. Their dates would involve dreary recitations of left-wing pieties. CHECK! "On many of their dates they examined movies, advertising and songs together, searching for racist messages 'hidden like camouflaged lizards in the leaves,' Ms. Jacobs said."


6. The hot and heavy stuff would also involve left-wing pieties. CHECK! "Soon, they were spending weekends rallying, picketing, studying the Constitution, blogging and jogging. Like her, he always stopped to speak at length with homeless people."


7. He would know how to please the feminists. CHECK! "'He shows good manners to everyone,' Ms. Jacobs said. 'He puts toilet seats down, but not people.'"


8. During their time living together, they would try to re-create the Age of Aquarius. CHECK! "They shared a condominium in Montclair, N.J., and filled it with books, rock music and fellow activists, who sometimes camped out in the living room."


9. He of course would not give her a patriarchal engagement ring. CHECK! "He proposed to Ms. Jacobs in their kitchen — without a ring. 'I don’t think Michael has ever given me a piece of jewelry other than some peace signs, which he's big on,' she said. 'Having a piece of jewelry on my body in no way relates to our love or our bond.'"


10. The clergyman who performed the wedding ceremony would himself be a left-wing activist. CHECK! "Along with several of the guests, the officiant, the Rev. Osagyefo Uhuru Sekou, a minister of the United Church of Christ, has been arrested more than once for civil disobedience, and sometimes takes homeless people into his home."


11. The ceremony, which naturally would have to be outdoors near the Statue of Liberty, would call for the guests and clergyman to step inside a circle with the bride, groom, and clergyman to offer marital wisdom, and the most notable wisdom would involve sex. CHECK! "During the ceremony, one guest after another stepped into the middle of the circle to share some marital wisdom. Mr. Sekou offered this advice on making marriage work: 'Love is a choice, so choose to love. Never go to sleep angry. It makes morning hard. And when in doubt, have sex.'"


12. The couple would eschew a formal honeymoon, preferring take their own separate trips. CHECK! "A few days later, the bridegroom took off on his motorcycle for a two-week road trip — a kind of solo honeymoon. 'It just makes our relationship so much better to have our own adventures,' the bride said."

Of course, all of this is just my grotesque wingnut stereotyping of ACLU-niks. I'm sure that none of it actually happened. Right?

OK, now where was I?

Oh, yeah, a wedding cake in the shape of a three-foot penis. That's where I usually am. Anyway, in case you think such a thing is not possible, I leave you with this photo, which comes from uglyweddingcake.com.


I urge you to click over there, because if you do, you'll find this photo on the homepage, with the following note from the unhappy bride:

I win for ugliest cake! My wedding was recent, and I asked for a cake of a beautiful sand castle with chocolate seashells. I even sent a picture of a cake that I wanted. THIS is what I get: a giant p____ cake. The cake was made with a cardboard paper towel holder and he smashed the cake around it. Everyone laughed when they saw it, and I was totally humiliated. WHAT A JOKE!!
-Erin B, Ventura CA

And here's another shot of it:


Finally, I have my answer to the enormous etiquette question: C. You smash the three-foot penis into your SILTB's hideous little face. After first taking multiple photos of the cake. For posterity.