We got married in a nice, middling-sized event — 40 or 50 people, I’d guess, in a little wedding chapel, with nothing particularly fancy or expensive. The best part was seeing old friends for a few hours, but if the wedding had taken place in 2020 rather than 1980, we would have skipped the whole thing, just had a tiny private ceremony (or even just a civil ceremony, the two of us signing a paper before witnesses) and been just as happy, and we’d still be just as married to this day. I guess it’s because we aren’t Texans, an alien subspecies with some wacky ideas.

The wedding photographer had already spent an hour or two inside with the unmasked wedding party when one of the bridesmaids approached her. The woman thanked her for still showing up, considering “everything that’s going on with the groom.”

When the photographer asked what she meant by that, the bridesmaid said the groom had tested positive for the coronavirus the day before. “She was looking for me to be like, ‘Oh, that’s crazy,’ like I was going to agree with her that it was fine,” the photographer recalls. “So I was like, ‘What are you talking about?’ And she was like, ‘Oh no no no, don’t freak out. He doesn’t have symptoms. He’s fine.’”

The photographer, who has asthma and three kids, left with her assistant before the night was over. Her exit was tense. The wedding planner said it was the most unprofessional thing she’d ever seen. Bridesmaids accused her of heartlessly ruining an innocent woman’s wedding day. She recalls one bridesmaid telling her, “I’m a teacher, I have fourteen students. If I’m willing to risk it, why aren’t you?” Another said everyone was going to get COVID eventually, so what was the big deal? The friend of the bride who’d spilled the beans cried about being the “worst bridesmaid ever.”

Did I say wacky? I meant irresponsible. Also, that bridesmaid who was so cavalier about the health of her students needs to be fired, immediately.

The story ends with a nice kick in the butt.

The photographer who got sick after shooting the COVID-positive groom said her experiences throughout the pandemic have left her a little depressed. She recalled one conversation from that wedding, before she left the reception. “I have children,” she told a bridesmaid, “What if my children die?” The bridesmaid responded, “I understand, but this is her wedding day.”

That’s one sick culture when the fancy party on day one of a marriage is worth the lives of a few children. There’s this whole bridezilla stereotype that really needs to die.

There’s a reason, I guess, that my wife brings me a big bowl of fiber every morning. I think she prefers that to having to pluck the legs off grasshoppers.

A man who lived in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands of Texas sometime between 1,000 and 1,400 years ago may have died from a horrible case of constipation, according to a study of his mummified remains.

And during the painful months just prior to his death, he ate mainly grasshoppers, the study researchers found.

Apparently, Chagas disease, which is caused by a parasite called Trypanosoma cruzi, had blocked up the man’s gastrointestinal system. That blockage caused his colon to swell to about six times its normal size — a condition called “megacolon.” The man was unable to digest foods properly and gradually became malnourished, scientists found. The condition would have made it difficult for the man to walk or even eat on his own. The researchers think that in the last two to three months of his life — either family or members of his community — helped the man eat by feeding him grasshoppers whose legs had been removed.

Ugh. What a miserable way to go.

I don’t usually listen to the kind of media that would subject me to Christmas carols — I MAINTAIN CONTROL OF THE STATION, a very Dad thing to do — but I found this one, and I will accept it.