In pictures.
Um, yeah, no. I don’t think so.
My friends, by the way, are the absolute best in the whole world ever. Now I know you’re thinking, “But Andi, that can’t be! MY friends are the best!”
But I ask you: did your friends plan an elaborately schemed, full 24-hour bachelorette party, complete with cabana boys, hula hoops, argyle knee-highs, police handcuffs, water taxis and inflatable penises?? (You knew there had to be something dick-related, right? It was a bachelorette party.)
I didn’t think so.
So again, my friends are the best. They love to plan parties, love to make crazy costumes, and this was a combination of all of that.
We started with a day at the pool at the Hard Rock Hotel in Orlando. Sixteen-dollar fruity drinks, a cute cabana boy named, coincidentally, Andy, and a hula hoop contest that we didn’t even know about but that for which, my friends had actually brought their own hula hoops. I mean, they brought the hula hoops for poolside fun. There just happened to be a hula hoop contest. Another coincidence. Of course one of my girls won the contest. Of course. (We honestly didn’t know there would be a contest – but they just brought the hoops because they’re crazy hippies and like to hula hoop.)
The night portion of the party was equally as awesome and surprising. We started with an amazing steak dinner at The Palm, where our waiter dropped it like he was hot. No joke.
I was nervous about what to wear, remember? To ease my fears, each of my friends brought a few things to choose from.
For what?
For our round of Pub Golf, of course!
One lady-friend made up some awesome laminated score cards on which we earned ’strokes’ for performing different things at each of 9 ‘watering holes’ along our course (of the bars/clubs at CityWalk Universal). Take a shot at Margaritaville? Birdie! Drink a beer at Bob Marley’s? Par!
But it doesn’t end with drinks. Strokes can be subtracted for performing certain feats, like finding random strangers to give me lap-dances or gathering phone numbers on napkins. Penalties are incurred for peeing at the wrong bar or spilling drinks. The list was long, and while we all played the game, a few people were certainly more competitive than others.
It ended up with all of us in the VIP section of a ridiculous 80’s club, drinking Grey Goose and Red Bull that probably cost way too much but that we didn’t have to pay for. It was a fantastic, memorable night – a night I will never forget, capped by 3-to-a-bed, very little sleep, an awesome Sunday brunch and an hour or so in the pool.
I feel incredibly fortunate to have such amazing friends. I’ve never been one for a ‘best’ friend, but I like to think I have 6. Or 7. Or 8. Each of them plays a different role in my life, and is there when I need them most and is able to show the strengths for which I need them. They’ve been with me for a good 6 or 7 years now (I haven’t been in Florida that long . . .), and these are the girls that I see traveling to Piper’s wedding. The girls that will be there with me through my ups and downs and who I cannot WAIT to see through their own. I get teary thinking about it. I don’t know how I ended up with such awesome people around me, but I am certainly glad I did. I love you all so much and can’t imagine my life without you.
