I got to warm up for my own reunion (yes, I'm going, more on that in a bit) by going to the wife's this past weekend. In a marked contrast to mine, her's was pretty informal, held at a restaurant and bar in the town her high school is in. No set agenda or fancy invitation, other than a variety of emails and a newspaper announcement that was apparently cut and pasted directly from the email my wife sent to them. Of course, not everyone can be the paragon of journalism that is the Whale City Tribune-Fishwrap or even the Manchester Cricket (which has not yet found a web presence to move it into the 1990s).

Anyway, it went surprisingly well for an event where I only knew two people (the wife and a friend of the wife who I've met once). I spent a fair amount of time talking to a spouse in a similar situation as mine, which was helpful. Given that they live reasonably close to us now, we may even see them again. Or at least that's what you say at reunions.

In any case, there was good beer and, eventually, the Sox game, so the awkward pauses were adequately filled when needed.

As for my own impending reunion, it turns out that it's now been moved to the restaurant that runs the hall where we had our wedding reception. Which is all well and good - if you like (or can eat) seafood. Should any fellow reunioneers from the MHS class of 1987 stumble upon this (my apologies if you do), feel free to claim our steamers.

The announcement that the reunion was moving had a list of attendees attached, and while I was happy to see some people I'd not seen in quite some time, there were two or three names I'd hoped to see that were absent. Par for the course, I suppose.