Crazy Catalog Stuff - Part 4: Say Yes to the Dress!

Gentle Readers,

I must address you personally about an issue so abhorrent, so outrageous, that I can hardly bring myself to even discuss the subject.

I refer to the cable television show "Say Yes to the Dress". (1)  Here, corrupting our youth with visions of wedding dresses STARTING at $6K (2) and heading northwards above, "**gasp**" $20K!!  I  implore you (and as a father of several young ladies ranging in age from the late-teens to the mid-20s) to DEMAND a stop to this insanity (or what I jokingly refer to as "wedding porn") (3).

As an alternative I have suggested to my young, female offspring "Well, heck, why don't you just get a wedding dress from the Sears Catalog like they did back in the 70s?  After all they only cost, oh say, 50 dollars!" (disgusted eye-rolls quickly follow that suggestion).

Okay, okay, this dress costs $75 instead of $50.  For my precious pumpkin, I'll splurge for the extra $25.00 (after all it's JCP instead of Sears so you'd expect to pay a little more!)  See!  Here Kathy looks absolutely resplendent in this dress!!  I mean, it meets all the requirements - it's white, it's got lots of frilly, lacy stuff, so there !! Why pay thousands, when you can pay dozens and still look great?!?

So Penney's is a little too "high falutin", well there's always Aldens for the budget conscious.  Still, it's white and the gal looks great, So What's the Big Deal?? (4)  Even mom and dad could get their wedding day outfits from Aldens!  "Happy the Bride" indeed.  Of course, it looks to me like mom and dad are the ones really happy with all the savings!  As a bonus: what kind of pose is the bride doing?  Some kind of limbo-low move?

Those crazy catalogs even displayed a wide choice of bridesmaid dresses!  Just look at these lovelies!!  Ahhh, memories of all the weddings of my friends come to mind - and NO, they didn't spend $20K for a dress!! (of course some of those weddings right after High School were, ah hem, a bit hastily put together, ah hem.)

More bridesmaid dresses, this time from Aldens.  You've got to love the old-time Southern Belle look with the pink parasol.

Kathy as a bridesmaid with a parasol, so lovely.  Hey!! Wait one cotton-pickin'-minute!! Isn't that dude the same guy that was with Kathy in the first pic???  You dad-bern-two-timin'-Sumofabee!! Get away from my daughter or you're gunnin' git a blast of rock salt in yer behind!!!!

So I implore you, dear readers, to join me in this quest to end wedding dress insanity!  After all, there are practical considerations also.  Think of what a young couple could do with all that extra money (or think of the new pickup truck dear ole dad could buy!)


footnotes:

(1) For those of you that don't follow such things.  "Say Yes to the Dress" is one of these quasi-reality shows that follows all the ups and downs of brides-to-be picking out their wedding dress at a high end dress store.  It's on TLC. Often is the time when I come home from work to find all the women of my household huddled around the TV watching this with rapt attention - the horror, the horror......

(2) On the show, a common theme is that the bride-to-be finds the perfect dress, but, alas, it's WAY over the preset family budget.  You can just see the disappointment on her face as her family attempts to convince her to settle for the dress of a mere $6K when her heart is set on the $15K version.  Naturally, after some tear-filled-drama, mom twists dad's arm and little princess gets her wish.  I think I'm feeling sick just thinking about it.

(4) I have even joked about putting parental controls on that station to have it blocked.

(3) So What's the Big Deal was a common theme in the hey day of Aldens catalogs, so I had to work that in.