DO YOU TAKE THIS KLOWN...?

Forget the suits, the hats, the specially selected gifts - it seems to me that the most important thing to bring to the wedding ceremony is the relentless cough.

Every wedding I've been to, without exception, has had someone in the audience with a nasty cough. Not a slight, "a-huh-huh" kind of thing that you can ignore - no, this is the full on, "I may die at any moment, here come my lungs right now" kind of coughing that really makes people look round. The vicar is midway through the vows, "Do you... yada-yada, take this man..." and old Uncle Barry back there is giving his all in a fine rendition of an unseasonable summer cold.

I attended a wedding a few years back while suffering from a stomach bug and I got no sympathy at all. None. Zilch. No one wants the stomach bug at the wedding. The coughing guy - he was popular, people couldn't get enough of him. He was at the church, the reception, the free bar, honking his way through a dry, rasping cough no matter whose speech it interrupted. My "I'd better not eat too much rich food at the reception" was deemed as contributing nothing compared to the guy sharing his bronchial pneumonia with all and sundry.

But, some people don't feel happy developing a cough for these occasions - I'm one myself - so if you're one of them, can I suggest the other popular option: the ceaselessly crying baby. There's always one of those at the back of the church during the service. It's an especially popular choice, I've noticed, if you're in a church where the acoustics are quite echoy. That really lets everyone know that that baby is out of control, doesn't it?

I always enjoy that little bit of audience participation in the wedding vows...

"If anyone here today has any objection to this union, speak now or forever hold your peace."

- because, as I understand it, forever is a long time. If you're holding your peace, you can't just hold it for the ceremony then blurt it out to perfect strangers you meet at the reception. It's really an all-or-nothing kind of deal there. Some people don't seem to appreciate that. They'll knock the marriage before the couple have even signed the register, and you'll see them in the bar later on explaining how "they're just not right for each other." They spend the rest of their lives waiting for these people to get divorced so they can be proven right. These are the people who won't give peace a chance.