Groom Speech With Funny Thank-Yous (3 Minutes, Later-in-Life Couple)

The speech

Hi, everyone. I'm Harlan, and as of about two hours ago, I'm Loretta's husband. I'm sixty-four years old and I was nervous enough this morning to put my shirt on inside out, so let's get the thank-yous done while I still have my nerve.

Thank you to Loretta's daughter, Edda, who planned this entire wedding with a clipboard and the confidence of a general. I asked her once if I could help, and she gave me a job. The job was to stop asking.

Thank you to my son, Abner, my best man, who only told one of the four stories I paid him not to tell. I'll take those odds.

Thank you to the kitchen for the brisket, and to the band for promising not to play anything we'd have to dance fast to. My knees thank you personally.

And thank you to everyone who traveled, including Loretta's cousins from the lake, who came by pontoon boat. I didn't know that was an option.

If I missed you, Edda has a list, and she will find you.

Now, one story about my wife.

Two winters ago I had cataract surgery, one eye and then the other, a week apart. For about two weeks I couldn't read, and what I missed most was the crossword in the morning paper. I've done it every day since 1979. So Loretta started coming over at seven every morning, before her own coffee, to read me the clues out loud.

She'd read one, and wait. If I got it, she'd write it in. If I didn't, she'd say, "Hmm, that's a tough one," and move on. Two weeks of this. I got almost all of them. I was very pleased with my brain.

When the bandages came off, I went over to her place and found a stack of newspapers on her kitchen counter. The puzzles were all done already. In pen. She had been finishing them at home at six, then driving over at seven to sit with me and pretend she was stuck.

I asked her why. She said, "You like getting them. I like watching you get them."

I've had a long life and a good one, and nobody has ever loved me as carefully as that. Loretta, I don't know how many mornings we've got. I want all of them, and you can keep reading me the hard ones.

Everybody, glasses up. To Loretta and Harlan. Seven letters, starts with M: married.

Why it works: Each thank-you gets one joke and moves on, so the room is warmed up and ready to listen when the crossword story arrives. The toast turns that story into a seven-letter clue.