Times' up, bridezilla.

I am no longer freaked out with preparations for the wedding and mission trip.

All the wedding details are now in the hands of professionals who will freak out on my behalf while I'm in Nicaragua digging pit toilets and working on my farmer's tan.

There's one small worry I kept for myself when I was dumping my worries onto the shoulders of the Professional Worriers: the matter of the missing musician. The musician who replaced the musician who bailed due to illness is now himself missing in action.

The only time I've ever spoken to Replacement Musician was a 30 second phone call last week when he told me the original guy had asked him to cover our gig and that he'd call me back the next day to discuss details. But I haven't spoken to him since.

With every passing day I worried more about it. Maybe our wires had gotten crossed? Maybe he didn't have us on his calendar? Maybe he had surgery like the first guy--maybe musicians are falling like trees these days? All these possibilities were running through my mind yesterday morning, and the more I thought about it the more worried I got, so I picked up the phone and called his house.

Mrs. Musician answered the phone and told me he wasn't home, that he's in Phoenix attending to an urgent matter, and she doesn't know exactly when he'll be back. I think she probably does know when he's coming back. I think she just said that to freak me out to get even with me for calling at the crack of dawn. Ooops, my bad. Sometimes I forget that everybody doesn't haul out of bed at 4 AM like we do, if you can believe it.

Anyway, she told me not to worry because we're on his calendar and he's played at lots of weddings and is an old hand at these things, along with a bunch of other comforting stuff a nice lady would say to a neurotic middle aged bride calling at 6 o'clock in the morning.

But since this musician is the very one who is going to play the "dum DUM DEE dum" song I'm a little worried anyway. As a back-up plan, I'll feel a lot better if you'd practice humming the tune and brushing up on the lyrics--not the lyrics with "big, fat, and wide" verse, the other lyrics--over the course of the next couple of weeks. And bring your kazoo if you have one. Just in case.

I'll probably obsess a little bit about this while I'm down in Nicaragua swatting mosquitoes and digging crappers.

Edited later to add:
I've now spoken at length with the replacement musician. He's absolutely delightful and everything his wife promised he'd be. And it's all good--we're definitely on the schedule, he's definitely showing up, and he knows all the tunes I had in mind. And hooo boy, are you guys gonna be grooving on this guy. I'd tell you more about him but I can't because he's a surprise for you. You're gonna love it, promise.

One less thing to think about while I'm digging latrines in Nicaragua: check!