Wedding Party
Emily VanCourt
Maid of Honor
Emily has been a friend of the bride since 7th grade, where they sat in school together snickering about Star Trek and Star Wars. She is currently a student and doctoral candidate at the University of Missouri in the field of Curriculum & Instruction for Social Studies.
A nerd girl after my own heart, Emily is more than I could ask for as a friend and as a Maid of Honor. Though the distance has kept us apart over the years, she has been there for me through my highest and lowest times, and I am grateful and honored for her to be part of my wedding. <3
Mike Paul
Best Man
Curtis and Mike met at Camp Horseshoe (Boy Scout Camp) in 1996 while on KP in the mess hall. Drawn to Mike's pun-ful shirt ("byte me") they got to talking about computers and over the following years kept in touch at camp trading stories about programs they wrote for their calculators (Curtis and his TI-83, Mike and his HP48G) until Curtis finally got email and then the conversations became a bit more regular. They both worked on the Robotic Team during high school, went to too many LAN parties, worked together on many computer and web projects, and spend half a day walking around in Japan looking for a restaurant that no longer existed.
Mike has his bachelors degree from Lehigh University in Computer Science and he works in Maryland as a software engineer.
Mike has always been there for me over the many years we've been friends, and he has certainly seen me at my best and my worst. I have always looked up to Mike as a programmer and as a man with honor. I couldn't ask for a better man to call my best friend.
Josh Berkowitz
Bridesman
Josh and I met freshman year in college where we lived only a few rooms down from each other on the same floor. I remember going to the dining hall one of the first nights of college with the people from our floor and having a distinct feeling that I would become good friends with Josh. I was right. We were friends straight through college, through senior year when we lived together in a 4 person apartment off campus.
Graduating was bittersweet, since Josh lives in New York and I knew I would be going back to Pennsylvania. We kept in touch via phone and internet after graduation, and every year since graduating I've hosted a Halloween party so I can see old friends, him included.
A caring and wonderful person as well as a kind and devoted friend, Josh has been there and helped me through difficult and tumultuous parts of my life. I can always count on him to make me laugh.
And by the way, SuperJew, I will totally be doing the Asparagus Dance at my wedding.
Maura Dailey
Groomsmaid
Maura and I met at one of Mike's LAN parties (computer gaming party) back in high school where we spent the night talking about my overly-flashy design for my high school web site. Well, at least *she* thought it was overly-flashy. We kept talking online and meeting up at other LAN parties over the years; covering everything from web sites we were working on, her knitting and writing projects, and various games we wanted the other to play. Eventually anime got added to the mix. She's been the host to about 7 years of Otakon (anime convention) madness while she's lived in Maryland which I greatly look forward to every year.
She kept me sane during my six-month exile to Maryland, accompanying me to movies and endless sushi runs. Maura was single-handedly responsible for re-igniting the Apple fanboy in me by selling me her iBook many many years ago. I owe my tea-addiction to her, too.
Maura moving to Maryland has sucked, especially when coupled with my inability to ever get on AIM anymore, but we remain close friends. Recently we've been getting together every other month to watch an entire anime series in a day (8 hrs of anime in a day!).
I've been very lucky to have her as a friend. Thanks for putting up with me, Maura :)
Tim Epler
Groomsman
Tim and I met in the trenches -- he came onto my program at work right as the (first wave of about twenty) madness was starting and we were left on our own to design an entire system within a week or two. Locked in a room with a white-board day after day immediately drew out the witty remarks and we quickly became friends.
We spent the days on the program reminiscing about World of Warcraft, discussing other MMOs and video games coming out, and other various dorky topics. And if I recall correctly, he fired the first shot in the nurf-gun wars at work.
The friendship expanded beyond work when he brought me along to Friday lunches with what ended up being my good group of friends up here in PA. To add even more dorkyness to the we all started a Dungeons and Dragons game that we get together for weekly. He (sometimes (slacker)) comes over for our weekly Rock Band games when he's not working too hard at work.
Tim's been a wonderful friend over the years and I look forward to our continuing shenanigans.
Chris Furst
Bridesman
Chris and I met freshman year of college (Josh, Chris and I were all on the same floor). We all hung out and watched TV together and ate dinner together almost every night. Although relatively quiet, Chris is willing to go along with my crazy/stupid/boring plans and have a good time. He fueled my nerdness as we played (the crap out of) Diablo II together (how many Shakos are enough?) and the A Game of Thrones CCG, as well as other games like Casino and Milles Bornes (@*$*@!). He is a wonderful and patient man, in fact I think I've only managed to fluster him a grand total of once. We all complemented each other well and were practically inseparable for several years.
He also lived with Josh and I in the 4 person apartment senior year of college. When I graduated, I was devastated to leave my two best friends behind-- Chris moved back home to Maryland. I am lucky that Chris had the fortune of finding a job in my area and moved 15 minutes away from me last year. We now play Rock Band every week, and we're currently both trying to master expert drums.
Thank you for always being around for me and I hope we remain friends for a long time to come.
