Rejected wedding theme #4: Buffalo Brawl!

Not a scene from the Buffalo Wedding Brawl, but from this funny Windows Phone ad.

Continuing my series of themes that I will not be using at my upcoming wedding, here’s one: Buffalo Brawl!

“I’m telling you, there was blood everywhere,” said one of the staff at a wedding reception in Buffalo that ended in a 100-person brawl. “There was holes punched in the walls. Words couldn’t describe it. Just when you thought it was over, another fight started.”

(“There was holes punched in the walls.” Never mind the guests — even subjects and verbs were in disagreement at this wedding!)

Police got a call last Saturday night at 11 p.m. about a fight breaking out at a wedding reception at Orchard Park Country Club. An officer who was among the first to respond says that more than 100 people were fighting both inside and outside the club when they arrived. The bride and groom were apparently not involved in the brawl — she had been hustled out the back, while he tried to get the guests to leave.

There’s still no clear explanation for what started the fight, although there’s a report that earlier that evening, a wedding guest was accused of groping a woman and then punched in the face. That guest was escorted off the premises, and the reception went back to normal until it was time to leave. Apparently there was still some lingering ill will, and that’s when the fights broke out. The fights got larger as people tried to break them up, only to be drawn into the melee. “There were intoxicated individuals who were not helping us at all and had to be sent along with a sober individual,” said a police officer who was at the scene.

Seven police departments showed up in response. This may have been because of the size of the fight, but I’m not going to discount the explanation that upstate New York is a crashing bore on most Saturday nights.

The Wedding-Industrial Complex doesn’t like anything tarnishing its image, and Orchard Park Country Club’s manager was quick to deny that the fight even took place. He showed Buffalo News their main lounge and dining areas, which didn’t look as if they’d been through a bunkhouse brawl. “Look around,” he said. “Does it look like there was any damage?”

It should be noted that the wedding reception was held in a side banquet room that wasn’t shown to Buffalo News. In the meantime, the officer who first arrived at the scene said damage included holes in walls, blood, broken crystal bowls and glasses and damage to property in the main banquet area, hallways and basement. “For them to say nothing happened is 100 percent wrong,” he said.

The best observation about the story comes from Gawker, in response to a witness who said “Things were said that can never be taken back.”: “Hey! It’s like a metaphor for marriage!”