Season 10 Greattasticly Ever After Blog 3: The Wedding Reception, Part 2

 The Wedding Reception, Part 2

Since Paige and I have been together she has taken me to two O'Brien family weddings. I didn’t depict either of them because I knew that eventually I would be writing an installment about our wedding reception, and O'Brien weddings are things that you can only write about one time. I walked out onto the dance floor, and began to dance with everybody. Now what was really cool about this dance floor was that we had hung up a “Disco Pig” above the floor from one of Dad's projects. Yes, I said Disco Pig, and yes it is exactly what you are imagining. A few of my family members, not to mention my new wife, asked me why my shoes were off, and I explained that they had been hurting my feet.

Our bartender was a woman named Ammy, her business is called Balila y Bebe. Our specialty drink was a Moscow Mule, but we called it “The Ulibrien.” I went to the bar and got a couple of Ulibriens, and the Andersons, Elena and her sister Jenna, and I took a shot.

During the night I danced with Paige obviously, Kid, Aspen, and Arden, Elena and Jenna, my cousins the Mitreys and my brothers (specifically to TNT), Noah, my cousin Cameron, Dad's high school best friend Martin, my coworkers Elizabeth Lexi, and Greg, and my former coworkers, Clo, Carly, Violet, Emma, Mac and her girlfriend Savannah, Nicole, her fiance Carson, and Paige’s other friend Miranda, as well as my childhood neighbors on the other side of me from the Andersons, Greg Parker, his sister Melody and her husband Rob. While the night was full of dancing and fun, there were two major set pieces of the night (besides Cousin Simple’s performance), both of which have their roots in Paige's parents, and my parents’ respective weddings. Let's start with Paige's parents as that happened first. 

Paige's dad is one of 11, and her mom is one of 6. At their wedding all of her dad's siblings built a pyramid in the middle of the dance floor and her mom laid down in front for a picture. I went to the bathroom really quickly and when I came back, the O'Brien side of the family was in the middle of the dance floor building a pyramid. Paige and I were supposed to be at the top. I ended up getting on top of Paige's brother Ryan, and as she was getting on top next to me, her uncles couldn't handle it anymore, (they had been down there for at least 5 minutes), and the pyramid collapsed!

When I was growing up, my aunts and Mom would sing Paradise by the Dashboard Light, almost any chance they got. Martin had been Dad’s best man at my parents' wedding. Mom and Dad's reception was held at the Ohio Theater. They had the venue from 3:30-9:30. When they were booking the venue, Mom asked, what if they wanted to stay longer and the event coordinator said just to tell them they would like to extend the time by an hour. So about a half hour before the reception ended, Mom and my Grandpa went up to the bartender and told him they wanted another hour. The bartender said, “That’s fine but we've already started shutting down the bar, so there will be no more alcohol.”

“That's fine,” Mom said, “everyone has had enough to drink.”

Unfortunately my Uncle Andy, who was just a boyfriend at this point, wanted another drink. He decided that the best course of action was to go downstairs, and buy a case of beer, and bring it back up to the reception. So there's a video of Mom and Martin in the middle of the dance floor singing Paradise by the Dashboard Light at each other, and the song gets cut off midway because they got kicked out. When Paradise by the Dashboard Light came on, Mom and Martin were finally able to finish their duet 33 years later. 

To Be Continued…

Season 10 Greattasticly Ever After Blog 2: Crimson Cup Reunion

 Crimson Cup Reunion

On Tuesday, July 21, 2026, after I dropped Paige off at work, I walked into Crimson Cup at 4:15. I walked up to the counter and ordered my usual.

“Hey,” I said to the cashier, “how’s Lydia? I came here on my wedding day, but I didn’t get a chance to talk to her.”

“Oh,” the cashier said, “she got a new job back in June! But I think she’s doing well.”

After I got my coffee, I sat down, and waited. About 10 minutes later the door opened and Elena Collins walked though. Elena is a friend of mine that I've known since kindergarten. We worked at Kroger together for a brief time and we finally reconnected last year. At this point, I hadn't seen her since Paige and my wedding. 

“Oh my gosh!” She screamed as we hugged, “How have you been?!”

“I've been (chuckles) Greattastic! How's your summer been?” I asked. 

“Oh,” She said, “It's been… Interesting.”

“Interesting how?” I asked. 

“I’ll tell you later,” she replied, “I'm gonna go get my coffee, and then I wanna hear everything about your summer!” 

When she returned with a decaf coffee I asked, “what do you want to hear about?” 

“Everything!”  She exclaimed, “How did you and Paige spend your first summer as a married couple together?” 

“I mean we did a lot,” I said, “Where you want me to start?”

“The wedding reception!” She declared.

“You were there!” I yelled. 

“Yeah, but we never debriefed about it!” 

I saw her point and said, “Okay so, we had our first dance, and I was a little nervous cuz, while I can dance, slow dancing is not my strong suit…”

“Yeah, I remember that,” she said, “and then it was the father/daughter and mother/son dances, and then you surprised her mom and your dad with a dance. Then Cousin Simple performed and at the end you guys sang Prima Donna…”

“Said your name was Paige,” I sang, interrupting her.

“Paige I like the view,” she responded, and then continued, “What was the rest of your night like?” 

“Well…” I said,

Season 10 Greattasticly Ever After Blog 1: Greattasticly Ever After

 Greattasticly Ever After

So Paige and I are married! These last few months have been incredible and worth all of the stress of planning a freaking wedding. Before we continue the story, there is something that I would like to discuss about how this series is going to change moving forward. And the best way to do that is with a flashback. 

When I started this series, I was already in the process of writing The Greattastic Adventures series. Knowing that in my head I broke this series into books as well. Season 1-3 is a book (called The Coronapocalypse), Season 4-6 is a book (called The Mitchell Project), and season 7-Now is a book (Called the Age Of Weddings). While I definitely didn't have it laid out back in 2019, initially I knew I wanted to end this version of the series with my and my (at the time imaginary) bride’s wedding/honeymoon.

Shortly after Paige and I started dating however, I was fully considering quitting writing. There was a lot going on at the time. A lot of changes. August was newly pregnant, and that was causing a lot of tension in the group and my support system was changing. Now the Andersons are still there for me to this day, but I was struggling to cope with those changes on top of the innate imposter syndrome that kind of comes with being a neurodivergent person. And Paige, well at the time, Paige and I were still in our honeymoon phase of dating. I trusted her with all my heart and I knew that I was going to marry her, but I didn't want to burden her with all of my insecurities.  

In August 2023, Box Seats played a show at a Donatos’s on OSU’s campus.. It's a basement bar in the bottom of the pizza shop And while that's kind of weird, it's an amazing venue. Now because at this point I was so insecure I wasn't really sure if I was actually that great of a writer, and I really really wasn't sure if I was even going to finish both Greattastic Adventures Sequels. 

Now in attendance at this Box Seats show was Will, the lead singer of Cousin Simple and Ryan's best friend. In my first book, I depicted an event in which I jumped into a duck pond because Will hyped me up way too much. That event led to me gaining my confidence at my new school when I was diagnosed with autism. What I'm saying is even before Cousin Simple, I have always looked up to Will. At the end of this Box Seats show, I hugged Will goodbye. 

“Hey,” he said to me, “Paige told me that you were a keynote speaker a couple of months ago.” I, in fact, had been. The night before I spoke, Cousin Simple had a show and Paige went with my family without me since I was out of town. This was presumably when Paige told Will about it. 

“Yeah” I said, “It was a state conference for The Council For Exceptional Children!”

“Oh yeah,” he said, “I think I saw that on your Instagram. I need to catch up a little bit on your podcast. But I’m really proud of all the stuff that you do and I love listening to it!”

This was a weirdly inspiring moment. I knew Will liked me as a friend, but I kind of thought it was a one-sided admiration. I didn't realize that he looked up to me too. Ever since this Will and I have had this weird bromance thing going. There's really no other way to describe it. Like neither of us have talked about it but, while I'm geeking out about Cousin Simple related stuff, he'll geek out about Greattastic stuff and Paige and my relationship in general (especially that early on). The idea that he was looking up to me too, kind of inspired me to continue writing. And I started to think about what this series would look like long-term. Eventually I came up with a plan.

Rules for a Greattastic Life would run until Paige and I got married/our honeymoon, and then after the series finale, there would be a brief break, and eventually it would return as a new series called Greattasticly Ever After. So The Greattastic Adventures is about my childhood with autism, Rules for a Greattastic Life is About my young adult life with autism, and Greattasticly Ever After will be about my life as a husband and father with autism. Now let me be very clear, Paige is not pregnant! But we are moving into a different period of our lives and much like before I hope that my stories will inspire other autistic people like myself and those in their lives! 

Have a Greattastic Day and Be Safe 

J. Mitchie Ulibarri, SBT