See
more of the story
Guests at Collin Haas' intimate Saturday wedding to Jason Matheson were asked to be in the moment by tweeting pictures.
The officiant was Colleen Lindstrom, Twitter's @mytalkcolleen, an on-air colleague of MyTalk107.1's @jasonmatheson. She told invitees to whip out their cellphones and tweet selfies using the hashtag #JasonandCollinWed. The grooms posted a selfie before reading their vows to each other, as DJ Jake Encinas played a digitally infused ditty that was perfecto.
Since Match.com brought the grooms together, it was only natural for them to embrace social media, instead of confiscating phones as some do these days. It was one of several delightful surprises that Haas, a business manager, and his media darling planned for their 200 wedding guests at this incredibly moving ceremony held at Minneapolis' Loews Hotel.
The tears started for Matheson's mom, Dar Smeal, as she and Jason waited to process down the aisle after Haas and his mother, Lori Haas, did so. Collin, who took Matheson's name, didn't start to tear up until Jason hugged his mom and proceeded to join him before they stepped up to the altar. Collin's dad, Carl Haas, and Jason's stepdad, Dutch Smeal, were escorted in ahead of the grooms and their moms.
Lindstrom stressed to bossy Jason that she was in charge for the next few minutes. She talked about how Haas brought show tunes to the relationship while Jason supplied a passion for "Dallas." Lindstrom recounted that on the night they met, when "Jason spotted Collin's bouncy walk coming up the sidewalk, he immediately adored him." She also said Jason tried to prepare Collin for dating someone "with Jason's high profile. Collin thought Jason was exaggerating and totally full of himself. But he realized [that] after one trip to the State Fair."
Collin was emotional while reciting his vows; he promised to continue loving Jason and telling him the truth.
Jason said he knew Collin was the one when they went to Southfork, the ranch in Texas that was the setting for "Dallas." Such a fan is he that I half-expected his pal Linda Gray to be there.
"We toured Southfork, and he didn't laugh at me, he didn't judge," Jason said during his vows. "He just knew it was joyful for me. Then on the way back, the moment that I knew I would spend the rest of my life with him was when he said, 'You know, I could build Southfork for you.' "
Tears flowed. I saw Susan Marler, wife of @KeithMarlerFOX9, dabbling away at her eyes.
At the reception — yes, all the food was fabulous; there, I'm saying it publicly for the Loews staffer who came over to get my feedback — one repeated topic of conversation among guests was: Did you cry?
I was close but didn't. Sunday I had to call Jason and admit that I got choked up while editing the video. (I hope to post it and put it atop this column before the guys get back from their honeymoon.)
During the dinner and dancing, the big surprise was a red velvet "bleeding Armadillo groom's cake" prepared by local baker Mariah Gregg. It was inspired by a cake in the movie "Steel Magnolias," a reference lost on me. Jason made a big production of hacking off the "Amarillo's" behind and presenting it to his new father-in-law, Carl Haas. (What a lovely man is this owner of Haas Plumbing and Heating. At one point, Collin and his dad shared a slow dance, arms wrapped around each other as they chatted.)
I got in a slow dance with Jason, which ended because there was a line forming. I told him that he and Collin threw a hell of a party. "That's what we gays do," he said.
Tough words from PA to AP
"There is nothing I can say to defend my favorite player," KFAN's Paul Allen said Monday on his radio show in a surprisingly vigorous dressing down of Adrian Peterson.
As you know, Peterson was indicted in Texas and accused of exceeding "reasonable" community parameters while administering corporal punishment to a 4-year-old son. Photos leaked to the media showed disturbing welts and broken skin.
"I can't handle the marks that were left on that boy," said PA, who is also the Voice of the Vikings. "This is also a 4-year-old child, [who] I don't believe one of my favorite guys has the opportunity to see like a regular dad on a day-by-day basis; for even like two, three times a week. I wouldn't be able to look at my child and see those marks and know that I did it. That would ruin me on many, many levels. The child's defenseless. I'm very fond of Adrian Peterson. I know how big Adrian's heart is; I've seen it with my kids, friends of my kids that I've [taken] to training camp. A fatigued, overwhelmed Adrian Peterson will spend a half-hour to hours with people and kids no matter the situation because that's the heart he has. But this is what he did, and now he has to live with it."
And then PA composed on air the tweet he wishes he'd seen from Peterson this weekend:
"I would want Adrian to mean it, but I was kind of waiting all weekend for the tweet, with Adrian saying, Thought about it. I blew it. I feel awful [about] what I did. I'll never do it again. I made a mistake. Please forgive me. If you can't, I understand and I thank you for all the love you've given me throughout the years."
Peterson did issue a statement of regret later in the day, stressing that he was not a perfect parent and not a child abuser but someone promising to learn from this. The Vikings reactivated Peterson to rejoin the team.
I want to know who told Peterson to smile so broadly in that mug shot. If that was Peterson's way of communicating that he didn't think he's done anything wrong, he went overboard with that, too. A look of concern would have served him better.
'Outnumbered' at 100
Harris Faulkner celebrates her 100th episode of "Outnumbered" Tuesday on the FOX News Channel, where she is acquitting herself beautifully.
"We are blessed, my friend. We are having great success and fun, a hundred episodes Sept. 16. It's unbelievable," she said. A FOX official tells me that "according to Nielsen, the show is up double-digits in both total viewers and the key demo since launch [84 percent in the key audience]."
Faulkner shares the couch with a rotating ensemble that includes Sandra Smith, Jedediah Bila, Kimberly Guilfoyle, Andrea Tantaros, Kirsten Powers, Stacey Dash, Ainsley Earhardt and "#OneLuckyGuy."
The former KSTP anchor, wife of former WCCO heartthrob Tony Berlin — they have two daughters — compared "Outnumbered" to "raising a baby. This isn't like having a show that gets interrupted by the news. This is a show that is news — my bread and butter — when it needs to be and is talk, smart talk. It's politics, it's cultural. We're nimble. At times because of the women on the couch, it's sort of like hard news, some talk mixed in with a girls' night in Vegas, every now and then," she laughed.
But they are not drinking like Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb over on their hour of NBC's "Today?"
"Nooo, we're not drinking. It's the noon hour, our blood sugar can be low, sometimes we snack."
When asked whether "Outnumbered" is supposed to remind us of ABC's "The View," Faulkner said, "No, this show is trying to remind everybody of smart women sitting on a couch talking about news topics. It's the only thing like it on television. We literally will go from what the president may touch on with his ISIS speech, to what's going on in the NFL in the fallout from Ray Rice and domestic violence. We do eight to 10 topics a show with a roundtable. That's a lot. Everybody has got to be up on every angle because you never know where the conversation is going to go."
Our interview went a couple places, and I even gave Faulkner an assignment related to the NFL.
As for TMZ.com getting the elevator video of Rice decking his now-wife, Janay Rice, Faulker told me, "What world do we live in that Harvey Levin can lead a team on TMZ to get the goods on a domestic violence videotape regarding one of the NFL's ex-star players. No matter who sits in that [NFL commissioner's] seat, I have never been convinced … that they aren't doing the dance between the mega corporate owners, the union with the contracts versus making decisions that would reflect what you and I would do — the right thing based on whatever the right thing would be. Sometimes the most motivated person to change something is the one being held accountable at the moment. We'll see."
I told Faulkner she was in a position to find out how many women there are in upper management at the NFL office. "That's a good question, and I am in that position and I will be doing that now," she said.
I had to ask her about the day that psychiatrist Keith Ablow, a member of FOX's medical A-Team, was on "Outnumbered" discussing First Lady Michelle Obama's campaign to make school lunches healthier.
The less-than-svelte Ablow's barbs included saying that Obama "needs to drop a few" herself.
"And then he told all of us on the couch we could lose 5 pounds," said Faulkner. "I was on the couch both days he said it. I told him, 'You know you shared with an audience some time ago that you pay a psychiatrist yourself to go once a week. Don't miss a meeting.' "
C.J. can be reached at cj@startribune.com and seen on Fox 9's "Buzz." E-mailers, please state a subject; "Hello" does not count. Attachments are not opened.
