Wedding wows: Sky as limit is too low

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Dear Madge: Just a note to say that the wedding was a complete success. None of the elephants got loose, the herald trumpets were great, and the dirigible was the perfect touch. Debbie's diamond wimple was fine. And that wedding cake -- it was so smart to put an elevator in it, don't you think? The view from the top was lovely ...

Needless to say, weddings have become an official category in the Guinness Book of Records, with a $100 million ceremony for 20,000 guests leading the pack.

Not to be outdone, Forbes magazine recently announced the top five "billionaire weddings" of note, for which the numbers stretched to the nth power, indeed. Donald Trump couldn't get married to his third wife, Melania, last year without 10,000 flowers, a 200-pound cake and 45 chefs. And a 20-page invitation announcing the $60 million Parisian wedding of a New Delhi investment banker and a daughter of a kajillionaire steel-baron was in verse:

"We enter a world of maharajahs and mystery, a gilded palace, a lavish feast fit for a king," the proclamation intoned, according to the British Broadcasting Corp., which covered the event.

"Guests were also regaled by cancan girls," the BBC dryly noted.

But of course. Cancan girls. Now, why didn't we think of that, Madge?

Meanwhile, the cable channel VH1 has devoted an entire series to celebrity weddings, advising its viewers that Paris Hilton had a 24-carat engagement ring at some point or another and Melania Knauss -- the Donald's bride -- had to heave herself down the aisle in a 60-pound satin dress with a 13-foot train and 1,500 diamonds and pearls personally sewn on by elves somewhere above the Arctic Circle.

Of course, an expensive wedding does not a marriage make. Just ask Sir Paul McCartney, who spent $4 million marrying Heather what's-her-name in a 17th-century Irish castle before 400 of their closest friends, only to face the hounds of alimony four years later.

At least the impending divorce has given new hope to all the 50-plus babes who were charter members of the Beatles fan club back when Mr. McCartney's name did not sport a handle.

Gee, do you think I have a chance, Madge?