The royal wedding between British Prince Harry Windsor and American actor Meghan Markle took place on May 19 at precisely eight o’clock eleven minutes fifteen seconds and two hundred and sixty four nanoseconds. The entire United Kingdom screeched to a halt as it watched on with bated breath, anxious for the event that would forever change the course of human history. Across the Pacific Ocean, the citizens of the US too demonstrated their great zeal for the marriage. Every major cable network aired the live event, save for Cartoon Network, which aired reruns of My Gym Partner’s a Monkey during the time slot instead. Here are a few vitally important developments that lead up to the joining in holy matrimony of the two godlike individuals:

Two weeks before the wedding, there was a nationwide panic concerning the number of royal swans to be sacrificed at the reception. While the official statement delivered by representative number five of the Windsor-Markle wedding team stated that 25 swans would be sacrificed, a subversive infiltration of the wedding team’s intelligence revealed that in actuality, only 23 swans would be present at the ritual. After a subsequent media frenzy, wedding representative number eight came forth and disclosed that a team of journalists stampeding to interview the janitor of the royal pool house had trampled two of the swans.

Another question that tormented the minds of the American public was the elusive color and type of Prince Harry’s tie at the wedding. NPR (News of Pertinence and Relevance) released a poll online inquiring upon this very question. The poll received a 90 percent voter turnout, a rate greater than any of America’s previous presidential elections. 42.43 percent vehemently stuck by a black bowtie while 36.5 percent stood staunchly by the red skinny tie option. On the day of the wedding, the American public realized that the groom does not wear a tie at British royal weddings. Other polls that captivated the public involved the number of icing bulbs on the cake, the median age of the choir, and the percentage of the British homeless that would starve to death from the 50 million dollars taken away from the tax reserve.

In other news, a school shooting in Santa Fe killed ten and injured thirteen.