Wednesday, April 26, 2006

The forces are converging

Bryan's parents have arrived in town and I am officially out of work (well, after I post this entry). I now feel like I have a million little things to do, but it's all really coming together. Unless I get wicked ambitious tomorrow, when next I post, I'll be a married lady.

Friday, April 21, 2006

There's still time before I'm married to help out the free world

This picture is awesome because the sign is awesome, but the point of the picture isn't the sign, it's the fact that there is a bag over the shoulder of one of the protesters that probably proves that the person is a librarian. And another librarian thought that this was cool and posted the picture. I am one of so many dorks.

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I have some birthday shout-outs to catch up on - my dad celebrated the big 6-0 and still no gray hair, not bad (my mom is so gonna comment that she got them all, thank you very much)

And happy birthday to Sheri - 29? Is that right? Or do we actually want to admit that we're "in our thirties"?

7 days left. That's, like, only a week away. Whoa.

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Preoccupied

I know that I've done a lot of stuff in the past week, but I can't remember a freakin' thing. Well, maybe I do.
*I read a really good book, Our Lives are the Rivers by Jaime Manrique, a book set in Ecuador and Peru about Manuela Saenz, the lover of Simon Bolivar. Really good historical fiction.
*I got to celebrate our upcoming nuptials with beer and free nachos and a tasty burger courtesy of Colleen and Kate. Yay!
*I also celebrated my dad's bday with tasty Fr@mingham B@kery pizza and my noisy (though lovely) niece and nephew.
*I had a hair "trial", which seems to be a pre-requisite for getting one's hair done on one's wedding day. It looked pretty nice I guess.
*oh, yeah, Easter. We ate ham, and it was good.
*Celebrated Patriots Day with my broom and mop - dustbunnies stood no chance against my wrath. To quote Tangina, "this house...is clean." (seriously? Poltergeist)
*Got surprised by my excellent co-workers with brie and a huge heart-shaped brownie, and presents. I love those guys.
*Visited weather.com more times than ever before to check that 10-day forecast.
*Went to dinner with my favorite grandma, who never ceases to amaze me with her grace and generosity.
*Felt saddened by all of the violence in Iraq and worried that it was too easy to feel good about so many wonderful things in my life when others live in constant fear. I hope that by working at an organization that attempts to instill cultural awareness and sensitivity in students, the future of this world, that I am doing a small part to make things better.

And that brings me to 5 more days of work and mere single digits until the wedding.

Monday, April 10, 2006

Update

Thank you to all of our wonderful friends who have offered to come to the DJ rescue. Though our DJ is not perfect, we're sure that he will do a credible job on the big day (that and we actually made CDs for him of any and all songs we thought he might mess up due to a Limewire gaffe). We really had entertained just making a play list in Bryan's iPod and letting that "dj" but we still would've had to rent the sound equipment and getting a real human thrown in for virtually the same price really will be better.

Now onto bigger and better things wedding-related. We had our final meeting with the caterer and wedding coordinator and after toasting our upcoming nuptials with what else but Bass Ale (at Bass Rocks) we got down to the nitty-gritty details. Our wedding coordinator actually recommended full open bar rather than just beer and wine bar because a vodka tonic at the Elks club is actually cheaper than a glass of wine. Gotta love that. At one point our wedding coordinator looked at me and said, "and you have the bathroom baskets, of course." Of course. Bathroom baskets? A strange custom exists of placing a basket with small bits of toiletries and assorted mints "just in case". Well, I had not given one second's thought to bathroom baskets, but after look of complete confidence thrown my way by the wedding planner, I thought I'd better get on it lest I look like a complete slacker bride. Over the weekend I went out and bought the baskets and assorted bits of wee toiletries to place in said baskets. So, if you are attending our wedding and need a tic tac or a bobby pin or a handy plastic brush, don't fret, just make your way to the bathroom. Next task is to assign seating to specific tables, a task that feels kind of like doing a puzzle and one that Bryan and I are enjoying.

As for RSVPs, we still have 3 outstanding for people who just don't want to tell us they are or are not coming. Due to the family grapevine and email gossip and such, we know whether or not each person is actually coming, but it sure would be nice to get an official yes or no. We didn't think that RSVPing was that darned difficult. Sheesh.

My seamstress is working double time to get the bottom hem just so, and one of these days I'll actually have a working bustle, but there is plenty of time left, right?

12 days of work to go...

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

No, the OTHER "Lean on Me"

I can't believe it's taken me so long to write about this incident. I think that I needed to forget about it for a week so that I didn't weep openly at work.
We've got a slight DJ-situation. I found his ad on CL and was impressed by his low price (just a side job for him, more of a hobby). We hired the person after a medium-length phone conversation and lots of emails, but we hadn't actually met him. Until last week. Let's just say that this meeting convinced us that he's a few Bradys short of a bunch.

Bryan and I actually made an entire play list and gave it to DJ, a list that the DJ said would play for almost 5 hours, the length of our reception. This sounded good - we picked music we like and he's going to play it. What could go wrong?

When we sit down with him, he explains in a VERY thick NY accent that he has all of the songs on our list and that he uses Limewire and it's "pretty good." I saw Bryan's face fall - he is NOT a fan of a heavy NY accent, OR this music sharing site, because people are less than accurate. For example, if you do a search for the song "Let's Stay Together", a kickin' song by Al Green, you might get the song listed by the artist Teddy Pendergrass or Marvin Gaye. You might get the title 05 Lets Stay together, referring to track 5 of an album and illustrating very poor grammar skills. Bryan doesn't use Limewire - it's not very reliable and it messes up the order in his iPod. I am more forgiving - I am not that particular because my music sits on my computer and I know which song is which regardless of which title or artist has been assigned to a song. So, I was willing to give the DJ the benefit of the doubt.

I wanted an old, hard-to-find song for my father/daughter dance. He found it. Good. Bryan joked that it was probably pretty hard to find his mother/son song from that little-known "White Album". Blank stare from DJ. I laugh nervously. DJ gives a half smile. Not good.

We mention DO NOT PLAY list. DJ has it and promises to keep it in front of him the entire night. Good. DJ then mentions a song that is really popular at all the high school functions he's done lately (red flag?) the "Boot Scootin' something or other". I blanche. I'm pretty sure I don't want a song with "Boot" or "Scootin" in the title played at our wedding. He proceeds to play the song - a line dance, despite large letters on our DNP list that say NO LINE DANCES. Bryan mentions having heard the song at Y*****s Stadium. DJ looks excited, "are you a Y*****s fan?" Bryan grimaces and says that he is the absolute opposite of a fan. DJ looks confused, I try to dilute the situation by saying that we're a Red Sox family and that the "Boot" song should definitely be left off the playlist. Not so good, but no harm done.

Next, we mention that we don't want to play our entire first dance song, just the first 3 minutes. DJ looks at me quizzically and says, "that's okay, the song is only 2 minutes and 40 seconds." Huh? It's a 7 minute song. Not good.

Our first song is a beautiful, slow ballad by Terry Callier. The title of the song happens to be "Lean on Me". Well, Limewire says that the Bill Withers version was sung by Terry Callier, so when DJ started playing the song for us, instead of our beautiful ballad, we got the techno version of the Withers song. Bryan is shaking his head. I'm wondering how this all went so wrong.

We say that we will be burning a CD with the correct song on it and dropping it off ASAP.

The final item is the announcing of the bridal party as they are introduced into the reception. DJ looks a little uncomfortable but takes the list. I have written exactly what needs to be read. Bryan explains that 2 mentions of L1nd@ Jeffr*y is not a typo, there really are 2 of them. DJ nods then starts to read it as if there were only 1 LJ. "So, they're both walking her in?" Yes, both my dad and my mom's boyfriend are walking my mom in. And LJ2 is going to hang out at the bar.

We once again explain that there really are 2 people being introduced with the same name and that they are, indeed, separate and distinct women. A 15 watt bulb finally goes off over DJs head. Got it. Good-ish. He proceeds to pronounce Bryan's parents' names with his loveliest NY accent, Mahry and Gahry O'Kawnah. Bryan looks as if the air has been forcibly sucked from his lungs. We move toward the door.

Bryan holds in the tears until we get to the car. I can only laugh hysterically (not that I thought it was hysterically funny, but that I was actually on the verge of hysteria). Music is one of the most important things to us and we had carefully and lovingly selected a playlist to entertain, delight and rock out. I reassure Bryan that we will give him all of the songs that matter on a CD and that we will get another friend to announce the wedding party at the reception. He understands DO NOT PLAY and keeps high schoolers happy on a regular basis. It will all work out.

Sometimes, you really do get what you pay for.