Life After Wedding: Desperately Awaiting the Honeymoon

For a variety of reasons, Dude and I have not yet gone on our honeymoon. While I don't regret at all giving us a break between wedding and honeymoon (I really don't understand how people leave for two weeks following the crazy wedding stuff!), I do regret that we put over two months between them. We didn't really have a choice, but there you go.

Anyway, we leave really, really soon! I didn't realize it was so close until yesterday. Words cannot express how excited I am. For now our itinerary looks like:

Rome, then train to
Florence, then train to
Trieste, then be driven to
Porec, then drive around
the rest of Istria and Plitvice, then ferry to
Hvar, then ferry and drive to
Dubrovnik, then plane to
London, then home.

Whew! If we have time and energy we are going to try to see:
Austria and Slovenia (within driving distance of Trieste)
Bosnia-Herzegovina and Montenegro (within driving distance of Dubrovnik)

If we hit all these sites that will be 7, yes count them, 7 countries in one honeymoon.

So excited!!!

On Addressing Your Invitations or Save the Dates (or Anything for that Matter)

One of my friends is getting married and since she knows I was very budget conscious, she sometimes she asks me how I did certain things. This week we spoke about addressing her envelopes. I told her that I used labels, and she said that she wasn't going to do that because she thought it was impersonal.

First of all, I completely acknowledge that she has the right to her opinion and that her comment was not some passive-aggressive comment directed at me. It's her wedding and I support her.

However, I wish to address the general idea that the use of labels is "impersonal." I am not attacking my friend, or anyone else for that matter, but I've seen this comment a lot in the blogosphere and the wedding forums and I wish to give my opinion on the matter.

There is nothing more personal than being invited to someone's wedding. You could throw an intimate 10 person wedding or a 500 person wedding where the bride and groom only knew like 100 people there, it would still be personal. In either scenario, guests are still witness to the legal joining of two people in matrimony. They saw the ceremony, ate the food, mingled with the couple's friends and family... they will be in the wedding photography FOREVER.

So I reject this idea that the manner in which your invitations or save the dates actually matter. They may matter to you, and you may prefer the aesthetics of calligraphy and choose to pay for it. Or you may choose to hand address them yourselves. That's great, that's your choice, and your choice is more likely than not about the appearance of your envelopes than it is about personalization. But it's completely insulting to say that using labels is impersonal. It's not an appropriate excuse for a thinly veiled criticism. Just because somebody decided to print out a name and address instead of paying for a calligrapher or crippling his or her hand from writing it out does not mean that it wasn't meant especially for the recipient. The fact that guests are holding an invitation at all is what makes it personal.

And perhaps, in my case, using labels meant more people could be invited, or that I didn't drive myself crazy hand addressing 80 invitations.

Closer! NY Assembly Voted 89-52 for Same Sex Marriage

This is not a victory yet. It has to go to the state Senate, where a similar measure died two years ago.

CNN story here.

A bit more heartening, though, is that the previous Assembly vote was 85-61. Three Democrats switched their votes as did one Republican.

Assemblyman Danny O'Donnell (Rosie's brother, I believe?) said a very poignant thing regarding this bill:

I am seeking a piece of paper that is issued by my government that all of you have had. Some of you have had it two or three times, some of you are running for governor managed to marry their cousin and all that's ok. But I don't get one. So it's not about anybody's religion. This is about 'by the power vested in me by the State of New York.'

Source: Gothamist

On Using "I'm Married" As Protection From Creepy People

Today there was a very annoying man on the subway that hit on me. On the one hand, I'm flattered (very slightly) that despite six years with Dude I've still got it, but really, it was annoying and I was just trying to read my book. This guy was relentless, trying to strike up conversation even though I clearly was giving him Evil Face and turned up my iPod so that I could barely hear him. It went on for a few minutes, "What's your name, beautiful?" "Where are you going?" "Why aren't you talking to me?" Then finally the question that put an end to it, "What's wrong with you, are you married or something?"

I'm not one to engage harassers because I really don't think they're worth the time of day, but at this point I said, "As a matter of fact, I am married, but even if I weren't, I still wouldn't want to talk to you." He shut up for a few minutes, and then I got out at the next stop and went into the adjacent car.

This whole anecdote was not really meant to boast about my desirability, but rather to convey my complete rage that a woman who is not interested in a strange man MUST be married, or else why isn't she talking to him? While I'm slightly comforted by the fact that if I'm in a sticky situation with a strange man, all I have to do is hold up my left hand, I'm very disturbed that for some men, that's what it takes for them to back the fuck off.

I'm also troubled by the fact that somtimes, the "I'm married" response is often the first response. What does that mean, that if you weren't married you wouldn't brush him off? It's the simple response, but it doesn't do much for fellow women, single or married (or attached but not married). The best response, in my opinion, is "I'm not interested" - but as I whined about above, some men just don't understand that.

Being female stinks sometimes. All I want is to commute in peace, and I can't even have that?

Yay Maine!!!

Maine becomes the fifth state to approve same sex marriage!

Story here.

Etiquette/Gift Giving Help, Please!!

Dude and I are less than three weeks away from our honeymoon (yaaaay!) and a not-very-distant relative has graciously offered to host us in Trieste. She and her husband have also offered to take us driving around Austria and Slovenia, then driving us to Croatia to pick up our rental car, and also getting us in contact with their friends and relatives for the remainder of the Croatia road trip.

Neat-o huh?

WHAT DO I BRING THEM AS HOSTESS GIFTS?! Someting New York-y, I'm thinking. Though I don't think they'll let me take cheesecake on the flight - will they?

Also, please keep in mind that we are carrying on only, no checking baggage for us.

Another Reason to Love Sweden Besides Meatballs and Ikea!

Sweden legalizes same sex marriages! Story here.

Thanks to Two Chicks Nest for the linkage.

On Our Registry: China

I did not think I was going to register for china. Looking at them at the store, I thought they were really pretty but fragile, and I refuse to own anything that's high maintenance.

But then the guy at Bloomingdale's gave me a spiel about how our roles will change with the years and we should really own a set for posterity. Then I thought about my grandmothers in the Philippines and how they always had a nice set of china that they brought out for Christmas.

So we registered for china.

Image from {Bloomingdale's}

We only registered for the dinner and salad plates. I didn't want the cup and saucer to be matchy-matchy, and anything that is served in them would not be served with the other plates anyway.

We registered for service for 12. We really only wanted 10, but both Dude and I are clumsy and are certain we'll break something over the years.

To our pleasant surprise, we got them all! I really didn't think that we would. They are lovely.

Life After Wedding: Love in the Time of Swine Flu

We're about a month and a half into LAW (Life After Wedding) and so far, almost every conversation has gone like this:

Person: "So, how's married life?"
Me: "Um, it's exactly the same."

Dude and I dated for six years prior to our nuptuals, and lived together for 2 of those 6 years, so as far as we were concerned we were already married. The wedding was just a one day party to sign our license.

But I guess it's not entirely true. Certain things are different. The biggest change I can tell right now is that when dealing with certain issues, we are a team. We back each other up.

So when my mother calls and says, "Listen, don't take the subway, you might get swine flu," and I tell her that's she's overreacting, there are now two of us telling her she's overreacting. Except Dude is much more diplomatic than me, so she listens to him. The point is, it's no longer me against the world. It's us against the world. It's nice to not have all that responsibility solely on my shoulders anymore.

Here's something for your amusement:

I can't properly credit this photo because it's been circulating around the internets.