I neglected to mention that as part of our Sorry You Had To Get Married Twice compensatory gifts, they also threw in this genuine replica of Elvis and Priscilla’s Marriage Certificate in a white vinyl presentation folder! I assume Elvis’ floating head was part of the State Seal of Nevada at the time.
But even that pales in comparison to the stunning gift we received from Rory and Jane – a genuine 1981 Charles and Diana commemorative coffee mug. We are having the velvet-lined display case custom built as we speak!
People keep asking, “How does it feel to be married?”. It still doesn’t feel real. I don’t think it will until I get my passport and Spouse Visa back from the Home Office, the official word that I am allowed to stay in the UK. Until then I feel like a fraud; I am Gerard Depardieu to Gareth’s Andie McDowell with a lower maintenance hairdo. I keep waiting for Immigration to knock down our door and scream, “SHAM MARRIAGE! SHAM MARRIAGE!” because the wedding was a bit too ridiculous to be real.
But it is real. Can you believe we pulled it off? Just three years ago I caught the bouquet and bitched all about it, but somehow I ended up hitched. Am I supposed to act different now? Should I bake some pies?
The foyer was decorated with photos of the veritable galaxy of stars previously wed at the Chapel. Jon Bon Jovi, Jay Leno, Billy Ray Cyrus, Chucky & Bride of Chucky, and some guy that used to be on The Young and the Restless. I gazed up at them as the receptionist handed me an bouquet of white flowers. “You’re here for the eleven thirty?”
“We’re the eleven.”
“Oh right! Groom’s name… Garth? Garett?”
“Gareth!”
“Oh, that’s unusual! Okey dokey then! You guys ready to get married?”
The photographer took us into the chapel and arranged us into a dozen different poses in three minutes. Bride stand here, groom stand there. His arm here, her feet there. Hand up, chin down. Kiss here, grope there.
“Now, will you be exchanging rings?”
Gareth and I grimaced, “Umm, sorta.”
I pulled two rings off my finger. “We didn’t get round to buying them so we’re just going to use these and turn them upside down so they look like wedding bands.”
The photographer pointed at one of them. “What is THAT?”
“It’s jade! Or plastic, maybe. Got it from a market in Moscow for 20 roubles.”
He raised his eyebrow at Gareth, “Big spender, aren’t ya buddy?”
Next we were introduced to the Reverend who’d be doing the officials. She was all cute and round like Dawn French in the Vicar of Dibley. “So it’s Shauna and.. Gar-eth?” She pronounced his name like it rhymed with “caress”, with added lisp.
“Gareth!”
“Shauna and Gary, okay. Now Gary you come with me down the aisle and we’ll shut the doors so the bride can make her dramatic entrance. I’ll say a few words, then we do the vows, and then you’ll be married!”
Even as the Bridal March cranking up, I couldn’t comprehend that this was our wedding. I just stared at the cheesy photos on the wall muttering, “Heh heh heh.” Someone opened the double doors and I strolled down the aisle, vaguely thinking “Oh, there’s Gareth”, but mostly “Woohoo! I can walk in these shoes!”. I half-listened to the Reverend as she said a prayer and some words about love and two lives coming together, blah blah blah.
But as soon as she started the vows, pow! I was finally in the moment. We didn’t know beforehand how the vows would be phrased, but they turned out to be simple and eloquent. Gareth was holding my hands, absently brushing his thumbs back and forth like he always does. That gesture always makes me feel so calm and reassured, this time it was electric. Until that moment this whole Vegas thing had just felt like some really elaborate vacation. But now we looked at each other with this mixture of nerves and warmth and tenderness and Holy Fucking Shit Batman, We’re Getting Married!
“Now repeat after me,” said the Minister. ‘Gar-ethhh, I love you.’”
“GARETH!” I corrected, “I love you!”
And I’d never meant it so much as right then. The tears prickled and my heart pounded like a Bon Jovi power ballad. Five stars to Boots No 7 Waterproof Mascara!
We then promised to love and cherish, but nothing about obeying, dammit. Gareth slid the upside-down ring-o-shite onto my finger. Then I stared at his hands in confusion, my usual battle with Left and Right made worse by the fact it was in reverse, but I eventually chose the correct digit without having to make an ‘L’ with my left hand.
The Minister smiled. “Now you may seal your marriage with A BIG KISS!”
And then we were hitched.
We headed to the counter to collect our certificate and pay the bill. A lady in a red and black sequined minidress was next up at the white doors, her tight-demined fella waiting down the aisle. They’d shelled out for the Elvis impersonator, and what a strapping specimen he was! Tall, lean and leather-suited; this was Elvis in the prime of his Vegas years, before he messed with the fried peanut butter sandwiches.
“So that’s you guys all done,” said the receptionist, handing me a receipt.
“Cool!” I gawked at the wedding certificate in disbelief. “Oh! I almost forgot. Do we get the DVD now or do you post it to us later?”
“You ordered the DVD? I don’t think there’s a DVD included your package?”
“True, but I rang back a few weeks ago and added it, remember?”
The receptionist flipped through the book. “Oh yes. Here it is. OH. Right. Umm. Let me go check with the photographer.”
A few minutes later the photographer rushed in, clutching his forehead, “OH… SHOOT!”
“You didn’t film their wedding?”
“OH… SHOOT!”
The staff were aghast and apologetic. Maybe they thought I’d be Freakout Bride and sue! “We are SO sorry!” said the lovely blonde lady that owns the place, “The photographer just saw the package name on the sheet and didn’t see we’d added a note about the DVD. I can refund you right away?”
“It’s okay, really!” I said, “But the only problem is that my mother was very insistent we get the DVD, so I don’t dare go home without it.”
“Okay,” said Blondie, “We’ll just have to reshoot.”
“Reshoot? You mean, do the wedding again?”
“If you guys don’t mind. It’s the least we could do!”
She was all apologies, but Gareth and I were in stitches. It was just so beautifully ridiculous. Two weddings in ten minutes? Classy! If we stuck around another hour we could beat Elizabeth Taylor’s record.
“I’ll tell you what, how about we throw in Elvis, too?” Blondie offered. “Since you’re being so good about this. He’s right here and ready to go!”
By then Mr & Mrs Minidress were done. Elvis sauntered over to be briefed on the situation. He grinned and gave the thumbs up.
Next thing Gareth was back at the altar and I was poised behind the doors for my second jaunt down the aisle. It was then I recalled The Mothership’s reaction when I told her we were running away to Vegas. There’d been a long pause on the line before she asked, “Are you sure you’re taking this marriage thing seriously?”
“We’re taking the marriage seriously, Mother!” I explained. “Just not the wedding!”
The doors swung open and there was Elvis waiting for me, strumming his guitar and crooning Love Me Tender. I hooked my arm through his and willed myself not to laugh for the next five minutes. I could hear the tripod screech every time the video camera changed position. This was going to be one classy production.
“Who gives away this woman today?” the Minister asked as we reached the end of the runway.
“On behalf of her friends and family,” drawled Elvis, “I do! Elvis, the King of ROCK AND ROLL!”
He winked at Gareth, “She’s all yers, buddy!”
“Thank you. Thank you very much!”
The Minister plowed through the vows again. For the benefit of the camera we tried to recreate the sincerity and emotion of our first marriage. I tried to get my voice to waver on the vows, so people wouldn’t know this my second time around. And I managed to kiss the groom with the same enthusiasm as I had all those minutes before.
As we unlocked lips there was the plasticky CLUNK of a portable CD player. Muzak dribbled forth as Elvis burst back into the chapel. The Minister gestured with her eyebrows for us to take a pew and be serenaded. We smiled awkwardly into the cameras as the King sang Can’t Help Falling In Love.
It’s cool to be on your second marriage without encountering lawyers, bitterness, custody battles or property settlements. Best of all they gave us a free t-shirt that says, I RENEWED MY VOWS AT GRACELAND CHAPEL!
I woke up cucumber cool and dead keen to get down the aisle. Gareth, on the other hand, wandered round the hotel room singing, “Whacking Day, O Whacking Day!”. It’s one of my favourite songs from The Simpsons, but it troubled me that this was Gareth’s tune du jour. Was it because “Whacking Day” has the same number of syllables as “Wedding Day”, or something more disturbing? Was he comparing his impending nuptials to being clubbed over the head with a big stick?
I was too busy being vain and obnoxious to be nervous. Ladies, if you’ve ever thought of eloping, consider a few things. Are you capable of dressing yourself? Can you apply mascara on without smearing the wand across your nose? Can you remember to break in your shoes before the day of the wedding? Can you do up your own frock, or do you need five people to hold down your guts while a sixth hauls up the zipper? If not, you should go the traditional route, i.e. with bridesmaids and mothers and make-up artists and hairdressers – also known as PERSONAL SLAVES. These people will remind you unpick that wedgie or powder your shiny nose before the photos. They will give you Something Blue so you don’t have to write it on your foot with a pen. They provide the brains on the big day, so you don’t have to climb onto a hotel room sink and batter your head against the mirror like a moth as you try to apply eyeshadow under a fluorescent strip while shrieking, “My eyes! My eyes! I can’t see my DAMN EYES in this DAMN LIGHT!”.
They would also make sure you didn’t get married with just one earring. Somewhere on the journey from our room to the Inclinator (the Luxor elevators that run on a diagonal down the side of the pyramid), I lost one of mine. It was only £4 worth of earring, but they were long and dangly and foxy, dammit! I made Gareth crawl around on the pharaoh-patterned carpet for ten minutes to no avail. Cue Bridal Hissyfit.
“Great! ONE DAY of my life I need to be classy. Why not just ONE DAY?”
“Just wear one earring!” said Gareth, ever-tolerant. “You’ll be totally punk, like Cyndi Lauper or something.”
“Bah!”
I finally stopped grumbling when we got into a taxi and headed down the Strip. We zoomed past our fake Pyramid, the fake Statue of Liberty, the fake Eiffel Tower, the fake Venice. With every tacky landmark my grin got bigger. I was about to marry the love of my life in the most ridiculous town on earth. Rawk! The chapel was in downtown Vegas, conveniently located between a seedy motel and an establishment that promised HOTT NAKED CHICKS!
What do Gareth and I have in common with Jon Bon Jovi and Billy Ray Cyrus? We all got married at Graceland Chapel! In all the excitement of Thursday I accidentally neglected to post THIS CRUCIAL PHOTO in which I revealed the Freaking Huge Dramatic Surprise that we had run away to Las Vegas to get married! What a turkey am I?!? Anyway we had a cracking few days in Sin City, earning a grand total of $2.00 on the slots and staying in a giant pyramid and saw Tom Jones on our wedding night! He even played What's New Pussycat and I swear he has a sock stuffed down his trousers. Now we are in San Francisco, I am blogging from the Apple store and we have another few days of honeymooning. Thank you to everyone who sent such kind messages to us! The wedding was unbelievably hilarious and what Gareth calls "Blogging Gold" so I will tell you all about it when we get home next Saturday. In the meantime, my apologies for cocking up the big surprise. Hope you're all well! Hee hee!
Be sure to tune in this Thursday 3rd March because I will attempt to post a few pictures LIVE from our nuptials. They will be of the shoddiest, low-resolution cameraphone kind. My grasp of mobile technology can be described as "shithouse" at best, so if it doesn't work please don't come after me with sharp knives. I tried to send a test pic to WNP via Flickr but it just won't bloody work, so just check my Flickr page every now and then coz that is where the grainy delights will be. Hopefully. At a very rough guess you may see a trickle of images around 7PM Edinburgh time (GMT), which translates as: 11AM San Francisco 1PM Guatemala 2PM New York 4AM Tokyo (Friday) 6AM Sydney (Friday) So Mothership, set your alarm! Update: Wedding pics have now been archived. Thanks for all your good wishes!
One week to go and I have a rotten cold. I caught it deliberately, so when I say "I do" I will rasp like Bonnie Tyler and Gareth will say, "I DO TOO! I cannae resist a voice so sultry!". I seemed to have caused blogging confusion again. I didn't make it clear that I was just moving to Chez Gareth — the hitchin' doesn't happen until 3rd March. So that's a whole week of living in sin. Woo! Last night I was doing some laundry and was strangely mesmerised by my socks thrashing around in the washing machine. I'd visited Gareth's flat a million times before but now this was meant to be my flat too. Our flat. And this was the washing machine that I'd be using until death do us part. I'm so used to living with six other people and Soviet-style queues that I'd waited politely until Gareth had washed all his stuff instead of chucking mine in too. But the thought of having both our clothes jumping around in there together felt so bizarre. His manly boxers and my PURPLES struggling together in this crazy modern world. What a great metaphor for marriage! So! I'll let you in on our wedding plans. Continue reading →
Moving house would have been quick and easy if I wasn't so sentimental. I came here with just two wee suitcases, but now I have those same two wee suitcases plus eleven boxes chock full of "mementos". I like to sift through this magpies nest and let random objects trigger memories, rather than having to remember things with my actual brain. So in lieu of packing, I spent Saturday sniffling and blubbering over two years of Scottish detritus. The wrapper from my first Tunnocks Tea Cake. A tiny lump of Icelandic volcano. Twenty-two boarding passes from our travels. A Durex wrapper from a Particularly Good Shag. A handwritten sign, SHAUNA AND RHIANNON'S FOOD CUPBOARD: KEEP OUT! And what a crying shame to be parting company with my treasured flatmates, what with their radioactive cheese in the fridge, penchant for playing The Best of Elton John at midnight; their rainbow of pubes on the bathroom floor. I haven't bothered to actually tell them I'm leaving, but maybe I'll reminisce as I waltz out the door, "Remember when you brought that guy home from the pub and your fake orgasm sounded like a cow being slaughtered?". Or, "Remember the time I peed on your bra?". Yesterday I woke up and thought, This is the last day on my own. Tomorrow it's off to the marital home. What would you if you had just 24 hours left as a single person? Take yourself out for lunch? Go clubbing? Bungee jump? Furiously masturbate, all day long? Well I chose to go the gym, scramble some eggs then arrange my boarding pass collection in chronological order. I was a thrillseeker right to the end!
Cheers to the anonymous eagle-eyed commenter who pointed out the logistical flaw in the last entry. How could the bodysuit possibly have pinned my arms over my head if I still had the crotch snaps done up? Good point! I can only blame that inaccuracy on hurried blogging close to midnight with a bellyful of champagne. I actually tried on two evil bodysuits. The first one got stuck on the hips and then we discovered the snaps. The second one saw me undo the snaps but still getting stuck when I tried to pull it over my head. Obviously the chronology of events became blurred by Veuve Clicquot. My apologies for any confusion, but one reassuring thing is that the bodysuit is definitely in the Warm Autumn Palette, as is the wedding frock. . . . I'm having sporadic Freak Outs about getting hitched. I was whining down the phone to The Mothership that I was genetically predisposed to being crap at marriage. For example, The Fathership is on his third wife. The Mothership told me that you don't have to let your genes dictate your path in life. Which is true. Joe Stalin had kids, and as far as I know they're not genocidal tyrants. There's no reports of Apple Paltrow-Martin writing boring but heartfelt songs. YET. So is life all about Nature or Nurture? Or is it the Nature of the Nurturing? An example. The Mothership always sends me Sensible Cotton Undies in the post, because she doesn't want me wasting money on British Knickers when Aussie ones are so much cheaper. Parents seem to like buying smalls for their kids no matter how old they get, it's a way of keeping their hooks in; a machine-washable reminder that no matter how cool you may think you are now, there is still this lady that used to wipe your arse. The Mothership once sent a six-pack of Bonds briefs. Two white, two grey marle and two lilac. The lilac ones had the word PURPLE printed all over them in giant white letters. PURPLE! All scrawly and cursive, like the Plat du Jour on a restaurant menu. PURPLE! Just in case you were colourblind and couldn't see for yourself. PURPLE! "She hates me," I brooded. "She is trying to sabotage my love life. She never wants me to find a man. These aren't even in the Warm Autumn palette. Who will love me with PURPLE undies?" When my birthday rolled round Mum asked did I need another shipment. "Sure," I said, "But can I have them sans-graffiti?" "What's wrong with the Purples?" "Every time I wear them Gareth cackles, 'PURPLE! Woohoo!' and it's bloody embarassing." Anyway, my point is: I managed to convince someone to marry me IN SPITE of the off-putting undies, thus overcoming both Nature AND Nurture. Therefore there is a chance I can outwit the divorce gene. Hurrah!
The very first dress in the very first shop. Surely this was a Guinness Book of Bridal Records moment! But not if you're working with the Grand High Priestess of Shopping, my trusty sister Rhiannon. Would you expect anything less from the organisational mastermind behind the Plastic Bag Luggage System and the Maximum Efficiency Grocery Run? She'd spent the last two Sundays trawling Oxford Street on what she called The Pre-Shop. She knew that my usual technique — stomping reluctantly into a store, glancing round once, and if nothing comes dancing off the rack singing PICK ME within thirty seconds I'll just say, "Nothing to see here," then break for lunch — would be particularly unsuitable for finding a wedding dress on a murderously crowded London Saturday. The girl thinks of everything. She'd sussed out the perfect frock in a big department store, but tracked it down in a small boutique in the suburbs. We arrived just as it opened so there were no crowds for me to freak out about. No hovering salesladies or queues for dressing rooms or abandoned husbands cluttering up the aisles. She simply strolled in, plucked a dress from a rack and declared, "Here it is!" Twenty minutes later we were back out on the street with my wedding dress. I ran up the block bellowing, "WOOHOO!". Rhi grinned modestly like the cat who'd swallowed a thousand canaries. She had delivered the project ahead of schedule and within budget. Two hours later I also had shoes and jewellery. All we needed then were the Squishy Undies. There's two types of women in this world. There's chicks who can toss any scrap of fabric over their head and waltz out onto the street without the need for serious hydraulics under the surface. Then there are those who require smoothing and shaping and lifting and flattening. Rhi walked into the Shapewear section of Marks and Spencer Lingerie department and says, "Looks like we have choice of Light Control or Firm Control." "Are they the only levels? What if your flesh is Out of Control? We need like, HEY You're Not Going Anywhere Little Lady Control-Freak Control." I picked up the dubiously named Variable Modulus Body, a garment so hideous and smothering that it made Bridget Jones' mumsy knickers look like the tiniest whisper of a thong. I didn't really look at it closely before putting it on, I assumed you just stepped into it like a swimsuit. But things got dicey around mid-thigh when I couldn't pull the bra bit up any higher. My knees were fused together by the crippling power of lycra. All I could do was sort of helplessly slide to the floor. I poked my head beneath the curtain and bleated, "Rhiannon. Please. Help!" It was such a pretty picture. I was bent over, hands braced against the wall, Rhiannon positioned behind me trying to haul the fabric over my hips, me wheezing away, "It won't FIT! It's just too TIGHT!" and Rhiannon huffing and puffing, "Just stay STILL!" Finally it was on. All was well. I tried it on with the wedding frock, everything looked under control. Now all I had to do was get the damn thing off. "Okay, I'm going to turn around while you undress," said Rhi. "Don't worry, I won't look." "Good, good." Five minutes pass. "Ummm, Rhiannon I think I might need you to turn around." "Jesus christ!" My arms were over my head, pinned to my ears by the evil forces of lycra. My fingers were turning purple from lack of circulation. One underwire was still holding a boob while the other provided firm support for my chin. It took ten minutes of grunting and groaning to remove it, and only afterwards did I discovered that the crotch has little snaps on it that you're supposed to undo first, then put the garment on over your head! Instead of trying to wrestle it over your prime-for-childbearing hips! Aside from that, it was a great weekend. Tonight we said our goodbyes as I headed for Heathrow. The two of us suddenly started bawling like babies, really sobbing. We said it was because weddings bring out the emotions. But it's possible she was crying from the sheer trauma of seeing me tangled up in a lycra bodysuit. And perhaps I was crying coz instead of Wedding Night Action, I will be too busy having the damn thing surgically removed.
Three weeks til our wedding and Gareth is all smugly sorted with his kilt. Meanwhile I'm sitting around like Cinderella, waiting for the fairy godmother to show up with a frock for the ball so I don't have to go to the shops. At least when I do go, I'll know what to look for. About five years ago when I was lounging in my life of trackpants, depression and unemployment, The Mothership decided to cheer me up by Getting My Colours Done. She dragged me along to the Women's Weekly Craft Fair at Canberra's Exhibition Park. Amidst the cross stitch, teddybear and decoupage stalls lurked a lady with prim lips and clanky bracelets. She peered at me under the fluroscent lights then wafted a rainbow of scarves around my face to determine which shades suited me best. "Right darling," she purred. "With your orange hair, brown eyes and pale, on-the-brink-of-death complexion, you are definitely a Warm Autumn." I gave her a Cold Winter glare. She flicked her wrist like a magician and produced a little fan of plastic strips, in graduated colours like Dulux paint samples. "These are the colours you must stick to when out buying shoes or lipsticks or suits for your non-existent job interviews. This," she paused dramatically, "Is the Warm Autumn palette." At one end of the spectrum we had dirt brown, which wandered along into cack brown, cack green, khaki, diluted mud and so on to BEIGE. The message was clear: You look good in poo! I am starting to get worried that I'm not that worried about not having a wedding dress. I'm also worried that other people are worried that I'm not worrying. Example: Gareth's lovely Mum's innocent enquiry: "Do you know what you're going to wear?" "Ahh, not yet." "Oh. Do you think you'll wear a dress? Have I ever seen you in a skirt before?" "Hey, I HAVE skirts." My paranoid translation: She thinks I'm a lesbian just using her son for the visa. Anyway, if anyone knows the best place for poo-hued frocks, please let me know.
