We had a very busy weekend. Way too busy. And with another overnight job unceremoniously dumped onto my lap tonight, I’m thinking tomorrow I’m going to sleep pretty well until Jodi gets home from work.
Somehow we managed to pick the busiest time I’ve seen in a while, to do our groceries, wherein all the old people were out in force to block aisles with their silly-looking two-tier grocery carts while they labored to stoop to get their cans of spaghetti sauce. We got the car fixed — our mechanic replaced the right front strut assembly. And while we were there, I fixed Samo’s computer. And again the next day. Continue reading “Epic weekend was epic”→
… and also for throwing things at the icky dirty gays that want it.
You live in a free country! Therefore, you should have the freedom to prevent two people who love each other from getting the same rights as other couples, if you don’t happen to agree with the people in question.
We’ve got a good chunk of our wedding plans hammered out, finally. It’s gone through multiple revisions since we started this whole escapade, so it’s nice to have some clarity. We are now renting the upstairs hall at Paddy’s Pub in Kentville on February 5th. It will be a double ceremony, with myself, Jodi, Sara (Jodi’s best friend), and our good friend Mark (of SWIG — for which Sara is bass player), all marrying our respective loved ones. Exercise for the readers to figure out who’s marrying whom.
We have a Justice of the Peace booked, we have a partially modified, wholly secular ceremony template (and will post ’em once they’re complete), and we’ve even gone back and forth on a few choices for the music. I especially like the idea of having some background music playing very softly while the JP does her thing, because, I mean, that’s how it works in the movies right? I’ve always said the big important moments should have appropriate theme music.
Then comes the fun. We will be buying a number of bottles of wine from Jodi’s vineyard (through the pub), for the toast, and will provide some appetizers / finger food, but everyone’s going to be expected to buy their own food. There will be music, a good deal of which being provided gratis by Mark, Sara and their bandmate Bill. Which of course equals free promotion for SWIG amongst those of our family members to whom we haven’t already pimped the band out. And there will hopefully be merry-making and drinking and food and happiness all around. Hopefully.
Also, Instead of gifts, as all of us have been living with our respective partners for several years now and already have lives semi-established, we’ll be doing donation boxes to go toward our respective honeymoons. Mark and Sara have a vacation booked in Cuba, and Jodi and I have designs on making the next CONvergence in Minneapolis. We’re also considering doing a donation Paypal button right here, for those of you who might feel so inclined to drop a few cents in the bucket, but you’re going to be under absolutely no obligation to do so — that is, unless you want to actively ensure we make it to the CON. Money’s going to be tight, but I honestly think it’s all going to be feasible. At least, if not for this coming year, definitely for the next.
(Err… How many married couples postpone their honeymoons for a year? Would we be particularly odd for doing so?)
Marriage is like a static group in any RPG. The same basic facts apply.
1. You need goals to achieve anything. You need to achieve things to be happy. If one or more of your group is unhappy, the result will inevitably be dissolution of the group. Set goals early, set them often.
2. Whenever undertaking any task it is important to understand each group member’s role. Though not strictly necessary, it is good to have a leadership position to orchestrate any support roles. This position may be shifted around the group based on whatever the scenario requires.
3. Eventually you will reach conflict, it’s inevitable. Practice care in participating in conflicts. Attempt to understand all party’s grievances and complaints and effect a useful resolution. Submit the proposed resolution to the group and hope for a diplomatic reception.
4. Keep the channels of communication open. Be sure all group members understand and approve of any actions prior to taking them. Nobody wants a Leeroy Jenkins in their group!
5. When you wish for your group to grow, the most important prerequisite is always preparation.
6. As your group grows in numbers, avoid favoritism. All members should be treated with respect and given the assistance they need to become fully useful participants.
7. Members of your group are unlikely to be so exclusively! They may still have close ties to the group or groups that nurtured them. Be sure to respect those ties and even assist in maintaining them.
8. That said, members of the group must understand their priorities. Most successful groups have prioritized with their own goals in mind.
9. Finally, you are not the group. And the group is not you. Sometimes you must focus on your own goals. Always take time to solo and be understanding of the need of others to do the same.
Those are just a few tips on successful grouping in World of Wedcraft. Good luck!
There’s also another one recommending lots of sex. I highly endorse this, but I haven’t checked in with the rest of the guild yet.
In Nova Scotia, Canada if you are ‘living in a conjugal relationship’ you basically have two options. You can apply for a Marriage Licence or make a Declaration of Domestic Partnership. I’m fairly new to this topic myself, so I’ve been relying on the Access Nova Scotia government website. Their definition of Domestic Partnership is a bit vague but is as follows:
Domestic Partnerships are different from marriages yet protect the rights of partners in the matter of health benefits, survivor benefits and other important areas. ….
Filing a domestic partners declaration provides the partners with many of the same rights and obligations that married couples have under a number of Nova Scotia statutes. These statutes are defined in the Vital Statistics Act. Filing the declaration provides the parties with these benefits and obligations immediately, eliminating the requirement to meet the definition of common law spouse in some instances.
It’s also worth noting that the Domestic Partnership can be declared by couples of the same sex. I’m not sure if same sex couples are allowed to ‘Marry’ in Nova Scotia or not. I thought they were, because our local MLA is infamously married and gay, but I’m now not sure if the ‘marriage’ was a Domestic Partnership or not. The website isn’t much help, as it doesn’t state anywhere whether same sex couples can apply for the marriage licence or not.
Anyway, Jason and I are going to be applying for the Marriage Licence. The fee for this is $119.39 and it gives us one year in which to get married. After that it is on to the task of booking a Judge or Justice of the Peace. We will be booking a Justice of the Peace because they will go out to whatever location you choose to perform the ceremony (within reason). You can also do the ceremony with the JP down at the court house (which is called something different but I can’t remember the name at the moment) for a slightly lesser fee. The fee for a JP runs about $100-$160 depending on how far they have to travel. Most JPs are willing to work with you on your ceremony to make it fit you perfectly. You can often choose your own readings, vows, everything. You don’t even have to exchange rings, you can exchange balloon animals instead if you want, it’s completely up to you. We haven’t really thought about this part yet, but I’m toying with the idea of involving the Maid of Honor and Best Man in the ceremony itself. There will be other posts soon about that kind of thing as we think about it a bit more.
The only other technical things involved are the fee for the Marriage Certificate – about $30, and the Registration of Marriage after the ceremony. I haven’t found a fee for that last one yet but the website states that the JP will assist with the registration so perhaps it’s part of their fee.
So if you wanted to you could get married for just a little over $300 and be done with it. We really want to have a big celebration of some sort however, so I’m sure our costs will be a smidgen over that. Still, we are going to try to pull this off on a reasonable budget.
The morning of the proposal, after I clicked my way furiously through to the final post and yelped when I finally clued into what was going on, I immediately posted the following:
Jodi wakes me up, where I’ve slept about two hours longer than her. “Hey Jason, I made you breakfast!”
More Star Trek eggos. I laugh.
She points to my laptop, says “there’s something weird on the internet for you.” Almost Diamonds is on a tab in Firefox.
Later, my eggos are now cold.
By immediately posted, of course, I mean “after I said yes”.
The link to Almost Diamonds above should, if I know my interwebs magic spell casting, take you to a mirrored copy of the original proposal trail as downloaded the day after it “all went down”. There are some comments in each of the threads for the time being, though I may scrub them out and give you a more “pure” sense of what I experienced when I was clicking from one big-name big-shot blogger to the next wondering what in blazes could have possibly earned me, a second-rate penny-ante comment troll, their attention en masse.
Please note that two links were originally broken in the original chain; they’ve been restored to their former glory, so this mirror should count as sort of a “director’s cut”. Navigate either by using the arrows in the top bar, or by clicking the “click here” links yourself for the Authentic Jason-Brain-Sploding ExperienceTM.
Stephanie Zvan, owner of Almost Diamonds, who masterminded these hijinks with Jodi, and is all around made of win, was so kind as to post another piece on her blog tying together the proposal trail and linking pretty well every place she found that had even the merest mention of our names in passing. I consider it the canonical master list, though I’m sure there’s well-wishing that even now has gone unnoticed in the Greater and Lesser Blogosphereohedrons. By all means, folks, let us know and we’ll post them as well.
Also, here’s a really cool image of the ScienceBlogs Last-24-Hours page when all the SB posts in the wedding trail were up. It’s a little creepy to see my own name up there so many times, and know they really ARE talking to me, rather than some other dude named Jason who actually has some import in these scientists’ lives. Well, creepy, but in a makes you smile wildly sort of way.
Click to actually see it, since you can't see squat in the thumbnail
I will likely at some point in the future mirror all the well-wishers’ posts as well, to keep a record of it in case any of the sites are inaccessible at any point in time.
Jason and I met at a call center. I was a newly hired techy and he was the IT manager. I didn’t expect to meet anyone at that job, I had just followed my friend Sara there because the money was good and I was fairly decent with computers. Things soon changed however when he hooked me with the most clichéd line in the book: “Don’t I know you from somewhere?” Continue reading “How it all began…”→
Just so you know, I’m importing the five posts over at the wedding blog and incorporating them here into their own category. It seems senseless for it to have its own blog since we’re hardly posting about it. Speaking of which, I should update everyone on how things are going, but maybe I’ll save that for tomorrow.
I wish I had more energy to blog today… haven’t felt all that hot all day, honestly. Plus, playing WoW with Jodi took precedence over blogospherics. Sorry interwebs. I’ll pay attention to you soon, I promise.
