On our way home

So we’re all packed up and have 24 minutes to vacate the B&B. We are dragging this out as much as possible.

Case in point? We’re actively watching “Nightmare on Elm Street” on AMC right now (“I’m your boyfriend now, Nancy!“). Neither of us much wants to leave, but thankfully we have almost an entire day left, one we plan on spending going from shop to shop, driving around and making our way back to New Hampshire. First stop is Bentley’s for a bloody Mary - thanks, Ky!

We’ll have more to say in detail about the trip when we get home, no doubt. I’d like to tell you more about the ceremony itself, saving some parts for ourselves, but definitely not the part where I nearly bit it walking up the steep slope up to the chapel. Or the part where a bunch of people gathered outside the chapel and watched, and cheered and clapped when we walked out. There also was all of the cheese. Seriously. We spent so much on cheese and maple syrup they gave us a discount.

I could go and on and on about how complete and whole it feels to finally be married to each other, how wonderful it feels to call Scott my husband and (Holy crap! I forgot Johnny Depp gets sucked into his bed!) that we keep staring at our rings but you probably assumed all of that. All of it is true.

We are very very happy.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith

We are so married.

Thanks to everyone for your love, kind wishes, blessings and support.

The Mr. and The Mrs. are off to enjoy some cheese.

The big day

Of course, a wedding day cannot run smoothly. We just learned that. After another lovely breakfast here at the B&B we drove to the florist to pick up my flowers and …

… they weren’t ready. They weren’t even in the same vicinity as ready. They’d got the time switched around and thought we were picking them up at 2:30 p.m. today. We looked at each other, sighed, and breathed deeply. Not much we could do, other than wait. And so we did and a few minutes later out came a beautiful bouquet. Crisis averted. We can get married now.

It’s drizzling here, and there are no promises of sunshine. We are putting the final touches on our vows and some movie is on Lifetime with Felicity sleeping with the dude from 7th Heaven. There was Law & Order but gah! No marathon for us today. Which is just as well – our love for Jack McCoy knows no bounds and we’d end up late for our own wedding.

I’m a little nervous – but in that good way. Scott is too. As we said last night over drinks, we’re really ready to be wearing those wedding bands now.

Town Hall

Getting our marriage license today was the exact sort of experience you’d hope you’d have when going to the town hall of a small town.

Everyone was friendly, and kind, and moved at a pace so relaxed that, at first, it’s unnerving and you sort of wonder if you’re doing something wrong and then you realize. Nope. You’re just not in Chicago anymore. The street signs are kinda vague, and for the most part include arrows pointing in non-specific directions. I’m guessing this is because nothing is so urgent around here that you can’t afford a few extra minutes to get lost and turn yourself around.

Anyway, the town clerk typed out our license on a typewriter, despite having a computer, and handled answering phones, people voting, folks picking up dog licenses, all at the same time. Folks came in and congratulated us as soon as they heard why we were there, and one couple could not have been more thrilled for us. They shouted at people passing by the office, calling them over, introducing us, announcing our wedding tomorrow. An older gentleman with a cane, wearing a Smith & Wesson cap told the following joke:

“Do you know what they call a bachelor? A man who hasn’t made the same mistake once.“

He told us he was “voting for Palin” because he fell in love with her as soon as he saw her. Scott remarked that he didn’t say he was voting for McCain. Heh.

We left really happy, and drove to the nearby town, where our justice of the peace owns the town general store, and met up with him to go over tomorrow’s ceremony. He made us sandwiches – really amazing, delicious, fresh sandwiches – from his store’s deli and we paid for them and headed back to the B&B.

Getting married here feels more and more right with each passing hour.

Holy Moses

Scott and I just finished breakfast.

Maine lobster quiche. With bacon. And homemade bread. And baked apples. And homemade coffee cake. And freshly squeezed orange juice.

Right now, we’re undecided as to whether or not we will marry each other and instead marry this B&B.

We’ve arrived, and to prove it we’re here*

We made it to our B&B. When you hear the words “Vermont B&B,” you probably think of some crunchy granola place run by a bunch of dirty hippies. I know I did. But this place is amazing. A lovely, quaint, historical inn run by two wonderful people, just down the street from “town,” where we had a lovely dinner at a place called Bentley’s.

It’s obvious Bentley’s is THE place in town to hang out. As Erin pointed out earlier tonight, THE place in town doesn’t always have the best food, just a little better than the other places. But Bentley’s has fantastic food, and they make a damn fine dirty martini. We’d recommend the crab cakes and the prosciutto ravioli. I think we’ll end up going back there again for drinks after dinner.

Here are some other highlights of the day:

- Southwest Airlines. For the longest time, I only flew SWA. Then once I got a bit more money, I dabbled in the other airlines. Your Uniteds, your Americans, etc. I don’t know why I strayed. First of all, SWA doesn’t take on extra fees. Plus, they have three times as many check-in agents as the other airlines. And lastly, they have luxurious, comfy faux-leather seats with embedded USB and A/C plugs. Southwest Airlines, you complete me.

- The three 50ish ladies at our gate that were dressed in gold lame capes. This was probably some Ya-Ya Sisterhood thing. It took everything in my power not to go up to them and shake their hands for their moxie. They wore capes! I was reading comics at the time, so when I looked up it was like I stumbled into some subplot about superheroines from Vegas.

- The drive down. Our little rented Chevy is really easy to get to 90. The only problem is that it makes it hard to take in the glorious changing colors.

- The proprietor of the B&B. When she saw Erin’s Obama button, she complimented her on it. Erin said she wasn’t sure how it would be received since we saw so many McCain/Palin yard signs on the way in. “Oh no,” our proprietor said, “Vermont is a cool state.” Obama=Cool.

For commentary about today from Erin, and some photos, check out our Flickr stream here.

* I will give $5 to the person who can identify this musical reference.

Not a virtual wedding, people.

You know, I know the Glamour magazine writer meant no harm, but the story has been picked up and I feel like we need to clarify something, again:

We are not having a virtual wedding.

I repeat: We are not having a virtual wedding.

No one is live-blogging the ceremony, or live-streaming it, or anything. We are documenting our trip, just like any other travelogue, only during ours we’re getting married, too. OY. If I have to read one more nasty comment about us and this blog I might flip out, and I don’t want to do that on the cusp of something that’s supposed to be a happy time.

I still maintain that people get the wrong idea about life as it’s lived online, which is to say that anything you write about or post online isn’t somehow real. I imagine in a few years, when a younger generation, whose lives are lived online as well, and they’re the main consumers of our society, people will have to get over their fears and misconceptions about being online. Either that or perish. I’m not saying you need to do what Scott and I are doing – which is NOT having a virtual wedding, Judgey McJudgertons! – but you do need to stop being so afraid of the world online that you ignore it and poo-pooh it at every turn. I think a lot of the seemingly angry comments that we got have to do with people making grand assumptions and having some pre-conceived notions about doing anything online.

Just the same, I wanted to clear it up for anyone because it’s been bugging me for days, every since the Glamour post came out. Not a virtual wedding, people. Calm down.