THEY APPROVED MY VISA!!! IT'S ON THE WAY HERE--and it should be here by 10 AM tomorrow morning! (or this morning really!)
I GOT THE VISA!!!!!!!!!!!!!
147 hours!
and now baby, from now on, for the rest of our lives, nothing like this should ever happen again. we should be able to travel together, no lying to immigration, no covering anything up, always honest, going everywhere together, no unwanted separation...
god i am so relieved.
and whoa!!!! 193 HOURS! less than 200 now! wootttttttttt!
going to the chapel and we're going to get marrrrrrrried...
The three places I've visited so far:The Fez (ridiculous name, great place.) The pictures of the room we are interested in (the Terrace Room, for further reference) can be found
here. If you go to the lower righthand corner of the main page, you will find more links there. I think you can also look at the menus and see if you like everything; there's links to pictures of on-site ceremonies and everything. ($500 deposit, $350 ceremony fee, approximately $52 per person, not including 6% tax and 15-18% gratuity)
The Timberhouse can be found below. ($750 deposit, $375 ceremony fee, approximately $46+ per person)
I've pretty much eliminated
Jeffries Landing from our considerations--The Fez does more for us, and has a room our size--but you can look at the menu if you like. ($500 deposit, no ceremony fee, approximately $44 per person)
Places I am going to be looking at:
Seven Oaks Country ClubBeaver Valley Golf Club. On checking this site out I was really impressed--if you look at the banquet quide under the Cavetti Grill, it's quite informative and I'm actually pretty excited about looking at this place; it sounds nice.
Stone Mansion Restaurantso that's what i've got so far. i'm guessing 6 places to look at should be enough? what do you think? i've done well i think so far in finding places that are, you know, slightly upscale, that do their own catering, and are pretty experiences with weddings. i think if i looked at any more than 6 i'd get too indecisive! of course right now the fez is the favourite but i have high hopes for the stuff i have yet to look at.
this is so exciting!
lof,
a busy leetle leezard.
i didn't think i would find it this early.
i thought i would be looking for a while.
but then..
i think i've found it.it's stunning! it's on a golf course, it will be absolutely beautiful when the leaves turn, we can get married outside and have the reception inside. just thinking about it is bringing tears to my eyes. god, i'm so excited. i hope you like it. we really should be book soon; we looked at two places today and i've got another place tomorrow--but i really think if we want to get married in a place surrounded by nature we'd be hard-pressed to do any better--and it's about 5 minutes away from my house. wheeeee!
so yeah check out the site, look at the pictures and we'll see if we can figure something out tomorrow.
love
w
and as a side note
as i was trying to publish the last post i was flipping through El Jukebox and "unfinished sympathy" came on,
and i wonder if there will ever be a time when i hear that opening bass thump
and my heart doesn't tighten up in my chest
and when the music swells
if there will ever be a time
where i don't think of your body next to mine
after laying on the couch watching napoleon dynamite--
everyone and their mom (literally) called that evening
and i was so nervous,
all night long
i felt like you could hear my heart pounding
as i curled up at your side
and you put your arm around me, carefully, awkwardly
as if we were both wordlessly saying
"are we really doing this? is this really going to happen?"
until the movie was over and we kissed,
there, on the couch, kissing, kissing, me leaning backwards
until i was laying on the couch, your body above mine
while you were careful not to lay your weight on me
as you pressed into me and you said
breathlessly
should we
take this
upstairs?
and i nodded
and all night
there was your body
and there was mine
and there were all the hours in the world
to feel all the nooks and crannies of each other
the little dips and curves
time to hear the little gasps and moans
time to feel each other trying so hard not to shake with nerves
and it being drowned out while you whispered
into my neck, my chest, my stomach, my mouth
the curiousness of your potential kiss
has got my mind and body achingand how perfect!
to be able to sing
as you feel that very thing
in your heart.
will there ever be a time
when i can hear it at all
and not think of loving you?
(i didnt mean for this to become a poem it just happened, i apologise)
lof
w
its 2 am and im drinking a watered-down margarita.
ok so there's this meme. a "life soundtrack" meme and basically what it is, you put on your music player of choice and for each moment, you name the songs that come up on random on your player, and that is the soundtrack to your life. no skipping for other songs! here, i shall demonstrate with the assistance of the up-and-running El Jukebox!
Opening Theme: "Hang On To Your Ego" The Beach Boys
Waking Up: "Beechwood 4-5789" The Marvelettes (a very nice old-school girl group soul song, like the supremes, very appropriate in its own way)
Falling in Love: "She Blinded Me With Science" Thomas Dolby (hahahahah!!!!)
Fight Scene: "The Ballad of Ira Hayes" Johnny Cash
Breaking Up: "Hallelujah" Jeff Buckley (if i ever got dumped to that, well, i would just kill myself)
Getting Back Together: "Lazy Flies" Beck (haha, bad omen.)
Secret Love: "Take the A-Train" Duke Ellington (wow, my life is sooooo woody allen.)
Life's Okay: "Landslide" Fleetwood Mac (eeeeeeerily appropriate.)
Mental Breakdown: "Another Travelin' Song" Bright Eyes (yeahhhh, if anything was ever going to make me lose my mind, it would be Conor Oberst. What is this even doing in my jukebox? I blame Wilco.)
Driving: "Fool to Cry" Rolling Stones (when this came up my jaw dropped--I don't even have the words for how many times I have actually driven around to this at night, windows down, feeling slightly sorry for myself and the reflection of my cigarette in the windshield.)
Sex Scene: "Rabbit" Chas & Dave (OMG HOLD ON WHILE I GO PEE MYSELF.... you got a lot without a doubt but im thinkin bout blowin you out, COZZZZZZZZZ.....)
Flashback: "One on One" Hall and Oates (I'm pretty sure Hall and Oates are a giant flashback themselves.)
Partying: "Jack-ass" Beck (not really a party song? but actually pretty appropriate if you were, say, watching the party as a removed narrator...)
Happy Dance: "Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da" The Beatles (I could not make this shit up if I tried)
Regretting: "What It Feels Like For a Girl" Madonna (I'm not ashamed)
Long Night Alone: "Work It" Missy Elliott (soooooo not appropriate.)
Climax: "Look What You've Done" Jet (not bad, that's a sad climax though. maybe a bad omen that the climax in the movie of my life is set to sad music.)
Death Scene: "I Believe in Sympathy" Bright Eyes (which is really, really appropriate)
Ending Credits: "What You Waiting For" Gwen Stefani
Hidden Scene: "Oxygen" Bjork
But in any case, as I was looking at this meme earlier, I was thinking, if you finished your 1994 CD, this could be your next project--the soundtrack of your life, but without the silly randomness--something that, if you could do it, would actually be the soundtrack of your life with all of these moments. There's 20 moments up there, and I was thinking you could take the next week and a half to sit at home with your CDs and jukebox and actually come up with the definitive soundtrack to Dave's Life. I think that would be awesome, and if you're interested I can do one for you when I get home. But yeah. I'd really like that to be your next project because I'm extremely interested in the results--and maybe you could even do like... almost like an explanation of why you picked each song, like a written commentary to accompany the CD. That would be the best present for me to come home to, I think..
Anyway I miss you like burning.
240 hours
lof,
your leetle leezard.
just saying...
336 hours.
the letter what i wrote
I figure, if we're going to use this to keep track of visa tribulations, we can use this to keep track of wedding tribulations as well.
An email I just sent off to a Ms. A. Lemmon (I'm not making this up), assistant to the director of Tourism and Cultural Heritage for the Greater Pittsburgh Convention and Visitors' Bureau:
Dear Ms. Lemmon,
I'm terribly sorry if this is completely the wrong place to look but I've been looking for information and I thought the CVB might be the place to go. Hopefully you can help or at least point me in the right direction!
Basically, I'm a Beaver County native, but I've been living in London, England for three years. I recently became engaged and my fiancé and I would like to be married in Pittsburgh rather than the UK in October 2007. So I suppose I have three questions: first, is there a list of venues in Pittsburgh who do weddings/receptions? Also, we will have a good amount of people travelling into Pittsburgh from both other states and from England itself, and I wanted to know if there is also a list of hotels who will do pre-booking for a large number of hotel rooms in the Pittsburgh area. Most importantly, are there any major events planned in Pittsburgh for either October 12-14 or October 19-21? We would like to do it on one of those weekends, but after seeing all the brouhaha surrounding the All-Star Game I figured it would be prudent to ask in advance if there would be anything major in the city happening those weekends--I don't want to coincide with a huge convention or sporting event that would make it really difficult to make both lodging and travel arrangements for our out-of-town guests.
I apologise for the barrage of questions, but I wasn't sure where to turn and I hope that even if you can't help you can at least point me in the direction of who would be able to answer these questions for me. Thank you for taking the time out of your day to read this; I appreciate it and look forward to any response you may have.
Sincerely,
Wendeline Wright
snake and lizard, sitting in a tree
SS:
sorry ive been lax in keeping this up, i've been worrying my head off about all this stuff so now that it's done i want to state for the record:
i sent my visa application on sunday, july 16th, with the intention of it reaching the consulate in new york by tuesday, july 18th. included in the package was: my application, your financial stuff, my passport, a copy of my degree from Richmond, two passport photos, and the original letter from KCL.
i just want to have that information on hand in case anyone i know ever has to do this crap. fortunately i won't have to do the student thing again as shortly thereafter i will be the wife of a very silly and sexy snake. whoop!
as far as the ticket goes, i would say, it shouldn't be a problem. if it says it takes an hour, i'll just have to believe it, i suppose. the one fortunate thing is that since i'll be outbound i won't have to do customs or anything. i guess the biggest thing is, will it be transferable? i am highly optimistic but i know that you are also very cautious! wendy = carefree, dave = picking up the mess carefree leaves behind it.
i'm sorry for getting so upset the other day. i just... at this point i really am nothing but a burden. just a constant.... bill, i guess. like, i need cash for student loans, i need cash for gas, i need cash for visa, i need cash for plane tickets, i need cash for school, i need cash for wedding. i hate feeling like i contribute nothing and i know that if we were talking one on one this would be the part where you cut in and say "that's not true" but i feel like it is. i guess that's part of the reason i'd like to leave london behind too--i like the idea of starting fresh, with both of us working, buying a house, raising a family, not all this... residual angst over me owing you so much. basically i see myself as a really solid, yet expensive investment. it costs a lot to start something like this for the first 2-3 years. but once it starts going, it's all profit baby.
wow, i can't wait for all of the stuff we're going to do... i feel like we're at the start of this big adventure. once i'm done with my MA i won't have anything holding me down again, so consider this your notice--we can do something wild, we can do something unexpected if you want! i mean we can stay for a few years in london but at the same time i love the idea of us getting married and then... shipping out, somewhere new and maybe even buying a place there eventually--i'd like to own our own place before we start our family. there really is so much open before us, two young people with really good earning potential, haha! i don't want to regret anything, i don't want to ever look back at these early years together and thing "oh if only we had done this or this or this." i want to make sure we do it.
gah, sorry. just getting excited at the idea of this huge future we have ahead of us and how happy it's going to be and... you know. silly stuff.
i want to come home!!!!
lof and keesies,
leetle leezard.
