We found a venue for our L.A. fiesta!
(images from their website)It already has a dance floor, and the cost of the rental includes tables & chairs and the clean-up fee. It has a great food-prep kitchen, complete with wet bar. They also have big tables for things like a buffet, cake and favors.
The best part: weekday rentals are discounted at 50% of the regular rate. Everything from pricing to available dates are easily found on their website. (Side note: why the hell are most places so damn coy about those things?!?) They don't consider Friday to be a "weekday" -- grammatically amusing, even as it's fiscally understandable. My favorite quote from our meeting with their event coordinator: "Monday is the new Friday." Um, okay. And Tuesday is the new October. Whatever -- we love it and we can afford it. Done.
Now there's just the simple matter of squaring the whole "small S.F. ceremony followed by big, informal L.A. party" thing with the nay-sayers. Normally, I wouldn't consider their opinions worthy of a vote. Except that the loudest member of said camp is Mr. UB. (Yes, exactly -- oh dear.)
To be fair, the exactly 5 people who don't live an easy car drive from one city or the other are all his family & friends. (Well, I really hope that my friend Carla will be coming from Italy, but I'm waiting to sort all of this crap out before I talk logistics with her. Otherwise she might buy a plane ticket for the wrong date/city.) I came up with the extraordinarily novel idea that he should, rather than just fretting silently/arguing with me ... you know, call and ask them. (I know. I'm a rare sort of genius. It's my cross to bear.)
His buddy in Florida promptly responded, "Dude, it's your wedding -- of course I'll be there." Of course, a) he's in the wedding, which necessitates the S.F. part, and b) he's "an enthusiastic heterosexual" who knows that many of my S Girls will be at the L.A. party. But who am I to question the man's motives? I'm just thrilled to hear that it's not a problem. One down.
His friends from New York are also in the wedding -- both of them. Groomsman (him) and Officiant (her). We need them, to say the least. Fortunately, they can make our new date in S.F. (phew!), and are going to try to combine our L.A. party with an already-planned trip to see her parents in Santa Barbara. Perfect! (They'll actually be closer to the north end of Malibu, coming from S.B., than I will, living east of Hollywood.) So that's three.
Which must've been enough to tip the scales. On our way to a game show run-through today (we pretended to play the game as part of the pitch to the network) I mentioned that we need to put money down this week to keep our date for the Palace. He asked me if I really, really wanted to get married there. I said yes, and he said okay. I love him.
And in hindsight, it's probably good that I asked him before the run-through. Because as part of the game, I had to feed him a chocolate-covered onion. While he was blindfolded, and couldn't see it coming.
It's a good thing I travel with Altoids.
5 comments:
So let me get this straight... if I had said no, we can't get married at the palace of fine arts, you would *not* have fed me the chocolate covered onion?
Or are you saying that there was something *worse* that you could have fed me? I don't even want to think about what that would have been. A chocolate covered tire-iron?
I'm glad I said yes!
(Please note that I had no fore-knowledge of what was going to happen at the game show trial run, and you should in no way infer that I said yes for any other reason than that I love you and want you to be happy. Also note that my mouth still tastes like onion. And yes, I brushed. Twice.)
Yeay! So pleased you have a location, and must say it looks amazing. Plus I love the idea of intimate ceremony and huge party.
But, a chocolate covered onion?! Did you make it or buy it from somewhere? And wow, you and Mr Un-Bride are such a lovely sweet couple. Wishing you both all the best for the rest of your planning.
Congratulations - now you only have a zillion more things to do! So you decided to go with the August date? Good call, it's beautiful & you love it - makes perfect sense. You can totally do it. You might hate it, as I do fairly regularly, but you can do it.
We're going to put our deposit down this weekend. Stay tuned for pictures!
Yep, August is on like ... Donkey Kong? ... never mind. And yes, C&E, I hate it with charming regularity.
As for the chocolate onion, they kept it hidden until it was time to feed it to him. (He's forgiven me.) Also, the chocolate-covered carrot "wasn't half-bad." (Have I mentioned he's The Most Patient Man Alive?)
Ok - So the wedding is in August in SF.. When the hell is the reception? I'm confused and I need to start asking for time off, cause it's getting close to that time of year when those pesky grapes decide to ripen.
yay for the POA tho!
Post a Comment