I was up early trying to get a paper done and thought it would be a better use of my time to get a post up. I'll finish where I left off on the last post with the wedding recap. When I'd stopped everyone had showed up at the town hall and we were trying to get upstairs. My soon-to-be wife had a gorgeous dress by the way. I don't know if I mentioned that before, but damn! She was smokin! In any case I don't think I'd been to a wedding when the bride had to walk up and down stairs. It's exactly as inconvenient as you'd expect it to be. She's quick on the uptake though and made it up with no glitches. The room is maybe 15' X 30' and at one end is a big table with two office chairs and there's maybe 30 folding chairs filling the rest of the room. We're guided to the two padded chairs and asked to sit. But wait! now we stand again and meet the marriage official, the town official and the official translator who're running the show. It's a small world in Belgium and the marriage official used to be one of the Pirate's teacher's when she was in her early teens. Everyone piles into the room and we get down to business. I say business with purpose because that's exactly how it rolled out. None of this, "in sickness and in health" stuff. It was all a bunch of regulations saying that we couldn't stop each other from seeking employment and we should support each other if wanting a new job. Assets gained by one are considered the assets of each. Honestly, I was a bit to giddy to really pay attention. I spent most of the time trading glances with my pretty pirate. I did glance back a couple times because directly in front of us was the marriage and town official, speaking in French. At the far left of the table was the translator so I had to look at him. It was pretty funny because all the Francophiles looked directly at the officials and the English speakers all looked at the translator. The rough part was the translator wasn't great. The marriage official, the teacher, she was on the ball though and she started to do the English and hers was much better. The translator wasn't offended at all and actually seemed a bit relieved. We get to the "I do's" and we'd practiced a bit so when it was my turn I stuck out my chest and almost shouted, "je le veut" Ah yeah, I spoke in French and was very proud. Everyone laughed. How cool is it that I got people to laugh at my wedding. I'd been to a lot of weddings it seems and don't remember any of them where everyone laughed at once. The pirate she's as cool as can be and sweetly says, "I do". We do the rings and voila. well not quite. Now the paperwork. They passed across the table some documents which we both signed and then had our witnesses sign. Then finally they let me kiss my baby and it was done. Before we got up though the wedding official told a cute story about the Pirate and she always knew what she wanted and usually always got it. The teacher then wanted to make sure my wife had stopped smoking! Too funny! I calmly reassured here such was the case. This lady was brazen. It was then demanded of me that I come back to the August festival (starting up this weekend) and that I speak perfect French when I come. Bon, mon Francais n'et pas bien, alors je n'ai alle pas. (I think that's what you'd say, if not exactly what you'd write) The next thing was she said her position afforded her the ability to be the first person to give me a kiss. She strided around the table, grabbed me (I'm stiff as a board and just a little freaked out), and she gave me a nice, grandmotherly kiss on the cheek. Pheww! That would've been weird. At this point everyone's standing, congratulating, snapping pictures, and trying to funnel out. Just as we walk out a band strikes up. A big parade band. Was this a surprise? They're not really looking at us or playing anything I've heard at a wedding before. A quick visual survey of the group indicates I'm not the only person a little taken off.
Seems I'm out of time this morning. I guess I'll finish the story with another post at an unforseen time. The paper calls.

Quick hits
Wes Anderson I think is done making good movies. I sat through Steve Sissou and was happy that it was over. Last night I watched the Darjeeling Limited and it was atrocious. This flick gets one star on the Netflix rating.
Since the last post I've also watched "Watchmen" and was almost equally disappointed. I'll give it three stars because it didn't totally suck and the message was at least a good one.
Watched the new "Witchmountain" flick and would recommend sticking with the old one. Harry Potter was spot on and I'll look forward to the other two when they come out. Watched "Step Brothers" again and it's not Talladega Nights, but it's funny. Boats'n'ho's, Boats'n'ho's...