Well, this is interesting. It appears the Canadians have gone the way of the US Anglicans and have affirmed the “integrity and sanctity” of same sex unions. You can expect the Anglican church to split in the next year. The international body of the church asked all the smaller bodies not to take action on it until the international body meets to discuss it. (This happened after the whole US bishop thing last year) On the upside, the Vineyard has a great relationship with a lot of Anglican churches in the UK, so maybe if there is a split our denomination might gain some new international members. That would be sorta cool, even though I’m not a huge fan of transfer growth, but at least our little denomination would get some press time and some more recognition.
I went home Saturday with Lauren. Yesterday we did the pre-marital stuff with my folks. It wasn’t that bad. My Mom and Dad are pretty good at it, and they should be since my Dad has done over 200 weddings and my Mom has done her fair share of them too. The only part that seemed to suck was when you got to a place in the service where my Mom and Dad do things a little differently, then we had to decide which way to do it. The only part of the traditional Methodist wedding service I didn’t like was the statement of intention. That is where Lauren and I both repeat some thing about what we intend to do, to make sure we are both their to get married. Then after that they ask her Dad that “Who gives away this girl..yadda yadda yadda” question. It seems like he is up there for way to long that way. Mom and Dad assured me that it only seemed long because we were discussing everything and having each part explained to us, but in reality it won’t be long. But I still wasn’t a huge fan of that part. I mean, I guess I decided to put a tux on, and she put a big white dress on and showed up at the church because we like to dress up….of course were there to get married. That is stupid, and the wedding vows should cover everything the “statement of intention” does too, so why do the same thing twice.
After counseling my Mom was like “What if I payed for alternate dish at the wedding, like say 250 chicken breasts.” And I got to thinking about it on the way home and I figured why the hell would we buy a whole different entree. I’m really sick of her and Laurens Mom whining about the pizza thing. Why is it such a big deal that we are having pizza. I don’t care if people can’t eat it, not everyone likes the dry chicken and undercooked roast beef that everyone else has at their wedding, so why should I have to have a second entree in a quantity that can feed all the guests on top of my pizza. The dish we picked is pizza. To have something like that would compete with the pizza, and undermine the message we are trying to send, which is “we like pizza, a lot, and we want this to be laid back, like the rest of our lives.” That just upsets me. And when I called my Mom back in the car to tell her that we didn’t want her to do that, Lauren asked for the phone and didn’t give it back, so I didn’t get to say anything to her about it and how tired I am of hearing about it. Seriously this whole deal with my parents not liking the fact that we are having pizza is really annoying me, and I’m getting insulted. The message my mother conveyed with this is “Pizza isn’t good enough for my family, so I’ll go so far as to pay for something that I think is better in a quantity that basically replaces the pizza as the main dish.” I don’t care if that isn’t what she is thinking, that is basically what she said. Buying anything in a quantity that can feed all the guests basically makes what we picked a worthless purchase. At most I would buy a second entree that could fee half the guests, and even then, I don’t really want to. There will be multiple kinds of pizza, and who doesn’t like pizza to the point that they can’t eat at the reception? I don’t know anyone that doesn’t like pizza, and I don’t think my aunt is so diabetic that she can’t eat a piece, or just be happy eating the salad or something. I think the primary reason my Mom keeps bugging me about this is because her sister is diabetic and can’t eat pizza or something, but I’m really thinking why should I buy a quantity of chicken that makes the pizza worthless for the three diabetic people I know. I figure maybe we’ll have something like a cold-cut plate that feeds 50 to 100 people available. That might cover the people who won’t eat pizza. But 250 chicken breasts we will not serve, because that is ludicrous in light of how much we want to spend and the plans we already have, besides, where would we cook that and when would we have time without hiring even more people to help serve the food.
In other news we are having an invitation stuffing party tonight. Please stop by if you want free food and drinks. I think we are ordering Papa Johns and buying some pop and beer. The more the merrier, so stop on by.
The big news besides wedding stuff is that we decided to stop the Saturday small group. It was seriously dragging us down by having the group in the middle of the day on Saturday. And almost no one ever came. At our peak we had three people besides the three leaders. So we are disbanding and looking to go to a different small group. Possibly Brent and Val’s since they are having one for couples. Lauren would like to go to a group with some woman in it, and it would be nice to get to know some couples before we leave. We don’t hang out with too many married couples, so that could be a good change of pace.
Thats it for now folks, hope everything is going great with you today.