I absolutely hate the word “blog”

I swore I wouldn’t wear heels at my wedding. I SWORE. I didn’t want to be any taller, I didn’t want to be uncomfortable, and I didn’t want to trip when I walked down the aisle or danced with my dad. But guess what?

JIMMY CHOOS AT THE RACK FOR $100. Beautiful, delicate off-white silk strappy delicious sandals with tiny brilliant rhinestone buckles. Somehow miraculously available in an elusive size 42, and marked down from $499. And in pristine condition. WHO CAN BLAME ME?

Now I’m going to be a walking/stumbling cliché of all the stupid mistakes brides make.  I’m going to trip and fall and twist my ankle; my heels will sink into the soft ground/carpet and get stuck or dirty; and when I inevitably get too uncomfortable and change into shorter comfier shoes at the reception, my dress is going to be too long.  Alas… the things I do for, um, Choo.

1) The Date: 07-17-10. Its official!

2) The Update: Looks like the U-Village glassybaby got downgraded.

Found out a great way to permanently recognize your union the other day.

1) Put on your engagement/wedding ring after washing hair.
2) Hold the dryer in the ring-free hair, and use your ringed hand to finger-comb hair while it’s drying, taking care to expose the ring itself to the stream of very hot air.
3) Eventually, the metal will heat up so hot that it will burn the skin underneath it in a perfect circle.

Cheaper than a ring tattoo, and quicker too! Possibly not less painful, but hey — 2/3 ain’t bad.

Ow.

This note was found underneath our dining room table after our (semi-raucous) engagement party.  Anyone wanna fess up?

Personally, we think the weird Engrish stationery narrows it down quite a bit…

And anyway, thanks for the engagement wishes, Note Fairy!

Below is my version of the proposal story, and if you’re dying for another perspective, check out Grant’s version.

—
So we’d been out singing karaoke for a friend’s birthday party on Saturday night, and we were up really late and had kind of a lot to drink.  But the next morning, curse my stupid Nintendo-run internal clock, I woke up at like 9 and got up and went out to screw around online and feed the cat and whatnot.  But Grant got up right after me, and I was like “what the heck are YOU doing up this early?”  And he was all “I dunno, but let’s go get food and beat the brunch rush.”  So we both start getting ready, but pretty soon I’m totally dressed and he’s still in his boxers and whatnot, and I’m all, “whaaaa?” since he usually is the one who has to wait for me, but I figured he was just sleepy/hung over and moving slowly.  So he’s all “since you’re ready and I’m not, could you go check the mail for this Gamefly game I’m waiting for, so I can download the update while we’re out to eat?”

So of course I do, but when I get to the mailbox, there’s just an envelope addressed to me in his handwriting.  So I open it up, and it says:

1. Mailbox
(Complete)

2. Kitty

At this point I’m pretty sure I’m in the process of getting proposed to, but I decided to toy with him a bit.  So I go back upstairs and say “baby, there wasn’t anything in the mailbox, it was empty!” just to see how he’ll react.  But he’s nowhere to be found, so I poke into the bedroom and I see just a sliver of what appears to be a suit-clad Grant dashing into the bathroom to hide from me.  Whoops!  I decide to continue on my mission, so I go find Trumpet sitting on our dining room table, looking pissed off as all hell, with a ribbon tying a note around him.  So I slip it off and read the note, and it says:

3. Scion

I go back downstairs to my car parked on the street outside our place, and I get in and look on the dash and in the glove compartment and under the seats and I CANNOT find any note, and I get out and circle it a couple times and check under the blades and I keep glancing up at our balcony to see if he’s gonna show up and help me figure out where to look, but no such luck, and finally I think maybe he left a song or audio clip in my stereo or something, so I turn on the car.  And he’s changed the text greeting/display on my stereo to say:

4. Projector

So I go back upstairs to the living room, and the projector is on and it’s just projecting a big screen that says:<

5. Virginiaptop (our name for my new laptop, haha)

And my laptop is nowhere to be found in the living room, so I head over to the bedroom and it’s on the bed with a calla lilly (my favorite kind of flower) on it, and I open it up, and I see that he’s registered virginiaroberts.com and it’s pointing to THIS.

And I click yes, which you’re welcome to test out for yourself, and it links to this page, with an embedded YouTube video of every single Final Fantasy victory fanfare clip from 1 through 12 (that’s his favorite game).  And I turn and he’s there in a suit with a ring. :)

(And of course when I’m done being weepy and happy and lovey-dovey I have to go click the “no” option and see what it does… too funny!)

The ring was his grandmother’s and it’s truly gorgeous, and it fits perfectly (he had it resized).  I’m so honored to be wearing a family piece with such sentimental value — his grandmother was constantly asking when we would be getting engaged from the first time she met me, so it’s nice to know I have her blessing.  We don’t have a date set just yet but we’re thinking early next year, like around March.  We’ll see!  We’re both still super-giddy and excited, and I had NO idea it was coming (I mean, when I first got that envelope I figured it out, but it was still a fun path to follow!  But I thought he was going to take forever to get it resized!  Turns out he stayed home the prior Wednesday to pick it up, and he kept trying to do it all week but I kept taking my car to work and ruining his plan, hahaha.)

What a creative guy. He gets major points for actually pulling a surprise over on me, that’s hard to do!

Due to recent news, my name will be changing a year or so from now.  And even though I’m very excited for the reason behind the name change, as well as the hope that I will no longer have to spell out my last name over the phone, I worry that no one will know who Virginia Roberts is.

I mean, it sounds to me like the name of one of those bestseller mystery novels you used to be able to buy at the checkout stand of the grocery store. “Virginia Roberts” — sort of a more polished-sounding female version of “John Smith”.  Maybe I’ll become a secret agent!

Either way, when I eventually get around to writing that book, at least people will know how to pronounce it when they ask for it at Barnes and Noble.