Let's not let them eat cake: Part 1

If there's one thing you need to know about us, it's how Outback Steakhouse has sustained us at different points in our lives. We know that it's not that great as steakhouses go, but the steak is completely irrelevant to us. We love the bread. We love the emu art on the walls. We even love the Yardley lavender soap in the bathrooms (a consistent presence from Maine to Maryland).

But all of these loves are eclipsed by our feelings for their Aussie Cheese Fries. Smothered in melted cheese and crumbled bacon, an otherwise ordinary appetizer is elevated to the heights of perfection by their special ranch dipping sauce. Taste-alike recipes for this dipping sauce abound, but none that we've tried has ever gotten it exactly right. It is this enigma that keeps us coming back, or, in some cases, traveling to other states to find an Outback... but that's another saga, and we're getting off topic. What does this have to do with wedding plans?

As much as we love Aussie Cheese Fries, we're just lukewarm about cake. And cake is, of course, a wedding tradition onto itself. One of our earliest wedding ideas was to nix the cake and replace it with a tiered display of Aussie Cheese Fries glory.

Why we didn't do this: By the time we got married, there was a substantial list of reasons not to go through with layers upon layers of fried potato, cheese, and pork product. Here are a few:

1. By the time we got married Dave had become lactose intolerant. He now enjoys this treat sparingly with the assistance of Lactaid caplets. 
2. The nearest Outback Steakhouse to our wedding reception was almost 70 miles away.
3. It would have been reasonably disrespectful to other people's dietary needs.
4. Really, cheese fries for dessert? It's just gross.

What we ended up doing: Stay tuned for Part 2...

Best (man) in Show

We have often been intrigued by celebrities who sell out all or a portion of their wedding in exchange for media attention and to defray costs. For example, Kathy Griffin financed her wedding in full by allowing exclusive coverage to the E! network.

And as your own wedding looms closer and you start to think about your budget, you become open to virtually ANY idea if it will cut costs and eliminate the need to hire a photographer. It's also fun to imagine what it would be like to be the kind of person whose wedding E! would be interested in. And if you're not famous enough, you cast around for a gimmick that would capture the attention of TV audiences.

Long about 2009, we were sure we had come up with the perfect gimmick. One year out of college and with an expanding circle of friends from our two different graduate programs, it seemed like we were going to have a small army of people to include in our (then-hypothetical) wedding party. What better way to determine everyone's roles than a reality TV competition? We had a particular surplus of male friends, and thus the idea for "Best (man) in Show" was born.

Each round/episode would feature a different challenge designed to test the contestants' wedding party skills, with one person eliminated each week. They'd start off with something simple, like trivia questions about the bride and groom, and progress to more difficult things like making toasts and running interference against wacky relatives. The season finale would have the finalists each planning a bachelor party, with the groom making a blind judgment as to which party he liked the best. An added draw for said groom would be getting to experience multiple bachelor parties. The winner would earn the title of Best Man, with runners-up serving as groomsmen and ushers. Those eliminated in the early rounds of competition would not be invited to the wedding at all.

Why we didn't do this: For starters, we don't know any TV executives (However, if there are any TV execs reading this, wouldn't this make a great summer series?).

But the biggest reason we didn't do this is that it really would have been no contest. Ray was the clear choice and the best Best Man we could have asked for. Here's the proof:

An Introduction

Our wedding could have been perfect. And if we'd gotten everything we dreamed of, it would have been horrible.

Allow us to explain. We were in a relationship for almost ten years before we got married. When you've been together that long, you have a lot of time to think about what you would do for your wedding, with varying degrees of seriousness.

About a month before our actual wedding, we were knee-deep in mason jars, unity candles, and RSVPs, trying to write our ceremony. In a haze of wedding-planning delirium, we stumbled upon the perfect theme to tie the elements of our ceremony together. After a short break to regroup, however, we realized that a Captain Planet-themed church wedding might not make as much sense to our guests as it did to us. This got us thinking about all the other "completely amazing" wedding ideas we'd had over the years, and what our impending nuptials would look like if we'd put all those plans into action.

Ten years is also enough time to have those dreams dashed on the rocks of reality, gunned down by parents, and brutally strangled by your significant other. In the very back of Amanda's wedding planning notebook, we listed of all the ideas that had hit the cutting room floor. Revisiting them now, we maintain that some of them are legitimately great ideas. A few of them were designed to exasperate others, but most of them were simply infeasible.

So we'd like to share them with you. We invite you to imagine what our ideal/awful wedding could have been like, and hope that by putting these plans out there, they won't simply die in the back of that notebook.