Help-less

I feel bad.

I'm in St. Louis. Have been all week. Of course, I'm here when it's hot and humid, but from what I'm hearing, that's a typical Summer here. Heat, I can deal with a little. Humidity, on the other hand, drains the very life from me.

But I digress. The humidity's not why I feel bad.

Y'see, for years, I was used to doing everything. If something had to be done, there was no one else gonna do it but me. I took care of Mum for all those years pretty much on my own. When I went to leave Pittsburgh, I packed up the whole house, no thanks to my family. Tim, bless him, helped me when no one else would, but really, I was on my own.

When I got out here, I found a family who was willing to help me. It still, to this day, blows my mind. Family who help? Family who'll come over and help? This is such a foreign concept to me.

Julie is up in DeKalb, trying to clear out space in her home for me to move in. My place, such as it is, has to be packed, and either put into storage or moved to her place. Since I've been out of town working, that's meant we've only had the weekends to do this.

I'm thankful for the job and the paycheck. It's a good job...I love it, save for the distance from home.

And it drives me a little batshit crazy to know that Julie's up there moving me into her place. She's taking care of me. Me! The guy who's done it himself has help.

This is a different concept for me. Whatever did I do to deserve this?

This weekend's gonna be busy. We've got to take Kadie Madison to the vet when I get home. We're taking Hailey and her friend Rachel to see Toy Story 3. We've got a garage sale and a graduation party to go to. We've got to clean out the last of the crap from my townhouse and move it into storage and/or Julie's...our...home before I leave Monday morning. Again.

Did I mention that I told my landlord I'd be out by the end of the month? Hm.

I'm sitting in a hotel in St. Louis, looking out the window at the cars speeding up and down I-64. They're moving fast, but Julie's going faster, and I seem to be crawling. I can only apologize so much for not being there to help. She'd tell me it's all right, but to me it's not. There's a part of me that's not used to the help.

When I leave here tomorrow morning, I'm not going back to Julie's place. I'm going home.

Missing

Something to post, since I've nothing to add at the moment.

One of my favourite songs. Everything But the Girl's Missing. Enjoy.

And now, for your monthly wedding update

It's the first day of June. I hope your Memorial Day went well. Because of the holiday, I've got the week off, and I figure now's a good a time as any to post a wedding update.

Julie figures we're about 60% to 65% prepared for the wedding. The last time I posted an update, this is what we had accomplished:

• We've ordered our wedding rings.
• We've decided on what the invitations will look like.
• We've come up with partial guest lists.
• We even found cool wedding cake toppers.

You can now add these to the list:

• We've decided on the site for the wedding and the reception.
• The guest list is pretty much finalized.
  
• We've designed the table centerpieces and found our toasting flutes.
  
• We've narrowed down the caterer's to two or three choices.
• We've set aside a block of rooms for out of town guests at one hotel, and we're gonna check another hotel to see they what they have.
• The first draft of the invitations (pending approval), as well as the insert cards, has been written.

Right now, the focus is twofold: Looking for a photographer and talking to caterers.

As much as I'd love to, I am not taking my own wedding photos. Julie might have issue with that, even though it'd save us a lot of money. We've been pricing photographers, and some of them are incredibly expensive! I could very easily save a lot of money if I bought a DSLR and took them myself, but...well...I'm kinda gonna be in the middle of the ceremony.

Imagine the wedding photos: There's Julie, looking lovely, saying her vows over her shoulder, all the while throwing me killer glances because I'm taking pics.

The other expensive thing will be food. We both know what we want, it's just a question of finding a caterer who'll a) have good food and b) be more than reasonably priced.

Julie's stressing, and I can't blame her. This is a lot of work, and while we've been very good at being frugal, finding bargains and saving money, this is where we start finding the big expenses. We'll make it work, though...of that I have no doubt.

I'd stay and write more, but I've gotta go back to purging, packing and sorting. Come the end of June, I'll be moving in with Julie. ;)

UPDATE: So we went and talked to the cake folks tonight. They're a lock on providing the cake, and wait until you taste it! As the youngsters might say... O M G. Oh, and they also do catering as well, and they've got a pretty tempting offer for catering the reception, but until we can taste their food, we won't make a firm decision. Still, if it's as good as their cake...