Anna and Dara get Canada-married, 3/2/2012

This being Part 2, and the biggest part by far, of my and userinfosolarbird‘s Grand Four Day Weekend of Marriage and Music!

Though that said, it was also actually one of the simplest days of the entire weekend. Here’s the thing, O Internets: if you’ve read Elfquest, you’ll know what I mean when I say that Dara and I got as close as you can get in real life to Recognition, and we went from 0 to lifemates in pretty much no time flat. For us, there’s no particular difference between that and being legally married. This entire affair therefore was a lot more about just reinforcing the legal status as far as Canada (and hopefully soon by extension, the state of Washington) was concerned, as opposed to any real change in status between us as far as we are concerned.

So I hope I won’t disappoint any of you all when I say that this was the most relaxed and groovy wedding ceremony ever! We didn’t dress up, and we didn’t exchange rings–though we probably would have done the latter if Dara didn’t have an issue with rings that keeps her from wearing them (she gets a mild claustrophobia reaction off of them).

Here’s how the whole thing went!

Continue reading “Anna and Dara get Canada-married, 3/2/2012”

A modest announcement :)

For those of you who have not already seen this breaking across Facebook, Google+, or Twitter tonight, userinfosolarbird and I would like to announce that on March 2nd, we will be getting a Canadian marriage license!

We were already planning this before today’s Washington state law signed by Governor Christine Gregoire. In fact, we are planning this as part of a Grand Four-Day Weekend of Marriage and Music, starting off with seeing these handsome boys perform on the night of March 1st! On March 2nd, Dara and I (and two other friends of ours who I will not identify publicly so as to respect their privacy, but who will be joining us for a dual ceremony) will be taking the appropriate steps to get legally married in Canada! On March 3rd, we will have yet more music as we attend Festival du Bois!

Mad props to userinfogerimaple who has very kindly agreed to put Dara and me up for the weekend!

I have been asked as well if Dara and I are planning anything with the new law being passed in Washington state. To this, I note that to the best of our knowledge, if we are legally married in Canada, then that will count in the state of Washington–assuming that the law is not shot down in November. So for now we will be focusing on Canadian marriage fun, and getting in a boatload of awesome Quebecois music to go with it. :D

And! And! And! This being my and Dara’s 25th year of being together, there’s a whole extra layer of anniversarial awesomeness to celebrate here as well! So if you’re so inclined, raise a jar on March 2nd and think of us!

Dara at Cafe Venus/Mars Bar tomorrow night!

Hey, Seattle-based peeps! My belovedest , in her auspices of Crime and the Forces of Evil, will be doing her very first bar-type show at the Cafe Venus/Mars Bar tomorrow night! She will be playing along with Natalie Quist and Gimmie a Pigfoot, and I’ll be there to provide merch support.
(Yes, you heard that correctly, I will be in an actual bar on an actual Friday night. But with my belovedest performing, hey, it’s worth it!)
Music starts up at 9pm and there will be a $6 cover charge. There will also very likely be shenanigans, and definitely rage-driven acoustic elfmetal. You should all come listen, and furthermore, buy her album while you’re at it. And if you see me, say hi!

That promised post about stuff besides books

So yeah, I’ve actually been doing things besides purchasing books lately, I swear!

The Great Enshrinkening of Anna proceeds apace, even if not quite as quickly as initially planned. As I enthused on Twitter and Facebook this morning, I hit 164 pounds today! Which is well and easily the lightest I’ve been in five years, and which gets me into territory before I’d started the Walk to Rivendell in 2005. (Which was when I started regularly tracking my weight.) 162 pounds is the 30 pounds lost mark. I’m still aiming for 150, so I have 14 pounds to go!

It’s a bit amusing as well to realize that if I count from my actual high point of weight last year, I’m actually down 29.5 pounds, not 28. But I’m still counting from when I actually started using the LoseIt app, so!

Work’s been a bit crazy lately since we’re hardcore face down on a huge project for the next few weeks–and my team’s having some QA shuffle going on as well, so we’re essentially down to two full-time QA people right now. But so far it’s all still good. And on Friday, we even finally got us an official Big Fish Games sign in front of our building! Check it out:

userinfosolarbird has gone to Oregon to play a gig down there, and I shall miss her, but wish her luck as well! In the meantime userinfospazzkat and I went to have tasty sushi in Woodinville tonight, saving me from having to figure out what the hell to make myself for dinner.

I am very, very happy that the heat wave from last week has passed. I don’t mind the hot so much, but I do mind the part where I don’t sleep well in heat waves. Today was lovely, though, once the clouds cleared up, and I had a great walk down to the shops.

I should also mention that userinfospazzkat has been getting into Leverage lately and I’ve quite enjoyed what I see of it so far. I can even tie this into Great Big Sea by noting that in the promo photos associated with the new album, Alan looks suspiciously Christian-Kane-like. This is not a bad thing. ;)

And speaking of GBS, NEW ALBUM COMING OUT ON TUESDAY! <3 <3 Brace for the squee, folks. You know it's coming!

All hail SOLARBIRD!

Many of you have remarked upon this already in your own posts, but for those of you who might not have yet, hey, it’s the Day of userinfosolarbird! Who is a very awesome Solarbird indeed. Did I mention she’d written me a SONG? With its very own bass solo?

Happy birthday, beloved! <3 <3 Today there will be sushi and movie viewing (we're going to go see How to Train Your Dragon), and hopefully also speedy recovery from strep throat since Dara picked that up from Norwescon. Doh.