Posts by Rich Lock
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Jackie, I think my point of view is coloured by my UK experience.
As Fletcher has pointed out, in the UK you usually get an either/or choice between the church, with all the pomp and ceremony (and great architecture), or a pokey little rathole office in a tower block somewhere off the Basildon bypass.
Sure, the outdoors option exists, but...the weather, the hassle, the urbanisation of the entire country, the difficulty getting a celebretant...
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So you like a good church wedding then? I have to admit that my wedding was more like a civil union, in that there was no cake - my mother is a diet nazi - we were married at my parents' farm under a rose bower (except that there were no roses), everybody had to stand for the full 10 mins it took to do the legalities with the celebrant, and I didn't wear a posh dress, and neither did Ian wear a suit. And there weren't any speeches nor a top table (Well there were tables, at least). We did have food, though. Oh, and no speeches, unless you count my Dad saying "Kai time, everyone!" There are, to be fair Rich, all sorts of weddings and ceremonies and such. I don't agree with the practice of spending thousands of dollars, but if that's what makes people happy, why not? Everybody has their own way of doing things, when it comes to tying the legal knot civilly or uncivilly.
What I was drviing at more was the attitudes of people outside the happy couple, whether that couple be none, one, or multi-penised.
For the record, everyone should have the right to the biggest blow-out they and their familiy and friends can afford, or if they prefer, to slope off down the registry office in jandals and shorts.
The church does spectacle, ceremony and ritual very well, and that is very attractive, not only for the happy couple, but also for the families. Registry office 'do's' often can't compete. So there is often this human urge to go for the church do (and to 'value' it more, and to feel it makes everything actually real, even though it shouldn't be).
Until the civil ceremony can compete with the church on equal terms for ritual and spectacle, I think it'll be struggling to get off the back foot.
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Is it possible to have an onslaught of pedantry?
A 'vigourous assault, or attack' of pedantry?
I don't think you've used quite the right word there, if I may be so picky.
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See what I did there? :) -
Other non-scientific polls (Herald, Stuff) have indicated between 33 to 40% think Henry did nothing wrong
If only there was some way we could round up these racist scum and put them on a special train to a re-education gulag on Stewart Island or somewhere else unpleasant and remote.
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What? I'm only saying what we're all thinking, right? -
Something which I don't think has been touched on yet wrt marriage is the very human need for ritual and spectacle, something which a church wedding usually provides in spades, and which the civil services often (but not always) fial to measure up to.
I was quite happy,despite being a fairly millitant atheist, to get church-hitched, because it gave us the opportunity to throw a big party and make everyone dress up in stupid clothes. Being in a old church with all the solemnity bells and whistles added an appropriate air of gravitas to the occasion.
I have several happily coupled friends, who have co-habited for years or decades, happilly raising families, etc.
It's almost like I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. There's a small part at the back of my brain that keeps saying: 'So. The party. When's that then? You know. The clothes, the cake, the speeches. Anytime soon? Should I make a note of the date?'.
Stupid, I know, but there you are.
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When forms arrive with the standard options: Mr, Miss, Mrs, Ms, - invariably in that order - I go for Dr, which keeps 'em guessing about the number of penises involved - just the way I like it...
There is a classic thought-experiment paradox along these lines, explained on wiki thusly:
Other paradoxes involve false statements or half-truths and the resulting biased assumptions.
For example, consider a situation in which a father and his son are driving down the road. The car collides with a tree and the father is killed. The boy is rushed to the nearest hospital where he is prepared for emergency surgery. On entering the surgery suite, the surgeon says, "I can't operate on this boy. He's my son."
The apparent paradox is caused by a hasty generalization; if the surgeon is the boy's father, the statement cannot be true. The paradox is resolved if it is revealed that the surgeon is a woman, the boy's mother.
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Mr and Mrs My Full Name, occasionally, yes.
She only fumes because it's been going on for so many years that the full-on eruptions have died down from magma to fumes.
Difficult to yell at elderly relatives, though.
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Yes, Zivil-Gewerkschaft doesn't sound better.
You keep your Gewerkschaft away from me, old son, Zivil or not. I don't swing that way. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Young Frankenstein
Masssster hasn't disappeared
He just got chopped up for spare parts?
We put a note in the programme (oh yes, we were very formal) saying that I was not changing my name.
My wife didn't change her name either. Which hasn't stopped everyone of my parents generation and previous referring to us on every piece of correspondence ever as 'Mr and Mrs Lock' despite repeated explanations.
So one of our Christmas traditions revolves around us getting cards addressed to 'Mr and Mrs'. I laugh while she fumes. Then she kicks me in the nuts so she can have a laugh.
And that's the secret to a happy marriage, isn't it? Making each other laugh after all these years?
More seriously, we looked at double-barrelling, but neither of the available combos sounded right (and one of them sounded like a particularly painful wrestling move), so we've put that one in the 'too hard' basket for the moment. It will become an issue when our children are of school age.