Cancel the hog trough.
As the news should’ve reached most of our immediate family by now, I guess it’s safe to let the cat out of the bag. It didn’t seem to come as a surprise to most people, so I doubt it’ll shock you folks… but for the record, yes, the Snook and I will be getting married in Las Vegas in two months. By Elvis. And yes, it’ll be broadcast live on the Internet so you’ll all get to watch. Fun, huh?

Addendum: I forgot to add a HUGE thank you to my sister Amy, who kindly consented to let her thunder be stolen a little bit so we could get married on the way to her wedding. She’s the bomb, yo.Now for those of you wanting romantic details, there are none. No one “proposed” to anybody else, and no jewelry has changed hands. I mean, eww. That just isn’t us. So here’s the story: We first discussed getting married three years ago when we were planning the move to Australia. It was along the lines of a, “Hmm, you wanna stop in Vegas? Well, I will if you will,” kinda thing. It turned out that we didn’t need to do it for the visa, so we didn’t. The issue was always kinda out there though, especially as my family kept asking us why we didn’t. Basically it was because we didn’t have any good reason. We’re not religious. Our “defacto” status (which basically means “common-law marriage”) in Australia pretty much ensures us the same legal rights as if we were married. Politically, I find it despicable that the government (of both the US and Australia) wants to restrict marriages to heterosexuals. Every time John Howard or George Bush starts talking about the sanctity of marriage and the importance of procreation I start to see red and dry heave. I don’t have any desire to be the shiny princess in a white dress and get handed to a husband like a piece of property. (Just my take; no offense to those who want the fairytale.) So why the change of heart?

Really, I think it was at Rodd’s Aunt Linda’s birthday party a few weeks ago. Her girlfriend Sue made a speech and then proposed to her in front of all their family and friends. I kept thinking about it for days. I mean, they can’t legally get married. So what was the point of proposing? Obviously it was a big moment for them. Why? Eventually I came to the conclusion that it was the fact of making it all public. We knew they’d been off-and-on for years, but now Sue was telling everyone that she intended to be there for the long haul, that she was making a public commitment to be with this person from now on. And I saw the good in that. Linda knew that Sue was willing and unembarrassed to tell the world how she felt about her. They also knew that by making their relationship “public property” in a way, that there was now the pressure to make it work. We know how they stand. That’s a good thing. And I decided that if it’s good for them, it’d be good for us.

So that was pretty much it. I told the Snook what I’d been thinking about, and that I felt I’d finally reached a reason that I could live with. He agreed. And since we always said that we’d only do it if we could get married by Elvis in Vegas… the rest sorta fell into place. So no, no proposal on bended knee or shiny three-months-worth-of-salary blood diamond. Just a shy decision inspired by a couple of lesbians. That’s one to tell the grandkids, huh?