Heady Mixtures

The RSVP cards have begun rolling in, reminding me how wonderful it is to find actual mail stuffed in next to my Fake Native American Goods and Discount Bedding catalogs. First prize (maybe a warm handshake, maybe a hug, I haven't decided yet) goes to Nick and Maria, whose RSVP card trundled in three days ago all by its lonesome. They do live two blocks away, however, and thus might have an unfair advantage.

Lots of you have been remarking about how much you like the invites. It must be said, at this point, that while I sat in the cushy art director's chair, most of the heavy lifting on these invites was done by genius and Canadian (those traits appear to go hand-in-hand) illustrator Tavis Coburn and his infinitely patient and lovely assistant, Patrick Gray. I first worked with Tavis at Outside magazine a few years ago, and his illustrations have appeared in pretty much every magazine cluttering newsstands today. At the rate he's going, Patrick won't be far behind. Check out both of their web sites: taviscoburn.com and grayillustration.com.

Last but definitely not least I have to thank the guys at V+V Sofortdruck GmbH in Germany. Whew. Try saying that three times fast. Anyway. They printed AND trimmed the invites for free, saving me hours of tears, sweat and colorful nervous breakdowns. No doubt my invites would've clogged the printers at the office in some disastrous and impossible-to-extract manner. And it's not like I could do what people usually do in those situations. Walk away, whistling a jaunty tune, later exclaiming: "WHAT?! Somebody broke the printer? Well...I haven't printed anything to that printer in three weeks!" 'Cause the invites got my name on 'em. So finding the culprit is a no-brainer. I've thought this through, as you can tell. But I--as usual--digress. It's unlikely that the folks at Sofortdruck will ever read this blog but I am nevertheless publicly thanking them. Herewith.

I would like to close by saying that as the wedding draws nearer, I am beset by a heady mixture of joy and anxiety. Last night brought the wedding nightmare tally up to three, and they are getting increasingly stuh-range:
1) Dreamt that I was an hour and a half late for the ceremony. But, thankfully, Nick had anticipated my being late and lied to me about the start of the festivities. Thus, I was only half an hour late. Hmmm. Highly unlikely. But on the weirdness scale, I give it a 1 out of 10.
2) Dreamt that my purple strapless dress (as if) fell down during the ceremony, thus causing me to expose myself to the entire assembled crowd. In addition, my hair had turned to straw. I give that one a 3.5.
3) In what a think was a 9 on this scale, I encountered some kind of slug-like deep-sea creature that had washed ashore. Naturally it washed ashore on land with no water in sight. In the Swiss alps, to be exact. Equally naturally I hugged it, as one does, and quickly developed a terrible rash that covered both my arms, causing them to swell up grotesquely and quite possibly leading to death. And in the dream I clearly remember myself saying to Nick not "My dearest, rush me to the nearest hospital!" but "God, I hope this clears up before the wedding."