wedding

We got married on Friday, 13th October 2006 at Bristol Registry Office with our reception at the Glassboat restaurant and then Fuchsia.

The week before the wedding was one of the most frantic ever. We moved into the new flat without too much mishap and set about trying to get everything sorted before everything kicked off. I was painting the sitting room bright yellow when the clock struck midnight on my birthday but we downed tools for the day and headed out for some fun, shopping and Nandos, which was a bit of a welcome break from The Horror Of It All.

Spent the night before the wedding frantically finishing off the painting and emptying boxes and entertaining Zell, who had come down from Leeds for the wedding. It seemed incredible that we were going to be getting married the next day as we had had no time at all to think about it or panic or anything normal like that!

The next morning dawned sooner than expected thanks to my having to stay up all night dosing myself with painkillers courtesy of my wisdom teeth and Felix deciding to get up rather earlier than usual. Ran around a lot getting ready and then finally piled into the car. Went via Nailsea, where we dropped off Felix and his stuff for the weekend (he was staying with the atheist's parents so that we could have a couple of days alone) and then headed to Bristol. Conversation at this point entirely revolved around feeling sick and competing about who felt most sick. Got to Bristol, at which point my shoes started to hurt and we tottered around a bit in search of goths. Did not have to look very far as soon lots of gothic types appeared to listen to me complain about feeling sick and how awful it all was and admire Felix, who looked extremely dashing in his Che t shirt and combats. I had forgotten to do my hair, so Stevy had to do it in the street and also gave me a string of pearls to wear as my Something Old, which was very sweet of her. Was bear hugged by Perf, which I always enjoy a great deal.

Finally the moment came and we were summoned in to meet the registrar. Answered a bunch of questions and selected our vows and then waited for everyone to come in. I was supposed to make an entrance on Simon's arm so that he could hand me over in an Eastenders fashion, with a significant look at Dave but I was so terrified that I couldn't even stand up let alone walk so we had to abandon that plan! The ceremony went by in a bit of a flash and I have no idea what I said or what I agreed to although I do recall a significant pause before I agreed to support the atheist in all of his defeats as well as his victories and there may also have been some giggling, as I struggled not to cry. He kept looking at me you see and it made me well up. There was some sniggering every time he had to repeat my hideous epic of a name. The feeling when the registrar pronounced us husband and wife was amazing and overwhelming and weird and wonderful. I have never felt like that before but it was a genuine high. We kissed and hugged, there was applause which became laughter when Babylon Zoo 'Spaceman' was played. Hey, it's Our Song! Shira and Stevy (who both looked wonderful) came up to sign the register as our witnesses and then we posed with the fake register for the photographs. There was much laughter about the fake 'Bridget Jones and Mark Darcy' entries. Informed Shira that it was 'awful'.

Announced that I no longer felt sick and we went outside and there was confetti and lots of photographs and people smiling and plenty of happiness. It is all a bit of a blur but I remember being overwhelmed by how lovely everyone was being and how fab everything was. There was some confusion when the atheist thought we were going to the pub for a quick drink before the meal and headed off with people without me, which led to much mockery because I didn't know where he was! May possibly have stood on Bristol Bridge shouting 'Well, at least this one married me before ditching me! Is it possible to be ditched after the altar?!' Luckily the atheist rang me and we were reunited.

Arrived at the Glassboat and Pimms appeared, which was excellent. Had lovely chats with Shira, Stevy and Simon while Felix ran about happily. I was forced to remove my nice shoes as they were too painful and swapped them for my Rocket Dog trainers instead, which must have looked wonderful as I kept them on for the remainder of the day. The meal was fabulous. I had blue cheese and endive salad, empanadas and then chocolate mousse with pistachio biscuit. Shira had a watercress soup so wondrous that everyone felt compelled to take photographs of it. Simon ate everything in sight. The conversation was just as it should be, extremely funny and slightly scandalous and there was a great atmosphere. The atheist's father gave a speech about how great the atheist is and then we started on the liquers. I was half way through my Amaretto when I realised that I was actually rather drunk. Felix had fallen asleep by this point. Stevy gave us Plates With Dresses On!

The party broke up and the atheist, Simon, Andy and I headed to the Llandoger Trow for a quick celebratory drink. Not very formal I know, but it wasn't That Sort Of Operation. I wanted an orange juice but no one would let me have one and Andy had everyone in the pub insisting that I get drunk and have more Pimms, so I duly obliged. The conversation at this point reached a serious low and Simon began to look rather intoxicated.

Walked through the dark streets of Bristol to Fuchsia, where a crowd of lovely people awaited us in the VIP 'Concubine' bar upstairs, an extremely pink, extremely glamorous den of iniquity. People started to arrive and I am afraid that we got extremely drunk as I rediscovered gin and tonic, people kept buying buckets of six bottles of beer and champagne manifested every so often in my hand (thank you Matthias and Kjersti!) Being a bride is ace. I kept hugging Hanka, which I am very sorry about but I was feeling a bit jolly. Loads of people admired other people that were there and wanted to talk about their beautiousness. Or something. Richard was very lovely and made us an Exhibit B! Perf wore an inappropriate t shirt! I informed Rhona that I loved her. And everyone else present. My camera came out and I took some Very Bad Photographs of people and then dragged Shellie into the loos for a bit of a make over with MAC Springsheen (I LOVE this blusher so much) and some Extremely Bad And Wrong conversation, which I am very sorry about but it felt So Good. Alexx was lovely and so so beautiful. Liz looked wonderful and Diva took photographs of pretty much, well, everything. Loads of the atheist's work mates turned up and I said some Scandalous Things which made the atheist clutch his head in despair.

There was an amazing atmosphere and we all got very, incredibly, raucously drunk. And then Mofette decided that it was time for karaoke and the evening went very, very weird. There was a lot of singing although I can't really remember the who or what of it all. I only know that Mof and Suebeedoo were in the thick of it all and were rarely seen without microphones for the rest of the night. Have recollections of screaming with laughter with Matthew to the point that we were bent double as we were treated to an extremely angst laden rendition of 'All By Myself' or whatever it is called. I also recall the atheist's manager's version of 'Hey Jude', which I feel could be used as potential Raise Leverage. Jozafeen and I sneaked off into the other room to sing New Order 'Blue Monday' and then Simon joined me for 'It's A Sin'. I believe that he may have flung himself to his knees at one point, but that can't be right can it? Zell sang Bon Jovi while Milfos and Flook looked traumatised by the whole experience. The karaoke continued until the end and became progressively more wrong and dubious.

Oh dear. I think that by this point my conversation consisted only of 'I LOVE you!' and 'I don't have a double barrel any more! I sound like a fucking NORTHERNER!' and 'Oh my God, what a C*NT! I am such a TERRIBLE BRIDE!' and to Kissycat and assorted people: (oh GOD) 'I am NOT HAVING SEX TONIGHT!!' (Lies) Sorry Alison! I think you got treated to a load of this!

All in all, it was a fabulous day and an amazing night and I am so thankful to everyone that made it there. It wasn't the most formal wedding ever but it was just what we wanted. Thank you to everyone who was there and who texted, called, emailed, sent cards and, bless you, gifted us with stuff, which was really unexpected but thank you so much.

Went to Bude for our honeymoon, which was excellent as we love it there. Got there in the late evening, chucked things around our cottage and then headed off to the beach with our kite, which we then promptly broke. It had Winnie the Pooh on it. Had a wonderful time running about on the dark beach and feeling all happily hung over. We were really missing Felix though. Drove about for ages looking for a pub to have a pub dinner in as I had a craving for lasagne and chips and then headed back for wine, Dave Gorman's Googlewhack Thing (extremely funny) and some much needed, er, sleep.

Spent a great deal of time making fun of the atheist because one of his cousins is some music producer who has worked with the Spice Girls (he did their second single apparently but I have no idea what it was called or what it involved or indeed what level of Wrongness it was on) and various repellent boy bands (Westlife or Boyzone or possibly both, I was drunk and can't remember the details) and Other People. Drunkenly blamed all of this iniquity on the poor atheist, who protested in vain that he could not be held responsible for the insalubrious actions of one of his relatives and all that he personally had to show for it was a signed Mel C album, which went on ebay.

The next morning we were up nice and early and went off to Tintagel to clamber around rocks and admire the amazing blue of the sea. I braved the wooden bridge (they terrify me!) and we went for a roam around the castle, which felt like it was on top of the world. Was sitting admiring the view when I realised that the man opposite looked very familiar and after thinking he was a dentist or someone from a shop or something I realised that he was familiar in the Have Seen In A Film sort of way. Realised that the atheist and everyone else there was staring in the same way and taking surreptitious photographs of The Famous Person although from what I could tell, no one could remember his actual name. It all got very silly. We later discovered that he was Michael York, who, if you look on imdb would appear to have been in everything on the planet. He spent a lot of time posing in profile while his wife (?) took photographs of him gazing moodily out to sea on a disposable camera. Imagine his chagrin if he had discovered that no one could actually remember his name and there was loads of confused mutterings about 'The Bloke In The Blue Coat' following him about the castle. The atheist only recognised him because he was in Austin Fucking Powers.

After this we decided to give Boscastle a chance. Avoided the witchcraft museum and wandered about taking photographs of rocks and sea. The atheist did not like all the hippy type shops and looked extremely disgusted and appalled by the whole thing. Went out for a rather splendid dinner and got rather drunk in front of The Wedding Singer, which brought back unfortunate memories, usually involving Mofette.

On monday we went to Okehampton to pick Felix up from the atheist's father who also rather nicely treated us to lunch at a nice restaurant, which was jolly decent of him especially as he had already bought us all lunch on the Glassboat. There isn't anything in Okehampton! Felix had a bit of a sore throat so we had to cosset him a bit. Poor Chops.

Went to Newquay on the tuesday, which was surprisingly down market and not at all what I had expected although the beach was excellent with its miniature replica of the Clifton Suspension Bridge. Went to the Blue Reef aquarium thing, which was excellent fun and the closest we came to a shark all week. They had the most enormous crab ever and a massive huge octopus and a seriously fucking enormous fish. It was all very odd and a bit exhausting. Felix seemed to enjoy it. Went to Padstow after this where we paid Rick Stein tax and bought rather lovely pies from his patisserie as I don't think they let you stay in Padstow if you don't display a Rick Stein bag. Wandered about a bit feeling a bit revolted by the hideous, affected fakeness of it all and then sat on top of a hill to eat the aforementioned Famous Pies. I had banoffee, which was delicious, and the atheist had lemon meringue, which he pronounced 'too sweet'. Apparently there was a hailstorm after we left. I wasn't able to have Rick Stein fish and chips because he doesn't like vegetarians. Drove back via Crackmouth Haven which is lovely. It is one of the Bude beaches and rather more shingly than the others with huge rock formations and loads of rock pools to explore. Felix had a bit of a paddle and I took a couple of pictures that I am really quite proud of.

Wednesday was spent pottering about Bude. Had another lengthy paddle in the sea and run around on the beach then hit the surf shops for New Stuff. It was definitely the end of summer there, the sun was still in the sky and there was a warm breeze but there was a definite sense of the town winding down ready for the winter. I started to get a bit stressed about how much we had to do when we got back so we decided to leave a day early, which was a bit sad. Decided that when Felix gets married, we will be accompanying him on his honeymoon and being as awkward, noisy and stroppy as possible. Went to a cocktail tasting thing in the evening, which was a bit bizarre. Waited until Felix was tucked up in bed and then got jolly on gin and wine and watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory while lengthily discussing how much we both love Roald Dahl. And Johnny Depp. There was much slurring. The atheist started talking about moving to France. Yay!

Thursday was bright and sunny so we decided to head down to the Eden Project and see what all the fuss is about. Had no idea what to expect at all but was pleasantly surprised by the whole thing. It really is ace! Usually when people rave on about something it fills me with a bloody minded desire to absolutely loathe it but Eden was a bit too expensive for that sort of thing so we had to do our best to enjoy. Went around the rain forest bit first and was shocked by how humid and hot it became, which made the atheist rather furious. I had a great time though. Had a bit of a break and then wandered about the other biome, which smelt delicious. It started to rain really heavily while we were in there and the sound as it hit the biome roof was just so cool and soothing. Had a really lovely time and am so glad we went in the end. Did the gift aid thing and had to use my new name for the first time, which was just WEIRD. I don't feel like Mélanie Clegg yet. It sounds odd and makes me feel all flustered and embarrassed whenever I have to use it. I need to practise a new signature as well as it is a bit of a confused scrawl at the moment!

So what is it like being married? Well, to be honest, it is far too soon to tell. I have a nice spangly diamond ring to look at though while I ponder the question and er a new surname to practise with as well. I still call the atheist my 'boyfriend' because I just can't get the hang of 'husband'. It is all VERY VERY WEIRD.

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