Since you're trying to make a getaway in park i'm going to assume that you don't have your chauffer's license.

See. Another Simpson's quote.

Now that we have both a ceremony and reception site I now have new issues to ponder. Did I say ponder? I meant obsess. Sorry.

The most pressing issue right now is transportation and dressing areas. The church is right down the road from our house so I could follow tradition and dress here with my mom and my girls. But I have four cats. One is obsessively on the hunt for affection and toes, the two girls are surly and growl at everything, and the fourth, my little jellybean Wally, inherited his mommy's anxiety problem and runs under the bed at the sound of footsteps on the porch. So i'm thinking that these cats and formalwear would not be a good combination. In addition to that, if I was seriously going to have several family members milling about for the day I would go into hostess mode. Hostess mode means cleaning frantically the night before, constant sensory alertness for fresh litter box deposits, freshening drinks, etc. Talk about needing a Klonopin.

That leaves us with a hotel room for the night. Awesome. Let the maid deal with my mess. A room would be more spacious anyway. Our house is nice, but it's not huge. It's also covered in cat hair. I already have some on my dress. So a hotel it most likely is. That's fine. Hotels are fun. But how to get to the church and reception?

Josh and the guys can easily drive themselves. I on the other hand learned the hardway that it is very difficult to drive, nay fit, into a regular car in a poofy dress. (I drove myself to my senior prom. It was the only drawback to going stag.) So I need a big car and someone to schlep my ass 20 minutes down the road. Then we can drive ourselves to the reception site and the hotel.

Obvious solution: Rent a limo.

Not so obvious problem: I hate limos.

Seriously. Not my style. Not Josh's style. Limo's are on the list of things banned from the wedding, right between the Electric Slide and tulle.

So I start calling around looking for a classic car. I called one person who only has a Rolls Royce. That's cool. What's not cool? The $125 per hour rate. So I call another company. They have a 1963 Plymouth. (I think. He called me back while I was loading the dishwasher so I didn't bother with details.) Total for his services for the day? About $900. I nearly plotzed.

You see, they want to be hired from the time they pick you up to the time they drop you off at the hotel. In our case that is about 5 hours of nothing while we are at the ceremony and doing pictures, and at the reception. And I know these people are making their living this way, but Norman-Tap-Dancing-Schwartkopf!

No i've decided no way. I may call a few other people and see if they will allow me to book them from picking me up to dropping us off at the reception, and then for an hour to take us to the hotel. They probably won't, but as my mother always said, it doesn't hurt to ask. It also doesn't hurt to have a Plan B.

Plan B is for us to call Enterprise and rent a bad ass Lincoln Towncar, get the extra insurance in case the groomsmen fuck it up bad, and drive ourselves. I guess I would have to have the car to take me and my big honking dress, but my mom has driven big cars before so I think i'm good there.

This is part of the planning that drives me to scratch. The tiny little details that can make everyone late and screw us up and piss us off. The devil is truely in the details. But it will work itself out. Hopefully there will be enough people around to point out any holes in my plans and make sure they are taken care of. If not, it could be worse. Homer could be driving us and wanting to do the 2000 year old man bit.