fun with a gun

... Scanner gun, that is. We finally did our Macy's registry. Eek and EGADS. It only took a couple of hours but by the time we were done, I was ready to drop. And we only put 57 items on our list (the registry guide suggests ___ for the size of our party, and given the size of our Macys we would have had to register for every item on the floor). I should preface the rest of this post by saying that I always thought bridal registries were unforgivably tacky ("Please buy us stuff" being the bottom line of this modern marvel) but my sensibilities have been outnumbered.

At first we were at a total loss as far as what to scan. We have pretty much everything we need (and frankly everything we can stuff into my apartment) already. Towels, linens, appliances, cookware and utensils, flatware and dishes, you name it, we've got it, plus twelve billion other things we don't really need but own anyway. Minus this really cool garlic basher-smasher thing my SILTB and her husband have, that Macy's did not carry anyway.

A little side note: I just looked up "brother-in-law" and found that there are two readily accepted definitions, and neither of them is my SILTB's husband. But since the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (3rd ed.) accepts that, and since "my husband's brother-in-law" sounds cold and retarded to boot, I'm going with "my BILTB."

So we went from, "We don't really need anything" to "Let's get this cutting board in the shape of a pig!" and "How about this cupcake carrier?" (Admittedly, those were my picks, and I have to say S. was way nicer to me than I thought he would be. Eventually he picked up on a lovely phrase: "Is that what you want?" He even, at one point, wordlessly shouldered my purse. I love him!)

We'd say something like, "Let's skip towels. We have towels," but find ourselves not two minutes later fingering lavender Egyptian cotton and saying, "How many, you think? Four?" Scott got really excited about knives, and I got excited about Corningware. We wandered around cookery forever, scanning Cuisinarts, Calphalons, Marthas and All-Clads. The whole process, which was fun for about 45 minutes, was just so exhausting when all was said and done. The only thing we firmly said we wouldn't bother with, and did not bother with, was cutlery. Because when it comes to forks, this Philistine couple seriously can't tell the difference between WalMart and Wedgwood.

Annnnyway, 'twas quite an adventure. Slightly shell-shocked and completely tired out, we headed to The Wedding Cafe at Ward Warehouse to have lunch (chicken walnut sammy for me; turkey for him; Caesar salad) and flip halfheartedly through some photo albums. If we hadn't had a BOGO coupon for TWC, I would have been just as happy in a drive-thru.

What's next?