Ahem.

Well, yes, it has been a while. Since last August, to be specific. Lots has happened since then, including the fact that I now live in a house full of boys and go to the grocery store twice a week. Also, I play computer games, which is a huge, soul-sucking waste of time, but DANGIT, THEY GOT ME HOOKED!! It's like crack, I'm tellin' ya. Anyhoo. We can talk LOTR vs. King's Bounty some other time.

There was also The Wedding and The Honeymoon, in which I became officially marrit and much better-traveled. In the interest of weaseling my way back into the blogging world, I thought I might highlight, with numerous pictures and very little text, these two events. Let us begin.

For starters, it's important that you understand just what a family of whackjobs I have entered into. Yes, they are mine own. Here are the guys on the Day Of Marriage, AKA "Wedding #1." They're trying out their gangsta poses, which took some time to perfect. Let's go through the evolution:

Here they are discussing proper technique.  Apparently, at a certain point with children, the parent stops being the teacher and becomes the teachee.  You can witness that here:   



Dad gets it!  Nice work, Max.  And Elder Son brings his own style into the mix, while Younger thinks to himself, The likelihood of these pictures ending up on the internet is very high.  I think I'll err on the side of coolness.

The younger joins in, just as the elder drops his pose.  Max, of course, just goes deeper into his role.  Gentlemen, this is much like synchronized swimming.  Coordination gets you a higher score.



Yes, they're getting into the spirit of things now!  Except Elder Son, who hasn't moved.  Perhaps he's thinking about dinner.  Personally, I think they're starting to take on a certain je ne sais quoi.  I see "frame-worthy" written all over this one:

I can't explain this one.  It's as if they forgot themselves:

And now let's move into the meat of things.  The bride enters:

And the minister, too!  We have all the ingredients for a wedding now.  This particular minister hadn't done a wedding in 30 years, but he was available on two days' notice and happened to be a very good friend of Max's.  He read from The Velveteen Rabbit at the wedding, which turned him into a very good friend of mine.  We got married in a beautiful old mansion-turned-restaurant, which was also available on two days' notice.  The staff helped us move two tables and voila!  Everything was ready. Behind el ministero is a big, beautiful bay window, which you can't see, but trust me, it's there.

I think this is the part where Max started quoting from The Princess Bride.  If you've seen the movie, you know what part I'm talking about.  Ad libbing  makes weddings more fun!  Is Younger Son texting over there on the left??  No, no, just getting the ring ready.

Well, badda bing, badda bang, we were married just like that.  All we said was, "I do," and we were hitched.  Crazy.  The seven of us then went upstairs to the lounge and had a little snacky poo and a drinky poo while we waited for the restaurant to be ready for dinner-serving, then we went downstairs and had a fantastic meal together.  It was the perfect wedding. 

Oh, and you thought I'd just end there, did you?  Nyerp.  It's honeymoon time!  We, of course, took Younger and Elder Sons along with us to the fabulous Greece, where much fun awaited us.  It all began in the airport, where Max began a long obsession with cell phones.  Here he is trying to get our international phones activated:

The rest of us were enjoying a delicious airport breakfast.  We flew Lufthansa most of the way, and I applaud them mightily for their wonderful service and fascinating snack crackers:

Who is she?  Why was she in a snack bag?  Her husband was in there, too, along with the moon and the stars.  They were delicious.  The crew never stopped taking care of us and all the electronics worked perfectly, such as the headphones and individual video screens.  I cannot say the same for our flight back, on which we flew a non-Lufthansa airline, but I will name no names.

Here's underage Younger Son, having his first legal drink!

Here we are in Athens, where we had to wait FIVE HOURS to get on our island-hopper flight.  That's a really long time when you've already been traveling, like, forever.  The guys are trying their first Greek coffee, which stunned them.  Or maybe it was the really bad ouzo that they drank just prior to the coffee that gave them these expressions.  It's hard to tell.

This is my all-time favorite photo.  It's just so doggone sweet.  We were still...waiting...for the flight that would take us to Santorini.  Not that I'm complaining, mind you.  We were in Greece.  I'm not sure that boy took off those sunglasses during the whole trip.

At some point everybody just gave up and did this. Not me, though mind you.  My job was to worry about missing our flight, and I take these thing seriously.  Why is it that men can sleep anywhere?!

At last!  Aloft!  These are just two of the many, many little islands we flew over on our way to ours.  The sea was every bit as blue as better pictures than these show.  It was elegant, it was beautiful, it just called to be swam in.  Pity it was so cold.

This is the descent onto Santorini.  Max and I stayed near Oia, which is the quieter and better-for-old-fart-couples part of the island.  The boys stayed in Fira, which was the action-packed party area.  Relatively speaking, anyway.  This picture shows neither of those areas. 

We were happily exhausted by the time we got there, but that didn't stop Max from immediately touching base, checking in, updating and figuring things out.  He'd never admit it, but he's an Organizer.  Also, he looks pretty comfortable on that couch, eh?  We did manage to go out to dinner, but that was the end of the adventures for the day.  Zzzzzzzz.......

So that's it--Day One.  Over the course of the trip I took about a thousand pictures, every one of which I will share with you.  Don't panic!!  Just kidding!  But I will share some, cause they're perty.   Opa!