An Exciting 2010

You might have been wondering where I've been for the past few months. It's not that I've been ignoring you, in fact you've been on my mind for quite a while--it's just I needed to take care of a few things before I was able to write again. Namely, snagging a fiancé. It was a wonderful (overdue) surprise. Nick proposed with boarding passes leaving for NY two hours later. It took an hour for the excitement to settle down enough for me to throw some clothes into a carry on and make our flight just in time. It was a perfect weekend. Well, actually everything went wrong--but we didn't see it as wrong. I could have been hit by a taxi and you still couldn't slap that giant smile off my face. I don't normally delve into my personal life in blog posts, but what the heck, it's a great story and I feel like sharing.

The day we arrived Nick had dinner reservations at the swanky Italian restaurant Paolas. This is the type of restaurant with an international sommelier always on staff. We were told they had an extensive wine list and would help you choose the perfect wines to pair with your meal. We left the taxi and crossed the street when we saw the Paolas restaurant sign. We had trouble finding the entrance on this strange corner block until we saw a side door. My first impression was, “huh—this isn’t exactly the décor I imagined.” But like I said, nothing was getting the happy grin off my face this evening. The restaurant also acted like they didn’t have our reservation and told us to sit wherever we’d like. I was handed a menu with 5 wines on the list; a shock for a restaurant that was known for it’s wine selection. My blissful grin only started to fade when we were introduced to our waiter. Imagine a failed male model greatly resenting the fact that he was waiting tables rather than posing for a Calvin Klein billboard shoot. Nick tried his best. “Mary enjoys Malbecs, Tempranillos, Grenaches, anything that’s along those lines. Do you have a recommendation?”

“Yeah, we got a Malbec.” He said without actually looking at either of us.

“Okay then, I guess we’ll have a glass of your Malbec.” Nick requested then looked at me for reassurance that he isn’t just imagining how incredible inept our waiter is. It wasn’t until I started reading the menu that I realized something was amiss. For the sake of the restaurant I’m omitting the name, but as you may have guessed, we were at the wrong restaurant. Nick immediately started back peddling. The wine was already poured, he paid cash and after explaining our mistake we sat chagrined in a window seat gulping down the wine as fast as we could.

Walking into Paolas was like walking into a little piece of heaven. We were immediately ushered to our private candle lit table with fresh red roses. A complimentary bottle of champagne appeared and all memory of the bitter male model faded away into dishes like house made warm Mozzarella, twice crisped artichock hearts and asparagus filled ravioli topped with butter, sage and shaved black truffles. I should also mention that an international sommelier spent no less than 5 minutes discussing my wine palette before appearing with the most fabulous bottle of wine I’ve ever had. It was decadent, it was long and it was fabulous. It was over espresso that Nick realized he didn’t have his wallet.

He ran back to the other restaurant hoping it fell out on the window seat while we chugged the bad wine. But it was gone. Fallen out in the taxi no doubt. I was dolled up in a dress with no pockets and didn’t have anything but a very strong wine and champagne buzz. Everything was in the wallet; hotel keys, both our ID’s, which meant we couldn’t get back on the flight. I was going to have to spend my engagement dinner washing dishes. I panicked. Nick left me again to search for the wallet. So hear I sat, alone, drunk, terrified that our waiter would ask me how we would be paying for our elaborate two-hour meal. So I did the only thing I could. I uncorked the bottle of wine and kept on drinking.

It all ended perfectly fine. The restaurant was very gracious--we called in a credit card a few hours later. Getting into the hotel is another story and talking our way past New York TSA without ID’s an even better story. But for another time…

I just wanted to write to let you know there are big things on the horizon for 2010. Namely, an Etsy Wedding. The date is set, June 12^th. And everything from the dress down to the wedding bands and flowers are going to be created by Etsy sellers who I’ll have the pleasure of introducing you to in posts to come. I’ll also be launching my new website shortly. So check back soon, I hope to go live later this week.

Here’s to a prosperous and eventful new decade. Cheers!