I need to get off my ass and get ready to go to my hematology appointment. I don't want to go. Neither Mom nor TCG could go with me today, and I hate getting bloodwork when I'm by myself. I know, I'm a big baby.

Nora, you need to know how many s.f. required per person. I mean, you can do the math without that but it doesn't really tell you anything. Basically you have about $1500/month, or $214 per person per month (not how rent is generally calculated, but okay).

You could use as a ballpark 200 s.f per person, which is fairly typical if not super generous. Any of the data I have on current rates in that area would be Class A office space, so probably not helpful.

My Dad's gf is very much Catholic. And wanting Dad to finally marry her. But to do so, he would need to anull marriage to my Mom, which would make us kids bastards. So, he's using that as a reason to not marry gf. It's kinda comical, if you ask me.

My second cousin married his high school girlfriend really quickly, I think they graduated and then not to long after his mom was calling to issue invitations over the phone because there was no time for printed invites. She assured everyone his girlfriend was not pregnant.

They got married for the financial aid - they'd talked about getting married in a year or two after graduation, but both wanted to go to the same out of state school so they got hitched to be considered independent of their parents.

I gotta say that I church-married a divorced guy with whom I'd been shacking up with no problems at all; everyone we checked with, once they heard that the first marriage was (a) civil and not remotely churchy, and (b) officially over with papers to prove it, didn't care at all. But he had been baptized, so there was that. And my Catholic grandmother married my unrepentantly Jewish grandfather with no problems, so there is some wiggle room.

But, in your case, two un-enthused non-Catholics church-marrying because the dad of one of the un/nons is a semi-recent convert who's pining for his grown-ass adult offspring to do something personally uncongenial just to make dad happy is almost definitely a no-go. Most of the priests I've personally known (aside from the pompous drip who ruined Berkeley) would kind of roll their eyes and say that the un/non's dad needed to get over himself and stop pining and let the grown-ass offspring lead his own life.

OTOH, if you *do* for some unfathomable reason get church-married, I will PAY YOU to liveblog the wedding prep retreat, because that would be golden (also because if you actually go through that horrible thing you deserve combat pay).

I'm still mildly peeved at the lovely Irish lefty radical priest who was going to officiate for going and dying between the engagement and the wedding; if he'd still been alive, we probably could've gotten out of the idiotic worse-than-useless wedding prep weekend retreat (one of his married couples [he said, "I don't marry people. But I do stand around while they marry each other."] was an older couple who'd been together for ages since their respective first spouses died, and who called him up one day to ask if he'd preside because they kind of felt like they might want to make it official. "What are you doing this afternoon? Wanna just drop by and do it today?" But, they said, don't we have to do the Cana weekend? "Oh, for shit's sake, you're in your fifties. If you don't know what you're doing by now, Cana won't help. Just come over." So they swung by City Hall to grab a license, dropped by his office, the parish secretary witnessed, and then everyone had a drink.)

Tep,

My Cathollc friend couldn't get married in the church she wanted because she had just moved to the area and they were new to him. So I can imagine the chances of you being wed in a Catholic ceremony are the nillest of nil.

Yeah, we are also married in the church, though only because our officiant was an ex-Episcopalian priest. Don't ask me how that works, but apparently it does. We didn't have a Mass or anything.

I gotta say that I church-married a divorced guy with whom I'd been shacking up with no problems at all; everyone we checked with, once they heard that the first marriage was (a) civil and not remotely churchy, and (b) officially over with papers to prove it, didn't care at all. But he had been baptized, so there was that. And my Catholic grandmother married my unrepentantly Jewish grandfather with no problems, so there is some wiggle room.

I'm so confused by the stated rules and what actually happens. But yeah, I have no desire for a church wedding, so there's that.

I think if you suddenly decided you really really wanted a sacramental marriage after all, some friendly person in some parish (you might have to shop a bit) would find a loophole to slip you through. But since you actively don't want it, THE END. And Tim's dad needs to find his peace with that.

I have no idea what his childhood-buddy priest friend is like, but if he's at all a reasonable guy then possibly he could help Tim out -- the reasonable ones really do take the sacramental part of it seriously, and don't want to inflict that on couples who don't want it, and think that "We hate the idea but this family member will pout otherwise" is a really lousy reason for a church wedding.

If he doesn't know Tim at all and seriously thinks he can reel him in, that's a problem, but if he knows him better than that, maybe he can be enlisted as an ally? Tim's dad might possibly listen better to "It's not going to happen and it is entirely appropriate for it to not-happen and you need to deal with that" if it comes from both Tim and from an actual priest.

Oh, my God, Ultra-Liberal Facebook friend, how in the *world* am I responsible for Bradley Manning sitting in the clink? (I don't *feel* responsible for *me* all the time, honestly. Not like I should, at what seems a shockingly advanced age to feel that way.) In the immortal words of that great human rights activist Super Chicken, "He knew the job was dangerous when he took it."(I don't mean to be glib about it...I'm sure it's awful, and I am a bit weak because he doesn't stick in my mind as it would if it were somebody I fancied putting himself in harm's way, and if you want to carp about that, I suppose you have a point, but even that's not new...it's Che' not Fidel on the T-Shirts, right? But my influence on the democratic part is, like, -5, right? I answer phones and get hung up on, and, sadly, still enjoy that more than my real life. You. Must. Chill.