Wedding Registry Available at Harrod's

You all know I've been following the Charles/Camilla wedding story and according to the most recent developments, the British are having their own constitutional questions about the definition of marriage. Due to both parties having been previously married, the Anglican church doesn't want them to wed in a religious ceremony, so they're going the civil route. However, the Wedding Act of 1836 defines civil ceremonies, but royals are specifically prohibited from participating in them. That act was updated in 1949, and 'supposedly' the royal prohibition was lifted, but constitutional experts are torn about whether royals should be given the full rights extended to regular British citizens.

There is some talk about creating a new amendment before the April 8 nuptials in order to insure the legality of the wedding union, but others in the government stick by original intent of the 1836 law, saying: "It's not natural for the Royal family to be married in a civil ceremony. This isn't what the word marriage stands for. What's next? They'll be asking for fair employment options as well. A civil union, that's the solution. If it's good enough for all the queens out there, it's certainly good enough for the prince."

And speaking of weddings, there's a fine book hitting the shelves now about a wedding planner: DRESS REHEARSAL by Jennifer O'Connell. It's the story of Lauren Gallagher, Boston's hottest cake designer, who is able to predict a marriage's chance of success, based on their cake choices. Unfortunately, one of her best friend's is getting married – to Mr. Absolutely All Wrong, and Lauren's got to save her friend, and prove her cake theory is true, even if it means taking her predictive powers public. All of a sudden it seems everyone wants to learn Lauren's secret for relationship success, but is predicting a sure thing the formula for true love, or a recipe for disaster?

In real life, the author of this nuptial narrative juggles her writing, a consulting career, and also her family, and I'm always curious how people who have WAY more energy than I do, manage to stay sane. Here's Jennifer's secret:

I'm more like type AA. I don't know what to do with myself if I'm not working. When I finished Off The Record I decided to take a week off, since I'd been working seven days a week for months. But after four hours I was so at a loss at what to do with myself that I decide to paint our basement - and it's a BIG basement. We're still in the process of finishing it.

Jennifer, we have a really big basement, too. Next time you finish a book, um… well, we can talk later.

After Jennifer politely refused to paint my basement, I asked her about her own wedding, and if any of her true-life experiences might have contributed to her book. Here's what she said:

My wedding was definitely not a nightmare. I've got two words that sum up why we had such an awesome time at our wedding - wedding planner. This guy handled everything. You could say we had a "destination" wedding because we got married in Scottsdale, AZ where my parents lived, but we were living in Chicago. We made a trip to Arizona to meet with the wedding planner over Thanksgiving and when April rolled around all I did was show up and look pretty. I was pretty laid back about stuff, didn't care what kind of flowers I had or anything. We're not a terribly formal people, so although the wedding was "elegant" it wasn't by the book. We got married outside in a garden, wrote our own vows and didn't do any of the traditional wedding stuff like feed each other cake or have him remove my garter (ok, so I wasn't even wearing a garter). Honestly, I don't even think I had the something-borrowed-something-blue thing going on. The song that preceeded the wedding march was a Tesla tune - one of our favorite acoustic hair-metal songs from the late 80's that was our own private joke.

A peek behind the scenes of what's sure to be a best seller. DRESS REHEARSAL has garnered great reviews from everywhere, so you should all definitely check it out.