"Are you changing your name when you get married?"

Today I happened to see an article that kind of offended me. Click here to see it – it’s by a writer who seems to think she’s progressive and modern. I just think she’s judgmental and bossy.

Faith Salie makes the argument that women should not change their last names when they marry. It’s her opinion that the practice is sexist and women are giving up their identities when they give up their last name. She gives several examples of famous women who go by their maiden names as “proof” that this way is better, such as Mariah Carey and Vera Wang. Okay…

My opinion? It’s a personal choice. I’m not going to change my name because my fiance asks me to, nor will I because my father asks me to. And I’m certainly not going to do something just because a humor writer says I should. That decision is my own.

Anyone who knows me, knows that I'm fairly liberal with feminist views. And I am 90% sure that I’m going to change my last name when I get married next year. I’ve thought about it quite a bit. That 10% of hesitation is there because I do have a problem with the man being the one to always keep his name. But really, I dislike that just as much as a child always taking his or her father’s name. It’s the same problem, and they’re both equally sexist.

My main reason for wanting the same last name as my husband has to do with us being a family. We do want children, and I want all of us to share a name. I think that makes a lot of details easier and it’s just something I want for our future family.

To my reasoning, Salie says “Um, nuh-uh. Did your grandmother have the same last name as you? Was she still your Nana?” No, biatch. But my mother does have the same last name as me. Duh.

James doesn’t care what name I use. He recognizes that it’s completely up to me and that’s how husbands should treat the decision.

My whole point is that a person’s name is his or her own choice. I can do what I want. And you, Faith Salie, can do what you want. We all have that freedom and to judge other people on their choice is just petty and divisive.

P.S. - After I'm married please don't call me Mrs. James K. I have a first name. It's Chardonnay K. I do feel that calling someone Mrs. Husband's name does remove her identity. It says that all she is, is that little "s" after "Mr." Just personal preference.

More wedding appointments

Next weekend we're headed to Santa Cruz once again to take care of some exciting (to me) wedding-related tasks.

We're meeting with an officiant - I realized I better take care of that since that's the one thing you actually 100% need to get married! I really like her from talking on the phone. She seems cool and like we'll get along great, which I think is important. I want her to genuinely be able to say something nice about us at our wedding ceremony, and have a personal connection.

I also tried to meet with another woman who I thought I liked, but she must not want our business. After some phone tag and emails back and forth, I said "Let's meet Saturday at 9 a.m. What's a good location to meet?" No response... ever... kind of unprofessional.

James and I agreed that our ceremony will be secular (like us) and our officiant must be willing to perform same-sex ceremonies. I know to some people it seems silly since we're not a same-sex couple, but it's a very important matter of principle to both of us. We don't want to give our money or trust our ceremony to someone who does not believe in equal rights as we do. Finding an officiant who met these requirements wasn't hard at all.

And, since we're in town, we also made some cake tasting appointments (free cake!). I'm bringing these photos to give them an idea of what we want:

Source

We'll also visit our ceremony site to scope out some details like parking (while enjoying the view). Have you seen the view? So excited that we're getting married here!

We'll also eat lunch at our reception site most likely. It should be a fun, busy Saturday!

Photo Friday: Halloween

Since last weekend was Halloween (and I didn't dress up), I'm posting pictures from Halloweens past. I don't dress up every year, but these are my favorites:

2008 - Flapper! I wish I had a better picture of the whole get-up, which included fishnet stockings, awesome flapper dress, pearls, clutch, feather boa, long gloves and headband.

This is a full-length shot, but I wasn't wearing most of the accessories.

Halloween 2008 was spent at a club with some friends from work.

I'm cutting friends out of these pictures, as I feel kind of weird about posting pictures of them where they probably don't even know about it.

2006 - Wilma Flintstone! I made my dress out of a ghost costume - I cut it into the right shape.

This was the first Halloween James and I were dating. He refused to dress up as Fred Flintstone. So lame.

I loved this costume, especially the fact that I made it all myself, including the Wilma necklace.

Halloween 2006 was a house party at the apartment of some good friends.

My idea for next year is a retro chick, kind of like this:

I'm sure I can find a totally groovy dress at a secondhand store, and some fugly accessories at the mall!

Thankful Thursday: Short commute

Living 2 miles from your office is great! I am so thankful for my short, 10 - 12 minute commute each day.

Most days I get to go home for lunch, which is great because I usually am too lazy to pack something for lunch in the morning. And I can’t go out for lunch every day; it’s just not budget or diet-friendly!

I realize that someday I won’t have this luxury, and that makes me sad. We want to buy a house in a year or two, and unfortunately probably can’t afford a home in our wonderful centrally-located neighborhood.

For now I’ll savor it and be thankful!

Best Buy update

Remember my post from last week about Best Buy’s horrible customer service? I sent the message to the company’s Customer Service, Public Relations and Community Relations departments, and I also sent it as a reply when they spammed me with sales emails. I was hoping that getting my story in front of all those people would cause someone to realize that their behavior was unacceptable.

It worked! Monday afternoon I received a voicemail from the manager of the Sacramento (Arden) Best Buy store saying that she’d like to talk to me about my complaint and get my mailing address to send my refund! I will say that she was polite and apologized for the way I was treated.

I’m still never, ever shopping at Best Buy again, as this situation never should have happened in the first place. But I appreciate that my complaint was addressed and I’ve received the refund I wanted.

My money order came in the mail today. I feel so vindicated!

Photo Friday: Deviled eggs

Today we're having a Halloween party at work, and everyone's bringing an appetizer. I made deviled eggs.

Here's the recipe I used (omitted horseradish).

I'm not really into Halloween this year... mostly because I'm too excited about Thanksgiving! But anway - Happy Halloween!

Thankful Thursday: Quality time

Today I'm thankful for spending lots of time with my sweet fiance, James!

If you don’t know us, you might not know that he is still a student. He’ll graduate from his Physical Therapy Assistant program in May. I’m excited about this for several reasons – one of them being that we’ll have lots more quality time together!

I met James when we were both students at Sacramento State. We both graduated with our Bachelor degrees in 2008, and the following semester he started the PTA program – which only offers night classes.

For over a year (the whole time we’ve lived together) he’s been gone until approximately 10 p.m. Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and sometimes Thursdays! I’m forced to entertain myself after work… but that’s coming to an end!

Next week marks the beginning of his externship, when he’ll be working in a clinic 40 hours a week with normal business hours. Then after work we’ll get to hang out together, yay!

I’m thankful for the conclusion of this education journey for many reasons. More time, more money, more opportunities… lots of good things are happening.