The 18 Reasons Why 2012 Was The Best Year Ever

Without question, 2012 was the greatest year of my life. And, well, our lives. Bridget and I became "The Briddons" in March and it's been nine months of growing closer. That's not to say we both aren't the same independent (and very different) people we were in 2011, but most sentences now begin with "We." So, in looking back on 2012, here are the 18 things that made it our best 366 days ever:

1. We celebrated five wonderful weddings -- including our own -- with friends and family. We may be biased, but we think ours was the best.
2. We never have to deal with the stress of planning our wedding again.
3. We ran a half marathon.
4. We're healthy.
5. We -- and Oscar -- survived the great hambone disaster of 2012. (In short, my mom, excitedly gave Oscar a hambone, which he excitedly devoured. We all smiled and laughed. Then we realized dogs are never, ever supposed to eat cooked bones. It was a tough and fairly disgusting couple weeks.)
6. We locked up our love on the Seine River in Paris.
7. We stayed in the nicest hotel room ever in Enniskery, Ireland. There was a damn TV in the bathroom mirror. In the mirror!
8. We enjoyed a week of paradise -- and ate about eight pounds of ribs and sushi -- in sunny Mexico.
9. We sat on a riverbank on a glorious sunny day in Breckenridge, Colorado, which, for my money, is the nicest town in the United States.
10. We bought a leather couch. (Weeks ago, Bridget and I decided it was best to wait until next Christmas to make the purchase. So, naturally, I'm staring at it in our living room right now.)
11. We saw the Lumineers, The Head and The Heart, Bon Iver, and Ben Harper -- four of the best concerts in recent memory.
12. We won the New Yorker Caption Contest. (One of the coolest things about this was when the guy at the framing store let out an unsolicited laugh when we brought it in.)
13. We went to a San Francisco Giants game, a Red Sox game, a Patriots game, and a Celtics playoff game. (Mike went to the Celtics game, but, you know, the whole our thing.)
14. We booked our one-year anniversary weekend at the Chatham Bars Inn. 
15. We went to Cambridge, 1 and West Side Lounge a whole bunch of times.
16. We got a MacBook Air and an iMac. (We really, really like Apple products.)
17. We started a blog. This is our 42nd post.
18. We were fortunate enough to do the first 17 things.

We only hope that 2013 can somehow rival 2012. It's a tall order, but if Kanye and Kim Kardashian can make it, hell, anything is possible. Happy New Year, everyone!

The Futility of Spending Limits at Christmas

This is the third Christmas Bridget and I have spent together. And every year, the same question gets tossed around starting in early November: How much should we spend on each other this year?

In our three yuletide seasons, I've learned two very important things:
1. We are great at setting spending limits.
2. We are absolutely horrible at sticking to spending limits.

Now, we always have the best intentions. And we're both fairly resourceful and careful with our cash. But for whatever reason, we really, really suck at this.

Take last year, for example. We set our limit at $200, which seems completely reasonable for a couple. Think of all the great stuff you can get for $200! A little weekend getaway in the winter. Lots of nice, warm, stylish clothes. Tickets to a Celtics game or a concert. There are plenty of options. So, of course, we went with diamond earrings and a vacation to Ireland. The trip, obviously, was way more than $200. And so were the earrings -- that is, until Bridget finds out they are cubic zirconia.

This Christmas, the same thing has happened. Realizing that we took several big trips this year and, you know, got married, we were going to take it easy to the tune of a $100 limit. And we really tried. At least I know I did. I spent a lot of time thinking about it. I looked around online for hours. Heck, I even went to a couple brick-and-mortar stores. (Imagine!) In a nutshell, I failed. Miserably. And while I haven't unwrapped her gift to me, I know she failed miserably, too.

This all leads me to a simple question: Why? Is it because we are greedy people who love material things? No. Is it because, as my friend Jesse said the other day, you really can't buy anything for 100 bucks nowadays? Maybe. Is it because this is the last year we're going to have extra disposable cash? That could be it. (Read: Mothers, Bridget is not pregnant. I repeat: Not pregnant. We're just assuming life will be much different next year. Again, not pregnant.) But I think the real reason is -- and get ready for the corny line here -- we're really, really in love. Getting a gift that is "good enough" just isn't good enough. We both feel the need to go above and beyond.

Will there be years when we can't go nuts with gifts? Probably. Will someone need braces or money for a hospital bill or a college education? Most likely. But those years, when we actually stick to a limit, we'll look back at these years and smile. And then probably find a way to break the limit again.

The (Stupid) Top of the Wedding Cake

From the title of this post, it's pretty easy to see where I'm going here. I also considered going with "I Want My Damn Freezer Back," but that didn't seem to be descriptive enough.

No matter how you say it, the tradition of keeping the top of the wedding cake until your first anniversary is silly. It needs to be retired immediately. No, yesterday. Or maybe even a year ago so I wouldn't be stuck angrily fitting things into our tiny freezer every Sunday for the last eight months.

Like many couples, we saved the top tier of our cake after our wedding in March. Covered in wrapping, foil, and probably like a veil or something girly, it has dominated the freezer space ever since. And every time I go in there to put away some ice cream, chicken wings, frozen dinners, or freeze pops, it taunts me. "Ha," it says. "I'm huge and annoying, and you can't get rid of me."

I've pleaded with Bridget several times to do something about this:
Me: "Hey, this cake thing is dumb. What if we just save one piece and share that?"
Bridget: "No."
Me: "Why not? It's not going to taste good anyway. It's going to be gross."
Bridget: "Because it's tradition and it will make me happy."

End of conversation.

The "make me happy" argument will get me every time. But tradition? Come on. What does that even mean? I decided to look it up and, on the Bridal Guide website, I found this:

Origin: To understand this tradition, you just have to think back to a familiar schoolyard rhyme: “First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes the baby in the baby carriage!” It used to be thought that once a wedding took place, a baby was going to come shortly after, so therefore the wedding and christening ceremonies were often linked, as were the respective cakes that were baked for each occasion. With fancy, elaborate, multi-tiered wedding cakes becoming a major trend in the 19th century, the christening cake began to take a back seat to the wedding cake. Since the top tier of the wedding cake was almost always left over, couples began to see the christening as the perfect opportunity to finish the cake. Couples could then logically rationalize the need for three tiers — the bottom for the reception, the middle for distributing, and the top for the christening.

Today: As the time between weddings and christenings widened, the two events became disassociated and the reason for saving the top tier changed. Now, couples enjoy saving the top layer of their wedding cake to eat on their first anniversary as a pleasant reminder of their special day.

"As a pleasant reminder of their special day?" Seriously? What are the pictures for? Plus, it's only a year. If you forget your wedding day after a year, you probably have bigger problems than the top of a cake.

Sure, when March 31, 2013, rolls around, I'll take a (small) bite. And yes, it will be nice celebrating one year of marriage. But mostly, I'll celebrate the return of space in my icebox.