I don’t suppose all you people who pop on to MrsPhysics to download the compendia, or view the past papers have the slightest interest in my life: but I’ll just post what has happened over the last few months, it will clear out my need to get it all out! I will do this by copying an email I wrote to the Forth and Clyde Canal Society after chartering a boat for our daughter’s wedding. Yes the daughter that named this site and got me the moniker “Mrs Physics”.
Ooh BTW a car in our area ,unfortunately a BMW car, has the registration number MR59PHY. If I had a spare stupid amount of money I would like that on my car, but it is a bit presumptious! I nearly stopped to speak to the man in said car at Wickes, but my bank balance has dropped by a considerable amount. So if you do see it around it isn’t me. I mean do I give the impression I’d drive a BMW!
Boat Trip
Please accept my utmost apologies for not writing before now to thank the FCCS for the Voyager charter for our daughter’s wedding on 6th August. Things have been quite chaotic as you’ll see.
Anyway please pass on our utmost thanks for the unforgettable trip. The guests all had a memorable time and now can look back with fondness and laughter. Chartering the boat was certainly an excellent way for the guests to mingle and get to know each other as part of the whole day, and I highly recommend it as a way of getting guests to a canal side venue.
I’ve never been to a wedding however, where the bride and groom were waiting for the guests to arrive because the majority of guests had been on transport together that had broken down. I must say that the guests did walk towards the venue like they’d just escaped some major catastrophe. However, I’ve seen the pictures and everyone was smiling and laughing on board, although I’ve not seen pictures of the crew.
One person onboard was very evasive about how he knew the couple but assured everyone the wedding wouldn’t start without them. It was therefore quite a shock when this same person whipped off his Harris tweed jacket and put on his regalia to start the service. He was the officiant! He broke the ice with a comedic reference to the boat trip and continued to entertain during the remainder of the ceremony. This also involved the near collapse of the canopy above the couple. This was partially expected and contingency Z was in place where the Matron of Honour did a Superman move and leapt forward to grab it before anyone really noticed. The mother of the bride took the other end and ensured no more movement. The best man was meant to take the other end but looked totally unaware of what was happening.
Why did we suspect the canopy might topple? Well the lead up to the wedding had been plagued with incidents, any one of which would have been hard to deal with, but these had built up into quite a story. We thought the day before the wedding our disasters were behind us but when the photographer arrived, on the morning of the wedding, later than he expected and obviously clearly in shock we knew we weren’t clear yet. Apparently he’d been involved in the nasty M8 crash where a motorcyclist had been knocked off his bike by a van returning to the inside lane. The photographer had needed to break and swerve to avoid running over the motorcyclist. Despite the obvious shock Gary James did a phenomenal job of capturing the day. He even took the couple out onto the canal path to take some lovely photos. The couple experiencing the typical Glasgow scenario where they met someone who’d collected his tinnies and commented on how lovely the couple looked. However, whilst up by the canal, the gate to the Engine Works closed shut and the photographer and couple were shut out of the venue. Unfortunately help was a long time coming as the bride had especially requested all phones be turned off. Luckily one of the guests had got the call and rushed passed everyone enjoying the canapes to declare they were on a rescue mission. We didn’t realise until much later it was the bride and groom.
So why were we not surprised by the boat breaking down?
Well it appeared to be the curse of the canopy. The first time the canopy was going to be built by the groom and his dad, the father of the groom had a heart attack and was in hospital for a couple of weeks. The second time it was going to be built by the bride, her dad and a friend, the friend’s boyfriend had a diabetic coma, in the friends flat in Glasgow. It was a rush to get someone with a key over to the flat to get the door open. He was found on the floor in a bad way. He was blue lighted to the Royal where he spent around 8 days in critical care. It later transpired the Drs had given him between half an hour to an hour before he would have had a heart attack.
That story could be told in much more detail, including the part where the groom’s parents were having dinner with the bride’s parents to sort the canopy but we’re duly dispatched after their last mouthful of roast beef to rush up the road to the hospital. There was also the part where a posse was sent out to pound the streets of central Glasgow to look for the guy’s car, which had indeed been ticketed. Glasgow Council did do the decent thing and cancelled the ticket when the bride explained the circumstances of why it was left 5 hours over the alloted time. There was also a funny part to that (well it is in hindsight, at the time it was pure scariness). The sick boyfriend hadn’t actually told his parents about the girlfriend, so over a hospital bed isn’t the best meeting venue. However, I happened to be a link via the Physics community. I therefore knew the brides friend, and the father of the sick man! So I took it upon myself to introduce them and it was the three of us that gallopped around the streets of Glasgow looking for the car. I must say I did feel like that picture of Christopher Robin dragging Winnie the Pooh along the road as I tried to keep up. As an addendum, everyone is tickerty boo now they’ve all met, and I’ll expect the role of “wedding planner” if things go well. 😁😂😍 Actually I shouldn’t expect any role in wedding planning given my luck so far.
Now fearing this canopy was cursed the mother of the bride took no chances when it came to her turn to build it. When she woke with tingling fingers, toes and face she called NHS24 who made an appointment to see the out of hours doctors at the local hospital. So off she set only getting 4 miles before large quantities of smoke started emanating from the engine bay. It was a further ½ mile before she could pull up safely in a layby and call the rescue people. They were fantastic and put customers care at the forefront and arranged a taxi to take her to hospital. Unfortunately, the taxi had been dispatched to some field in the middle of nowhere to collect her. She’d been reassured by a lovely lady on the phone that she’s informed the doctors she’d be late for the appointment and very grateful that the hospital receptionist had recognised her and said “Is that you Jennie?” The reassurance was just what was needed as she paced the layby for an hour and a bit. The cause of the tingling turned out to be a like overdose of vitamin B12, but the car was terminal. The car wasn’t rescued for another 2 days and went to the scrappy in the sky.
Then we’d had the mother of the bride dress incident. It had been bought on a whim in November 2024 and looked rather a knockout. A friend had offered to make a matching stole and had dyed silk and felt. In the time between the purchase of the dress and the wedding it no longer fitted. The bride had calmly suggested it could be let out but a wonderful woman who answered a Facebook plea suggested the bride was being a bit too kind and there wasn’t the hands width of material to let it out. So what was the solution? When the immediate depression lifted and the talk to the creative friend had been drafted a replacement dress expedition was arranged. Several shops were visited but they didn’t have the Summer wow of the original dress. Dieting wasn’t an option as it would have required two weeks of no food and limited fluids to possibly squeeze in, but the mother of the bride was unlikely to be compus mentis. There was also the matter that she had nearly 70 candles to personalise as wedding favours. The bride meanwhile had been scouring the internet and found someone in Gatehouse of Fleet who was selling the dress one size up, bought at the same bridal shop as the MOTBs original dress. So a day out was arranged, stopping at the bridal shop for a couple of back ups. The dress could be done up, and with much relief the MOTB began to relax. Another plea on FB also yielded a wonderful lady who made the dress fit a little better and is likely to become a good friend.
Then there was the celebrant incident. The celebrant had been booked at the start of the process, àlthough finding a religious celebrant had been tricky. When we read through the contract it appeared to be a blessing not a wedding. We were assured by someone, I can’t remember the circumstances, that our celebrant could be linked to our religious group and everything would be tickerty boo. It was a risk but everyone had been consulted and it all looked fine. The marriage schedule was lodged exactly 3 months prior to the wedding. All was going well until the paperwork was being dealt with. There were rumblings that our celebrant wouldn’t be linked. We’d had a zoom call with the celebrant so that we knew who he was, but the camera pointed to his chest and that was all we saw. He told us we’d recognise him as a 6’2” gent, I thought he meant tall, but later discovered he meant in circumference. Finally, it was confirmed, our celebrant would not be permitted to marry the couple. So we had a venue, the gear, food, a honeymoon but no marriage. The couple did well and sorted it in 24 hours, but with a cost of another £500. Another celebrant would legally marry the couple in a private ceremony at the venue in front of two witnesses and then the blessing could occur downstairs in front of the guests. We weren’t one of the witnesses but we could hear a lot of laughter coming from the print room where the legal marriage was taking place. We later found a video on Facebook in which Tina the Celebrant labelled it #quirkywedding and explaining that as the couple were exchanging rings downstairs they might want to exchange daggers. They took this to heart and exchanged 8 inch swords. I’m glad the father of the bride didn’t know he’d been driving around Glasgow and the Southwest with a couple of swords in the boot. The couple assured us later the daggers were legal but I wouldn’t put it to the test. Who sells these things?
I forgot to add this in to the incidents too. We are now on to the fourth print of the cover for the wedding certificate. This was to be an ornate design to put on the wall for the couple to remember their vows to one another. Mr Physics is a stickler for precision and after I used my fancy Cricut (pronounced cricket for some strange reason) to cut out a fancy metallic copper vinyl border we set to fixing it in to the frame. Now this was to be mounted over some lovely hand made teal and purple paper I’d had for years. These were the wedding colours. I realised that sticking the vinyl to the paper wasn’t going to work as it would rip the paper and I wouldn’t be able to transfer it properly. We came up with the solution to stick this to the perspex frame and use another piece of perspex from a spare frame to hold it all in place. So Mr Physics went about marking up a sheet of paper to line it up perfectly on the perspex and after quite some time we transferred the vinyl to the perspex. It looked pretty good if I say so myself. Then the problem started. We’d carefully determined prior to the transfer which side had the protective film over the perspex and carefully made sure that it wasn’t stuck to that side. However, when the protective film was removed from the back the perspex still looked cloudy. The protective film was on both sides of the perspex. So when the vinyl and film were peeled off the vinyl looked like it had been stuck to clingfilm. Back to Amazon to order another pack of 3 posh vinyl transfer sheets, only one of which was copper. Attempt 2 ought to have been better as we knew what we were doing, the protective film was off both sides, the paper that was marked up to align everything was still there. So another 40 minute wait for the Cricut machine to do its stuff and an evening “weeding”. This great name if the term for removing all those tiny bits of vinyl that you want to remove from the cutting. I think i was up until gone 23:30 finishing that part, but it was quite cathartic. Unfortunately the mistake we made this time was to use the expensive transfer tape and not the cheap one. Transfer tape is similar to stick back plastic, but with less stick. You place the transfer tape over the vinyl and rub it hard with various tools so the transfer tape causes the vinyl to peel off the backing film. The transfer tape is then carefully placed over the surface where you want to be the final resting place of the vinyl and then rubbing it off the transfer tape leaves it at its desired location. If you’re not following this you’ll need to look at some of the many Cricut workshop video tutorials online, I particularly recommend Jennifer Maker as a real pro. Anyway as we’d chosen the high quality stuff it did want to grip any surface it came in contact with and unfortunately, due to miscommunication and a lack of reach Mr Physics and I stuck it in the wrong place. As it was the high quality stuff I hadn’t been as meticulous at rubbing it firmly on to the transfer tape, resulting in a curled vinyl mess all over the perspex. (Picture the bowl of spagetti from Lady and the Tramp, and you’ve got the idea). Back to Amazon, another £14, and a growing collection of spare steel and black sheets, which I haven’t yet thought of a use for. This time we left it until the week after the wedding to make the frame. I got the cricut to cut it and sent it up with the groom with instructions on what to do with it when he got it home. I’ll let you know, but it this one doesn’t work the couple can come up with an alternative. By this time it would have been cheaper to have someone personalise and draw it all out for them.
Now this wasn’t all that was going on in the household at this time. The roofers had finally made an appearance after a wait of 19 months from the date of the quote. This was partly due to being in a conservation area and partly busy roofers. It appears expensive planning permission has to be obtained to change one roof to another when in a conservation area. The planners are very strict about what can be submitted so you can’t send in a photo of the roof and say that it will look like this but with new tiles. No, you have to spend a fortune getting an architectural technician to draw plans to say this is the roof before and after.
So the roofer came and set up the scaffolding about 4 or 5 weeks before the wedding. Eventually they took the poles away that were blocking the front door but only when they’d built things up quite high to take the load. Things were slow but going well, until 2 weeks in. The builders had stripped the roof but needed to reline it. This involved bashing galvanised nails through plastic and into the walls. Little did we expect them to come out the other side and leave what looked like bullet holes in a neat pattern down all the dormer wall. More excitement when the roofers had packed up on the Friday night and gone home and the rain started. It started outside but then it started inside in the spare bedroom with all the wedding stuff. Now I’d wanted an en-suite, but rather on my terms and not full of wet plaster. The roofer drove from his home 15 miles away, donned his waterproofs and climbed up on the roof. As he’d thought the plastic had made it to the top of the water pushing the water in through the roof. The water didn’t stop for hours but was reduced when husband drilled holes in the ceiling. Despite buckets and boxes over the drips the carpet was a soaked mess of fine wet plaster dust. The fan heater on for 48 hours dried the damp carpet but not the plaster dust stains. The following day another leak, this time over the dining room table. It took a long time to identify the source. There was a room upstairs, surely the rain wasn’t coming through two floors. The son realised it was caused by the bashing of the nails into the roof shifting the toilet cistern so that a large crack appeared and toilet water was pouring through the bathroom floor. We still don’t have an upstairs working toilet.
We’d had enough of the roofers and the portaloo plonked on the drive making manoeuvring off the drive tricky. They’d originally plonked it down out of the way by the garage but after being emptied it was dumped on the driveway reducing the width of the drive as it was leaning at 15 degrees. It finally got removed 2 weeks after the wedding 4 or more weeks after the roofers left and after I’d threatened ground rent. It was a lot less smelly than you’d imagine, especially as it was used as a public toilet to those using the park across the road.
The roofers finally moved up a couple of gears when the council let it be known that the road would be closed for up to three days, with no diversion. How can a road be closed? First it was Monday to Wednesday, then Tuesday, and finally Sunday. Some of the scaffolding was pinned in the road, so despite not being completely finished the scaffolding was taken down. It was the following Sunday, 4 days before the wedding that the road was closed. Luckily it was for a couple of hours and cars could get passed, although with a sticky coating on the base of the car.
I’m sure I missed out loads of incidents. I hope you’re glad I didn’t tell you before you set off for our charter as you might not have set off from Kirkby.
The key performance indicators have been completely, the couple are legally married and very much in love, we put on a very memorable wedding, and people had fun, RESULT!
27th August 2025
