h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Well, we survived it all and now I'm back.

The wedding was a superb day, I had great fun. Even the service is a lot more interesting when you're up the front and taking part . The wedding went mostly smoothly, and the reception venue came up trumps after appearing worryingly incompetent in the weeks leading up - as it was, they only played the wrong music and screwed up the seating arrangements (top table was OK, so we didn't notice until the meal was half-way through, and then there didn't seem a lot of point moving everyone). People mostly muddled through; the main concern was Gurhan, whose English isn't wonderful so separation from his wife Ayse had the potential for disaster, but even he was smiling.

The honeymoon was memorable - two lovely but very different homes, one very chic and sophisticated nestled in the woods outside Siena, one very rustic perched on a dramatic mountainside North-East of Pisa. We had a superb time at both, though Mother Nature's footsoldiers (some with more feet than strictly necessary) did sometimes seem determined to eat us alive or scare us to death.

So, now it's phase three of the life readjustment - I've dropped a job and gained a wife, all I need is a new home in a new country. Our house in County Galway is waiting for us to move in, and things can start to settle down. I'll almost miss the upheaval.
 

Gary - if you want to relive some memories of Florence and Pisa I have put up some of mine and Doug's pictures on http://www.h2g2.com/A183070 . Thanks for the advice about the Uffizi - we got tickets the day before and bypassed all of those long queues