Driving without AC

Fortunately, I had some time over the recent holiday weekend to do a little wedding location browsing in the Indiana countryside. Unfortunately, my car's leaked out all of its Freon, or whatever, so I had no air condition to enjoy while I did it. Tragedy.

Still, I braved the 90+ degree heat and explored areas to the east and south of town that it probably would have taken me months or years to see otherwise. There are some very cool places down here, lots of state forests and parks and a couple really cool-looking (literally and figuratively) lakes that I passed, just in the 20 miles to either direction of Bloomington. As for wedding places, everything I saw was really nice: good facilities, air conditioned banquet rooms, and lots of parking (key). But several of the places were pretty expensive to rent and hire for catering too, more expensive than the ambiance & AC seemed to dictate, and most of the fairly inexpensive options didn't really bring much to the table -- the kind of oomph it would take to surpass a place with personal history/connections like Mapleridge, PA (or whatever I called it).

But there were two places that I really liked, and I still haven't checked out the science museum since there was a crafts fair downtown and the idea of driving there and finding parking just did not seem appealing.

The first is another golf course, Hawk Poke (he he, I like that pseudonym), with a really nice building dedicated to hosting events. The building had big glass picture windows out to the course and the surrounding woods, was separate enough from the clubhouse for a bit of privacy, and just generally appealed to me a lot. The catering there isn't that expensive, but I still don't know whether they have a building rental fee aside from the catering. If they don't or if it's reasonable, then Hawk Poke is definitely in the running. Otherwise, not.

Melissa Restaurant is also an option - it's tough to describe the ambiance there, but I liked it a lot too. Sort of an elegant cottage feel, at least to most of the facility that I could see. I need a lot more information about them before they're solid, though. I've got everything on pricing, but I couldn't see in the windows that well on Sunday.

Ah, that reminds me.

This has not been a particularly dignified process. In Clarion, at least, my mom and I knew roughly what each of the places we were scoping out was like. If we'd wanted to, we could have called and made appointments to talk to their event coordinators (it seems like absolutely everything that could possibly hold a wedding has one. Why do people need their own wedding coordinator when everywhere comes with one? But I haven't really gotten to that stage yet, so maybe I'll find out?). Anyway, we just didn't want to spend that much time so we just dropped by.

Well, I had about 3 times as many places to check out in Indiana as in Clarion, just because I didn't know enough about anywhere to eliminate it without looking first. And there was no way I was going to make appointments to talk to someone, probably for over an hour, about table settings and God-knows-what, if I knew within 30 seconds of walking in the door that I didn't like the place.

The end result being that all these scopings-out were about as sketchy as possible. With two exceptions, I drove up to the place, parked in any shade I could find, and proceded to walk around the building or inside, as it seemed appropriate, with my camera and a notebook, taking pictures of everything and peering in windows. I peered into the restaurant I mentioned (it was closed), sketchily wandering around back entrances and onto porches while my car sat in an empty parking lot. I parked in a "future tenets only" spot outside a rentable clubhouse thing and walked into multiple areas that I later discovered were marked "PRIVATE," taking pictures through dark windows the whole time.

At two places, both golf courses coincidentally, I actually talked to receptionist-type people who gave me permission to wander around, and some guidance. I even talked to the event coordinator at one; she ushered me around the set up for a wedding there later that afternoon. That was great, actually, because I never would have plucked up the courage to do that on my own.

The worst, though, was my visit to Bloomington's private country club, where I parked in a packed parking lot and proceded to wander around as usual. I immediately felt underdressed, because the club (like many private golf clubs) had a dress code of collars and shorts-lengths that I was obviously violating in my sweaty t-shirt and non-IZOD shorts. Still, I persevered and wandered into the (blessedly air conditioned) clubhouse, then onto the outside porch. The room off this 2nd-story porch was cleary the banquet room (I hadn't seen it inside), but the lighting was such that I couldn't see inside very well from any sort of distance. I approached the windows to do a little peering and I realized that there were people inside. Waitstaff and so on, many of whom were looking at me rather oddly. I smiled and walked away. Quickly. I still snapped a few pictures before I left, though.

And as I was heading to the parking lot, I realized that lots of people were arriving in Sunday-church-clothes, obviously for the event I'd just been peeping-toming. Good time for an escape.

Now, though, it looks like the sketchy wanderings are over; I'll probably actually contact people at Melissa's Restaurant and Hawk Poke, now, and definitely for the WonderLab. It really is amazing, though, what I've already done for this wedding. And all by trying to keep things simple. Hopefully this is the craziest I'll get?