fight the power

So I was reading an article today about Danica McKellar (aka Winnie Cooper of the Wonder Years, and Elsie Snuffin if you're as big a West Wing fan as I am and stuck it out past season 5.). She has her PhD (I think) in math and is otherwise just a crazy-smart super-nerd. She wrote a book called Kiss My Math aimed toward tween girls, to get them to believe that it's okay to be smart and not just boy-crazy. She was on the Today show this morning and explained that "she wanted to put math in terms girls could understand, like boys and popularity." (Then Al Roker told her he would have been more interested in math if his teacher looked like her. Sigh.)

So my internal question is this: can you fight the problem if you're still kind of buying into it?

I am a little conflicted about a lot of wedding planning. On the one hand, I really want to have an amazing gathering for all of our friends and family. And I know people can do that for pennies on the dollar, but you know what? I can't. I don't want to ask my family to cater or do flower arrangements. I don't want to DIY my invitations. Hell, I don't really want to DIY anything. I am not that crafty.

On the other hand, though, I don't want to buy into this idea that you have to have a fancy caterer and flower arrangement and the best invitations. I don't want to, but I totally have.

I read somewhere that the average cost of a wedding in the US these days is somewhere in the neighborhood of $30,000. Particularly in this economy, it's hard not to think about all the "better" places that money could be going. But I guess at the end of the day, I'm only doing this once and I want it to be perfect. We're not extravagant people, and our wedding won't be either, but I have definitely bought into a lot of things that I didn't think I would and I'm not totally comfortable that I have. I guess the uneasiness is probably a good sign--I think if I were spending this much money willy-nilly, someone should probably have stopped me by now.