Mr. John Eklund, of Charlotte North Carolina, is pleased to announce that he has elected a bride to share the rest of his life with.

"You don't know her," Eklund announced to a room that suddenly became very hushed. "Just kidding! It's Erin!" he later exclaimed and the crowd roared with delight.

Ms. Erin Bryan, also of Charlotte North Carolina and oddly enough the very same mailing address as Eklund, is the bride-to-be.

"John who?" Bryan said recently at a formal dinner party, "OHHH! That John! Yeah, we're engaged! He's my groom-elect!"

Sources close to the couple say that despite the jokes, they are extremely happy and excited about getting married.

No date has been set, but the couple will likely marry in their hometown of Shreveport, LA. A web site is expected at johnanderin.com.

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Though this news might not classify as "breaking" and though my mention here might be considered "tardy" I did get engaged on August 22 while at home in Shreveport for Rusty's wedding.

The day before Rusty's wedding I took Erin to Norton Gardens and we had a picnic, as we had done so many times in the past but hadn't done lately since we live 13 hours away. After we finished we walked to the bridge over the pond with the fountain and I asked her to marry me. She said she'd think about it and put it in her Palm Pilot to revisit the idea in a few days. Actually she said yes right away, which was good because my contingency plan was to push her in the pond. =)

Rusty's wedding was a great time too and I'll post some pictures of that in the near future.

The trip home was great and wonderful and I don't think I've ever been more tired in my life. We had a lot of late night fun in the nights leading up to the wedding and all in all enjoyed ourselves entirely too much.

And I got engaged.

This past Tuesday night me and my fiancee went to the John Mayer/Counting Crows concert and it was amazing. John Mayer was great but the Counting Crows blew me away. They did most of the set acoustically and it was incredible. They are a great live show with a ton of energy and emotion. I'd definitely go back and see them again. Though hopefully the next time the people around us won't be as stupid (Like the two grown women behind us who held an ENTIRE conversation for the full 3 hours of the show, yelling because the weren't smart enough to actually sit next to each other and apparently not noticing the concert going on that oh, yeah, wasn't cheap. Or the drunk chick two rows in front of us who was rocking really really hard to songs that weren't rock - Counting Crows - mellow songs, mellow lyrics, nothing to head bang over here. Luckily she passed out for John Mayer.)

P.S. Wedding planning is hard!