Be sure to note Judd Nelson's shoulder in the poster for The Breakfast Club in the background.
(Photo scanned from the Northwest Herald)
We knew we'd be in the paper. Amy had received a call from the Herald for a story on couples and their first year of marriage. That'll teach us to put our wedding announcement in the paper. When the reporter found out how we'd met, you could fairly see her eyes light up, even over the phone: "Oh, let me give you to Jennifer. She's doing a Valentine's Day story on interesting ways that couples met."
The week of the 7th, we each talked on the phone to the reporter, giving our little story, and on Wednesday the 10th, Andy snuck away from work to get photographed by the charming & delightful Chris Birks. He posed us atop Amy's desk, fairly embracing her monitor, snapping pictures at an alarming rate on his droolworthy digital camera.
So now it was the 14th, and we had to trek out to get the Sunday paper. We stood there at the entrance to Jewel laughing and being vaguely embarrassed. We were one of three couples spotlighted in the story, but we were also on the front page, in all our 6"x9" glory.
The story follows, with our comments after each paragraph:
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Be sure to note Judd Nelson's shoulder in the poster for The Breakfast Club in the background. (Photo scanned from the Northwest Herald) |
Andy: My first thought was that there probably WAS a site called computerlove.com, and it sure sounded like a porno site. Then, even worse, we thought that maybe it was a dating website, and people would think we met there. Fortunately, although the name computerlove.com is taken, there's not a website up.Amy Coughlin, 29, and Andy Lester, 31, met cyberstyle in 1996.Amy: God forbid they should use that space to publish our actual website addresses.
Andy: "Cyberstyle?"Coughlin was surfing the Web, looking for information about a popular music group. She found the website of another fan who mentioned the band.Amy: Grosser.
Andy: The band in question was the BoDeans.The fan, a woman in Idaho, linked her page with her brother's website. The brother was Lester, Coughlin's future husband.Amy: It sounds like I was looking for the Osmonds. Why didn't they just say BoDeans? Because the plebians wouldn't understand?
Andy: It's not like Waukesha is too far away.
Andy: This paragraph is very convoluted. She should have just said that "the site was Lester's sister's.""I've never gone into chat rooms, but this guy seemed really nice so I e-mailed him thinking he lived in Idaho," Coughlin said. "I didn't expect anything to happen."Amy: I never thought about Cinda as a "woman in Idaho."
Andy: "My woman in Idaho / She makes me sing."
Amy: I won't take the stand on the statement that I've never been in chat rooms.The pair discovered they lived just 2 miles from each other in Palatine and quickly made a date at a local record store.Andy: Fortunately, the 5th Amendment covers that.
Andy: QUICKLY! WE MUST MAKE A DATE! HURRY!"He made it clear he was dating other people and I wouldn't be his girlfriend, but I knew he would like me if he got to know me," Coughlin said.Amy: "Local record store?" Followed by a trip to Pop Tate's Choklit Shoppe for a malted.
Andy: And Rolling Stones Records is hardly local to Palatine.
Amy: "Can I be your girlfriend? Starting today?"Lester and Coughlin continued to e-mail but also continued to date other people. Then Lester had a change of heart.
Andy: I wonder who else we dated?"At one point, I went to visit my sister in Idaho and planned to make it a short vacation, but I stopped at a truck stop in Montana to call her (Coughlin) because I realized I really missed her," Lester said. "That was it."Amy: I wonder if they were fun?
Andy:To answer my brother-in-law, it was a TA truck stop, but I don't even remember what town. I remember I had a big plate of roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy and green beans, as I sat talking to Amy on the little phone they have in the booth.The couple married last June and now live in McHenry. Coughlin is a high school teacher and Lester designs computer programs for Follett Software.
Andy: It's disturbing how they refer to Amy as Coughlin, even though she's taken my name, and refused to give it back. I'm also amused that I design computer programs, since I haven't done that for three years."He's a computer geek," Coughlin said. "He helped my grandma buy her first computer and set up her own Web page."Amy: The computer programs you design, are they nice?
Amy: Both of my grandmothers have been dead for decades. I never knew them. But I'm sure they'd both enjoy creating websites about... well... Irish things.Lester said: "You know, I didn't have that page to pick up chicks, I wasn't patrolling. It was completely unexpected. I didn't see it as mystical but now I know we're a good team."Andy: I did help Amy's mom buy a computer, but that was mostly just fending off Best Buy drones who wanted us to buy the extended warranty. And I certainly didn't help anyone set up a web page.
Andy: "Patrolling?" Me and the local constabulary. The actual word I used was "trolling." But it is true that Amy and I are a good team.So that's our moment of glory. It can't be too glorious, since nobody recognized us the three times we bought copies of the Herald today.