Over at Gallery Place Living, contributor Columbo provides an illuminating rant on everyone’s favorite topic to whine about: D.C. government bureaucracy. In this case, specifically the arduous process of obtaining a marriage license in D.C. Before a lengthy recounting of the entire ordeal he and his fiancée went through to obtain a license to be wed in the District, Columbo summarizes the experience thusly:

Step 1: Discover bureaucratic nightmare that is DC.
Step 2: Get blood test for syphilis despite how crazy & outdated that is.
Step 3: Decide DC’s not worth it and get married in Vegas.

Check out the whole post for the all the details of his story, which does make the process, including the syphilis test and having to declare who your officiant will be even before you get the license, sound like a pretty big pain in the keister. In all, the blogger says you have to make minimum of 5 separate trips to get a marriage license from the District. And as one married DCist staffer points out, Columbo’s story even leaves out some of the finer points of frustration involved — like that if you want a minister from a non-DC church to do the ceremony, you have to get them licensed, which includes sending in notarized copies of church bylaws.

If you’ve been married or have ever tried to get married in D.C., be sure to answer our poll below.

Photo by Kyle Walton