Rush at the civil registry office!

We seem to be following a trend: fixing an appointment at the civil registry office (read: Standesamt / Byfogden) is not something you "just do"..
Six months in front of the date you would like to marry, you can save the date. August being an "it-month" to get married in combination with awful opening hours led to this strange situation on February 22nd in Düsseldorf: the both of us, tired as one would expect at 07.10h in the early morning, standing in a freezing cold queue in some side street behind 40 (!) other couples that wanted to reserve the same date as we did...
Thanks to great connections (*sending a big hug to Gerresheim @ Mathias big sister Kerstin*) we were able to reserve our date of choice: Friday August 20th, 14.00 hours!


PS: the office opened at 07.30h (sharp), at 07.40h all appointments on Saturday were gone, at 08.10h all appointments on Friday. We were the third couple reserving a date on Friday :)