I want to bang my head against a wall - registry office photography

I started looking for someone to photography my registry office wedding about 3-4 months ago.  I made serveral international phone calls and finally found who I thought was the perfect guy.  We worked out a price and he asked me to email him before I made my next visit to the UK (in June, which he knew) and we'd work out a time to meet up, see some work, and sign a contract if we were still interested. 

So I emailed him.  June 22 (when I land) is getting close and I wanted to make a time to meet up.  He emails back, can't do it, the first week of April 2006 is the only time he will get to go on vacation with his wife.  I went through what seems like *thousands* of photographer's websites, sent serveral emails, and made an ungodly amount of phone calls.

I feel like what we want is simple.  Show up at registry office in London 15 minutes before the ceremony, take pictures (absolutely NO posed, I don't want to know that anyone besides friends is there) for about three hours during service and after as I want to kinda wonder the streets (Tower Bridge, etc) with our friends to get some pretty shots.  Then leave.  AND I'm getting married on a freaking Wednesday afternoon (hopefully 3:45-6:45pm for photos) so it's not as though I'm asking someone to take a less profile, less paying job on a "typical" wedding day.

Thanks for listening to me vent!!

Well, I don't  think the fact that you want something 'simple' will really affect the fact that the photographer is on vacation that week... unless I misunderstood your post (I got a bit confused anyway).

http://www.spillerphoto.fsnet.co.uk/homeframe.html

I make no guarantees - just thought you might want to see if he's available.  He's a friend of ours (though we haven't seen him and his wife in a while...must get in touch...) and he took brilliant photos at our wedding, even though he wasn't our "official" photographer.

Good luck.