not that you asked...

General whining and frustration

Can we talk about maternity clothes here for a second?

Today I dressed myself in what I assumed was a reserved, attractive, black toile shift dress that I purchased at a consignment store several months ago, before I was really showing, for $10. It looks relatively cute when I’m standing up. It inspired no less than five compliments from co-workers in the kitchen this morning as I stood at the counter toasting up my bagel. And even though I bought it weeks upon weeks upon weeks ago, it still fits relatively loosely and will probably accommodate me and the parasite fetus for another couple of weeks.

However.

I absolutely CANNOT sit down in it comfortably. I actually can’t even sit down in it MODESTLY. When I’m standing, the dress falls tastefully to my knees. But when I sit down? The hem hikes all the way up to my crotch. Now as far as I’m concerned, the only time I might need my general crotch area exposed to anyone or anything? It will be for a DAMN FINE REASON, like, oh, say, A BABY IS SHOOTING OUT OF IT.

I most certainly don’t need anyone here at work taking any type of gander at my (still non-maternity) underwear. Likewise, I also did not think that the drivers of the 25 dump trucks I passed on the way in this morning needed to see the generous expanse of milky white thigh I was unwillingly modeling from inside the car.

WHAT IS THE DEAL? Does anyone else have this problem? Why can’t someone design a maternity dress that accommodates the voluptuous and awkwardly shaped pregnant body while sitting AND standing? And presumably, without being floor-length and looking like it was designed by the Amish? As a result, here I sit, thankful that I keep a long black spring jacket in my cube. I used to keep it here because sometimes the office became intolerably cold. Now I am glad I’ve been keeping it here so I can drape it over my legs, therefore preventing me from flashing my private parts at anyone who stops by to chat.

[Update: I went home at lunch and changed clothes because I was so unbearably uncomfortable. This embarrasses me for some reason—I don’t want anyone in my office to actually notice that I changed clothes for some reason. I feel rather shameful about it. Therefore, I have told everyone who asked where my dress went that I had a major mustard incident at lunch. This is a complete and total lie, but I am okay with it. And yes, I would rather have people believe that I am totally inept when it comes to putting condiments on a sandwich rather than have them think I couldn’t handle three additional hours of wearing an uncomfortable dress.]

Also? I completely ran out of things to do at approximately 8:22 am. And that’s only six minutes after I got here. Which, incidentally, is about 16 minutes later than I’m SUPPOSED to be here. Thankfully no one ever notices that part.

But let me clarify: I am not talking about running out of REAL work. I actually ran out of REAL work—and by REAL work I simply mean anything I do here that contributes to the overall success and bottom-line of the company—about five working days ago. I simply mean that I have run out of ways to be entertained by the Internet. As a result, I am bored. I am grouchy. I am not entirely sure if I will be able to force myself to just sit here, at this desk, DOING NOTHING until 5pm this afternoon. Or tomorrow, for that matter.

And for the LIFE of me, I cannot even begin to imagine how frustrating this situation would be if this was January and I had returned to work on-site three months after the baby was born and somehow found myself paying someone $300 a week to take care of him just so I can sit here on my duff doing nothing.

AB. SO. LUTE. LY.

NOTHING.

There are certainly times when my services here are needed all day. But those times are far, far outweighed by long, empty, fruitless days where I spent an hour or so doing billable work and then wile away the rest of my time here reading blogs or shopping for diaper bags or padding our baby registries with superfluous crap that I will never, EVER have room for in our teensy tiny house and that no one in their right mind would even think about buying for us anyway. Also I sneak out some afternoons to the gas station across the street for a bag of cheese puffs and a ginger ale. But this only kills about 20 minutes and then my fingers are stained orange for the rest of the day.

And although I am tired of the boredom and the occasional feeling of uselessness, I need this particular job. I need its flexibility, I need its low stress level, I need the bi-weekly paycheck. I do feel extremely blessed that I have a relatively easy way to earn needed income shortly after having a baby. But right now? While this kid is still inside of me, kicking me in the ribs and producing a liter of waste a day and elbowing me in the bladder so that I have to run all hunched over to the bathroom? IT IS EVER SO BORING TO JUST SIT HERE.

I have high hopes for more interesting content as the weekend progresses. I promise. But until then, how’s about a little help from all y’all? Discovered any new, exciting blogs lately? Wasting time at a website you don’t think I’ve heard of? Are you shopping somewhere FABULOUS online and you’re dying to tell someone about it? Also, I’m in the market for a new desk for our office: where would you look online? I HAVE ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD, so be generous.

Tile removal and navel-gazing

   
Bathroom renovation: NOW IN PROCESS

Dave and I spent Saturday afternoon ripping out the bathroom sink, vanity and tile floor. We finished the job in just under three hours, which is exactly when I started thinking, hmmm, turns out the old bathroom wasn’t THAT bad after all. Except that I thought it out loud and well, let’s just say if looks could kill? Or even maim in a serious and efficient manner? Dave would be doing hard time in solitary confinement right about now. (And I would be helping myself to that box of Chewy Chips Ahoy that he threw into the grocery cart on Sunday afternoon even though I begged and pleaded with him not to. I may have already helped myself to a handful.)

   
Perfectly acceptable bathroom that is now GONE. GONE I SAY!

The bathroom process was pretty painless and efficient. I say this because I was not allowed to help in any constructive way except to remove the door handles from the vanity. Oh, and I got to carry the old medicine cabinet downstairs. The rest of the time, I simply watched Dave wrestle with countertops and caulking and 30-year-old tile. I did prove semi-useful when the World’s Largest Bathroom Mirror almost fell off the wall and onto Dave’s head by running three doors down to retrieve a male neighbor for help. Otherwise I was mostly in the way. I know this because Dave told me through clenched teeth approximately every 2.6 seconds. We’ll be removing the turlet and patching some holes in the floor this week before Dave leaves to go out of town for a wedding on Thursday, and then my dad is going to help me lay the new tile over the weekend.

So far the only surprise has been the condition of the walls—there is going to be a lot of patching and sanding and repainting, but I don’t see it being an insurmountable problem. Of course, this is primarily because I’m not planning on doing any of the patching and sanding myself. I will be standing in the hallway, wearing a dust mask and patting myself proudly upon the back for starting this project while in a very sensitive and delicate condition. It’s all been nothing but convenient for me.

The only downside to the renovation is that now Dave and I are sharing a bathroom. Which we have never, ever done in our entire married existence unless you count the times we’ve stayed at hotels and I honestly can’t be bothered to count those times because whenever Dave left toothpaste, hair gel and beard trimmings smeared all over the countertop at a hotel, a MAID came in to remove it. And she left fresh towels! Now I’M that maid. And I ain’t got no fresh towels.

Sunday night I took my first shower in Dave’s bathroom. And for the most part, I am not looking forward to my next shower in Dave’s bathroom. And that is simply because the water pressure in Dave’s shower is so terrifyingly forceful that I think if I ever had the courage to turn around and face the spray? IT WOULD FORCE THIS BABY RIGHT OUT OF MY BODY. It took about three seconds to wash the shampoo out of my hair and I think my scalp got bruised in the process. I always found my shower perfectly acceptable; now I realize that in comparison, the water pressure feels a bit like being peed upon. And for the record, I am ok with that. I think I would rather be peed on than frightened into keeping my eyes squinched shut during a shower because I am afraid that accidental contact with the water at such extreme pressure will force them back into my brain. I am thinking about wearing goggles in there tonight. (First I will be using them while I chop up an onion for dinner. And no, I am not kidding.)

The pregnancy continues to progress in disappointing directions. For starters, I am undeniably puffy. My wedding rings are becoming increasingly difficult to slip on and off and the only shoes that are comfortable are my running shoes (which must be tied very loosely) or my flip flops. (Which stink. And you cannot Febreeze flip flops. I know this because I have tried.) Yesterday morning my feet were so swollen when I woke up that it was actually painful to walk the six steps to the bathroom. THEY JUST WOULDN’T BEND. It was like walking with skis attached to the bottoms of my feet. It was also, in a word, gross.

But perhaps even more disturbing is the new status of my bellybutton. It hasn’t popped out necessarily; though it has developed what I would call an upper lip which you can see through the thinnest of my shirts. But that isn’t the weird part: the weird part is that the inside of my bellybutton (which until now I have never seen until now due to its cavernous, echoey depths) is BROWN.

Yes. Brown. As in, several noticeable shades darker than my skin tone. Almost like a birthmark. I showed Dave and my mom, who both agreed that it was weird and who also agreed that it was kind of nasty. Dave seemed to think it was because the skin there has never before seen the light of day. I dismissed this theory immediately because wouldn’t a lack of exposure make the skin there paler instead of darker? My mom’s suggestion, on the other hand, while certainly realistic, was also kind of distressing.

“Maybe you never cleaned it very well growing up,” she said.

I thoughtfully considered her point but then remembered that I had taken a shower in Dave’s shower the night before and NOTHING ABOUT MY BELLYBUTTON COLOR HAS CHANGED. If water pressure that could take paint off a wall can’t clean out my sad little brown bellybutton then NOTHING CAN. I am, as always, open to your suggestions and theories.

Who knew I had so much to just ramble on about?

Lately I’ve been taking some time to try and educate myself about the inevitable: birth, breastfeeding and the daily care of a newborn. I have absolutely zero desire to try and “wing it” when the baby gets here, so I’m trying to digest every morsel of information I can possibly get my swollen hands on. Because I don’t know the meaning of the word “moderation” and also because I WAS STARTING TO PANIC JUST A LITTLE BIT.

I’m starting to realize that the inevitable will be just that in a few short weeks. Hence, the cramming and the non-stop nesting urges. (Exactly how bad is said nesting urge? Only so bad that I spend much of my time here at work WRITING OUT TO DO LISTS THAT ARE CATEGORIZED BY ROOM AND CLEANING PRODUCT. Help!)

Something else interesting has occurred in the last week though: it appears that I have already developed some of the important coping mechanisms that I will be using when I am finally in possession of the small, helpless, poopy human being who is headed our way.

For instance, this morning? I needed something to wear to work. I have not done laundry in a while, presumably because I have been memorizing a 600-pound book about baby care during each and every waking minute. Simple, new-mom-worthy solution: Drag brown pants from laundry hamper, determine that they miserably fail sniff test, douse thoroughly with Febreeze (sometimes pouring is more effective than spraying), toss into dryer for 10-minute low-heat cycle and pray it removes general funky odor that has resulted from being buried under a wet pile of sweaty workout tank tops for the last five days.

Guess what? It totally didn’t work. My pants still kind of stunk of funk after I removed them from the dryer. And guess what else? I TOTALLY WORE THEM ANYWAYS. Because I’m gross and because I’m assuming that this is how I will need to function for the first three months of this kid’s life. And you know what? I’m totally okay with that. Totally. So totally okay with it that I’m telling the entire world via the Internet. HEY INTERNET! I STINK.

Also? I totally went grocery shopping the other night at my parents’ house. I came away with gobs of fresh fruit and a pound of leftover pulled pork and an entire bag of sliced cheese. (And I would have brought home candy except that I mindlessly ate three handfuls of M&Ms while standing there making small talk.) Because going to the REAL grocery store with an infant is going to be completely nervewracking, isn’t it? Exactly HOW do people do it without falling to a miserable heap on the ground at the thought of the baby getting germs or the baby starting to cry or the car seat maybe even FALLING OFF THE CART and into the produce aisle? Let me tell you, it is SO MUCH EASIER to just shop at the ‘rents. My dad even bagged everything up in a garbage bag and sent me on my merry way with the latest issue of Sports Illustrated. It was AWESOME.

In conclusion: I am making slow progress. Although today at my 31-week appointment they gave me a pre-registration form for the hospital so expect some sort of setback because seriously? This birth is happening so soon that they already need my insurance information at the hospital. GOOD. LORD.

Also at my appointment it was determined that my weight gain amounted to only one more pound over the past two weeks (surprising, what with those handfuls of M&Ms and the fact that I forced Dave to take me out for a gargantuan helping of frozen custard last night). We saw my favorite doctor in the practice, the one who looks like Star Jones and has no knowledge of an “indoor voice” and even though we heard her clearly approaching the exam room, when she opened the door and exclaimed “HELLO!” Dave jumped three feet out of his chair. And she found this absolutely hilarious. She graciously complimented me on my ankles (so far I am avoiding the dreaded CANKLES), told me I was doing FANTASTIC with my weight (total gain so far is somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 pounds and I kid you not, NO ONE is more surprised about that than me) and then asked how I fared on my three-hour glucose test, to which I answered, “Uh, hmmm. I guess I passed? No one called and I thought the office policy was no news is good news?” Yes, it all came out sounding like one big question.

This answer did not satisfy her so she went out in search of my results. And lo and behold WHAT DO YOU KNOW? Not only did I pass the glucose test, I passed with FLYING COLORS. “Why did they ask you to take the three-hour test?” she asked me. “Your levels are perfect.”

PERFECT. YES! Me! I know!

So Dave took me out to lunch to celebrate and I had a gigantic chocolate cookie and then I went home to let the dog out and figured I might as well take another belly picture for posterity’s sake. But I ended up having to take about 30 before I even managed to get my whole self into the picture and then I had to change shirts because whoever said that thing about horizontal stripes making you look enormous was SO RIGHT and then the next thing you know the only picture that turned out halfway decent involved the same shirt and necklace I wore the last time I gave you all a pictorial view of my enormous girth.

Let’s all just be glad you can’t smell me.


31 weeks, 4 days pregnant

Mmmmm, sausage

Sadly, for the last seven and a half months, I have been living in some kind of idiotic fantasy world where I considered myself completely immune to the regular rigors and challenges of the pregnant lifestyle. I prided myself on avoiding morning sickness. Save for that one time I forced Dave out of the house for stool softeners at 11pm, I have managed to keep both constipation and heartburn at bay. I haven’t needed a regular naptime. I haven't had to give up my daily exercise routine. Quite disappointingly, I haven't had to buy new bras to accommodate a newly-generous bosom. (It turns out that my bosom is rather stingy indeed.)

I honestly believed I would be one of those lucky ones who gets all the way to 40 weeks feeling great and by golly, I’d be looking it too!

Boy was I ever wrong.

These days I feel like I develop a new pregnancy symptom every six minutes. Today’s was particularly humbling: I was forced to leave the office barefoot to drive home for lunch because I couldn’t stuff my fat swollen sausage feet back into my shoes without wincing in pain. Oh people. I so wish I was making that up. I returned from my lunch hour sporting a pair of worn out Old Navy flip flops which do not meet appropriate dress code guidelines, not that it matters anyways because I can’t remember the last time I actually kept my shoes on once I got to my desk.

For the most part, I have been lucky enough to avoid unnecessary and potentially hurtful comments or belly rubbing from complete strangers. Yesterday, though, at the adjournment of a department meeting, my boss asked how the baby was doing while the rest of my co-workers were gathering up their things and leaving the room. I answered her that everything was going well, and that yesterday marked exactly two months until my due date. Which is when my retarded, asinine co-worker, WHOSE WIFE GAVE BIRTH LAST YEAR AND WHO WAS NEVER REALLY TINY HERSELF THANK YOU VERY MUCH, piped up with, “TWO MONTHS LEFT?! You’ve got to be kidding me! You look like you could have that baby tomorrow.”

And because I am polite and appropriate and also relatively well-educated on the subject of HOW TO ACT IN PUBLIC UNLIKE SOME PEOPLE, I did not kick him square in the gonads, although I really really wanted to and I think Dave did too after I told him what happened. There was also an incident in the office a few months ago where this really horrible woman gave me a lengthy speech about how she thought I was carrying a girl at first because of how my face had really filled out, but she is exactly the kind of woman you expect that kind of insensitivity from so I was neither surprised nor particularly irritated by her general insolence. But the unnecessary comment from someone who knows exactly what pregnant women are supposed to look like since he has been MARRIED TO ONE? Simply inexcusable and completely worthy of a serious gonad-kicking.

Nothing else much has happened in our simple little world. I wore myself out running errands on Saturday (lesson learned: go to Costco first thing, NOT LAST) but it was completely worth it as I found a shower curtain and matching towel ensemble at the Pottery Barn Outlet for the new bathroom that I love even more than I loved the alphabet one I touted here last week. Not only does it have dinosaurs on it, but it matches the current paint job in the bathroom perfectly, which means HURRAY! LESS WORK FOR ME. Dave and I meant to get started on the bathroom demolition this past weekend but uh… well, we didn’t. But now? Knowing that I now have a new shower curtain and adorable coordinating accessories that are anxiously awaiting their shiny new home? That should be more than enough motivation for me to get moving on this project this coming weekend.

Tomorrow is my 31-week appointment and I’ll bet you your first-born that I gained more weight than is doctor-recommended. Because I lost track of how many handfuls of M&Ms I consumed at my parents’ house over the weekend. Oh, OK, I know. I was never meaning to keep track in the first place.

30 weeks

Dear Baby Boy,

Time sure flies, doesn’t it? As of tomorrow, you will only have nine weeks left in that cozy little uterus of mine before I post your big, fat eviction notice. I know that the whole idea of being born and entering into a new, bright and shiny world where you'll be subjected to someone's really poor diaper-changing abilities (mine) in only nine short weeks sounds more than a little intimidating and probably a bit scary, but I assure you—as your MOTHER—that there are some really awesome things waiting for you on the other side of The Birth Canal.

Awesome things like me and your Dad (seriously, we're AWESOME), as well as all of your grandparents and great-grandparents and uncles and your one (loony) aunt. Things like the cozy and adorable little outfits that people just keep stockpiling for you. Things like toys and stuffed animals and play mats and yummy-smelling creams and lotions and this awesome little bouncy seat that vibrates. Yes, VIBRATES! And someday, when you’re old enough, things like McDonald’s French fries and Coke and Auburn football.

Speaking of which, I wanted to give you adequate time to prepare yourself for some big changes that will most certainly be taking place in the next few weeks. I know that up until now, you’ve been hearing your father and I speaking to you and to each other in calm, reassuring, even peaceful tones. We haven’t had a real knock-down, drag-out fight since before your ears started working properly in there. But here’s the deal: The college football season starts in a little over two short weeks and I don’t want you to worry or get upset if you hear a lot of screaming—even if you recognize that it is ANGRY screaming. I certainly don’t want you to think I’m angry with you or your father, unless, of course, your father is messing around with the HDTV antenna and royally screwing up the picture in which case YES I’m very angry with him but surely in the future you’ll come to understand exactly why. This year your Mama’s team is preliminarily ranked number six in the nation and although this makes her very very happy, it also makes her very VERY nervous so along with the screaming you can expect to be soothed and comforted by hours of repetitive pacing action and perhaps four full quarters’ worth of comfort eating.

I am interested to see what kind of tolerance you have for sports when you get a little older. I wonder if you will take after your father, who played a few seasons of youth soccer before he turned 10 and then became solely interested in wrecking his bike and acting up in school before finding the sport of scuba diving compelling at age 17, or if you will be more like me, who participated willingly in several individual and team sports from about age eight until I was halfway through high school. Granted, your father did not grow up with a father and brother who ate, slept and dreamt every single sport on the planet (except cricket—I can say I never saw either of them profess even a passing interest in cricket, but I HAVE seen them watch bowling, HONEST TO GOD) and who owned officially licensed merchandise for all seven gazillion of their favorite teams.

But regardless of how you feel personally about throwing your own body into full-contact sports situations, there will be no tolerance for you adopting any other college team but mine as your favorite at least until you are old enough to reasonably and intelligently explain to me EXACTLY WHY. Don’t worry, I will be helping you manage this newfangled concept by dressing you in persuasive clothing, and showing you educational videos and I might have bought you a cute little music box to tuck into your crib that plays an adorable tinkly version of the fight song. Your father thinks this is going a bit overboard, but I could not possibly agree less. There are just certain things you have to learn to be passionate about from a very early age, and I would much prefer you to be coerced into a passionate relationship with football rather than hot women or fast cars or God forbid, the Wiggles.

Only nine more weeks, big guy. Hang in there.

Love,
Your Mom

The last three paragraphs may be toxic to men

Life has pretty much come to a screeching, boring halt after last weekend and the great Dog vs. Moving Vehicle Drama of 2006 that went with it. Hambone either doesn’t remember what happened to him last weekend or else he just doesn’t care, because he very willingly went with Dave on a car ride on Tuesday night and managed to remain inside the vehicle for the entire duration of the trip. Granted, a great deal of Tuesday’s car ride success could be attributed to the fact that Dave kept all the windows up the whole time, but still. This is the same dog that, two years ago, wouldn’t come within five feet of Dave for nearly eight months because Dave had accidentally slipped and fallen down the stairs and frightened him. Now he’s falling out of moving vehicles and acting like nothing ever happened. It makes me so proud. And also takes away SO MUCH OF MY GUILT.

This week we are also dogsitting for my in-laws’ dog while they’re out gallivanting around Arizona (state motto: But it’s a dry heat!) visiting Dave’s older brother. She’s really a great dog—she’s very well-behaved for the most part, and she is the only dog I have ever met that actually poops on command. But having her around the house really messes up my standard before- and after-work routines, and you people cannot have any idea how DIFFICULT that is for me. And then when I get frustrated it just serves to remind me how I have GOT TO GET OVER THAT because there is a SQUEALING BABY coming into our home in about two months who will be throwing every schedule or routine or habit I have ever had the pleasure of participating in OUT THE WINDOW. So I am working on that.

Other things I am working feverishly on:
Two bags of Pepperidge Farm Dark Chocolate Milano cookies
Four quarts of Edy’s Slow Churned Rich and Creamy Light Ice Cream
One pound of strawberries
Mentally preparing myself to share a bathroom with Dave for several weeks as we renovate mine

Really the only reason I wanted to get the nursery done as early as I did was so that we could also renovate my bathroom. And by “we,” clearly I mean Dave and my dad, because conveniently, here in my 30th week I am now way too large and in charge to fit comfortably behind toilets and under vanities doing someone else’s dirty work. (Not that I PLANNED it like that or anything.) We aren’t doing a total remodel but we are replacing the disgusting tile floor, the moldy, vile toilet and the vanity. The bathroom is approximately 30 square feet (also known as “dinky”) and the ancient 1970’s-era shower/tub combo takes up about a third of that. So we’re actually looking at redoing about 20 square feet of bathroom space. I’m very optimistic about how it will all turn out, and I’m also very optimistic that this shower curtain will look adorable in there once we’ve got it all pulled together. I realize that both the nursery and bathroom decorating schemes could potentially shove the concept of the alphabet down our child’s throat but I am professionally trained as an editor and a writer and I do not believe it is too much to ask for him to begin respecting his mother’s profession at an early age.

I firmly believe he should also learn to respect his father’s profession, but Dave started a new job last year and I am still a little unclear on what exactly it is he does. I know it is something to do with the Internet and talking on the phone and probably a lot of wires everywhere but frankly I don’t think they make a shower curtain and coordinating bath towels and accessories for that. (Although someone feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.)

This weekend I have big, exciting NESTING plans. Dave is going to be out of the house on Saturday night and I am going to tackle the cleaning OUT of my bathroom and the cleaning OF his. Doesn’t that sound like a good time? Does anyone want to come over and crouch uncomfortably on the floor and wield a grout-scrubbing toothbrush with me? No?

I also have a few errands to run this weekend, one of which involves buying myself some new underwear. Not only do I need some basic everyday underwear (still successfully boycotting anything that involves the word “maternity,” by the way) but I guess I need to have something other than, ahem, THONGS to wear after the birth. Granny panties, perhaps? I have no idea and I have not worn a pair of underwear that covers anything other than my crack for several years. Also, nursing bras? Do I buy a couple now or do I wait until I’m out of the hospital? Because I seriously doubt I’ll have the courage to leave the house within the first, oh, six months after the baby gets here. But then I wonder if I shouldn’t buy any because what if my size changes? Oh Women of the Internet Who Already Birthed Offspring, what do I do? And while we’re at it, is there a specific nursing bra or brand that you can wholeheartedly recommend?

Seriously. WHAT WOULD I DO WITHOUT YOU PEOPLE?

Also? Sorry for not warning you that this post would contain references to my crack. SO GLAD my in-laws don't bother with the Internet while they're on vacation.

Worse even than the raspberry incident. But this time, for an appropriate reason.

Happy Monday, everyone! Bear with me whilst I take a quick moment to run through this weekend's notable accomplishments, ok?

Passed the 30-week mark? Check!
Indulged in enormous (and OH SO DELICIOUS) chocolate shake from Chick-Fil-A? Check!
Had lovely al fresco dinner out with Dave? Check!
Took leisurely four-mile walk in the cool Saturday-morning hours? Check!
Bought baby an adorable matchy-matchy fall outfit emblazoned with squirrels and acorns? Check!
Filled two new prescriptions at Target? Check!
Finished repairing water damaged wall? Check!

Sounds like a lot, doesn’t it? But there's something I feel like I'm forgetting about... hmmm...

Oh that's right! Now I remember!

Took sharp turn while driving and accidentally dumped the dog out the car window, over the grassy median and into oncoming traffic? Check!

“Wait,” you’re surely thinking, “did I read that right? Something about a dog… and a car window… and what seems to be really poor judgment YET AGAIN on Emily’s part…”

And to that I say OH HELL YES you did people! My dog WAS THROWN THROUGH THE WINDOW OF A MOVING VEHICLE ON SATURDAY AFTERNOON. And it bears repeating once more: AND THEN HE ROLLED OVER THE GRASSY MEDIAN AND STOOD UP IN THE PATH OF ONCOMING TRAFFIC.

I should add that he’s 100 percent FINE, before anyone starts to panic or calls PETA on my behalf (not like I didn’t consider calling them MYSELF on Saturday). Dave and I have been religiously pressing our hands all over Hambone’s little body every 10 to 15 minutes to check for developing bruises or feverish places or bones that might pop through his skin at any moment and so far he’s done nothing that suggests he’s in any kind of pain or discomfort. He does manage to look beyond irritated when we wake him up from a nap by probing his hind quarters, however.

I, on the other hand, am only today finding the situation the least bit humorous. It wasn’t much comfort to me to discover that he is completely fine; instead I tortured myself with visions of what MIGHT have happened for the rest of the weekend. Those visions included massive head injuries courtesy of the cement curb and lots of mashing and mooshing by speeding cars. Not that anything even close to that actually happened.

What REALLY happened was that Hambone was hanging out the back window on the driver’s side of the car like he always does, when I took a right-hand turn at a stoplight extremely close to our house. The next thing I knew, I heard a thud and a thump and when I looked into my rear-view mirror, I saw him tumbling across the median and into the opposite side of a four-lane road. Somehow I managed to stop the car AND put it in park (never checked to see if anyone was behind me, but miraculously it turned out that no one was) and by the time I got out of the car, he was just standing in some kind of stupor in front of a car that was waiting for the light to turn green. I called him over to me and he walked over in a bit of a daze and then I grabbed him and lifted all 50 pounds of him back into the car (twice the doctor-recommended weightlifting limit for pregnant women, don’t think that didn’t cross my mind) where he resumed acting like nothing at all had happened except that he was getting to ride in the car, yippee! It must have all happened within 30 seconds, but it felt like an absolute eternity. My hands were shaking so hard I could barely hold onto the wheel, but I managed to drive the half mile back to the house before I fell completely apart and went all hysterical on Dave. A moldy-raspberry freakout does not even BEGIN to hold a candle to an I-almost-killed-the-dog-BY-THROWING-HIM-OUT-OF-THE-CAR freakout.

Dave has really honed his comforting skills in the past few weeks and he’s pretty much got it down pat. After he assured me that Hambone was just FINE, seriously, Emily look at him, he’s running around the backyard and he’s FINE—he started in on the list of other necessary reassurances: namely, that just because the dog fell out of the car, it didn’t mean I was a bad driver and it didn’t mean I was a bad person and it CERTAINLY didn’t mean that I was going to be a bad mother. That was a nice thing to hear.

What wasn’t so nice to hear was what Dave said when he returned from retrieving a few things from the car that I was physically unable to get for myself because not only did it mean I would have to revisit the scene of the crime but also because my eyes were swollen shut from all the crying: “Wow, there’s an awful lot of dog hair stuck in the back window.” Which made me start hyperventilating all over again because HELLO! DOG HAIR STUCK IN THE WINDOW, a reminder that it’s not like he went out of it WILLINGLY!

And then I was glad that we had picked up a 12-pack of toilet paper at Target that morning and that it was the really soft and also extra-absorbent kind.

In other news, Dave called the baby by what I think will be his name TWICE this weekend and it started to sound… well, it sounded right. I can’t believe we might actually have a name. A name that starts with an A. You know, in case you were wondering.

Houston, we have paranoia!

Wednesday’s glucose screening wasn’t nearly as bad as I anticipated it would be. The waiting room chairs were much more comfortable than I expected and I brought along a big, fat (and somewhat perverse) book that kept me pretty well entertained for the last two hours of the test. (The first hour I was so jittery and jumpy from slamming back my glucose shooters that I could barely keep my eyes on the page.) I was also lucky enough to be the only patient in the office that early in the morning which meant that I had exclusive, singular access to the office bathroom, and everyone who has ever been pregnant knows that having access to a convenient, clean and nearly-always-unoccupied bathroom is like winning the freaking pregnant lady lottery. The only thing better would be a vending machine stocked with giant bags of free Cheetos. (And not the baked ones either.)

That’s not to say that all aspects of the test were super duper fabulous. For starters, the nurse accidentally gave me 150 grams of glucose to drink when the test only called for 100. I caught her mistake before I started ingesting anything, but the thought of being forced to do the test again or receiving skewed results that would require me to see a nutritionist and possibly give up my one-Coke-a-day habit left me a tad unnerved. I could not go on living without the Cokes, people. The blood draws weren’t too bad since the nurse only had to take a quick glance before categorizing my veins as “awful and flat.” She never tried to use anything bigger than a butterfly needle, but it still took about seven sticks to get the requisite four vials of blood. As a result I now have extremely attractive bruises on the backs of my hands as well as in the crooks of both my arms… although that means I can stand in the kitchen and pout and show Dave the visible, purple hell I go through to have his love child and although he will roll his eyes he will also get the heavy heavy jug of milk out of the fridge and pour me a glass so I don’t have to use my own tortured appendages. He’s a good man, and I will continue to use this to my advantage.

Of course, there are two very good, solid reasons why I should fail the test anyway:

I have waited more than two years to eat a shaved ice from SnoBiz and I finally got my opportunity on Monday, approximately 38 hours before the glucose test. My medium-sized, grape-flavored treat was absolute heaven until I got to the bottom of the styrofoam container and my spoon made that horrible scraping noise which is when I got really sad. Inexplicably sad, to be honest. Horrifically, appallingly, devastatingly sad that my SnoBiz experience, TWO ENTIRE YEARS IN THE MAKING, was over just like that. It is possible that tears may have welled in my eyes. So my dear dear friends encouraged me to just go ahead and get another because GOOD GOD, Emily, you are PREGNANT after all and I’m not sure if anyone told them that at my last doctor appointment I showed a gain of seven pounds. But I bought one anyway, even though it was a minor embarrassment to explain to the girl at the counter why I was back for another and that no, it wasn’t because I accidentally dropped the last one in the hot Winn-Dixie parking lot. And it was worth it, even though I think two grape shaved ices may have contained the equivalent of approximately six gigantic truckloads of sugar. And I sincerely doubt those truckloads completely left my body by Wednesday morning. We’ll find out early next week. (And just for the record, my weight gain this last time was only one pound, and I am still pissed that they weighed me AFTER I drank the glucose because HELLO that right there was like 20 additional ounces of fluid in my body. UNFAIR.)

Tomorrow I will be 30 weeks pregnant. THIRTY. WEEKS. That is THREE-WHOLE-QUARTERS OF THE WAY TO FULLY COOKING THIS BABY. I will be honest with you all: I am simply not ready to have this baby yet. I cannot even BEGIN to wrap my mind around all that it will entail. I’m just not good with change, with altering my routine, with anything that doesn’t go according to plan. And realistically, I know having a baby means giving up that mantra. But I feel like I just got used to the idea of being pregnant last week and now all of a sudden I’m supposed to transition into having a CHILD instead? Yesterday I ran into one of my neighbors while walking Hambone and she asked me if I thought my doctor would be willing to induce me early. Let me be quite frank: The thought of this baby arriving even ONE FREAKING DAY early absolutely terrifies me. Maybe that’s something that goes away once I get closer and closer to my due date and more and more uncomfortable, but right now the thought of having any less than 10 weeks with this sucker residing inside my body in his own little perfectly controlled environment is TERRIFYING. I feel like the most terrible future mother in the world, but I haven’t even gotten myself to the point where I’m curious about what he looks like. I mean, I guess it would be nice to know, but right now that would involve pushing him out of my body and then CARING FOR HIM AND THAT INCLUDES FEEDING HIM WITH MY BOOBS and I just don’t think I’m there yet. I’m just… content. Content with the way things are right now. Does anyone at all know what I’m talking about? Or am I just a wretched, horrid sack of a parent who you will all be removing from your blogrolls and bookmarks as soon as you finish this crazy wild-eyed post?

Thank God for Dave. Not only does he pour me big glasses of milk from a heavy jug, he also knows how to pat my head and tell me everything is going to be ok and that I’m going to be a great mom. Even at 4 o’clock in the morning. (Not that I was panicking about this earlier today or anything. No, not me.)

Now in my future? MORE GLUCOSE

I always find it really difficult to get back into a blogging mindset if I go more than a couple days without posting. And yet here we are, more than a week after my last hearty post and I can barely remember how to string a few words together to form complete sentences, much less make them witty and original. And to make matters worse, I used up a substantial portion of my allotted weekly brainpower attending a two-day training class at work on Tuesday and Wednesday. Normally I don’t do much thinking on the job, so two full days of learning new concepts and then actually putting them into practice was completely draining, which in turn was detrimental to all of the Shark Week programming I was planning to watch. Even amateur footage of someone being eaten alive by a massive Great White didn’t provide enough stimulation for me to keep my eyes open past 8 p.m.

Also, on the list of things you shouldn’t say to the person teaching your training class who just happened to mention that years ago he was employed as a corrections officer? “Wow, so that’s why this place feels so much like a prison.” Yes, it will make your classmates laugh. Laugh heartily, even. But your instructor? From experience, I would say… not so much.

The past few nights I’ve been able to entertain Dave with a lot of amusing work stories and I think my relatively good disposition made up a little for the two bizarre crying episodes I subjected him to early in the week. The worst of the two involved me sobbing uncontrollably into Dave’s chest over moldy raspberries. To Dave’s enormous credit, as soon as he could see that I was getting frustrated with something in the kitchen, he immediately stood up from the couch and made his way over to me—just in time to watch me to burst into hysterical tears. I know I blubbered something about how I had only bought them the day before and how they were expensive and how much I hated stupid Safeway and their stupid produce department and how I had wanted to eat those raspberries even more than I wanted to eat ice cream. And while it was happening, I knew it was the most ridiculous-sounding outburst and that I should be ashamed of myself for getting all worked up over bad produce but I just COULDN’T STOP.

So. Moldy raspberries. Clearly a new pregnancy low for me.

Understandably, Dave likes me a lot more when I come home and tell him how the president of my company watched me pour some old lemonade down the drain in the kitchen and then asked me if that was a urine sample. I like me a lot better then, too, really. After all, a wife who cries over expensive, spoiled fruit can be such a downer.

Dave also likes me a lot more when I drag him places like the Loudoun County Fair so that we can attend the rodeo. I had a good time making fun of the carnies and touring the livestock barns before the show started, even though it was still 95 degrees at 6 p.m. and I was sweating like… well, like a big fat farm-raised pig. You wouldn’t have thought the temperature would have been a problem what with the multitude of electric fans that were rigged up in the hog barn. Except that all those fans were aimed directly at the hogs themselves. My big pregnant self was forced to cool off with a sno cone instead of a man-made breeze.



A sno cone that I dribbled helplessly all over my new white tank top. I tried to pretend I wasn’t embarrassed by my slovenliness and told everyone who would listen some long-winded excuse about how I am simply teaching myself what life with a baby will be like! Adapt early I say! Strangely, very few people were convinced that this was actually the case. Most were simply convinced that I am messy. Whatever.

Also at the fair? Reminders of breastfeeding! At EVERY TWIST AND TURN!


Milking practice!

Teat torture!

And the reason I am glad that most of my sensitive girl parts are hidden away. Bull riding does not look like it is easy on the male gonads.

Tonight at 6:30 I’m headed down to Atlanta for a weekend of girly stuff. Shopping, eating, toenail-painting, spoiling my friends’ babies… I can’t wait. I won’t be home until Tuesday but I’ll have pictorial evidence of everything that happens. You know what they say… what happens in Atlanta? Goes right on this here blog for the Internet to enjoy. Wednesday I'll be back to let you know how my three-hour glucose test goes. Because technically I "failed" the one hour even though I was under the cutoff by a couple of points. Sucks to be me! Sucks even worse to be me when the only place your doctor's office can get blood is from your hands because you have such terrible veins.

I need a good book to enjoy while I'm spending three hours in an uncomfortable waiting room chair. So what's the best thing you've read lately?