37 Weeks

Our baby education continues. 6 weeks of childbirth class culminated in me eating bunches of cookies while we listened to a couple talk about the birth of their adorable, massive-cheeked 5-week old AND in a horrific video of a woman with hemorrhoids the size of large grapes giving birth to twins in her bathroom, during which I did not eat cookies. We are heading to Breastfeeding class tonight and Parenting class on Saturday. Yes, Rob is attending the breastfeeding class. Yes, I suppose this might be one example of the ways in which I am slowly but steadily emasculating him. But these people are the experts and they recommend that partners attend class. What's a chubby girl to do?

We're also still reading, although I admit I have been way more into reading the stack of books my friend Mark sent me from his company than the stack of parenting books that continue to pile up around me. I just finished Men and Dogs, a novel by Katie Crouch that comes out next month. And I am currently reading a thriller by Michael Koryta called So Cold the River. That comes out in June. Both are recommended, even though I'm only halfway through the Koryta. I am driven to distraction by the book and would much rather curl up on the couch with its creepiness than read about ways to get my baby to sleep better. I realize I am likely making a mistake with this decision. Later, when I'm up all night with a crying baby, maybe I'll reread these books. Or maybe I'll just cry, too.

I'm still going to prenatal yoga, and feeling an almost desperate need for it at least twice a week. There's something so reassuring about sitting around with other front-heavy gals, talking about our situations. And some of these women are going through much tougher times than I: jobs lost, big moves ahead, abnormal sonograms, swollen ankles. It puts things in perspective and gives me a sense of community.

My latest addition to the pregnancy curriculum is Acupuncture. As I type this, I have four needles in my ear that are working on making my back feel better (I see you rolling your eyes, Mom.) I spent 90 minutes with the acupuncturist yesterday. She lectured me on staying warm--I told her I can't help it if my hands and feet are icicles, but she disagrees and says that, in fact, I can help it. When I asked her how, she said "STAY WARM." She then covered me with blankets, turned a bunch of heat lamps on me, stuck me with needles and let me take a nap. I now love her and am going back next week. Her plan is to use the needles to help make my contractions stronger, while reducing the pain I feel. (I see you rolling your eyes again, Mom.) Except instead of "help", she pronounced it "harp" so it took me a while to figure out what she was saying.

Ok, I guess this is enough boring information about the last few weeks of someone's pregnancy. See why I don't blog more often? I'm only thinking of you, people.

24 Weeks

Brooke took this picture on Saturday night. I can't decide which is bigger, my stomach or Rob's head.

Big Baby

I don't want to be overly dramatic or anything, but getting dressed has now made me break down into tears twice. The first time was the night before Tash and Steve's wedding. I had tried on my dress 5 nights earlier (not even a whole week!) and it fit. Not only did it fit, but it somehow managed to kind of squeeze my belly into an if-not-flattish-than-maybe-only-a-little-hilly state wherein I probably still looked pregnant, but kind of svelte at the same time. I was Kentucky! I should have known it was too good to last.

When I tried it on again as I was packing, I couldn't even zip it up. Not at all. Dismayed, I walked into the living room and asked Rob to try, as though it was some hard to open can of pickles that he could wrestle into submission. He tried to be tactful. "I can't get it to go any further without ruining the dress."

So I started pulling dresses out of my closet one after the other, including a few that I haven't worn in 6 years for good reason. Nothing fit. Even the dresses that were at one point too big for me now strained around handfuls of my chubby back. On the plus side, my cleavage was distracting. Still, nothing was quite right and I suddenly remembered the dress I had bought in LA when I was with Liz. It was $5 at a store called Veronica M, and had apparently been waiting in the back of my closet for its chance to rescue me. You may not see it and immediately think "wedding dress" (I didn't), but once again, my sister is my hero.



It's not that I'm concerned about getting larger. I realize I'm pregnant and that this is what happens, which is what Rob told me as he hugged me and I cried, surrounded by a pile of useless fabric. I just wasn't prepared. My stomach popped out in a matter of days, and I suddenly find myself standing at the closet in the morning, totally panicking about what to put on my expanding body.

The day of the wedding, we went maternity clothes shopping, which was a whole new exercise in frustration. It should have been a 30-minute trip, but every store we headed for had somehow closed--not for the day, but forever. Were there not pregnant women in Denver? Where did they shop? We finally found a Gap maternity store that was so small and sad that I sat down in a chair and cried again. "This looks cute!" Rob said, looking at a row of sweatpants and cotton dresses. "What's the matter?"

But I couldn't speak the words to tell him that this all looked like schlubby maternity loungewear, and if I wasn't going to be able to go outside in my new purchases, then what was the point of buying them? He took my hand and dragged me to the nearest restaurant, where I was distracted by chicken salad and a bunch of people fawning over John Elway as he left the building. Fueled by the food, we tried one more stop (our quick trip having now turned into a 3-hour tour.) At Pea in the Pod, I found out that I am still not big enough for maternity pants and that all the maternity tops just had the effect of making me look even bigger than I am. I bought some clothes I will probably be able to wear in the next month or so. Until then, I am just going to get used to adding an extra 30 minutes every morning to tear apart my closet in hopes that I can find something suitable to be seen in.

Poetic Justice

On Tuesday night I went out for drinks with a friend. Over chips and guacamole, he told me that he thinks it is unbelievably stupid that people wear flip flops when they know it's supposed to rain. Though I am sometimes one of those people, I just nodded and the conversation moved on to other important topics, such as how spicy we like our guacamole and how old our cats are. Wow. It is sentences like that one that make it clear I will never be a rock star.

I thought about his footwear comment this morning, as I got ready to go to work. The forecast was 86 degrees with thunderstorms, so I threw on a skirt and my flip flops (also I put a shirt on), grabbed my umbrella, and headed out. My logic was thus: it was hot; I didn't want to wear rain boots. Also, I don't have any rain boots.

No rain on the way to work. No rain most of the way home from work. I made a quick stop at Whole Foods and left with a paper bag full of food, since I had forgotten the handy reusable plastic bags I am so fond of. No rain.

I was three blocks from home when it started, just a drizzle at first. By the time I was two blocks away, I swear what I was walking through could have been classified as a small tornado. The wind was whipping the rain so hard down 23rd street that I had to hold my umbrella directly in front of me like a shield. I was struggling with my three dripping wet bags, one of them full of groceries and starting to tear, another insufficiently protecting my lap top, when my shoe broke. The flip pretty much flopped right out of it. I tried to make my way to the side of the street to look at it, but there was nothing I could do. I had no free hands and the sidewalk was quickly becoming a river. People walked by without umbrellas, and though I know they were worse off than I was, all I could think was: I have to walk down 23rd Street wearing only one shoe. There are so, so many things wrong with that. 23rd Street is just ok when you're wearing shoes. If you're barefoot, it's a toilet.

The paper bag ripped more. I clutched it to my chest and kicked my shoe into a gutter. I hobbled home, every inch of me soaking wet and finally made it to my door, where I was greeted by Manny, the doorman. "I lost my shoe," I told him. "Did it break?" he asked. "You shouldn't wear flip flops when it's raining."

Four Eyes Sees Again

I got new glasses today. I had glasses already, but I rarely wore them, so they were about 4 prescriptions behind and weren't really that fun to wear, what with the searing headaches and random floating spots. Plus they were crooked.

So I forked over one fourth of my annual salary and bought new ones. When I picked them up at Oliver Peoples, the store manager said, "I'm so excited!" Hmmm...me too, I guess.

I put them on, and was immediately sure something was wrong. "I think something is wrong," I said. [Regular readers of this blog will have noticed by now that there is not a whole lot of lag time between the things I think and the things I say. Occasionally, I consider working on this.]

"You feel like you're in a fishbowl?" she asked.

"Yes." I said.

"Perfectly normal," she assured me. "Just wear them a LOT, and if they still feel like that in two weeks, then..."

She had trailed off, so I filled in the sentence with "Come back here, waving them around and looking for you?"

I walked out of the store in my glasses, and the small step at the door, which hadn't phased me on my way in, was incredibly hard to navigate. I tottered off of it and headed down the street, experiencing what I imagine an acid trip or a Cirque de Soleil show to be like.

The subway stairs were particularly special. I actually took the glasses off and walked blindly down the steps. I had to touch the railing, which was horrifying, but it was that or slide down the stairs on my butt. Pros of the butt slide: less chance of swine flu. Cons: everything else.

And now the world is a beautiful place.

Things You Should Know

There are a few things in my life that I hold as static truths. I have examples.

ONE: If you work at Baskin Robbins and you think it's a good idea to mix all the ice creams and all the toppings together to make one large shake...you're wrong.

TWO: Stuffing all of your junk into a drawer or nearby closet will only make it go away for a little while.

THREE: Vincent Van Gogh, he of the Starry Starry Night, cut off his ear in a deep depression over his artistic and personal failures. Learned this one in art class when I was 6.

You know, obvious things.

Yet today, my truths have been rocked, in at least one way. According to the BBC, my constant source of important world news (as well as an excellent fount of knowledge on the sexual habits of people in other countries), Vincent Van Gogh's ear was in fact cut off by his "friend" and fellow artist Paul Gauguin outside a brothel in 1888.

Here's the thing: the authors of the new book on this subject say it's not clear whether or not this was in an argument or an accident. Because, you know, if you're an avid fencer and you're waving your epee around outside a brothel one night, someone could lose an ear. But it was all just for fun, whoa, how did that happen? Which brings me to Truth number

FOUR: You should always keep your sword sheathed at a brothel.

Later, they tucked her spleen back into her eardrum

Soooo, not to ruin the punchline, but this link will take you to a story about a kidney which was removed via the donor's vagina. Read the story, if you want. You basically have all of the important information already.