We're all sick again, or more accurately, we're still sick since we didn't have the chance to get well first. The actual details are tedious and don't matter, and I don't think anyone really needs a recitation on how annoying it is to have an entire household sick for a month. So here's the shorthand version:
Whine, whine, complain, kvetch, WE'RE All SICK AND I'M SEVEN MONTHS PREGNANT, grumble, grutch, kvetch.
There. Subject adequately covered.
On the bright side, our European visitor has arrived and it's been a pleasure to have her here, even if no one had the energy to do nearly as many things as we had talked about this weekend. Fortunately, being European, mass transit doesn't scare her, so we were able to send her off on the subway today to experience the pleasures of Center City.
Other news, in brief:
*K is a huge fan of dyeing Easter eggs, and an even bigger fan of eating hard-boiled eggs. Coincidentally, we only have one Easter egg left.
*The taxes are filed, and I now get to sit with lots of money in my bank account until the IRS gets around to taking it out. It still beats going to the post office two days before taxes are due though. I actually had our taxes done two months ago, but I didn't see any point in filing before I absolutely had to, when I could keep our money earning (miniscule) interest for us instead. Hey, that twelve cents could be vital to our future solvency.
*We watched the Doctor Who easter special on Saturday night. It was a pretty good episode, but not what I would call... special. If we're only getting four episodes this year, I kind of expect them to pull out a few more stops. I need my Doctor Who fix more regularly, dammit.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Monday, April 6, 2009
Dubious milestones, part 24 of an infinite series
When I was pregnant with K, starting at about 32 weeks she started amusing herself by alternating between slouching down in my pelvis in transverse position and stretching herself up into breech, jamming her hard little head into my ribs in the process.
At a mere 29 weeks, Wulfrith has discovered the same trick of jamming his head into my ribs. I guess this is one of the milestones you get to experience when you have babies that don't care to go head down. I suppose I can take comfort in the fact that I may never know what it feels like to get kicked in the ribs.
It's very cute of you to try and imitate your sister, sweetheart, but there's no need to be precocious.
At a mere 29 weeks, Wulfrith has discovered the same trick of jamming his head into my ribs. I guess this is one of the milestones you get to experience when you have babies that don't care to go head down. I suppose I can take comfort in the fact that I may never know what it feels like to get kicked in the ribs.
It's very cute of you to try and imitate your sister, sweetheart, but there's no need to be precocious.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Nesting
When B started getting a cold in the middle of the week, I was a bit surprised because K and I came down with our cold a week before and I had thought that since B had gone so long without getting it that he safe.
As it turns out, B was getting an entirely different cold, which he has now passed on to K and me before we could completely get over the last one. Sigh. Thankfully, I didn't have to work yesterday or today, so I was able to get a couple good naps. Better yet, I don't have to work next weekend at all, so hopefully I can rest up a bit and help out my depressed immune system. Hopefully we can all get better - I'm a little tired of our house sounding like a tb sanatorium.
On the positive side, I'm incredibly excited that a friend from the Netherlands is coming to visit this week! We met in England during foreign study my junior year, and I haven't seen her in ten years.
Besides getting to see an old friend I haven't seen in forever, her visit also has the positive effect of making us finish the major rearranging of our house that we started last weekend. Our house has an L-shaped living room and dining room, and a large finished room downstairs. We decided to put the bulk of our books in the living room/dining room area and put the couches and tv downstairs along with all of K's toys. It worked perfectly well until we decided to have another baby who is going to need the third bedroom which is currently the guest room, leaving us with the question of what to do with guests. As much as I'm sure guests would love to sleep in the same room as the baby and take over nighttime baby duty for me, we decided the only real option was to move the futon downstairs. But that left us with the question of what to do when there's a guest downstairs asleep and we're still awake and would like to watch tv. There's also the fact that in the increasingly likely event of my having a c-section, I'll need to avoid the stairs as much as possible for a while.
So last weekend we moved half of the books downstairs, the couch and tv upstairs and turned our living room into an actual living room. So far the new arrangement is very pleasant. Even though I'm fine climbing stairs right now, I'm tired and sore enough these days that it's awfully nice not to have to climb stairs every time I want something to eat or need to get K something.
The second major change was figuring out how to handle the very likely possibility of two children in our bed on a regular basis. We're planning on having Wulfrith in our room at first, and if he's anything like his sister, he'll probably wind up staying in our bed after feedings because it's much easier just to go back to sleep with the baby in bed than trying to gingerly transfer a sleeping baby back to the bassinet and hope against hope that they will stay asleep. But K also comes into bed with us on a regular basis, and B and I usually wind up hugging the edges of the bed as a result. There just isn't room for another child.
So I measured and discovered that K's toddler bed is exactly the same height as our bed, making it ideal to attach to our bed as a co-sleeper. We scored an Ikea Kura bed at nicely lowered price for K from Craigslist this week, so her old bed can go into our room when the baby comes and eventually be Wulfrith's first Big Boy bed.
However, in the way of these things, as of yesterday the state of our house was as follows: living room mostly set up except for several piles of books waiting to go downstairs; new bed for K residing on the futon in the guest room; basement an unspeakable mess. If nothing else, I assume Judith hasn't taken of any forms of asceticism and would like to be able to sleep on the futon itself without piles of wooden slats in the way, so we at least had to get the new bed set up. As of this evening, the bed is set up and K is thrilled*, most of the books are cleared out of the living room and we've managed to move most of our dvds upstairs onto shelves and we've made progress on the basement. It's still unspeakable, but at least all of the furniture is where we want it to be so all it will take is someone taking the time to go downstairs and shelve books. As long as keep her from looking at the basement, our house is mostly ready for a guest and part of the way ready for a baby. Not a bad weekend's work.
*Can I take a moment to say how much I love that K has reached the age of semi-reason? I mean, she's still three, so she certainly has her moments. But for the most part these days, she can be told "We can't do x because of y" and will mostly accept that. Because of that, we can also make bargains. While B put the bed together this afternoon, I took K to get some new bedding for it. I had scoped out a very cute generic fairy princess bed-in-a-bag set on sale that I probably should have just bought without bringing K into it. Because she took one look and rejected it in favor of a much more expensive Disney princess comforter. The princess didn't bother me, but I try to avoid giving to much money to The Mouse, and I wasn't too happy at the amount I was going to have to spend. But luckily, we found a Disney Princess lamp on clearance that K wanted as well. So I told her that we could only afford to get the lamp if we got the fairy bedding and she actually went for it. A year ago, that would never have flown.
As it turns out, B was getting an entirely different cold, which he has now passed on to K and me before we could completely get over the last one. Sigh. Thankfully, I didn't have to work yesterday or today, so I was able to get a couple good naps. Better yet, I don't have to work next weekend at all, so hopefully I can rest up a bit and help out my depressed immune system. Hopefully we can all get better - I'm a little tired of our house sounding like a tb sanatorium.
On the positive side, I'm incredibly excited that a friend from the Netherlands is coming to visit this week! We met in England during foreign study my junior year, and I haven't seen her in ten years.
Besides getting to see an old friend I haven't seen in forever, her visit also has the positive effect of making us finish the major rearranging of our house that we started last weekend. Our house has an L-shaped living room and dining room, and a large finished room downstairs. We decided to put the bulk of our books in the living room/dining room area and put the couches and tv downstairs along with all of K's toys. It worked perfectly well until we decided to have another baby who is going to need the third bedroom which is currently the guest room, leaving us with the question of what to do with guests. As much as I'm sure guests would love to sleep in the same room as the baby and take over nighttime baby duty for me, we decided the only real option was to move the futon downstairs. But that left us with the question of what to do when there's a guest downstairs asleep and we're still awake and would like to watch tv. There's also the fact that in the increasingly likely event of my having a c-section, I'll need to avoid the stairs as much as possible for a while.
So last weekend we moved half of the books downstairs, the couch and tv upstairs and turned our living room into an actual living room. So far the new arrangement is very pleasant. Even though I'm fine climbing stairs right now, I'm tired and sore enough these days that it's awfully nice not to have to climb stairs every time I want something to eat or need to get K something.
The second major change was figuring out how to handle the very likely possibility of two children in our bed on a regular basis. We're planning on having Wulfrith in our room at first, and if he's anything like his sister, he'll probably wind up staying in our bed after feedings because it's much easier just to go back to sleep with the baby in bed than trying to gingerly transfer a sleeping baby back to the bassinet and hope against hope that they will stay asleep. But K also comes into bed with us on a regular basis, and B and I usually wind up hugging the edges of the bed as a result. There just isn't room for another child.
So I measured and discovered that K's toddler bed is exactly the same height as our bed, making it ideal to attach to our bed as a co-sleeper. We scored an Ikea Kura bed at nicely lowered price for K from Craigslist this week, so her old bed can go into our room when the baby comes and eventually be Wulfrith's first Big Boy bed.
However, in the way of these things, as of yesterday the state of our house was as follows: living room mostly set up except for several piles of books waiting to go downstairs; new bed for K residing on the futon in the guest room; basement an unspeakable mess. If nothing else, I assume Judith hasn't taken of any forms of asceticism and would like to be able to sleep on the futon itself without piles of wooden slats in the way, so we at least had to get the new bed set up. As of this evening, the bed is set up and K is thrilled*, most of the books are cleared out of the living room and we've managed to move most of our dvds upstairs onto shelves and we've made progress on the basement. It's still unspeakable, but at least all of the furniture is where we want it to be so all it will take is someone taking the time to go downstairs and shelve books. As long as keep her from looking at the basement, our house is mostly ready for a guest and part of the way ready for a baby. Not a bad weekend's work.
*Can I take a moment to say how much I love that K has reached the age of semi-reason? I mean, she's still three, so she certainly has her moments. But for the most part these days, she can be told "We can't do x because of y" and will mostly accept that. Because of that, we can also make bargains. While B put the bed together this afternoon, I took K to get some new bedding for it. I had scoped out a very cute generic fairy princess bed-in-a-bag set on sale that I probably should have just bought without bringing K into it. Because she took one look and rejected it in favor of a much more expensive Disney princess comforter. The princess didn't bother me, but I try to avoid giving to much money to The Mouse, and I wasn't too happy at the amount I was going to have to spend. But luckily, we found a Disney Princess lamp on clearance that K wanted as well. So I told her that we could only afford to get the lamp if we got the fairy bedding and she actually went for it. A year ago, that would never have flown.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
28 weeks
I had my 27 week prenatal checkup last week and a "check to make sure the baby's still growing" ultrasound today. All looks very well.
After being scolded about my lack of weight gain and measuring behind at 23 weeks, I have now gained a lofty 6 pounds and am measuring a bit ahead. This doesn't surprise me given that while I was in Michigan, I was suddenly attacked by The Hunger. I would have a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch, then make another one an hour later. I would get up to get a snack and grab two other snacks for later because chances were good that "later" would be within the hour. So I guess that's what it's like to be a preschooler going through a growth spurt, even if I wasn't actually the one growing.
Though actually, I am. My stomach grew visibly last week and I finally have an undeniably pregnant shape. My stomach still doesn't stick out to the point that it can't be hidden with a sweatshirt and even if people suspected that I was pregnant, I don't look big enough that they would probably ask for fear that I'm just chunky, but I'm definitely round. My belly button has gotten visibly shallower in the past week as well, and the skin on my abdomen is feeling stretched and sensitive.
Wulfrith measured perfectly on the ultrasound - 28 weeks, 3-4 days (a couple days ahead) and two pounds, 9 ounces. I am no longer worried about his growth or mine.
It's still too early to really worry about positioning, so I will simply note for the record that he is transverse, has been hanging out in that position for at least 6 weeks and is in exactly the same position K spent about 18 weeks in. I asked the doctor what the chances are that he won't turn, given that K never did, and he said pretty good. Babies who like to take weird positions usually do so because there's a structural issue that makes it more comfortable for them. Ah well. He'll come out one way or another. I have another ultrasound at 36 weeks, so we can decide what to do if he hasn't moved by then.
It's definitely the third trimester. I'm tired yet find myself concocting plans to rearrange every single room in the house and sew a tent to cover it. I've had a rotten cold for the past several days, and have discovered that a violent cough and the third trimester don't really mix (if you've been pregnant, you can probably figure out what I mean when I talk about undesirable side effects of coughing. If you haven't, feel lucky). My uterus hasn't grown far up enough in my abdomen yet for him to jam his head into my ribs in that lovely way K did for the last ten weeks, but I'm starting to feel the periodic pressure of his head just below my ribs. He's also large enough to make my abdomen dance and undulate in an entertaining yet highly creepy way.
Less than twelve weeks to go. Eep.
After being scolded about my lack of weight gain and measuring behind at 23 weeks, I have now gained a lofty 6 pounds and am measuring a bit ahead. This doesn't surprise me given that while I was in Michigan, I was suddenly attacked by The Hunger. I would have a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch, then make another one an hour later. I would get up to get a snack and grab two other snacks for later because chances were good that "later" would be within the hour. So I guess that's what it's like to be a preschooler going through a growth spurt, even if I wasn't actually the one growing.
Though actually, I am. My stomach grew visibly last week and I finally have an undeniably pregnant shape. My stomach still doesn't stick out to the point that it can't be hidden with a sweatshirt and even if people suspected that I was pregnant, I don't look big enough that they would probably ask for fear that I'm just chunky, but I'm definitely round. My belly button has gotten visibly shallower in the past week as well, and the skin on my abdomen is feeling stretched and sensitive.
Wulfrith measured perfectly on the ultrasound - 28 weeks, 3-4 days (a couple days ahead) and two pounds, 9 ounces. I am no longer worried about his growth or mine.
It's still too early to really worry about positioning, so I will simply note for the record that he is transverse, has been hanging out in that position for at least 6 weeks and is in exactly the same position K spent about 18 weeks in. I asked the doctor what the chances are that he won't turn, given that K never did, and he said pretty good. Babies who like to take weird positions usually do so because there's a structural issue that makes it more comfortable for them. Ah well. He'll come out one way or another. I have another ultrasound at 36 weeks, so we can decide what to do if he hasn't moved by then.
It's definitely the third trimester. I'm tired yet find myself concocting plans to rearrange every single room in the house and sew a tent to cover it. I've had a rotten cold for the past several days, and have discovered that a violent cough and the third trimester don't really mix (if you've been pregnant, you can probably figure out what I mean when I talk about undesirable side effects of coughing. If you haven't, feel lucky). My uterus hasn't grown far up enough in my abdomen yet for him to jam his head into my ribs in that lovely way K did for the last ten weeks, but I'm starting to feel the periodic pressure of his head just below my ribs. He's also large enough to make my abdomen dance and undulate in an entertaining yet highly creepy way.
Less than twelve weeks to go. Eep.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Is it a bit mean of me to be kind of glad that K didn't seem to have a great time when her preschool class went to Chuck E. Cheese this week?
I mean, I didn't want her to have a terrible or traumatizing time, but while my antipathy towards place like Chuck E. Cheese wasn't enough for me to make her stay behind when the rest of her class went to have fun, I didn't especially want to deal with demands to go back. Chuck E. Cheese is in the shopping mall right next to where B works, so we would be dealing with it a lot.
I recognize that there are inevitably things that are suitable for children but not adults that parents will simply have to endure, like Barney or the twenty millionth repetition of The Poky Little Puppy. You don't feel right saying no because the only thing actually wrong with it is that it makes you want to scale a three story building with your bare hands to get away from it, and your child loves it. I accept this as a consequence of parenthood, occasionally sacrificing my sanity and unrended garments for my child's happiness. Into each life a little McDonald's playland must fall*. But that's not to say that I'm not happy to allow my child to remain in ignorance of the things I don't like as long as possible. I would have been happy to keep K from knowing about the existence of restaurants filled with mediocre pizzas, rigged video games and creepy animatronic singing animals that inexplicably attract children for several more years. We got lucky this time - she didn't seem too enthusiastic about the experience and said eating lunch was scary, which I think means she has the good taste to think the supremely creepy animatronic singingdevilsanimals are in fact quite creepy. Good taste AND we can still pick B up from work without having to worry about tantrums over going to Chuck E. Cheese. Lucky indeed.
This is just one example of the eternal problem of parenthood: eventually, you have to send them out into the world, and once you do, you no longer have total control over what they're exposed to.
This is both good and bad, of course. I can't count the number of ways preschool has been a positive influence on K's development, physically, mentally and socially. And then, we have days like last week, where preschool featured Enforce Gender Stereotype Conformity Day, which is to say I went in on Wednesday and saw a sign saying that tomorrow, the boys would wear blue and the girls would dress like princesses. Theme dressing days are pretty common at preschool, but they tend to be things like "wear pj's!" or "wear a hat!" not "make your mother's head explode by asking her to put you in a sexist, stereotyped outfit!"
And the real hell of it is that while I feel perfectly free to ignore theme days at preschool (or more often, just forget) or come up with a dozen ways to dress K subversively, I couldn't. Because one of the other influences of preschool is that all of her little friends love dressing up in princess dresses and now K does too. It would have broken her heart if all of the other girls were wearing princess dresses and I sent her in jeans. Otherwise I the only dress I would have sent her in on Thursday would have been the one I made from the dinosaur camouflage fabric last summer.
It's just life, of course. When they start out, you're their entire world, and slowly but surely they grow away from you and learn how to engage the world on their own as their own person with their own preferences and desires. But it's a process that can be awfully hard on all concerned.
*Well, in our case it's the local Burger King with an indoor play gym that we frequently find ourselves at on the nights that B is working. Oh, don't look at me like that. She eats macaroni and cheese, apples and chocolate milk, gets healthful exercise and socialization climbing around the gigantic child habitrail with other children, picks up yet another virus** and we go home. I get the weekly serving of red meat my body seems to want right now and get half an hour of reading in. The only major downside is yet another piece of plastic crap for the landfill that will clutter our house for a while. True, I prefer Panera where she can get organic milk and hormone-free turkey, but until they install a tasteful wooden playground, Burger King will be where K campaigns to go.
**To the woman last night who was insisting that her daughter couldn't go in the playstructure without her shoes on because "it's filthy in there": precisely what terrible disease do you think she's going to pick up that she wouldn't have gotten from crawling around on her hands and knees? Also, the reason it's so dirty in there is because parents let their children go in with their shoes on, which is why they're supposed to take them off. That, and it hurts other chldren a lot less when they inevitably get clocked in the head by the child going down the slide immediately after them or accidentally kicked when they follow someone up the ladder too closely.
I mean, I didn't want her to have a terrible or traumatizing time, but while my antipathy towards place like Chuck E. Cheese wasn't enough for me to make her stay behind when the rest of her class went to have fun, I didn't especially want to deal with demands to go back. Chuck E. Cheese is in the shopping mall right next to where B works, so we would be dealing with it a lot.
I recognize that there are inevitably things that are suitable for children but not adults that parents will simply have to endure, like Barney or the twenty millionth repetition of The Poky Little Puppy. You don't feel right saying no because the only thing actually wrong with it is that it makes you want to scale a three story building with your bare hands to get away from it, and your child loves it. I accept this as a consequence of parenthood, occasionally sacrificing my sanity and unrended garments for my child's happiness. Into each life a little McDonald's playland must fall*. But that's not to say that I'm not happy to allow my child to remain in ignorance of the things I don't like as long as possible. I would have been happy to keep K from knowing about the existence of restaurants filled with mediocre pizzas, rigged video games and creepy animatronic singing animals that inexplicably attract children for several more years. We got lucky this time - she didn't seem too enthusiastic about the experience and said eating lunch was scary, which I think means she has the good taste to think the supremely creepy animatronic singing
This is just one example of the eternal problem of parenthood: eventually, you have to send them out into the world, and once you do, you no longer have total control over what they're exposed to.
This is both good and bad, of course. I can't count the number of ways preschool has been a positive influence on K's development, physically, mentally and socially. And then, we have days like last week, where preschool featured Enforce Gender Stereotype Conformity Day, which is to say I went in on Wednesday and saw a sign saying that tomorrow, the boys would wear blue and the girls would dress like princesses. Theme dressing days are pretty common at preschool, but they tend to be things like "wear pj's!" or "wear a hat!" not "make your mother's head explode by asking her to put you in a sexist, stereotyped outfit!"
And the real hell of it is that while I feel perfectly free to ignore theme days at preschool (or more often, just forget) or come up with a dozen ways to dress K subversively, I couldn't. Because one of the other influences of preschool is that all of her little friends love dressing up in princess dresses and now K does too. It would have broken her heart if all of the other girls were wearing princess dresses and I sent her in jeans. Otherwise I the only dress I would have sent her in on Thursday would have been the one I made from the dinosaur camouflage fabric last summer.
It's just life, of course. When they start out, you're their entire world, and slowly but surely they grow away from you and learn how to engage the world on their own as their own person with their own preferences and desires. But it's a process that can be awfully hard on all concerned.
*Well, in our case it's the local Burger King with an indoor play gym that we frequently find ourselves at on the nights that B is working. Oh, don't look at me like that. She eats macaroni and cheese, apples and chocolate milk, gets healthful exercise and socialization climbing around the gigantic child habitrail with other children, picks up yet another virus** and we go home. I get the weekly serving of red meat my body seems to want right now and get half an hour of reading in. The only major downside is yet another piece of plastic crap for the landfill that will clutter our house for a while. True, I prefer Panera where she can get organic milk and hormone-free turkey, but until they install a tasteful wooden playground, Burger King will be where K campaigns to go.
**To the woman last night who was insisting that her daughter couldn't go in the playstructure without her shoes on because "it's filthy in there": precisely what terrible disease do you think she's going to pick up that she wouldn't have gotten from crawling around on her hands and knees? Also, the reason it's so dirty in there is because parents let their children go in with their shoes on, which is why they're supposed to take them off. That, and it hurts other chldren a lot less when they inevitably get clocked in the head by the child going down the slide immediately after them or accidentally kicked when they follow someone up the ladder too closely.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
End of the week review
*I worked all day at the library today, then came home, took a nap and started in on the second job. Only to discover after an hour that the server had been taken down for unplanned maintenance (although I only found out a couple minutes ago that's what it was - thanks for letting us know so expeditiously, guys). This wouldn't bother me so much except that we were told to have our hours into the payroll system by 3 this afternoon, so I had to put my Friday hours in before actually working them. Ack. Well, I'll figure out how to handle this next week, I guess.
*Tonight after dinner, K went into the cabinet, got out several cookies and came to give me one. Then she told me that two of the other cookies were for Daddy. It was very sweet and touching. Of course, it was sweet and touching in a way that meant that she got two cookies as well, but a year ago she would have been trying to hoard all five cookies for herself so I'll count it as significant progress in the "thinking of others" arena.
*In Friday night tv, Dollhouse was a definite step up in quality from previous episodes and Battlestar Galactica had about as good of an ending as I could hope. This week's episode of Dollhouse also had a fairly clear message from Joss Whedon of "In case you thought I was trying to say that human trafficking is in any way acceptable or that I'm trying to glamorize it, no, I'm really really not."
*B had the day off yesterday, so we were finally able to go see Watchmen. I admit that it's been quite a while since I've read the comic, but from what I remember, the movie was remarkably faithful to the comic. It was definitely incredibly graphic, but it helped create a tone that was very consistent with the story. Since the point of the comic was to provide a non-glamorized view of what real-life superheroes would really be like, the depictions of violence that didn't spare the viewer at all seemed pretty appropriate. Mind you, that meant I watched quite a bit of the movie through my fingers or with my eyes averted since I have very little stomach for graphic violence, but this is one of the very few movies I can think of where it didn't seem gratuitous.
*The same things has happened this week that happened last pregnancy: the day I started my third trimester, my pelvis started aching. It's more in the hips and lower back this time instead of the pubic bone, probably because Wulfrith is lying even farther back in my abdomen than K, which I didn't think was possible. I'm doubly glad now that I got travelling out of the way last week so I didn't have to traipse across the airport with my hips feeling like they're about to fall apart. Ah, the delights of the third trimester - aching joints, reflux, exhaustion, sciatica, ever-decreasing lung and bladder capacity... all sending the message that it's all downhill from here. Of course, at the bottom of the hill you get a baby, so it's worth it.
K informed me tonight that she wants two babies, a baby brother and baby sister. Sorry kid, there's just the one with no options of adding on. But it's good of her to remind me how much worse it could be. Yikes.
*Tonight after dinner, K went into the cabinet, got out several cookies and came to give me one. Then she told me that two of the other cookies were for Daddy. It was very sweet and touching. Of course, it was sweet and touching in a way that meant that she got two cookies as well, but a year ago she would have been trying to hoard all five cookies for herself so I'll count it as significant progress in the "thinking of others" arena.
*In Friday night tv, Dollhouse was a definite step up in quality from previous episodes and Battlestar Galactica had about as good of an ending as I could hope. This week's episode of Dollhouse also had a fairly clear message from Joss Whedon of "In case you thought I was trying to say that human trafficking is in any way acceptable or that I'm trying to glamorize it, no, I'm really really not."
*B had the day off yesterday, so we were finally able to go see Watchmen. I admit that it's been quite a while since I've read the comic, but from what I remember, the movie was remarkably faithful to the comic. It was definitely incredibly graphic, but it helped create a tone that was very consistent with the story. Since the point of the comic was to provide a non-glamorized view of what real-life superheroes would really be like, the depictions of violence that didn't spare the viewer at all seemed pretty appropriate. Mind you, that meant I watched quite a bit of the movie through my fingers or with my eyes averted since I have very little stomach for graphic violence, but this is one of the very few movies I can think of where it didn't seem gratuitous.
*The same things has happened this week that happened last pregnancy: the day I started my third trimester, my pelvis started aching. It's more in the hips and lower back this time instead of the pubic bone, probably because Wulfrith is lying even farther back in my abdomen than K, which I didn't think was possible. I'm doubly glad now that I got travelling out of the way last week so I didn't have to traipse across the airport with my hips feeling like they're about to fall apart. Ah, the delights of the third trimester - aching joints, reflux, exhaustion, sciatica, ever-decreasing lung and bladder capacity... all sending the message that it's all downhill from here. Of course, at the bottom of the hill you get a baby, so it's worth it.
K informed me tonight that she wants two babies, a baby brother and baby sister. Sorry kid, there's just the one with no options of adding on. But it's good of her to remind me how much worse it could be. Yikes.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Happy St. Patrick's Day!
We are all full of delicious corned beef and cabbage and have enough left over in the refrigerator to make corned beef hash, which counts as a good holiday in my book.
New England boiled dinner is only half of my traditional St. Patrick's Day celebration. The other half is enjoying the magnificent song stylings of the Leprechaun Brothers:
New England boiled dinner is only half of my traditional St. Patrick's Day celebration. The other half is enjoying the magnificent song stylings of the Leprechaun Brothers:
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Home again
K and I took two blessedly uneventful flights home yesterday and have gratefully settled back in at home. Our week in Michigan was really great, much to my surprise. Based on my previous experience of travelling alone with K, I thought adding having to work on top of that would smash me flat.
But as it turns out, K has turned a major developmental corner recently and was happy to spend huge amounts of time playing on her own with my old Playmobil and Fisher Price figures, and spending time hanging out with my mother or her aides (her aides are almost universally middle aged women who have children of their own, so they were pretty good with her). She also took a good nap every day, so I was able to get enough work done during the day that I didn't have to stay up too late at night, before then having to get up with K in the morning. Between getting something resembling enough sleep and not having a preschooler velcroed to me (and being so freakin' cute and pleasant that it was a joy to be around her most of the time), it was a remarkably relaxing visit.
It's been a long time since I've felt like that visiting my parents. Before my mother's accident, going home was very relaxing - being the child of two introverts means that the atmosphere of their house tended to be very quiet and uncluttered. But then Dad got sick and Mom had her accident, and there were always strangers in the house and my mother always needed me to do things for her. Add a baby on top of that and visits home got very hectic and demanding. But unlike Christmas, we weren't trying to shove six people into a two bedroom condo, my mother didn't seem to need anything from me and life was pretty calm.
That doesn't mean that I'm not really looking forward to tomorrow when I can ship K off to daycare and to work and have the whole house to myself for a few blissful hours though.
*****
I went to work today and spent most of the day taming our new museum and library software, Past Perfect. So far, I've managed to figure out how to add books and perform searches, format everything so that our catalog cards and spine labels would print correctly and set up a file that can be imported into Past Perfect so we can catalog books the computer without the new software, put it on a disk and then import it into PP. If we're going to put the entire catalog on computer, we're going to have to clock a few million monkeys' worth of typing time, but my boss is being all picky and insisting that other people be able to use PP occasionally, so we have to figure out how to do some of the typing on our other computer. Stupid selfish museum workers grumble grumble.
Importing data into PP naturally is far more complicated than it needs to be. Part of it is PP's fault, since it's only willing to import either very specifically formatted text files or obscure or out of date programs like Excel 5 (for reference sake, Excel 5 is the one that came out with Windows 95, which of course we don't have. I mean, we're a Victorian museum and all, but that doesn't mean we keep around antiques that old). But mostly it's because Microsoft Excel was being a complete butthead, refusing to either maintain accurate formatting in an older version of itself or dancing around being willing to save the data in a format that PP would accept. "Well, I can do comma-delimited, but I'm not going to save it in a text file. I can do a text file, but it'll be tab delimited and I won't use the quotes around the data that PP wants. And if you want me to do any of this, you'll have to balance three teacups on your head while wearing roller skates and doing the hora. Now dance for me, monkey. Dance!"
As it turns out, the secret of getting the data in the right format is actually to use Access, a fact that is so secret that they were completely unwilling to include it in any of the PP documentation or training materials. It may be that it's available in a secret file that only becomes visible on the third Thursday of every month with a gibbous moon after the computer has been spun widdershins five times. However, I had to just apply my poor overheated brain to the problem to figure it out instead. On the plus side, I felt like a Sooper Computer Genius once I managed to successfully set up the Access database, add a couple books and then import the file successfully into PP. And even more on the plus side, an Access database means that I'll be able to set up a more user-friendly interface for inputting books for anysuckersvolunteers willing to help with the project.
***
In a strange twist of events, we've seen Olwen twice in the past few days. I had truly thought that she had either been rescued or was dead. Finding her alive as a stray over a year after losing her was about the last thing we expected. She wouldn't let us get near her, but we put food out and found her eating it tonight. We're planning to buy a live trap tomorrow to see if we can catch her that way.
And then... we're not sure. This would have been a lot simpler before we added two more cats to the house. IF she is healthy or can be made healthy with vet care and TLC and IF she can be resocialized to us and the other cats, we have to then decide if we really want four cats. We like the kittens, but I haven't really fallen in love with them yet. I definitely don't love them the way I loved Olwen. Four cats starts to get into the realm of not being affordable.
But we can worry about that later. Right now, I'm just praying we can catch our poor wayward kitty.
But as it turns out, K has turned a major developmental corner recently and was happy to spend huge amounts of time playing on her own with my old Playmobil and Fisher Price figures, and spending time hanging out with my mother or her aides (her aides are almost universally middle aged women who have children of their own, so they were pretty good with her). She also took a good nap every day, so I was able to get enough work done during the day that I didn't have to stay up too late at night, before then having to get up with K in the morning. Between getting something resembling enough sleep and not having a preschooler velcroed to me (and being so freakin' cute and pleasant that it was a joy to be around her most of the time), it was a remarkably relaxing visit.
It's been a long time since I've felt like that visiting my parents. Before my mother's accident, going home was very relaxing - being the child of two introverts means that the atmosphere of their house tended to be very quiet and uncluttered. But then Dad got sick and Mom had her accident, and there were always strangers in the house and my mother always needed me to do things for her. Add a baby on top of that and visits home got very hectic and demanding. But unlike Christmas, we weren't trying to shove six people into a two bedroom condo, my mother didn't seem to need anything from me and life was pretty calm.
That doesn't mean that I'm not really looking forward to tomorrow when I can ship K off to daycare and
*****
I went to work today and spent most of the day taming our new museum and library software, Past Perfect. So far, I've managed to figure out how to add books and perform searches, format everything so that our catalog cards and spine labels would print correctly and set up a file that can be imported into Past Perfect so we can catalog books the computer without the new software, put it on a disk and then import it into PP. If we're going to put the entire catalog on computer, we're going to have to clock a few million monkeys' worth of typing time, but my boss is being all picky and insisting that other people be able to use PP occasionally, so we have to figure out how to do some of the typing on our other computer. Stupid selfish museum workers grumble grumble.
Importing data into PP naturally is far more complicated than it needs to be. Part of it is PP's fault, since it's only willing to import either very specifically formatted text files or obscure or out of date programs like Excel 5 (for reference sake, Excel 5 is the one that came out with Windows 95, which of course we don't have. I mean, we're a Victorian museum and all, but that doesn't mean we keep around antiques that old). But mostly it's because Microsoft Excel was being a complete butthead, refusing to either maintain accurate formatting in an older version of itself or dancing around being willing to save the data in a format that PP would accept. "Well, I can do comma-delimited, but I'm not going to save it in a text file. I can do a text file, but it'll be tab delimited and I won't use the quotes around the data that PP wants. And if you want me to do any of this, you'll have to balance three teacups on your head while wearing roller skates and doing the hora. Now dance for me, monkey. Dance!"
As it turns out, the secret of getting the data in the right format is actually to use Access, a fact that is so secret that they were completely unwilling to include it in any of the PP documentation or training materials. It may be that it's available in a secret file that only becomes visible on the third Thursday of every month with a gibbous moon after the computer has been spun widdershins five times. However, I had to just apply my poor overheated brain to the problem to figure it out instead. On the plus side, I felt like a Sooper Computer Genius once I managed to successfully set up the Access database, add a couple books and then import the file successfully into PP. And even more on the plus side, an Access database means that I'll be able to set up a more user-friendly interface for inputting books for any
***
In a strange twist of events, we've seen Olwen twice in the past few days. I had truly thought that she had either been rescued or was dead. Finding her alive as a stray over a year after losing her was about the last thing we expected. She wouldn't let us get near her, but we put food out and found her eating it tonight. We're planning to buy a live trap tomorrow to see if we can catch her that way.
And then... we're not sure. This would have been a lot simpler before we added two more cats to the house. IF she is healthy or can be made healthy with vet care and TLC and IF she can be resocialized to us and the other cats, we have to then decide if we really want four cats. We like the kittens, but I haven't really fallen in love with them yet. I definitely don't love them the way I loved Olwen. Four cats starts to get into the realm of not being affordable.
But we can worry about that later. Right now, I'm just praying we can catch our poor wayward kitty.
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Almost certainly overshare
When I was getting dressed this morning, K pointed to my nipples, which as is very common in pregnancy have darkened considerably, and told me they were poopy. Ah, the sophisticated humor of the preschooler.
Of all of the myriad indignities of pregnancy, I have to admit that this is one I've never read in any of the books and websites.
I'm still trying to decide if this is better or worse than last year when she would poke a finger into my nipple and say "Beep!"
Of all of the myriad indignities of pregnancy, I have to admit that this is one I've never read in any of the books and websites.
I'm still trying to decide if this is better or worse than last year when she would poke a finger into my nipple and say "Beep!"
Leaving on a jet plane
K and I are flying out to Michigan far too early tomorrow morning (I had thought I was so clever in getting a 9:15 flight so we wouldn't have to get up too much earlier than normal. Then I realized Daylight Savings Time starts tomorrow - d'oh!). I don't precisely expect this to be a relaxing trip, between solo childcare, working and no doubt helping my mother in various and sundry ways. But I've been feeling a desperate need for a change of scenery since the middle of January and like I really need my mommy for a while. Michigan in March isn't exactly the favored spring break destination, I know, but it's home and it will be good to see it. Travel is about to get a lot harder in a shockingly short amount of time, so if it be not now, well, it's going to be a darn good long while before it's yet to come.
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