'Do you see what you've done to me?'

There I was, enjoying my evening when Alise looked up from her laptop to deliver this bombshell.
'Do you see what you've done to me?'
'What are you talking about my sweet, beautiful princess?' I said. Roughly. At least that's how I'm choosing to recall this conversation.
'My boobs are all weird. They're bigger'
I confess at this point to mentally high five-ing myself. There was of course a cloud to which this delightful silver lining could frame. A smelly, turbulent cloud.
'And I'm really gassy'.
'Gassy?' I asked before realizing quickly what she meant.
'Burps and farts', she TMI'd. 'Almost non stop'.
'Well that's what I've been doing for the last 31 years' I reasoned. 'Doesn't make it my fault'.

Apparently burps and farts are an early side effect of pregnancy. I had not known this. Now not only do I know this, but Alise knows, the cats know, the mice know and Coco the dog has someone to blame when I'm not around for her own indiscretions.

In all honesty, the gas from Alise isn't all that bad at all. Net fartage from her is still only at about 10% of the level that I produce on any average day, and I haven't even smelled anything bad yet. I'm really just putting this on record so that I can point to something tangible when I'm attempting, and likely failing, to shift the blame for a stinker.

It Even Hurts to Type

It took me twice as long to walk to the train station this morning. It hurts to lift my arm above my shoulder, it hurts to sit down, it even hurts to type.

 

Yesterday I played tennis for the first time in about eight years. I played against 'Milos', a neighbor who answered my email to the local listserv. It really is kind of cool, you can send emails to the entire neighborhood (at least those signed up for the listserv) to ask if anyone knows a good electrician, if anyone knows where to get good Chinese food, and if everyone can turn their music down. Milos and I arranged to meet at the tennis courts that are close to my house at seven.

 

By eight thirty I arrived back at home a sweaty, smelly, victorious mess. The game may have ended at a one set all draw, but for the basic fact that I had survived the workout without being crushed during the game was all that was important. I took a much needed shower and crashed out.

 

In short, exercise is good. I have woken up this morning in a lot of pain, barely able to move, but with a huge grin on my face and a good feeling inside. I always imagined myself being one of those fathers who plays sports with his kids and I really hope that I am that kind of dad, but to do that will take some serious getting into shape.

 

'Did you have fun?' Milos said as we walked off the court.

'Yeah, yeah I actually did. Shall we play again some time?'

'Sure!' he said. 'What are you doing tomorrow?'

'Aching, crying, possibly dying', I told him.

'Me too. Next week?'

'Next week sounds good', I said.

How is Babby Formed?

As previously mentioned, Alise and I have been doing quite a bit of research recently on the internets about this whole 'baby' thing.

There are a number of websites out there, of varying quality, that will guide you through each week of pregnancy telling you what is happening to the alien and what to expect for yourself. Some are a little scary and have drawings or ultrasounds of the child's development, but most seem to agree on one point:

Oh my god you're having a baby and your body will never be the same again! Kiss goodbye to your life as you know it! Be very very afraid!!!

Good to know.

I already touched on one annoying acronym (AF, meaning Aunt Flo, meaning period), but Alise drew my attention last night to another particularly annoying and inane one. BD. In context, 'my partner and I did a BD last night and I think I might be pregnant'.

BD stands for 'baby dance', which means trying to conceive. I wish I were making this up.

Anyway. The pregnancy week by week websites are usually broken into three sections. The first charts baby's development, telling us what size (usually in comparison to fruit) he or she is, and which parts are forming when. Fascinating, scary stuff.

The second section tells us what's happening to Alise's body and what to look out for in the coming week. 'Boobs growing' is the only one that I can remember, but I'm sure that there are other changes afoot.

The third section of most of these websites is usually titled 'tips for dad', or something equally banal. This section seeks to help 'mom', by letting 'dad' subtly know what's required of him.

Some of these tips include (and again, I'm not making this up):

• Perhaps you could do the laundry this week?
• Show Interest!
• Fill the gas tank
• Cook her a meal (or order take-out!)

Are men really so useless that we have to be asked to do these things when our women are pregnant? Aren't these things what we are supposed to do anyway?

Sadly, conversations and relayed conversations with mothers and mothers to be have revealed that there are quite a few guys out there who aren't pulling their weight when baby is coming. I have also seen quite a few comments from guys who complain that their pregnant partner is getting fat, and unattractive…

Now, excuse me for stating the bloody obvious here… but it takes two to do the baby dance. You're the one that put that thing insidaher, you're the one who gets to keep your figure, you're not dealing with raging hormones and swollen ankles; deal with it and stop being so bloody stupid.

All of which leads me to Yahoo! Answers, that last stop on the train of online stupidity. This question and answer is an oldie, but a goodie, and deserves publication here, I think.

How is babby formed?????

how is babby formed?

how girl get pragnent?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker

They need to do way instain mother> who kill thier babbys. becuse these babby cant frigth back it was on the news this mroing a mother in ar who had kill her three kids . they are taking the three babby back to new york too lady to rest my pary are with the father who lost his chrilden ; i am truley sorry for your lots

There be changes afoot...

You may (or may not) have noticed a couple of changes to this page. I've decided on a new look, and rather than make everything totally work properly with no glitches, figured I'd just throw it together and unleash it onto the world.

The FAQ and ABOUT buttons up there won't do anything just yet, but check back soon and I'll make them work. The 'Home' button will take you home (original works best sometimes), the 'Contact' will allow you to send an email right to my inbox.

Comments/Suggestions more than welcome, as always.

Apparently, it happens to us all.

Alise and I were both in the bathroom the other night, doing what we do before bed. She was applying some kind of edible sounding stuff to her face, as she does on occasion, while I waited nearly patiently to use the facilities.

I'm really not a gentleman. I have often in the past 'gone potty' while she's been in the room. One interesting side effect of pregnancy though is a heightened, almost superhero like sense of smell. My deodorant has been forcibly changed, the cats can no longer secretly pee in a corner of a lesser used room and get away with it, and I must be alone when I wee. The sacrifices I'm making for this woman.

At one point she stopped what she was doing and looked at me. No doubt wondering what terrible thing she'd done in a past life to now find herself living with a man who was at that moment crossing his legs and humming the 'I gotta go' tune. As I looked back at her she gave me one of her 'you're cute and helpless' looks, and leaned towards me.

Anticipating a kiss, I closed my eyes and puckered.

As quick as a flash and while my eyes were closed, she grabbed a pair of tweezers and pecked at my nose like a small bird at a day old croissant. After 3 seconds of furious work, she stepped back to admire her work.

'Four hairs' she proudly announced. 'Four hairs from your nose'.

Let me just make one thing clear here. These hairs weren't living in my nostrils. These hairs were on the flat of my nose. Where hairs shouldn't ever grow.

Sadly, they are not alone. I've noticed hairs growing from my knuckles, my elbow, my neck and from the very crest of my ears.

In short, ladies and gentlemen; I'm getting old. When our child is 18, I will be 50 years old. FIFTY!! I'm not impressed.

Clearly, there isn't much that I can do about the age thing. I might be able to do something about the 'feeling old' thing though, and to that end I've set up a couple of games of tennis with some neighbors. My first match is on Wednesday, and as soon as I've recovered (probably Sunday), I'll let you know how I got on, and what injury I feigned to hasten the end of my punishment.

Dear Hunter Fan Company

Dear Hunter Ceiling Fans,

There are many things that I can accomplish in five minutes. I can boil an egg. I can decide that I want to better my life, and then think better about it and begin a nap. I can take a shower while shaving with reasonable success, and I can create human life. Five minutes, that's all I need.

I cannot, in five minutes, put up your five minute ceiling fan.

I already had two of your fans in my house, one in the kitchen and one in the living room. I did not install either, but I observed from a distance. To be honest it looked terribly difficult but nonetheless I imagined that I'd be able to eventually throw up a ceiling fan and make our bedroom pretty and cool. When we saw your 'five minute fan' in Lowes, I adjusted your claims to take into account my inadequacies of all things manly, and gave myself two hours.

It took roughly two hours for me to open the box, get the directions, attempt to read them, cry for a bit, have a cup of tea, think to myself, then put up an ad on craigslist.com for a real man to help.

We eventually found a licensed electrician who said he'd come and help us install your five minute ceiling fan. It took him, and please note that he was paid for the job and not by the hour, two and a half hours to install the five minute fan.

It has taken me five minutes to write this letter. Writing letters I can do, I consider myself an expert. Our electrician considered himself an expert in installing ceiling fans.

My question to you therefore is... Who, and in what circumstances could ever put this fan up in five minutes?

I await your response,

Jeremy

Video Diary 3: Return of the Video Diary

We're ALL being watched

I decided on my way home on Friday that I was going to take charge. I was going to be a man. I was going to show Alise who wore the pants in this household, I was going to exert my masculine authority.
I strode purposefully from the train station. I didn't even look both ways twice when I crossed the road. I was a man on a mission and nothing was going to stand in my way.
I burst into the house, threw down my bag, negotiated Coco with ease, located Alise and made my manly declaration.
'We are going to Home Depot!' I barked.
'Why?'
'We are going to buy a ceiling fan!'
'Okay', Alise said. Clearly not ready for what was to follow. 'Who are we going to ask to put it up for us?'
'I am going to do it myself!'

Bombshell.

I'm really not a handy person at all. I have, and this is true, cried while holding a running drill. My arm aches when I paint, and I have no idea how to get down from a ladder without whimpering. I'm less of a man than I've known any man to be, and it often shames me.

An hour later we were in Lowes (Home Depot was a step a little too far for me, Lowes is a little more 'inadequate man' friendly). We settled on a ceiling fan that said it was 90% assembled, and was called a 'five minute fan'. The box claimed that it could be installed in five minutes. The box, it turns out, was a lying sack of shit.

In my defense, we do live in a very old house with very old wiring. We (ok, Alise) eventually worked out how to unscrew the old light fixture which then revealed a hodgepodge of scary, knarled, and unrecognizable wiring. I stood staring at this maze for a few minutes, scratching my head while making 'hhhmm' noises.
'We should call Dave', Alise said.

Dave is a friend of ours who is remarkably skilled in all things manly. He can fix cars, he's built a house, he can do 'shit'. Dave is a man.

I tried calling Dave, but he didn't answer his phone. I left him a message. These days Dave has been doing a fair amount of manly work on a house that is out of cell phone range, and where he doesn't have internet access. I figured he was there and would call me in the week, when he steps back into civilization.

About two hours later Alise was on her laptop, checking her facebook. 'Dave just changed his status!' she told me. 'He's not at that house at all!'.

And this, in a roundabout way, is what I wanted to talk about today. I am as anti CCTV and Government spying as the next lefty, but yet I often stalk my friends and family online. You see the 'sitemeter' icon at the bottom of this page? This is how I can see how many people are on this site and roughly where they are from. I don't know who in Austin, Texas visits me daily, but I know that you do and I hope that you'll say 'hi'. When the child is born we will no doubt deploy baby monitors and maybe even a camera in a bear to keep an eye on the poor little bugger. Even before he or she is born, we will take pictures and watch the creature on a video screen. I want to watch everyone yet I hate to be watched myself.

So what kind of world will our alien grow up into? How far will surveillance have come by the time its my age? Will he or she have an implanted chip that tracks its movements? Will they have any privacy at all?

I ended up placing an ad on craigslist for an electrician; 'Brian' is coming tomorrow at 10am to put up a ceiling fan and to make himself $100. being a man can be so profitable.

We're gonna have a trophy baby

I take the train to work, every day that I decide to go to work. I
kind of like it, it allows me to play games on my phone and ipod,
sometimes write, and above all to people watch. While I do miss
driving, Alise allows me to drive  (in her car) whenever we need to go
anywhere on four wheels, which is gracious and very trusting of her.

I get on the train at its first stop and remain on until the last one.
Partly because I like to get the biggest bang for my buck seventy
five, partly because these are the stations closest to my home and
office.

Even though I travel at basically the same time in the mornings and
evenings, I rarely see the same people on my commute. This is a little
odd, but it is good to mix it up.

One young man that I often see gets on the train at, let's call it
stop five of my route. When he gets on at five, he boards with his
possibly one year old daughter, a delightful child with beautiful
blond hair. He then gets off at stop eight with daughter in tow.
Some days I see this young man get on the train, alone, at stop eight.

I have deduced (never let it be said that I'm incapable of intelligent
thought before my first gallon of coffee) that his mornings consist of
getting on the train at five with child, getting off at eight to drop
child at daycare, then getting back on at eight to go into Boston
where he works. Probably making cookies or saving kittens. He's that
sweet looking.

Now, to my point (I do have one this time!)

When he gets on the train at five with daughter in tow, he is the
center of attention. The guy is mobbed. Everyone wants to know
everything about not only the child, but about him too.

When he gets onto a different train at stop eight, he is totally
ignored. No one says a word to him, he may as well be invisible.

I guess I have this to look forward to. When I am out with our child
we will be popular and interesting. When alone I will be as I am now,
just another face in the crowd. Babies, like it or not, are attention
whores and our child will be my trophy baby. Fun times.

And Baby Makes Ten...

I was talking with my good friend Alexandra the other day.

 Alexandra works in New Jersey for a shipping company, but before that worked in ecommerce. She relayed a story from that time to me:

 One of my reps took a call from a lady who bought this gadget, a pet translator, you put it on your pets neck and it translates what the dog is barking. really stupid.
aaanyhow, she was calling very dissatisfied with her purchase and was demanding a full refund. apparently she put the thing on her dog and the dog told her 4 year old daughter ' I hate you'

Now, even though I've seen the Disney movie 'Up' (a great movie, watch it if you can) I don't actually believe that these devices do work or that they could work. This story however does raise some important questions.

Alise and I do have quite the menagerie. As mentioned previously, we have 4 cats, 2 mice and a large and very goofy dog. We love our animals a great deal… but…

 What if they don't appreciate the new addition to the family? What if one of the cats (Havoc, I'm looking in your direction here) looks at the baby as a threat and starts peeing all over everything? What if Coco the dog tries to snatch food from the plate of an infant? What if the child is allergic?

Sadly, a lot of the questions asked lead to some straightforward but sucky and depressing answers should there be any conflicts.  I'm crossing my fingers tightly on this issue.

Oh what a tangled web...

Alise and I both use the internets about as much as we use oxygen. This is the case under normal circumstances as much as now, but our browsing habits have shifted a little. Personally I've been spending a little less time researching the moment of conception and a little more 'what happens when you wake up pregnant' – and while it is no less interesting it is certainly a lot more scary.

There is something to be said though for having all of these resources at our fingertips. I'm an old person, born in 1978 no less, so grew up largely without the internet. I have no idea how I survived.

While daydreaming earlier (if my boss asks I was solving a complex issue while meditating), I imagined a future conversation with our alien:

Me: you know, when I was your age there was no such thing as the internet.

Alien: What?? Then how did you find things out?

Me: if you wanted to know something you either asked someone who you trusted to tell you the truth, or you looked it up in a book.

Alien: And what if you wanted to know what was happening in a sports game or something?

Me: you listened to it on the radio, or read about it in the paper the next day.

Alien: Wow.

Me: Tell me about it.

Alien: You're really old.

Me: Yes, yes I am.

 

I'll be writing about some of our online findings, and how they compare to this pregnancy in due course. Allow me though, please, to place one thing firmly on the record.

 

A lot of these pregnancy sites have forums, where people can share their experiences. A lot of these people use abbreviations, as happens all over the nets (LOL, WTF, BTFO, you get the idea). There is one though that I had to ask Alise about, and which she found to be as strange as I.

 AF. AF is short for Aunt Flo. Aunt Flo is apparently a polite way of saying 'period'.

 I think that those people who are researching a pregnancy forum will be okay if they see the word 'period', please don't shelter me. If you need to use 'Aunt Flo' to shelter yourself, perhaps childbirth isn't the best idea for you?

 And now, a short poem/song, to the tune of John Denver's 'You fill up my senses (Annie's Song)'

 You look like a tadpole,

You're as small as a button,

You don't have an arsehole,

You don't even have ears,

You give your mom heartburn,

But you made her boobs bigger,

There's something about you,

That makes me feel good.

La la la la la la you make me feel good.

T'was the Night before New Year

I'm not sure exactly why I've been thinking about this so much recently, but thinking about it I have. been. Is there an English teacher in the house??

Last year, on December 31st; I had to work late and got home at around 9pm. Alise was at home, and even though it was New Years Eve we had already decided that it was too cold out, that we were too tired, and too old to go partying to celebrate the retirement of our 2008 calenders. We settled in with a cup of tea and were watching television, deciding that we'd probably just go to bed before midnight.

At around 10:30pm, Coco the chocolate lab started to whine. The kind of 'I really would like to go outside kind of NOW', whine. I let her out.

When she was back inside I noticed that her stomach seemed HUGE. She was also dry heaving a bit, seemed like she needed to puke.

I, as usual, had no idea what the right thing to do was.

'I'll just take her for a walk', I told Alise. 'Let her get whatever it is coughed up. She'll be fine'.
'Maybe we should call the emergency vet', Alise said.
'She'll be fine' I said, with authority.
'Call the vet' Alise told me.

I did as all men should do when told to do something with a tone as employed by my dearest. I called the vet.

It turns out that Coco was suffering from a terrible condition called 'bloat'. This is when the stomach basically fills with gas and twists, cutting off circulation and will lead, if not immediately treated with surgery, to a painful and fairly speedy demise. The vet advised that we get her into their vet hospital at once.

Alise was throughout all of this calm, considerate, generous and amazing. I won't detail on a public blog exactly the lengths that she went to, but needless to say she saved Coco's life a couple of times over, and I am forever grateful to her. I've often told her in private but also want to put on public record my gratitude to her, and to let her know that the compassion and love for that damn, dumb, docile and bloody awesome dog that she showed that night will forever remain in my heart.

Alise, you'll be an amazing mother. You'll always know what's best, and you'll always tell me sternly, and quite correctly, to call the doctor when it's necessary.

We took you EVERYWHERE!

Alise and I went to the zoo this past weekend.

It was a nice (though hot) day, Alise's car had been fixed, we'd been to breakfast and wanted to do 'something'. Clearly doing 'something' is how we got into this whole baby mess in the first place, so we thought we'd instead do 'something else'.

Franklin Park Zoo in Boston is a great place! I was kind of surprised. It was very much unlike a lot of the Boston attractions, in that it was cheap ($13 each), it was not too crowded, and it was a place into which you can take your own food and drink. You know, I took my sister to Six Flags (the amusement park, not the baby to be of the same name) a couple of years ago when it was about 100 degrees out and humid. Being from the UK she's a delicate flower and not too used to these conditions so I thought it wise to take cold drinks with us. Not allowed into the park. Cold drinks inside the park? $5 each. What. The. Fudge. Obama, make it illegal.

Anyway. The zoo. It was cool! Zebras, giraffes, butterflies, babies, gorillas... awesome. I recommend it to anyone, and I think we'll probably find ourselves going back. This is basically what we do... we find something we like, and we go back a lot. It's how we signed up for a yearly membership to Old Sturbridge Village, and it's how we'll make it worth it by going 12 times this year.

Going to these places also gives us both chance to do what we enjoy doing best. People watching. It's easily my favorite thing in the world.

It's becoming obvious to us both now though that whereas before if we saw a baby human being while out we'd sneak peeks at it and saw 'aw' to each other, we're now spotting them and conversing in a corner:

'is that the Graco travel stroller?'
'Yeah I think so, the one with the sticky latch though'
'Yeah, I thought it might have been one of the Melbourne models at first'
'I thought that too, but the Melbourne has three pockets, that's only got two'
'You're right. Ooh! look! a McLaren stroller... 2007 model?'
'Yep, look at that red plumage on the back. Quick! take a photo before anyone notices'...

I've a feeling that we're going to be doing a lot of sightseeing over the next few months, partly to get ourselves out of the house, partly because we simply enjoy going to these places, partly because we're nerdy geeks who are trying to make absolutely sure that we're as researched as we possibly can be in all things child. So you see little alien? when you're able to talk and able to hate and are telling us that you never go anywhere or do anything fun; remember this... we really did take you everywhere!

Life is a revolving door...

I have a number of irrational fears.

One that I mentioned in an earlier post, is cotton. I hate the stuff. I will, and have, crossed the road to avoid it. Alise knows that she is to keep all cotton buds away from me, and she has those Q-tip thingys hidden in the bathroom.

If one day I'm rooting around in there, looking for a bandage or something and I happen across a big box of them, I'll probably scream and then cry.

Another of my fears is revolving doors. They drive me mental.

If I'm totally alone, I can handle revolving doors. If someone is behind me, waiting to use the door after me, I break out into a smelly sweat and I panic. I can't stand that someone else will be using the revolving door to enter before I've exited, and it has led me to walk a very long way every morning to the exit that I really shouldn't use at the train station, to avoid a revolving door.

I thought about using the revolving door at the train station today. I was running late, and could have done with that 4 minutes that I lose by walking around the long way. I decided to take a deep breath, be a man, and to just go for it.

Before I had exited, someone entered. I broke into a smelly sweat, panicked, and barely made it out of there with my right leg intact.

This is similar to some of the feelings that I've been having when I think about a baby coming. In my mind, I'm still a child. I'm the youngest, I still play a lot. I just don't know if I'm ready to exit childhood.

The thing is though, there's someone coming in; so I'd better get out. Or risk serious injury.

A taste of things to come...

Alise and I both slept very badly last night...

We have decided that we are going to rearrange our house around a little. We technically have 3 bedrooms, which are basically 2 medium-ish sized rooms and one small one which has been used as an office and a spare room in its time.

Right now the small room is the spare room and has our sleep sofa/Coco's couch in it and little else. It's really that small a room. We occupy the room right next door, that I'll call the green room. It's got a tiny closet but does look out onto the back of the house, so is a little more tranquil. The blue room is at the front of the house and has a larger closet, and currently is really being used by the cats as a place to eat, drink and poop.

We decided that we will move into the blue room ourselves, move the sleep sofa/Coco's couch into the green room to make it a more habitable spare room/office/library, and turn the smaller room into a nursery.

As part of this, we moved all of the cats food/water/cat litter downstairs into the kitchen. All of the cats move around the house, so they'll adjust. One of them though, last night, didn't seem to get it and decided to keep waking us up.

'I have no food', she'd tell us.
'It's downstairs', we'd reply.
'Where downstairs?' she'd say.
'The kitchen'.
'Oh. I liked it upstairs'
'We know you did... but we had to move it'
'Ah'. She'd say. Feeling hungry, she'd pop into the blue room for a snack.

'I have no food', she'd tell us fifteen minutes later.

And so it went on. All night.

I consider this practice.

The Little Shop That Can.

Alise and I went to Babies'R'us the other day.

Now, don't fret. We're not getting too ahead of ourselves. We didn't go there for any other reason than to buy a bath thermometer. Alise has read that taking too hot baths can be harmful to babies at pretty much all stages of the pregnancy, and while we looked for a bath thermometer in CVS, they didn't have one so we took a trip to the big store with everything for baby.

Babies'R'us was, to me, surprisingly nice. I had expected a giant store, rather like its big brother, with a ton of things that no-one has ever in the past ever needed for their child. This store though was fairly tranquil, with clearly defined areas and wide aisles. Soft music played, the air smelled… clean.

We wandered around for a while. We soon found the bath thermometer in the 'First Aid/Bath time' aisle (it's as if they KNEW why we were there and rearranged the store before we arrived!). we picked it up, Alise got some things for morning sickness (a pill for the nausea, a blindfold so that she doesn't see my half dressed scrawn every morning which is what I still think may be the root cause of the nausea). Whereas usually I like to run into a store, grab what I need and run for the exit, sometimes stopping to pay, sometimes not; this evening caught me in an inquisitive mood. I spotted the strollers, and puttered towards them.

Did you know that they now have baby strollers that you can put baby into and wheel them around with you, then you can lift baby out while still in its cradle, and use the same cradle as a car seat?? They are like Transformers! Genius! Baby doesn't get woken up! And this same contraption can be used later on as a toddler stroller! I played with basically all of them. Practicing lifting them out and putting them back in. judging for myself how easy this would be for both of us, relaying my findings to Alise, who was looking at me like… well I don't know what that look was like. I think she thought this was 'sweet', with perhaps a slight shade of terror thrown in.

We moved on from the strollers once I'd decided that I would conduct further research at a later date. We are being very careful at this early stage to not actually buy any of these things, but figure that it doesn't hurt to have a look. It was just a quick walk to the pack and plays.

These things are AMAZING!! They're travel playpen things, that can also be used for a newborn with what I can only describe as a raised floor. They have shades, storage holes, they vibrate and have lights. And they pack down to the size of a deck of cards! Well not quite. But they are impressive.

I had FAR too much fun at that place. I only had to leave when one baby called another baby a 'bugger head' or something, and the whole place exploded in screams and cries. Why do children always have to spoil my fun?

Branding Baby

Alise and I have been talking baby names recently.

That is to say, it's a topic that has come up regularly basically since we started dating. It was always a hypothetical conversation, and to a large extent still really feels like one. Until I actually see a bump, I'll continue to refer to this cluster of cells as an alien, and Alise will call it 'pumpkin' or 'peanut' or something equally as cute. One day though, we will have to actually give a name to this thing, a name that this thing will have to live with for quite a while.

It's a terrifying responsibility. My one request has been that the child isn't given a name that is too uncommon. For that reason, I have asked (time will tell if I'll be successful) that the name chosen passes the 'pencil test'. I want our child to be able to walk into a gift store, go to the stand with name embossed pencils, and be able to find their very own pencil.

As part of our conversation on Sunday, I came up with what I thought was a brilliant idea.

'Lets call it Foxwoods', I said.

Foxwoods is the name of a casino in Connecticut, which Alise and I may or may not have been to.

'No', she said. Without considering the idea for a second.

'But it's perfect!' I told her. 'We'll get free stuff from the casino! Free nights at their hotel, meals, drinks, everything!'

'We are not naming our child after a casino', she said. I don't think she was joking. She didn't think I was either.

'It does pass the pencil test though', I reasoned. 'Kid will be able to get everything with their name on. Pencils, mouse pads, sweaters…'

'Not happening'.

'Fine', I said. 'how about Six Flags?'

Quick thought of the day...

Did you know that I was born almost exactly 9 months after Elvis died? It's true! And that must be where I get my amazing singing voice from. Irony is becoming quite a theme on this blog, isn't it?

With that said though, isn't it cool that our child will be born almost exactly 9 months after Michael Jackson died? I was actually a fan of MJ, so I'm reading far more into this 'coincidence' than anyone else. Sad really.

Which brings me to my joke of the week...

Q: What's the difference between Neil Armstrong and Michael Jackson?
A: One walks on the moon, the other is a dead pedophile.

vIDEO dIARY tIME111!!

The title is supposed to look like that, It's ironic.

But for those of you who think that I would type out something like that on purpose, I quite understand. The technical glitch in the video diary was not ironic, but quite typical of something that I, as an old man getting older, would do.

A blog about a blog

You may all be wondering where this blog is going. I wonder this myself.

 

At this early stage of pregnancy, there really isn't much that I can report on as far as physical developments are concerned. That isn't to say that there isn't a lot going on, mind you.

 

At this time our child is forming its central nervous system, muscles, bones and its heart. This week, if it is developing according to plan, its heart may start to pump blood. All while the alien is still about the size of a grain of rice. Pretty impressive huh? And to think that I feel accomplished when I manage to leave the house wearing matching socks.

 

While that's all going on inside Alise though, there's not much evidence of it on the outside. Her breasts (soon to be referred to as 'mobile vending machines') have grown a little and she's a little more tired than usual, but that's about it so far. I haven't yet been called upon to go and get her foods that she craves, she hasn't yet really suffered morning sickness. She is slightly nauseous, but that could be more from seeing me do 'the pirate dance' while nekkid.

 

For that reason, this blog has mostly been more concerned with my thoughts and emotions while I try to come to terms with what's happening, and what's about to happen. I hope that's okay with you all.  

If I could, I'd wrap her in cotton

I was on the train yesterday evening, making my way home from work. It's about a 45 minute journey from downtown Boston to my stop, which itself is about a 10 minute walk to our home. Oh the joys of living in suburbia.

As usual, of the lucky ones on the train to get a seat, most were asleep or at least pretending to sleep. Pretending to sleep on a train is a tactic used by some to avoid feeling guilty enough to give up their seat to someone elderly, disabled or pregnant and is equivalent in my eyes to crossing the road to avoid helping someone who has tumbled face first down a tall flight of marble stairs, but I digress. I usually stand for part or whole of my journey, casting suspicious glances at those that are clearly faking sleep.

One gentleman yesterday clearly wasn't a faker. As the train pulled into a stop he remained asleep. As the doors opened, he dreamed. As they started to close, he woke suddenly, realized where he was, and attempted to make a bolt for the door.

Sadly, tragically, and painfully, he had failed to tell his right leg that it was time to get up. As his left leg strode his right leg wobbled before pressing the snooze button and collapsing beneath him. The rest of him, deciding to see what was going on, followed him to the floor.

The noise that came from the mouth of this poor soul will live with me for a long, long time. Quickly he picked himself up, looked thoroughly embarrassed, and stood by the door. Avoiding the glances of anyone else he patiently waited for the next stop, no doubt hoping that the floor would swallow him whole.

I tell you this because Alise suffered a similar but much more serious and painful fate, many years ago. Before we even met, in fact.

Alise had the misfortune to tumble basically face first down a tall flight of marble stairs. The pain suffered must have been incredible, and I know (because she has told me so) that bruises covered her legs for months.

Alise has told me this story, and I've been in company when she's told others. Usually I think to myself 'the poor girl, that must have sucked'.

Watching Mr. Floopydigit today though brought that incident back into my consciousness. For the first time, I think that I fully understood the pain that my sweet babymomma went through on that dreadful day. The very thought of it made me want to pull the emergency cord of the train, jump into the middle of the highway, flag down the first passing DeLorean (I know, I'd probably be there for a while), carjack it, set the date coordinates and push the throttle to 88 MPH. I'd jump back in time and save her, protect her, make the pain never happen!

And that, is my problem.

I've always been a little over-protective. Just a little. Since news of the alien broke though, I've become terrible and it's going to end in tears. Take yesterday morning, for example.

Alise was up, dressed, and functional as I left for work. I have that 10 minute walk to the station, followed by a 45 minute ride, followed by a 5 minute stroll to my office. Yesterday morning, for the whole time, I checked my email on my phone religiously. When I got to work I checked my email once more, before calling her in a panic.

'Hi love', she said as she answered.
'Are you okay??' I gabbed. 'I haven't heard from you yet'
'I saw you less than an hour ago', she said. 'I'm just getting ready for work'.
'So, you're okay, right?'
'Right'
'Are you still pregnant?'
'Still pregnant'

I'm terrible, and I'm going to get worse, and I don't know what to do about it. Anne Frank had more control over her daily movements than this poor girl. If I didn't have a terrible, morbid fear of cotton, I'd wrap her in it.

The Calm Before The Storm...

New England is a wonderful place, with friendly people (at least most of the time they are), charming towns, excellent sports teams and cutting edge medical facilities and schools.

New England is also home to some of the most contrasting weather that I've ever seen.

Spring here can be lovely. This year it was a little cold, but usually a time when flowers and trees burst into life and memories of winter are blown away. Our alien is likely to be born at the beginning of Spring, and I personally can't think of a better time to first come to life.

Summer here is a little too hot for my liking, but nice nonetheless. We've been getting quite a few thunderstorms recently, and they've been scary for the cats and Coco, but they are kind of cool.

Autumn is glorious... nothing says 'pretty' better than dying vegetation.

The winters are what bother me. In a few short months our driveway and lawn will look very different than they do now. They will probably be covered by a thick sheet of ice and snow, and will only get more unrecognizable as time progresses.

I thought about this last night as Alise and I drove home last night, after a 'tour de dollar store' experience that we had undertaken. I looked at the driveway and tried to picture it as it will be in a few months. I then looked at Alise and did the same.

Alise is a stunningly beautiful woman who will, I'm quite sure, continue to look stunning throughout the pregnancy. It is no secret though that she is going to undergo some serious changes over the coming months. When the driveway is covered in snow, she's going to be a trifle larger than she is now.

I think... no, I'm pretty certain that I'm okay with this. It is going to be strange though.

All in all, it is still a little surreal. It's a lot for me to take in. Just as I know in July that by January we'll have snow and ice, and just as I know that Alise will at the same time be bigger, I just can't really picture either in my mind, to tell the truth.

One day soon though, it'll be snowing heavily and a pregnant Alise will be tapping on the window and waving at me. Telling me to get out there with her and shovel.

To blog or not to blog...

Now then, that IS a good question.

There is so much advice out there on the interwebs and in bookstores and in the minds of everyone that you talk to when it comes to pregnancy and all things related, that sometimes it can get a little overwhelming. one of the first question that we faced, and doubtless others face, when we first saw that YES + sign on the pregnancy test was; when should we tell people?

Some people say that you should wait until the first trimester passes. That is to say, you should calmly see yourself through the first three months of panic and terror and then tell those closest to you; 'you know how I've been really cranky, how my breasts have suddenly grown, how I've been throwing up all over the place every morning, and I've been wanting to kill you? Well here's why, I'm going to be a baby daddy'. Alise will probably say something similar.

Others say that you should wait until later, in case something else terrible happens to the fetus. I'm pretty sure that if we researched enough there would be someone out there who would advise, in all seriousness, that we should wait until the child is eighteen and ready to go off to college before we tell our family and friends that we had them at all.

We calmly discussed our options as we drove to the 24 hour Walmart that Sunday evening to buy the most expensive (product + gas + really late so I needed coffee = lots of cash) socks in baby history. We then realized that we'd probably just tell pretty much everyone pretty much straight away, and be totally upfront and honest the whole way through. This has been one way of our 'making it real', and being able to ask advice that doesn't start with 'hypothetically speaking...', which when heard pretty much always means 'what I'm about to describe is happening fo'realz'.

The best advice that I've had so far though came from my big brother Richard, who commented on my first post. Cheers mate, and cheers to everyone else too.

Still Week One...

I decided pretty early on in this venture that I'd like to create a video diary. Something to remember this time, something to show our child when he or she is old enough to appreciate it.

I then decided to post it on here too.

One thing that really worries me is that our child will face the same obstacles at birth as I did. Namely that it would be born with a 'clicky hip', and that it would be virtually deaf.

I had a hearing disability that affected me until I was well developed, and still now can hear little out of my left ear. This whole episode has left me with a speech impediment that's obvious to all. I realize that I am on the whole 'lucky', and that so many were dealt poorer hands than I was, but still... differences can be difficult to deal with and children can be very cruel.

It's an ironic twist that when I hear myself speaking 'live', I hear a wonderfully clear voice. Not the garbled mess that actually is expelled from my mouth. When I hear myself on tape or video I hear myself as you do, and it embarrasses me to no end.

Putting these videos up is therefore something that isn't easy for me.

You know what though? This first week of knowing about the baby has taught me one thing above all else. I am no longer the most important person in my life. My concerns mean less, I am living my life for others.

Week One --- What the hell have you done this time??

Today is Sunday, July 12th. It's a lovely summer afternoon, just as it was last Sunday. I'm sitting at my computer, just as I probably was this time last Sunday. I'm drinking coffee and thinking about smoking a cigarette, again, just like last Sunday. I'm also thinking about baby names, scouring the internets for baby clothes and furniture, and wondering what the hell I've done this time, which I didn't have to do last Sunday afternoon.

Last Sunday evening my fiancee Alise took a bath while I stayed downstairs on the porch, looking at news and porn websites on my laptop and enjoying some 'me' time. When she emerged from the bathroom about an hour later (I have no idea how she accomplishes this, I can barely stay submerged for ten minutes before I start to wrinkle and escape to dry land) she called 'Jeremy? can you come up here?' in a voice that trembled slightly. I dutifully bounded upstairs, hoping as I usually do that she'd be naked and ready to do the dirty.

It surprised me a little that she was fully dressed. Clearly I'd missed the boat. She walked silently into the bathroom and picked up a large, apparently new thermometer from the top of this IKEA shelving rack thingy that we have, and showed it to me.

A closer inspection revealed to me that this was not actually a thermometer. She's passed to me a pregnancy test. One of the new digital ones, one that said 'YES +' in clear type.

This information took a little longer for me to process than it probably should have done. I considered that it might mean 'yes, you're not pregnant, get on with your life as usual' before finally putting one and one together, adding 'baby', and making three.

Now, I've mentally rehearsed this moment for probably years. I've seen how 'real men' do this in movies and TV shows. I was supposed to scream at the top of my lungs YES! WHOO HOO! GET IN! BACK OF THE NET! HE SHOOTS HE SCORES!!!'; run about a bit, come back and look at the test again, hug Alise tightly and then loosen my grip, show slight panic that I've harmed her stomach, be reassured by her as she laughs at me and cries, run about some more, possibly spend some time on my knees and say 'thank you' to the ceiling, and then cry. And then repeat. And then smoke a cigar or something. The thing is though, this kind of surprised me a bit, you know? It's a Sunday evening! I had plans to read a bit, go to bed and hopefully do the wild thing. I froze a bit before realizing that Alise was looking at me, no doubt thinking 'He'd better start shouting and running about a bit otherwise I'm going to punch him'.

I didn't scream or even run about a bit. I still feel bad about this. I did hug her, fairly gently, before telling her what I wanted to do next.
'Let's go for a drive'.

Alise and I often go for a drive when we need to talk about things or when we need to process news. While I am only 31, I'm an old man at heart and I like to do old man things. Sometimes I like to go for a drive, end up in a new place and then try to find my way home for the sole purpose of knowing that one day, someone is going to ask me if I know where 'Bumblefuck, MA' is, and how to get home from it. I had actually intended this time to go to a Dunkin Donuts to get some coffee but had a better idea along the way and ended up in the parking lot of the local Target.
'Why are we here?' Alise asked me.
'Because I wanted to buy some socks', I told her.
'We drove all the way here on a Sunday night because you wanted some socks? What's wrong with the socks you have?'
'I wanted to buy a pair of baby socks', I said. 'This is my very understated, British way of saying that I'm ok with this'.

I think Alise cried. I'm not sure if it was because she thought this was pathetic or cute or most probably a bit of both.
'It's past nine though, she said. 'It looks like they're closed'.

As usual, she was right. Target was closed. Bollocks.

So, this is why we ended up driving about 40 miles to the nearest 24 hour Walmart; where I bought a Winnie the Pooh pair of socks and a little cloth hat with Pooh bear ears; for the cluster of cells that are in my fiancee, that will one day rule my life. They actually already do rule my life, and I've found that pretty much everything that I do is either because of, or in spite of them.