So plans for the house are well under the way. I made up a list of what we'd need (based on The Cob Builder's Handbook) and posted it in a note on Facebook, asking for help/materials. We're pretty inherently broke, and a lot of the point of cob building is using green materials and reclaimed materials, so asking seemed like a good idea. We had several people offer to help with stuff/lend tools/give materials, including Mike's fiancee, who says that her uncle is always tracking stuff like that down for people. I feel really blessed to have such a wonderful group of friends who will help me with this. :)
I'm struggling with the dimensions in our plans, though. I'm honestly not really sure how big I want everything to be. Our plan is to build 3-4 rooms by the end of summer/fall - a kitchen, a bathroom, a living room, and a bedroom. Then, next spring, we'll add a hallway and attach to it 1-2 more bedrooms, an office for Shane, and maybe a 2nd bathroom. Since we won't have a dining room, our kitchen has to be largeish, I'd like a decent sized living room, and the bedroom and bath sizes are kind of in the air, too. I certainly want things bigger than we have here - we're so crowded here that it's insane. But I don't want to over-do it, either...we have a limited amount of time to complete this before bad weather comes, and, let's face it, it's not like Missouri always has the most cooperative of climates even in the right seasons. So I want to be reasonable, but comfortable. I'm not sure what size that would be, and we kind of need an idea of how large everything is so we can start clearing the ground and readying things for building. I tried looking at blueprints online, but the issue there is that building with cob is a lot more fluid and rounded than building with "normal" materials. So blueprints don't mesh correctly. :/ And, for some reason, most of the free blueprints don't have dimensions, anyways. Which I kind of thought was the point of blueprints. But whatever.
Luckily, with cob, you can build in lots of storage and even some furniture. So our rooms don't have to be massive to hold everything. For instance, I have a bajillion books, so we plan on making the future hallway have book shelves up and down the entire length. Shane's room will also be full of shelves so that his office space can be quasi-organized.
The more I think/talk about this, the more excited I get. Which is weird, because, originally, I was against the idea of building here. I don't want to stay in Missouri forever. Neither does Shane. I thought doing the mobile home thing might be a better idea. But the thought of constructing something exactly as we want it is so appealing. And, honestly, we'll have a larger, nicer space for close to the same amount that we would have spent on a larger trailer.
Anyways. So, my goal for this week is to get the plans finalized and start working on readying the ground for building. I also need to track down sand, clay, and straw - the three most important components in this endeavor. :) Wish me luck!
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Saturday, May 29, 2010
More random crap
So, in my last blog, I mentioned that we were co-sleeping with Keira, half expecting a few people to warn me of the inherent dangers of it. Instead, a lot of people have told me that they, too, co-slept with their kids. Even people who aren't at all attachment parents or crunchy or anything like that seemed to have done it a few times.
We still are, too, and I can honestly say that I never thought I'd be feeling this good 9 days postpartum. I'm not sleep deprived and frustrated and unhappy. I sleep at night, so, during the day, I can actually do stuff. It's crazy awesome.
I also am in love with my (generic) Moby Wrap. It makes everything so much easier. We went to the store today, and I could actually accomplish stuff and hold Keira. Plus,people didn't get all up in her face like they did when she was in a carrier. Since she was on my chest, people kept a more respectable distance, which was lovely.
The only thing I'm having a hard time with is restrictions from this c-section. And that's mostly related to how much I loathe my body right now. I look at pictures of myself where I was so toned and thin and strong, and I hate that I'm not any of those things right now. I want to break out my weights and exercise DVDs and go for runs. And I can't. Which irks me to no end...I don't like not being able to do what I want to do. Also, nothing fits. I'm using a belly band to hold up maternity pants, and I refuse to buy new clothes when I am NOT staying this size.
I'm looking up a bunch of house stuff today. I want to get some concrete plans together so I can make a material list, see what I can get off of Freecycle and through friends and such (also, my ex seems to always know someone who is tearing something down or getting rid of materials or something, so I'm hoping he'll have some friends who have supplies, too. Which will be reason 9876579 that I'm thrilled we're still on good terms.) I want to get this crap started!
My blogs aren't very fun lately, sorry. :/ I'll be humorous again someday, I promise.
Oh, hey, someone else who blogs on here should tell me how to change my template to one of the cute ones, like you all have, or make one or whatever. Because I totally don't get it.
We still are, too, and I can honestly say that I never thought I'd be feeling this good 9 days postpartum. I'm not sleep deprived and frustrated and unhappy. I sleep at night, so, during the day, I can actually do stuff. It's crazy awesome.
I also am in love with my (generic) Moby Wrap. It makes everything so much easier. We went to the store today, and I could actually accomplish stuff and hold Keira. Plus,people didn't get all up in her face like they did when she was in a carrier. Since she was on my chest, people kept a more respectable distance, which was lovely.
The only thing I'm having a hard time with is restrictions from this c-section. And that's mostly related to how much I loathe my body right now. I look at pictures of myself where I was so toned and thin and strong, and I hate that I'm not any of those things right now. I want to break out my weights and exercise DVDs and go for runs. And I can't. Which irks me to no end...I don't like not being able to do what I want to do. Also, nothing fits. I'm using a belly band to hold up maternity pants, and I refuse to buy new clothes when I am NOT staying this size.
I'm looking up a bunch of house stuff today. I want to get some concrete plans together so I can make a material list, see what I can get off of Freecycle and through friends and such (also, my ex seems to always know someone who is tearing something down or getting rid of materials or something, so I'm hoping he'll have some friends who have supplies, too. Which will be reason 9876579 that I'm thrilled we're still on good terms.) I want to get this crap started!
My blogs aren't very fun lately, sorry. :/ I'll be humorous again someday, I promise.
Oh, hey, someone else who blogs on here should tell me how to change my template to one of the cute ones, like you all have, or make one or whatever. Because I totally don't get it.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Oh, Many Things...
So I've been a mom of two for a week now, almost, and it's pretty nice. Still trying hard to balance the two girls, and kinda failing miserably, but that'll come in time, I imagine. When Keira's a little less needy, Rhi will get more attention again. And living by my mom is so helpful, she's been sending us food, and taking Rhi over there to play sometimes so she doesn't feel super neglected...
Keira is totally gorgeous, and a pretty good baby. We've been sleeping really, really well, because we've been co-sleeping. I know, I know...you're not really supposed to, for a billion reasons. But Keira does NOT sleep well in her crib. Like, she has us up every fifteen seconds. But in bed with us? She sleeps amazingly. Every couple of hours, she wakes up, makes little noises, smacks my chest with her hand, I latch her on, nurse her, and then we go back to sleep. We're taking appropriate co-sleeping precautions (I read a lot of the Dr. Sears stuff on it) and it's working wonderfully for us. I still intend to try to get her into her crib, but, right now, she wants nothing to do with it. And I have so many co-sleeping friends whose babies have done very well, so I'm not that stressed about it. I might change my mind when she can move around more, and the dangers of her suffocating or something increase, but for now, this works. We feel very close as a family at night. And, I get sleep! Lol.
So, as you may or may not know, our family moved while I was ginormously pregnant with Keira. What you almost certainly don't know is that we moved into a very small trailer. We did this mostly so that I could stay home longer with the baby - I own the trailer, so no rent or mortgage, and it's all electric, so no gas, either. But it is VERY, VERY, VERY crowded. And making us slightly insane. Soooooo...we've decided to work on constructing a house. Soon. Optimally, we will do 3-4 rooms by fall, and move into them for the winter, keeping the trailer as storage. Then, spring/summer of next year, we'll add another 4 or so rooms, completing our home. We're going to try to do almost everything ourselves (but if you're local, and want to help, dear god, we would love you FOREVER) and we're going to try to use a lot of green materials and reclaimed stuff for the building itself. We're thinking of doing a cob bale construction, although we need to look into some stuff with that, like how you do normal electricity in those (we're not green enough to be able to be totally off the grid.) But we're excited about it all, and I'm looking forward to creating a new home for us all.
We have a 2nd doctor's appointment for Keira tomorrow. She lost a BUNCH of weight in the hospital, and had gained a little back as of Monday at her first appointment, but her doctor wants to see her again tomorrow just to make sure she's still doing ok. Which she should be, as she is growth spurting like crazy, and has detached from me for, oh, 2 hours total today. :/ Oh well, it'll calm down soon.
Keira is totally gorgeous, and a pretty good baby. We've been sleeping really, really well, because we've been co-sleeping. I know, I know...you're not really supposed to, for a billion reasons. But Keira does NOT sleep well in her crib. Like, she has us up every fifteen seconds. But in bed with us? She sleeps amazingly. Every couple of hours, she wakes up, makes little noises, smacks my chest with her hand, I latch her on, nurse her, and then we go back to sleep. We're taking appropriate co-sleeping precautions (I read a lot of the Dr. Sears stuff on it) and it's working wonderfully for us. I still intend to try to get her into her crib, but, right now, she wants nothing to do with it. And I have so many co-sleeping friends whose babies have done very well, so I'm not that stressed about it. I might change my mind when she can move around more, and the dangers of her suffocating or something increase, but for now, this works. We feel very close as a family at night. And, I get sleep! Lol.
So, as you may or may not know, our family moved while I was ginormously pregnant with Keira. What you almost certainly don't know is that we moved into a very small trailer. We did this mostly so that I could stay home longer with the baby - I own the trailer, so no rent or mortgage, and it's all electric, so no gas, either. But it is VERY, VERY, VERY crowded. And making us slightly insane. Soooooo...we've decided to work on constructing a house. Soon. Optimally, we will do 3-4 rooms by fall, and move into them for the winter, keeping the trailer as storage. Then, spring/summer of next year, we'll add another 4 or so rooms, completing our home. We're going to try to do almost everything ourselves (but if you're local, and want to help, dear god, we would love you FOREVER) and we're going to try to use a lot of green materials and reclaimed stuff for the building itself. We're thinking of doing a cob bale construction, although we need to look into some stuff with that, like how you do normal electricity in those (we're not green enough to be able to be totally off the grid.) But we're excited about it all, and I'm looking forward to creating a new home for us all.
We have a 2nd doctor's appointment for Keira tomorrow. She lost a BUNCH of weight in the hospital, and had gained a little back as of Monday at her first appointment, but her doctor wants to see her again tomorrow just to make sure she's still doing ok. Which she should be, as she is growth spurting like crazy, and has detached from me for, oh, 2 hours total today. :/ Oh well, it'll calm down soon.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Tomorrow at high noon...
I give up.
I'm 41 weeks, 1 day pregnant. So eight days “overdue.” (I put that in quotes because everyone knows your due date is a guess unless you had IVF or something.) And nothing is happening. I'm not dilating. I'm not effacing. The baby isn't at the right station. None of this has changed for at least 3 weeks by anything but the most minimal of progressions.
My OB has been amazing. She knows how much I wanted to have a VBAC, and she's been amazingly supportive. She's done every non-chemical induction technique she can think of (save breaking my water, because she literally can't, due to the aforementioned non-progression.) She's been supportive of the non-chemical things I've done to try to help things along. She's let me continue past my due date, although most of the group that she practices with has a pretty stern policy of “as a VBAC, you go into labor by your due date or you schedule another c-section.”
But nothing's working. And I'm beginning to feel like I'm putting principles over everything else.
It was fine for awhile. But I found myself today, with a less than wonderful non-stress test, and higher than normal blood pressure, and everything still not looking favorable for labor, and I really can't deny anymore that this just ain't doing it.
If you know me, you know I'm pretty pro-intervention free labors. I didn't even want an epidural, much less another c-section. I started this pregnancy in optimal health, and although I gained more weight than I wanted to, I stayed pretty active and ate pretty healthy foods for the most part. I did a lot of things right. But something is just wrong.
My OB said today that every time she does something – a c-section, an induction, any intervention – she thinks, “Is this a necessary thing for the baby, or am I doing it for some other reason?” If it's necessary, then she goes ahead. Otherwise, she looks at other options or holds off. Well, for weeks now, I've been looking at other options, so to speak. I've been doing all in my power to make this happen. But I've been doing it for me. I've been doing it because *I* didn't want a c-section, because *I* was scared, because *I* felt like less of a woman, because *I* didn't want to give up.
I remember, at the start of this pregnancy, bargaining with my body after reading the risks vs. rewards of VBAC. I remember thinking, “Ok, body. I'm gonna trust you. I'm gonna let you do your thing. Because I believe that you'll inherently know if something isn't right, and you won't go into labor..”
Well, labor hasn't happened. And it's time for me to go, “Maybe this isn't meant to be, and since it's possible that I could be endangering my kid by keeping this up, it's time to throw in the towel.”
And so I scheduled my c-section today. For tomorrow, at noon. And I cried. I cried in the OB office, I cried in my car, and I'm crying now. I've always been an amazingly determined person, and I honestly have a hard time believing or admitting that I can't do anything. It's served me pretty well so far, too. Usually, what I set my mind to hard enough, I get. This is one of those rare times that I'm not going to. And it hurts my pride.
It's not like that's the total reason I'm upset, of course. I also feel defective, like a failure. How can I not birth a child normally? Really? That's what my body's design is for, but I can't manage it? And I'm terrified of the surgery itself. If you remember, in a previous blog, I talked about it being a pretty traumatic experience. And I almost felt like this successful delivery would cause some of those wounds to heal. And I'm still scared of things like “getting a blood clot” or “dying on the table” or a multitude of other things.
But I'd be scared if I had a vaginal delivery, too. I need to try to remember that, I guess.
Anyways. Tomorrow I will be a mother for the second time. And it won't be the way I had hoped or intended or wanted. But that's life, I suppose. And it's just dumb to let my upset about the way I'm delivering my daughter cloud the momentous and wonderful occasion of her birth.
I'm 41 weeks, 1 day pregnant. So eight days “overdue.” (I put that in quotes because everyone knows your due date is a guess unless you had IVF or something.) And nothing is happening. I'm not dilating. I'm not effacing. The baby isn't at the right station. None of this has changed for at least 3 weeks by anything but the most minimal of progressions.
My OB has been amazing. She knows how much I wanted to have a VBAC, and she's been amazingly supportive. She's done every non-chemical induction technique she can think of (save breaking my water, because she literally can't, due to the aforementioned non-progression.) She's been supportive of the non-chemical things I've done to try to help things along. She's let me continue past my due date, although most of the group that she practices with has a pretty stern policy of “as a VBAC, you go into labor by your due date or you schedule another c-section.”
But nothing's working. And I'm beginning to feel like I'm putting principles over everything else.
It was fine for awhile. But I found myself today, with a less than wonderful non-stress test, and higher than normal blood pressure, and everything still not looking favorable for labor, and I really can't deny anymore that this just ain't doing it.
If you know me, you know I'm pretty pro-intervention free labors. I didn't even want an epidural, much less another c-section. I started this pregnancy in optimal health, and although I gained more weight than I wanted to, I stayed pretty active and ate pretty healthy foods for the most part. I did a lot of things right. But something is just wrong.
My OB said today that every time she does something – a c-section, an induction, any intervention – she thinks, “Is this a necessary thing for the baby, or am I doing it for some other reason?” If it's necessary, then she goes ahead. Otherwise, she looks at other options or holds off. Well, for weeks now, I've been looking at other options, so to speak. I've been doing all in my power to make this happen. But I've been doing it for me. I've been doing it because *I* didn't want a c-section, because *I* was scared, because *I* felt like less of a woman, because *I* didn't want to give up.
I remember, at the start of this pregnancy, bargaining with my body after reading the risks vs. rewards of VBAC. I remember thinking, “Ok, body. I'm gonna trust you. I'm gonna let you do your thing. Because I believe that you'll inherently know if something isn't right, and you won't go into labor..”
Well, labor hasn't happened. And it's time for me to go, “Maybe this isn't meant to be, and since it's possible that I could be endangering my kid by keeping this up, it's time to throw in the towel.”
And so I scheduled my c-section today. For tomorrow, at noon. And I cried. I cried in the OB office, I cried in my car, and I'm crying now. I've always been an amazingly determined person, and I honestly have a hard time believing or admitting that I can't do anything. It's served me pretty well so far, too. Usually, what I set my mind to hard enough, I get. This is one of those rare times that I'm not going to. And it hurts my pride.
It's not like that's the total reason I'm upset, of course. I also feel defective, like a failure. How can I not birth a child normally? Really? That's what my body's design is for, but I can't manage it? And I'm terrified of the surgery itself. If you remember, in a previous blog, I talked about it being a pretty traumatic experience. And I almost felt like this successful delivery would cause some of those wounds to heal. And I'm still scared of things like “getting a blood clot” or “dying on the table” or a multitude of other things.
But I'd be scared if I had a vaginal delivery, too. I need to try to remember that, I guess.
Anyways. Tomorrow I will be a mother for the second time. And it won't be the way I had hoped or intended or wanted. But that's life, I suppose. And it's just dumb to let my upset about the way I'm delivering my daughter cloud the momentous and wonderful occasion of her birth.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
I'm like a superhero. Except crazier.
Or maybe the hormones are just a good excuse for the fact that I'm just nuts? It's possible.
Anyways, folks, it's been an interesting couple of days.
I should mention that I've been in the middle of some really stressful events that require a lot of manual labor for a 9 months pregnant chick, and we are not amused. This could be contributing to my psychosis.
Basically, I am the Incredibly Pregnant Hulk. And I will explode on your ass if you piss me off.
Probably the best thing to do would be to sequester myself from everyone on the planet til this kid pops out, but that's not really an option.
Let me give you an example of my insanity. As some of you may know because I whined about it on Facebook, Facebook was taunting me today with these ads. They were ads for Kansas City. Inexplicably, these ads contained some of the most amazingly delicious looking cupcakes I have ever seen in my life. Cupcakes that looked so good that I wanted to lick the screen of my monitor. These ads were making me literally do nothing for 5 minutes at a time but stare and think, "Jesus, why don't I have a cupcake? Could I bake some cupcakes...no, they wouldn't come out that good, I'm not that talented. I could *buy* some cupcakes...no, no, no, the cupcakes at the store aren't that good, either." It was not conducive to doing anything.
Then I realized that you can click "x" on the side of ads and make them go away.
Ha! I thought smugly. Screw you, cupcake ads!
And I victoriously clicked X.
If you click X on an ad on Facebook, Facebook gets very concerned. So they ask you why you clicked X.
Since "these cupcakes were too delicious looking and pissed me off" wasn't an option, I clicked other. And silly, silly Facebook gave me a little box to post what "other" meant to me.
Bad move, Facebook.
I'm not certain what the advertising team at Facebook will do/say when they get this gem back:
"I clicked X because those cupcakes were destroying my soul with their deliciousness. You see, I am hugely pregnant, and actually overdue, and seeing those cupcakes made me want one with a desperation usually only discussed in soap operas or Twilight fan fiction. However, all the ad says is some vague crap about Kansas City. Wtf? You don't even say WHERE I should get these cupcakes. And also I can't drive to Kansas City this pregnant. What if I went into labor? And! These cupcakes were probably made with HFCS *and* slave chocolate, so they'd probably be awful for me, nutritionally and morally."
I was going to write more examples, but that's probably the funniest. Well, that and when I went off on my friend Summer's BIL. But I really have to be productive now, on account of how the cupcakes seduced me into laziness earlier, so I'll have to tell that one another time.
End note: If you need someone bitched out, I'll happily do it right now. It might not make any sense. But I will. Spots are quite limited, though, as I won't be this hormonally insane forever.
We hope.
Anyways, folks, it's been an interesting couple of days.
I should mention that I've been in the middle of some really stressful events that require a lot of manual labor for a 9 months pregnant chick, and we are not amused. This could be contributing to my psychosis.
Basically, I am the Incredibly Pregnant Hulk. And I will explode on your ass if you piss me off.
Probably the best thing to do would be to sequester myself from everyone on the planet til this kid pops out, but that's not really an option.
Let me give you an example of my insanity. As some of you may know because I whined about it on Facebook, Facebook was taunting me today with these ads. They were ads for Kansas City. Inexplicably, these ads contained some of the most amazingly delicious looking cupcakes I have ever seen in my life. Cupcakes that looked so good that I wanted to lick the screen of my monitor. These ads were making me literally do nothing for 5 minutes at a time but stare and think, "Jesus, why don't I have a cupcake? Could I bake some cupcakes...no, they wouldn't come out that good, I'm not that talented. I could *buy* some cupcakes...no, no, no, the cupcakes at the store aren't that good, either." It was not conducive to doing anything.
Then I realized that you can click "x" on the side of ads and make them go away.
Ha! I thought smugly. Screw you, cupcake ads!
And I victoriously clicked X.
If you click X on an ad on Facebook, Facebook gets very concerned. So they ask you why you clicked X.
Since "these cupcakes were too delicious looking and pissed me off" wasn't an option, I clicked other. And silly, silly Facebook gave me a little box to post what "other" meant to me.
Bad move, Facebook.
I'm not certain what the advertising team at Facebook will do/say when they get this gem back:
"I clicked X because those cupcakes were destroying my soul with their deliciousness. You see, I am hugely pregnant, and actually overdue, and seeing those cupcakes made me want one with a desperation usually only discussed in soap operas or Twilight fan fiction. However, all the ad says is some vague crap about Kansas City. Wtf? You don't even say WHERE I should get these cupcakes. And also I can't drive to Kansas City this pregnant. What if I went into labor? And! These cupcakes were probably made with HFCS *and* slave chocolate, so they'd probably be awful for me, nutritionally and morally."
I was going to write more examples, but that's probably the funniest. Well, that and when I went off on my friend Summer's BIL. But I really have to be productive now, on account of how the cupcakes seduced me into laziness earlier, so I'll have to tell that one another time.
End note: If you need someone bitched out, I'll happily do it right now. It might not make any sense. But I will. Spots are quite limited, though, as I won't be this hormonally insane forever.
We hope.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Pity, party of one
I am officially postdate.
For those of you who might not speak pregnant woman, that means that my due date was yesterday and now I am on borrowed time with this baby. In America, it is unheard of for the most part to allow a pregnancy to progress beyond 42 weeks. Most doctors get itchy around 41 weeks and start talking inducing.
I am in the unique position of being totally unable to be induced, though. I had a c-section with Rhi, as most people know. It wasn't what I wanted, and followed an induction at 40 weeks, 1 day after there were some serious issues with the amniotic fluid levels in my uterus. I've come to terms with Rhiannon's birth, although it was quite unlike anything I wanted. However, the c-section makes it possible that if I were to be induced, my uterus could rupture, leading to serious issues and/or death for Keira and me. I'm gambling that anyways with a VBAC, but the odds increase exponentially if I'm chemically induced.
So two weeks from yesterday is the longest possible time I could go before I have to have a c-section.
I'm not happy about the idea of this, to put it mildly.
I healed well from my inital c-section. My body is a champ and takes what I throw at it with a lot of grace. So I'm not worried about that, or the pain, or anything. I have a small weird paranoia that I'll die in childbirth but that actually appears to be a fairly common fear, so there's that.
But my c-section before was just so disappointing. I remember being taken into surgery. I remember it taking FOREVER for them to get the spinal in (apparently, I have nice, thick cartilage. That's not the compliment you'd imagine when they have to stick you about 9 times to get it to go through.) They laid me on a table (the second the spinal worked, I lost all movement from my mid chest down and just kinda flopped over.) They poked me several times to see if I was numb enough, and then my ex came in. He and the anesthesiologist sat by me while my OB was cutting me open. I remember thinking, "Pfft, this isn't that bad."
Then it happened. Despite the fact that they'd given me anti-nausea medicine, despite the fact that I hadn't eaten anything for over 24 hours but Bomb Pops, and despite the fact that I have a cast iron stomach and rarely vomit, I had to puke. Epically. But I couldn't. The spinal had made my muscles too weak to allow me to. Which scared me terribly. I remember being convinced that I was going to choke on my own vomit and die and I wasn't even a freaking rock star post drunken binge. And I got hysterical and started shrilly talking about this to everyone. So Mike and the doctors are trying to calm me down, and I just kept telling them that I didn't want to do this anymore and to please stop and take me off the table now. I actually tried, at one point, to get up, which - and this may shock you - doesn't work when you're given a spinal. And, in retrospect, is a bad plan when someone has cut the lower half of you apart.
It was terrifying, and I have never been more sure in my life that I would die. I know I sound melodramatic, but it is true.
When they pulled Rhi out, I saw her for all of five seconds - I can't even remember if I got to touch her - before they left with her. And then they stitched me up and I was so exhausted that I passed out on the table.
When I got to the recovery room, I did, in fact, get to hold and nurse her right away, which is fairly unusual for many women post c-section, I guess. But the experience had been so traumatic for me that I was emotionally and physically exhausted, and I really felt...disconnected from the whole thing. Understand, Mike and I tried for this baby for a long time. I spent every second of the pregnancy waiting anxiously for her. I was so connected to the whole process, so ready to have my baby, but the events and the drugs of the day made me almost ambivalent to my own kid. And then they shot me up with morphine, and I projectile vomited all over the room. So that was special.
The c-section also made my milk come in later than it normally would have, leading to issues with nursing. And there were a lot of things I wasn't supposed to do right away, either, because of the c-section. It made me feel very weak and almost powerless, which is not a feeling that I enjoy.
Because of the events of then, I'm pretty against having another c-section.
I want to birth my baby normally. I want to hold her instantly. I want it to be a beautiful moment for Shane and me. I want to see her, touch her, hold her before everyone else this time. And I want to be able to bond with my kid without being all doped up and traumatized.
So far, my body doesn't seem to be cooperating. Keira's head down, has been forever, I'm having Braxton Hicks contractions, but I'm not dilating or anything. At all. I take some solace in the fact that there are many people who just...don't, until they actually go into labor. Those measurements appear to not matter for a whole hell of a lot.
Which is only slightly reassuring. Because I have, again, maybe 14 days to spontaneously burst into successful labor before I lack choice in the matter. Which seems like an awfully short amount of time.
I'm doing everything possible to encourage my body to go into labor, but, in the end, it's really my body's call. I can wish and pray and prepare all day long, but if everything's not perfect, it's just not gonna happen.
And that's kind of depressing.
It depresses me, too, that people get elective c-sections. Seriously. Reading an article about some chick going into the hospital 5cms dilated and *opting* to have a c-section to "avoid the pain of labor" made me want to jab that person in the throat with something sharp. Fuck you. I'd love the pain of labor. Send it my way.
I know being all resentful doesn't help anything, but I'm a hormonal psycho right now and not entirely normal anyways. And I think even if I wasn't all hopped up on pregnancy insanity that I'd be pissy reading that stuff. It's human nature. I'm not justifying it, or saying that it should happen, but it does.
I'm not even sure where I'm going with this blog anymore. I think I just had to write it to get my feelings out about this whole thing. Because this mixture of dread and depression and jealousy and resentment and anxiety is a pretty crappy one. And although I've talked about it before, I don't think I delved into it this much.
*Sigh* Makes for pretty boring reading for you guys, though. Sorry.
I promise a funny, happy blog soon.
Also, I'm not spellchecking this. Because I hit the button and it flagged a bajillion words like "Braxton" and I thought, "Man, screw this." So if my spelling sucks, I'm sorry. Kind of.
For those of you who might not speak pregnant woman, that means that my due date was yesterday and now I am on borrowed time with this baby. In America, it is unheard of for the most part to allow a pregnancy to progress beyond 42 weeks. Most doctors get itchy around 41 weeks and start talking inducing.
I am in the unique position of being totally unable to be induced, though. I had a c-section with Rhi, as most people know. It wasn't what I wanted, and followed an induction at 40 weeks, 1 day after there were some serious issues with the amniotic fluid levels in my uterus. I've come to terms with Rhiannon's birth, although it was quite unlike anything I wanted. However, the c-section makes it possible that if I were to be induced, my uterus could rupture, leading to serious issues and/or death for Keira and me. I'm gambling that anyways with a VBAC, but the odds increase exponentially if I'm chemically induced.
So two weeks from yesterday is the longest possible time I could go before I have to have a c-section.
I'm not happy about the idea of this, to put it mildly.
I healed well from my inital c-section. My body is a champ and takes what I throw at it with a lot of grace. So I'm not worried about that, or the pain, or anything. I have a small weird paranoia that I'll die in childbirth but that actually appears to be a fairly common fear, so there's that.
But my c-section before was just so disappointing. I remember being taken into surgery. I remember it taking FOREVER for them to get the spinal in (apparently, I have nice, thick cartilage. That's not the compliment you'd imagine when they have to stick you about 9 times to get it to go through.) They laid me on a table (the second the spinal worked, I lost all movement from my mid chest down and just kinda flopped over.) They poked me several times to see if I was numb enough, and then my ex came in. He and the anesthesiologist sat by me while my OB was cutting me open. I remember thinking, "Pfft, this isn't that bad."
Then it happened. Despite the fact that they'd given me anti-nausea medicine, despite the fact that I hadn't eaten anything for over 24 hours but Bomb Pops, and despite the fact that I have a cast iron stomach and rarely vomit, I had to puke. Epically. But I couldn't. The spinal had made my muscles too weak to allow me to. Which scared me terribly. I remember being convinced that I was going to choke on my own vomit and die and I wasn't even a freaking rock star post drunken binge. And I got hysterical and started shrilly talking about this to everyone. So Mike and the doctors are trying to calm me down, and I just kept telling them that I didn't want to do this anymore and to please stop and take me off the table now. I actually tried, at one point, to get up, which - and this may shock you - doesn't work when you're given a spinal. And, in retrospect, is a bad plan when someone has cut the lower half of you apart.
It was terrifying, and I have never been more sure in my life that I would die. I know I sound melodramatic, but it is true.
When they pulled Rhi out, I saw her for all of five seconds - I can't even remember if I got to touch her - before they left with her. And then they stitched me up and I was so exhausted that I passed out on the table.
When I got to the recovery room, I did, in fact, get to hold and nurse her right away, which is fairly unusual for many women post c-section, I guess. But the experience had been so traumatic for me that I was emotionally and physically exhausted, and I really felt...disconnected from the whole thing. Understand, Mike and I tried for this baby for a long time. I spent every second of the pregnancy waiting anxiously for her. I was so connected to the whole process, so ready to have my baby, but the events and the drugs of the day made me almost ambivalent to my own kid. And then they shot me up with morphine, and I projectile vomited all over the room. So that was special.
The c-section also made my milk come in later than it normally would have, leading to issues with nursing. And there were a lot of things I wasn't supposed to do right away, either, because of the c-section. It made me feel very weak and almost powerless, which is not a feeling that I enjoy.
Because of the events of then, I'm pretty against having another c-section.
I want to birth my baby normally. I want to hold her instantly. I want it to be a beautiful moment for Shane and me. I want to see her, touch her, hold her before everyone else this time. And I want to be able to bond with my kid without being all doped up and traumatized.
So far, my body doesn't seem to be cooperating. Keira's head down, has been forever, I'm having Braxton Hicks contractions, but I'm not dilating or anything. At all. I take some solace in the fact that there are many people who just...don't, until they actually go into labor. Those measurements appear to not matter for a whole hell of a lot.
Which is only slightly reassuring. Because I have, again, maybe 14 days to spontaneously burst into successful labor before I lack choice in the matter. Which seems like an awfully short amount of time.
I'm doing everything possible to encourage my body to go into labor, but, in the end, it's really my body's call. I can wish and pray and prepare all day long, but if everything's not perfect, it's just not gonna happen.
And that's kind of depressing.
It depresses me, too, that people get elective c-sections. Seriously. Reading an article about some chick going into the hospital 5cms dilated and *opting* to have a c-section to "avoid the pain of labor" made me want to jab that person in the throat with something sharp. Fuck you. I'd love the pain of labor. Send it my way.
I know being all resentful doesn't help anything, but I'm a hormonal psycho right now and not entirely normal anyways. And I think even if I wasn't all hopped up on pregnancy insanity that I'd be pissy reading that stuff. It's human nature. I'm not justifying it, or saying that it should happen, but it does.
I'm not even sure where I'm going with this blog anymore. I think I just had to write it to get my feelings out about this whole thing. Because this mixture of dread and depression and jealousy and resentment and anxiety is a pretty crappy one. And although I've talked about it before, I don't think I delved into it this much.
*Sigh* Makes for pretty boring reading for you guys, though. Sorry.
I promise a funny, happy blog soon.
Also, I'm not spellchecking this. Because I hit the button and it flagged a bajillion words like "Braxton" and I thought, "Man, screw this." So if my spelling sucks, I'm sorry. Kind of.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Kids and the world
So I read something another parent posted today that said something along the lines of how she wasn't going to let people say negative things about their bodies in front of her child, so her body image wasn't destroyed. And I read this blog, again by Maria, where she discusses, among other things, some close minded thoughts on Sandra Bullock adopting a black kid, and how people worry that he won't be able to understand what it means to be black, since his mom is white, and won't be able to deal with racial slurs.
Here's the thing.
We all want Utopia for our kids. We want serenity, and beauty, and peace and love. We don't want them to experience evil, or hatred, or pain, or unfairness. We want them to keep the innocence we don't get anymore. We want them to believe that every fairy tale has a beautiful, shiny, happy ever after.
But they're not going to get that.
The world can be an amazing place. The people I meet on a regular basis wow me with how amazing they are. I live a fantastic life, and I'm very, very lucky to have the amazing friends and family that surround me. Sometimes the wonder of life overwhelms me.
You can't discount the darkness in the world, though.
There is hatred, and prejudice, and evil. There are people who intentionally hurt others for no real reason. There are people who hate based on sex or race or ethnicity or religion or orientation or body type. It's a sad reality.
Shielding your kid entirely from the negative things out there, to me, sets them up to be crushed. If they don't know that sometimes, people aren't good, it hits them that much harder when they realize it. It's a fine line. You can't, and shouldn't, raise your kid to be a jaded jerk who thinks everyone is out to get them. But stopping anything negative from being said around them just puts them in a big old bubble that someone, someday, is going to pop with a giant bang.
I don't know exactly when or how I'm going to broach things with the girls. I don't know how to someday tell them that there will be bad things in their lives beyond "Mommy won't give me a sucker for breakfast." I'm sure I will botch it a little, I'm sure it'll still hurt when they discover it. I'm not, and never going to be, the perfect parent. And it's especially hard to address hatreds that I really don't understand. I can't tell the girls why some people hate gay people, or black people, or whatever, because I don't get it. I don't get to use my lack of understanding as a pass, though. My job is to raise my children to be decent people who make the world a little bit better. I am incapable of doing that if I never address the less pretty side of people.
And, in case anyone's wondering, I have no idea on the bat issue yet. I'll probably update the last bat blog whenever I do.
Here's the thing.
We all want Utopia for our kids. We want serenity, and beauty, and peace and love. We don't want them to experience evil, or hatred, or pain, or unfairness. We want them to keep the innocence we don't get anymore. We want them to believe that every fairy tale has a beautiful, shiny, happy ever after.
But they're not going to get that.
The world can be an amazing place. The people I meet on a regular basis wow me with how amazing they are. I live a fantastic life, and I'm very, very lucky to have the amazing friends and family that surround me. Sometimes the wonder of life overwhelms me.
You can't discount the darkness in the world, though.
There is hatred, and prejudice, and evil. There are people who intentionally hurt others for no real reason. There are people who hate based on sex or race or ethnicity or religion or orientation or body type. It's a sad reality.
Shielding your kid entirely from the negative things out there, to me, sets them up to be crushed. If they don't know that sometimes, people aren't good, it hits them that much harder when they realize it. It's a fine line. You can't, and shouldn't, raise your kid to be a jaded jerk who thinks everyone is out to get them. But stopping anything negative from being said around them just puts them in a big old bubble that someone, someday, is going to pop with a giant bang.
I don't know exactly when or how I'm going to broach things with the girls. I don't know how to someday tell them that there will be bad things in their lives beyond "Mommy won't give me a sucker for breakfast." I'm sure I will botch it a little, I'm sure it'll still hurt when they discover it. I'm not, and never going to be, the perfect parent. And it's especially hard to address hatreds that I really don't understand. I can't tell the girls why some people hate gay people, or black people, or whatever, because I don't get it. I don't get to use my lack of understanding as a pass, though. My job is to raise my children to be decent people who make the world a little bit better. I am incapable of doing that if I never address the less pretty side of people.
And, in case anyone's wondering, I have no idea on the bat issue yet. I'll probably update the last bat blog whenever I do.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Bats are Evil and Depressing Part 2 *UPDATED!*
Subtitled Rabies is Scary
So, as most of you remember from the bat blog the other day, there was a bat all up in my house on Saturday. And if you don't remember, you should re-read it. But I'm not linking to it, because it's, like, two blog entries ago, and you can probably find it on your own.
Well, a friend of mine had messaged me after I wrote it saying, "Hey, not to alarm you, but you can't always feel bat bites and you might need a rabies vaccine." Which freaked me out a little, but whatever. I called our doctors' afterhours lines. My line said we were probably ok, Rhi's line said get the vaccine.
So, I'm confused. So I call Mike, and do a lot of Googling, and after a lot of upset, we decide to wait until Monday, talk to our actual *doctors* and go from there.
My appointment was this morning. And my doctor was totally unconcerned. She said she doubted a bat would just bust up into my bed and bite me for no reason, and that she wouldn't advise the shots, because the chances are slim to none of rabies, anyways.
Whew, right? Not so fast.
Rhi's doctor calls, and he advises that we get the shots. Because if you do get rabies, you die. The end. And you don't die nicely, you die horribly. And, apparently, of the cases of rabies discovered that led to death, 26 of the 28 appear to have come from bats. 20 of those people had never mentioned being bitten by a bat in any way, shape, or form. Not even to their families and closest friends.
So I inquired how to get the shots, and Rhi's doctor said that they didn't carry them and to call the county health department.
So ok.
I do, where they, of course, don't have them, or have any idea where you get them. OF COURSE. Because god forbid anyone know what to do if something serious as hell totally happens or anything. *rolls eyes*
But, they do put me in touch with a very nice woman who handles animal type issues for the county. And she tells me that about 1% of bats are rabid, that the fact that the bat went away from Shane and didn't just lie fluttering on the floor or go towards him is a good indicator of health. And also that rabies isn't in season, which makes no sense to me, but whatever. She advises not to get the vaccine.
Then Rhi's actual doctor calls me. (I know I said doctor before, but it was his nurse. Which probably makes sense if you have a pediatrician, as they seem to never want to get on the phone.) And he's still skeptical, but agrees that it is hard to get the shots. But he says he'll totally write a doctor's order for us, but he wants to run it by the state animal health person (which is probably not their actual title.) So he'll call back tomorrow and let me know what's up.
This entire thing has made me utterly confused. I have no idea what's happening or what to do, or if I have to make my poor three year old and I get a series of 5 shots over 14 days (no, the rabies shot isn't in the stomach anymore, and, yes, it's considered safe for preggos. And I'm not including Shane in this equation because he has flatly refused to even consider the vaccine anyways.)
But I do know this.
If you have a bat in your home ever, KILL IT AND SEND IT OFF TO BE TESTED. Don't crush its head because they have to test the brain. And then you won't have to go through a confusing nightmare of utter annoyance like we are.
Sigh.
I'll update you all on this tomorrow.
UPDATE #1
Rhi's doctor called and said the state guy can't call him back until tomorrow, but he's done his own research and believes that, according to information from the CDC, that we are at extremely low risk. However, it still all hinges on what the state dude says, and he will call tomorrow. Hence the update #1 part.
So, as most of you remember from the bat blog the other day, there was a bat all up in my house on Saturday. And if you don't remember, you should re-read it. But I'm not linking to it, because it's, like, two blog entries ago, and you can probably find it on your own.
Well, a friend of mine had messaged me after I wrote it saying, "Hey, not to alarm you, but you can't always feel bat bites and you might need a rabies vaccine." Which freaked me out a little, but whatever. I called our doctors' afterhours lines. My line said we were probably ok, Rhi's line said get the vaccine.
So, I'm confused. So I call Mike, and do a lot of Googling, and after a lot of upset, we decide to wait until Monday, talk to our actual *doctors* and go from there.
My appointment was this morning. And my doctor was totally unconcerned. She said she doubted a bat would just bust up into my bed and bite me for no reason, and that she wouldn't advise the shots, because the chances are slim to none of rabies, anyways.
Whew, right? Not so fast.
Rhi's doctor calls, and he advises that we get the shots. Because if you do get rabies, you die. The end. And you don't die nicely, you die horribly. And, apparently, of the cases of rabies discovered that led to death, 26 of the 28 appear to have come from bats. 20 of those people had never mentioned being bitten by a bat in any way, shape, or form. Not even to their families and closest friends.
So I inquired how to get the shots, and Rhi's doctor said that they didn't carry them and to call the county health department.
So ok.
I do, where they, of course, don't have them, or have any idea where you get them. OF COURSE. Because god forbid anyone know what to do if something serious as hell totally happens or anything. *rolls eyes*
But, they do put me in touch with a very nice woman who handles animal type issues for the county. And she tells me that about 1% of bats are rabid, that the fact that the bat went away from Shane and didn't just lie fluttering on the floor or go towards him is a good indicator of health. And also that rabies isn't in season, which makes no sense to me, but whatever. She advises not to get the vaccine.
Then Rhi's actual doctor calls me. (I know I said doctor before, but it was his nurse. Which probably makes sense if you have a pediatrician, as they seem to never want to get on the phone.) And he's still skeptical, but agrees that it is hard to get the shots. But he says he'll totally write a doctor's order for us, but he wants to run it by the state animal health person (which is probably not their actual title.) So he'll call back tomorrow and let me know what's up.
This entire thing has made me utterly confused. I have no idea what's happening or what to do, or if I have to make my poor three year old and I get a series of 5 shots over 14 days (no, the rabies shot isn't in the stomach anymore, and, yes, it's considered safe for preggos. And I'm not including Shane in this equation because he has flatly refused to even consider the vaccine anyways.)
But I do know this.
If you have a bat in your home ever, KILL IT AND SEND IT OFF TO BE TESTED. Don't crush its head because they have to test the brain. And then you won't have to go through a confusing nightmare of utter annoyance like we are.
Sigh.
I'll update you all on this tomorrow.
UPDATE #1
Rhi's doctor called and said the state guy can't call him back until tomorrow, but he's done his own research and believes that, according to information from the CDC, that we are at extremely low risk. However, it still all hinges on what the state dude says, and he will call tomorrow. Hence the update #1 part.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
I don't wanna...
I have to be a responsible adult today.
This kid is due in 9 days. Nine. Freaking. Days. The LONGEST I could still be pregnant is 28 days, if my doctor were allow me to go to 42 weeks (which she may or may not, depending on many, many circumstances) but, most likely, I will have another kid in 16 days or less.
We are, as you may remember me mentioning before, not even slightly ready.
We have most of what we need. Well, except for a couple things. One of which I may have just ordered last night. And it may take 7-10 business days to get here. So, Keira has to wait 7-10 business days to be born. Which probably means I'll be in labor tonight.
Anyways. I really just don't feel like doing responsible things. I feel like lying on my couch reading and eating Ben and Jerry's (by the way, Ben and Jerry's has a flavor now with fair trade, and subsequently slave-free chocolate in it, which fills my heart with joy. If you have no idea what I mean by slave-free chocolate, you should go here, to the blog of the lovely and talented Maria, and spend less than 5 minutes educating yourself.)
But I can't lie on the couch today.
Because within 16 days (probably,) we'll have a baby.
And I have a HUGE laundry list of things to do.
Like wash baby clothes. Now, understand, this seemed like it wasn't at all a big deal yesterday. Because I was looking at this small bag of clothing that I'd purchased from Goodwill for Keira and thinking, "Yeah, no problem, that's like a half a load."
Except, I'm an idiot.
What I totally forgot was the fact that, at our baby shower, we got 80 acres of baby clothes, and blankets, and washcloths, and other things that you have to wash before using on a baby.
Annnnddddd, I also just remembered that I forgot to ever write thank you notes. So if you bought me a gift and think I'm a jerk, I'm not. Ok, yes, I am. A little. But I'm mostly just really forgetful.
This has nothing to do with this blog, but I JUST ORDERED PIZZA ONLINE. I'm pretty excited about this, because I didn't have to wait through the annoying fake person on the phone telling me all of Domino's specials. And, I know, I know, I'm trying to eat better, but I've been doing really well with that and sometimes you just need someone else to make you pizza. And this someone else is apparently Heather, who put our order in the over at 12:14, according to the Domino's website, which is strangely specific about stuff.
Oh, and I have to sterilize bottles. I can't remember doing this with Rhi, but that may have been because she thought bottles were evil and only breasts could dispense milk. Which was fine, except that sometimes, I really, really would have enjoyed being able to go anywhere for over 10 minutes without taking her. So when the threat of nipple confusion passes, I plan to occasionally try to get her to take a bottle. That won't be for awhile, and, honestly, I *could* slack on washing and sterilizing now, but, really - I will hate myself when I have this child if I haven't done it all. Because doing anything with a new baby is damn near impossible. I can remember begging Mike to take Rhi for like five minutes so I could just, please god, take a shower. So yeah.
And I have to check my infant Tylenol for this recall. Recalls increasingly freak me out, especially when they're for baby products.
In other news, my daughter is walking around with puppets on her feet.
****UPDATE****
Wait, can I put an update on a blog that I haven't actually posted yet? I'm doing it anyways. I'm a blog maverick like that. You can't touch me, Sarah Palin!
So, Shane failed to mention to me that, "Hey, baby, let's order pizza and I'll pay since we're both hungry and also I love you and stuff," came with the stipulation that *I* had to remove myself from the couch and go pick it up. And nothing I said to try to get out of it worked. Even when I told him that I was blogging, he wouldn't let me off the hook. In fact, he just said that I was probably writing about spiders or bats or how much he sucked and that it wasn't that important.
Which is wrong, because the fate of the world probably somehow depends on me writing blogs. Somehow. In some strange butterfly effect kind of way.
I, after much whining, did go get pizza where I discovered that "Heather" actually appeared to be a portly man with no hair and flour smeared on his apron.
And the boxes also tell you to tip your delivery driver and that they carry less than $20. Which seems like a crappy time to tell you that, after you have your pizza. And you may or may not have already robbed a driver or not tipped someone by then, so that sucks.
Sigh. I really should get up and do something constructive now. Also, I'm pretty sure that this blog is probably not at all amusing or even coherent. Until next time, blog readers.
UPDATE #2, actually written AFTER I posted!
How do I sterilize bottles again?
This kid is due in 9 days. Nine. Freaking. Days. The LONGEST I could still be pregnant is 28 days, if my doctor were allow me to go to 42 weeks (which she may or may not, depending on many, many circumstances) but, most likely, I will have another kid in 16 days or less.
We are, as you may remember me mentioning before, not even slightly ready.
We have most of what we need. Well, except for a couple things. One of which I may have just ordered last night. And it may take 7-10 business days to get here. So, Keira has to wait 7-10 business days to be born. Which probably means I'll be in labor tonight.
Anyways. I really just don't feel like doing responsible things. I feel like lying on my couch reading and eating Ben and Jerry's (by the way, Ben and Jerry's has a flavor now with fair trade, and subsequently slave-free chocolate in it, which fills my heart with joy. If you have no idea what I mean by slave-free chocolate, you should go here, to the blog of the lovely and talented Maria, and spend less than 5 minutes educating yourself.)
But I can't lie on the couch today.
Because within 16 days (probably,) we'll have a baby.
And I have a HUGE laundry list of things to do.
Like wash baby clothes. Now, understand, this seemed like it wasn't at all a big deal yesterday. Because I was looking at this small bag of clothing that I'd purchased from Goodwill for Keira and thinking, "Yeah, no problem, that's like a half a load."
Except, I'm an idiot.
What I totally forgot was the fact that, at our baby shower, we got 80 acres of baby clothes, and blankets, and washcloths, and other things that you have to wash before using on a baby.
Annnnddddd, I also just remembered that I forgot to ever write thank you notes. So if you bought me a gift and think I'm a jerk, I'm not. Ok, yes, I am. A little. But I'm mostly just really forgetful.
This has nothing to do with this blog, but I JUST ORDERED PIZZA ONLINE. I'm pretty excited about this, because I didn't have to wait through the annoying fake person on the phone telling me all of Domino's specials. And, I know, I know, I'm trying to eat better, but I've been doing really well with that and sometimes you just need someone else to make you pizza. And this someone else is apparently Heather, who put our order in the over at 12:14, according to the Domino's website, which is strangely specific about stuff.
Oh, and I have to sterilize bottles. I can't remember doing this with Rhi, but that may have been because she thought bottles were evil and only breasts could dispense milk. Which was fine, except that sometimes, I really, really would have enjoyed being able to go anywhere for over 10 minutes without taking her. So when the threat of nipple confusion passes, I plan to occasionally try to get her to take a bottle. That won't be for awhile, and, honestly, I *could* slack on washing and sterilizing now, but, really - I will hate myself when I have this child if I haven't done it all. Because doing anything with a new baby is damn near impossible. I can remember begging Mike to take Rhi for like five minutes so I could just, please god, take a shower. So yeah.
And I have to check my infant Tylenol for this recall. Recalls increasingly freak me out, especially when they're for baby products.
In other news, my daughter is walking around with puppets on her feet.
****UPDATE****
Wait, can I put an update on a blog that I haven't actually posted yet? I'm doing it anyways. I'm a blog maverick like that. You can't touch me, Sarah Palin!
So, Shane failed to mention to me that, "Hey, baby, let's order pizza and I'll pay since we're both hungry and also I love you and stuff," came with the stipulation that *I* had to remove myself from the couch and go pick it up. And nothing I said to try to get out of it worked. Even when I told him that I was blogging, he wouldn't let me off the hook. In fact, he just said that I was probably writing about spiders or bats or how much he sucked and that it wasn't that important.
Which is wrong, because the fate of the world probably somehow depends on me writing blogs. Somehow. In some strange butterfly effect kind of way.
I, after much whining, did go get pizza where I discovered that "Heather" actually appeared to be a portly man with no hair and flour smeared on his apron.
And the boxes also tell you to tip your delivery driver and that they carry less than $20. Which seems like a crappy time to tell you that, after you have your pizza. And you may or may not have already robbed a driver or not tipped someone by then, so that sucks.
Sigh. I really should get up and do something constructive now. Also, I'm pretty sure that this blog is probably not at all amusing or even coherent. Until next time, blog readers.
UPDATE #2, actually written AFTER I posted!
How do I sterilize bottles again?
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Nomenclature
If you have any idea why I titled this blog that, you're better than me. At life, possibly. The word has been stuck in my head today, like that popcorn piece that always seems to get stuck in my gums and then I have to floss my teeth, no matter what the time, place, or extenuating circumstances or life sucks. Except the word isn't inherently annoying like that popcorn piece. So really it's not the same thing at all.
I'm in a strange mood today.
Perhaps it is because I am slightly rabid, although I certainly hope not, as I suspect that that would be a negative for the child incubating in my uterus.
You see, Shane and I - and Rhi - live in a house. We rent said house. The house appears to be just like any other house, except that the outside has a Santa Claus tethered to the porch, and it's May. No one quite knows why the Santa is there; it appeared quite randomly one day and, honestly, I am too lazy to move it. I realize that it is possibly 5 pounds of plastic, so this shouldn't be difficult, but it seems like a considerable amount of effort somehow, so Santa stays where he is. On the plus side, I image that anyone who has thought for even a second about robbing our home has come to the (correct) conclusion that anyone who has a plastic Santa tethered to their porch in May probably does not have overflowing heaps of riches.
Anyways, I digress.
So, my house seems perfectly normal, despite the fact that it's a little more festive than yours, but I remain convinced that, once upon a time, Bruce Wayne lived here. Now, Bruce Wayne was not known for his humble beginnings, so I have no idea why he lived in a rental in a small, poor, and utterly lame Missouri town, but there is just no other explanation for the fact that bats are attracted to this house like the plague.
(I'm segueing here to mention that, yes, I know Batman was not actually known for his association with bats in the comic books and or movies, but this is my blog and I can write whatever I want. Also, if you were a bat, and a famous superhero had your name in his heroic moniker, wouldn't you want to visit his house? You totally would.)
Anyways, back to the bats and why I may or may not be rabid.
So, Shane has lived in this house since...um...last spring, I think. So a year(ish)? And I've lived here a few months less, but since he got the house while we were together, it goes without saying that I've spent a lot of time here. And since I have been spending time and/or living here, there have been no less than 24* bats that have somehow maneuvered into the house at night time, intent on killing us all. Or flying around in circles around the house, which curiously has no doors on anything but the bathroom in mysterious patterns that may, if correctly interpreted, lead to the truth about life and/or the endtimes. Or it could just be some crazy bat game that they get off on. Who knows.
We have literally no clue where these bats originate from. It began last spring, ended over the winter, and, as of last night, has begun anew.
Usually these nocturnal visits occur while someone is still awake, but, last night, Shane apparently woke up to the interesting and unmistakable sound of a bat flying through our bedroom. So, being extra heroic, he leaped from bed, suited up for battle (and by that, you should picture him grabbing a blanket and pillow to chase the bat, knock it down, and catch it, and he was probably wearing Halo boxers and a t-shirt. Hey, I believe my loyal readers have a right to know all about Shane's studliness as a bat avenger. [wait, that sounds like he's avenging the bats, and not us. Ah, well, you get the point.])
So Shane apparently chased the bat into our kitchen, where it landed on a little shelf next to the cabinet that I never use. Assuming that he had beaten the bat into submission (but not, for my animal loving friends, having hit it at all, since Shane refuses to kill the bats and instead catches them and releases them outside where they can make their way back into our house for whatever fiendish purposes they have,) he left it lying there and went to get something to pick it up with. This is probably due to the fact that I have long lectured him about bats and rabies and how he is NEVER allowed to touch a bat with his bare hands EVER as I refuse to watch him get rabies shots and also he has no insurance for rabies shots, and so I would obviously just have to shoot him, a la Ol' Yeller, and that was a very sad book/movie and not something I want to do to my fiance. So, while he is gone, the bat scoots itself into a corner of said shelf, and is hovering there, looking pathetic and not evil when Shane gets back. Then, because bats are sneaky, sneaky jerkfaces who want you to think they're all nice when they're really bloodsucking harbingers of death, it, quick as a wink, shoves itself into a space roughly as big as the one between these two lines / / and goes behind our cabinet.
Shane, being extra heroic (and also knowing his fiancee will kill him in the face if she finds out he left a bat in the house while her pregnant self and her small child are asleep in said house since she is utterly convinced that bats are there to steal her soul or infect us all with rabies that will be totally incurable and turn us into zombies, somehow,) attempts to get the bat out by poking it with a spatula, but this apparently doesn't make the bat feel like leaving the area behind the cabinet. So, he seals up the space around the cabinet with plastic bags from grocery shopping (and that is why you should always save your bags for recycling, ladies and gentleman.)
Except, at some point in the night, the bat escaped.
I know this because after I woke up this morning, and puttered around the house, and woke Shane up, and ran some errands, I looked up at the ceiling to discover the bat, hanging and asleep, off of the trim stuff that has an actual proper name that I can't remember or bother to Google right now.
Being the brave soul that I am, I yelled, "Shane! Bat!" and barricaded myself and Rhi in the bathroom while he released the demon bat outside. (No joke, he didn't even touch it with his hands, and I made him scrub them afterwards for fear of him being infected by bat funk or something. That's how paranoid I am.)
So that's fun.
Seriously, I have no clue how these bats get in. There are no open spots in the house that appear to court a bat entering, and the only window that was cracked was in our room and is fairly new, with no holes or gaps in the screens. It is a mystery to me as to why bats seem to think our home is the bee's knees and why they don't just stay outside and eat bugs or whatever like normal bats do. Are we doing something, inadvertently, to attract them? I don't know, and you get a surprisingly few helpful entries when you try to Google such things.
I was, however, joking about the rabies. I'm 98% sure that any of us would have known if a bat landed on us through the night, and I checked myself and Rhi over for bite/scratch marks just in case. Although Shane is coughing a lot and acting quite grumpy today. Hmmmm...
*readies shotgun, just in case*
*by 24 up there, I meant 6. I'm prone to exaggeration sometimes. Still, try to tell me 6 bats isn't a wtf-inducing amount. You can't.
Also, I would never shoot Shane. Ever. Unless he really did become a rabid zombie and I had to to save humanity, and, man, even then, it'd be really hard and I'd cry a lot.
I'm in a strange mood today.
Perhaps it is because I am slightly rabid, although I certainly hope not, as I suspect that that would be a negative for the child incubating in my uterus.
You see, Shane and I - and Rhi - live in a house. We rent said house. The house appears to be just like any other house, except that the outside has a Santa Claus tethered to the porch, and it's May. No one quite knows why the Santa is there; it appeared quite randomly one day and, honestly, I am too lazy to move it. I realize that it is possibly 5 pounds of plastic, so this shouldn't be difficult, but it seems like a considerable amount of effort somehow, so Santa stays where he is. On the plus side, I image that anyone who has thought for even a second about robbing our home has come to the (correct) conclusion that anyone who has a plastic Santa tethered to their porch in May probably does not have overflowing heaps of riches.
Anyways, I digress.
So, my house seems perfectly normal, despite the fact that it's a little more festive than yours, but I remain convinced that, once upon a time, Bruce Wayne lived here. Now, Bruce Wayne was not known for his humble beginnings, so I have no idea why he lived in a rental in a small, poor, and utterly lame Missouri town, but there is just no other explanation for the fact that bats are attracted to this house like the plague.
(I'm segueing here to mention that, yes, I know Batman was not actually known for his association with bats in the comic books and or movies, but this is my blog and I can write whatever I want. Also, if you were a bat, and a famous superhero had your name in his heroic moniker, wouldn't you want to visit his house? You totally would.)
Anyways, back to the bats and why I may or may not be rabid.
So, Shane has lived in this house since...um...last spring, I think. So a year(ish)? And I've lived here a few months less, but since he got the house while we were together, it goes without saying that I've spent a lot of time here. And since I have been spending time and/or living here, there have been no less than 24* bats that have somehow maneuvered into the house at night time, intent on killing us all. Or flying around in circles around the house, which curiously has no doors on anything but the bathroom in mysterious patterns that may, if correctly interpreted, lead to the truth about life and/or the endtimes. Or it could just be some crazy bat game that they get off on. Who knows.
We have literally no clue where these bats originate from. It began last spring, ended over the winter, and, as of last night, has begun anew.
Usually these nocturnal visits occur while someone is still awake, but, last night, Shane apparently woke up to the interesting and unmistakable sound of a bat flying through our bedroom. So, being extra heroic, he leaped from bed, suited up for battle (and by that, you should picture him grabbing a blanket and pillow to chase the bat, knock it down, and catch it, and he was probably wearing Halo boxers and a t-shirt. Hey, I believe my loyal readers have a right to know all about Shane's studliness as a bat avenger. [wait, that sounds like he's avenging the bats, and not us. Ah, well, you get the point.])
So Shane apparently chased the bat into our kitchen, where it landed on a little shelf next to the cabinet that I never use. Assuming that he had beaten the bat into submission (but not, for my animal loving friends, having hit it at all, since Shane refuses to kill the bats and instead catches them and releases them outside where they can make their way back into our house for whatever fiendish purposes they have,) he left it lying there and went to get something to pick it up with. This is probably due to the fact that I have long lectured him about bats and rabies and how he is NEVER allowed to touch a bat with his bare hands EVER as I refuse to watch him get rabies shots and also he has no insurance for rabies shots, and so I would obviously just have to shoot him, a la Ol' Yeller, and that was a very sad book/movie and not something I want to do to my fiance. So, while he is gone, the bat scoots itself into a corner of said shelf, and is hovering there, looking pathetic and not evil when Shane gets back. Then, because bats are sneaky, sneaky jerkfaces who want you to think they're all nice when they're really bloodsucking harbingers of death, it, quick as a wink, shoves itself into a space roughly as big as the one between these two lines / / and goes behind our cabinet.
Shane, being extra heroic (and also knowing his fiancee will kill him in the face if she finds out he left a bat in the house while her pregnant self and her small child are asleep in said house since she is utterly convinced that bats are there to steal her soul or infect us all with rabies that will be totally incurable and turn us into zombies, somehow,) attempts to get the bat out by poking it with a spatula, but this apparently doesn't make the bat feel like leaving the area behind the cabinet. So, he seals up the space around the cabinet with plastic bags from grocery shopping (and that is why you should always save your bags for recycling, ladies and gentleman.)
Except, at some point in the night, the bat escaped.
I know this because after I woke up this morning, and puttered around the house, and woke Shane up, and ran some errands, I looked up at the ceiling to discover the bat, hanging and asleep, off of the trim stuff that has an actual proper name that I can't remember or bother to Google right now.
Being the brave soul that I am, I yelled, "Shane! Bat!" and barricaded myself and Rhi in the bathroom while he released the demon bat outside. (No joke, he didn't even touch it with his hands, and I made him scrub them afterwards for fear of him being infected by bat funk or something. That's how paranoid I am.)
So that's fun.
Seriously, I have no clue how these bats get in. There are no open spots in the house that appear to court a bat entering, and the only window that was cracked was in our room and is fairly new, with no holes or gaps in the screens. It is a mystery to me as to why bats seem to think our home is the bee's knees and why they don't just stay outside and eat bugs or whatever like normal bats do. Are we doing something, inadvertently, to attract them? I don't know, and you get a surprisingly few helpful entries when you try to Google such things.
I was, however, joking about the rabies. I'm 98% sure that any of us would have known if a bat landed on us through the night, and I checked myself and Rhi over for bite/scratch marks just in case. Although Shane is coughing a lot and acting quite grumpy today. Hmmmm...
*readies shotgun, just in case*
*by 24 up there, I meant 6. I'm prone to exaggeration sometimes. Still, try to tell me 6 bats isn't a wtf-inducing amount. You can't.
Also, I would never shoot Shane. Ever. Unless he really did become a rabid zombie and I had to to save humanity, and, man, even then, it'd be really hard and I'd cry a lot.
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