When I See You Smile

I sat and watched Noah and Jason play in the sand -- digging holes and ponds and building bucket-castles. And I sat and watched them play in the ocean -- and I would realize that I was smiling. A big, goofy, squinty, involuntary smile. Every time I looked at him. I couldn't help it.

The last time we went to the beach, Noah was a baby. He couldn't walk or do much beyond shove handfuls of sand in his mouth or squeal when we dipped his feet in the water.

This time he could run and dig and splash on his own, just cautious enough to ask "Hole my hand? Hole my hand?" each time we'd take him down to the water. The beach was the most exciting, most fun, most greatest thing in the entire world, and the joy would sometimes bubble up over and he'd toss his hands in the air and scream. We heard him murmur "beach, water, ocean, beach" quietly in his sleep at night.

But sometimes, as I sat and watched, I still saw that little baby. The round little belly and the barest hint of chub where wrist meets hand. The excited babble of sounds and shrieks instead of words. There was something about wet hair and shivering lips that made him look so small, so vulnerable, so perfect.

He could play and swim and play for hours, and we watched and smiled, wishing we could give him more time here, wondering whether he's old enough to remember this trip, with his Nemo bucket and the big holes Daddy dug in the sand and the taste of grit in his peanut butter and jelly.

And when I wrapped him up in a towel and held him close while he shivered and struggled against his heavy eyelids, his head against my chest and his baby brother kicking from within, I promised to remember. And to thank him one day for letting me see the world for the first time all over again.

Please Hold

We've been at the beach. It's been very taxing.

Will post real sentence-y update soon.

Nitwit

Internet: 1

Amy: 0

www.twitter.com/amalah

I am now "tweeting" to my "tweeps" on this thing called "twitter" and jesus ham god in a blanket, I want to punch myself in the face.

Feel free to now abandon twitter en masse for shark-jumping, oh-my-god-it's-so-two-weeks-ago reasons. Or let me bug you via "cellular phone" with important updates like NOAH, WE HAD FROZEN PANCAKES I MADE IN THE TOASTER FOR BREAKFAST, YOU MUST EAT SOMETHING APPROPRIATE LIKE FROZEN PIZZA I MADE IN THE TOASTER FOR LUNCH.

(Shit! 158 characters! How do you people stay so concise? Does this mean I may have to start breaking my thoughts up into [HORRORS!!] separate sentences? Like with [GASP!!] periods and shit?)

(Oh my God, WHAT HAVE I DONE?)

28 Weeks & No -Ish

Since my doctor and I have finally agreed on a concrete due date, or at least a decent compromise on one (four days later than my math suggests, four days before some of the more runty early ultrasounds), I figure it's time to stop with the fuzzy update titles and just commit to a week already.

So. 28 weeks. Solidly in the third trimester. Eleven weeks or so away from delivery via hacksaw.

I won't lie. I'm a tad defensive about the scheduled c-section. (It's hard not to be, out here on the Internet.) When people inquired about my due date at Blogher I was unable to give the simple answer: October 18th, but I will probably deliver sometime around the 10th. Instead I found myself rushing to provide all sorts of details that no one really asked for: Noah was 10 pounds! Occiput posterior! Meconium! Cord around the neck! A really narrow, weirdly turned-in pelvis that prevented him from ever getting anywhere near the exit! Fetal distress! Doooooooom!

(And that's usually when people would back away from me, possibly emitting high-frequency screams that only dogs could hear. I need a Saint Bernard, some hot cocoa and a shitload of Bailey's, I imagined them saying.)

I've spent a lot of time thinking about my options. To have a shot at a vaginal birth, I'd likely need to be induced ahead of time, before the baby gets past the 8-pound range. (My doctor believes, based on what we saw last time, that I'd probably only be able to safely deliver a baby who was UNDER 8 pounds. It's not that I'm ridiculously petite or anything -- I simply do not have the birthin' hips. I've got something more akin to a bear trap.)

I worry that an induction is (for me, anyway) just a long, drawn-out path to a repeat c-section, since I have no idea how I'd respond to pitocin or if we'd really be able pinpoint the sweet spot between "manageable baby size" and "oh, you know, LUNG MATURITY AND SHIT." Knowing that a c-section would remain on the table in case of trouble, I would again opt for an epidural to prevent having to go completely under in case of surgery, and...that's not what I really want either. If I were to attempt a VBAC, I'd want to go full balls-out natural -- if I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna DO IT. The full monty of vaginal birth. With that more or less off the table, the VBAC looks less attractive and more...like a needlessly risky choice I'd be making for probably the wrong reasons.

(And yes. Yes! I get that a c-section is major abdominal surgery and not without its own risks. Which is why, if it's going to remain a likely possibility anyway, I'd prefer for it to happen in a calm, scheduled manner instead of the OH SHIT I LEFT MY SCALPEL IN MY OTHER PANTS emergency scenario we had last time.)

Sp provided my uterus doesn't get any fancy ideas in the next 10 weeks or so, I'm not gonna do it. Because of the mitigating factors -- pitocin, epidural, a baby who seems to flip between tranverse and breech but never head down, and this little needling suspicion that I'd end up exhausted and worn-down and sliced open anyway -- I've realized that I don't really want to go for a VBAC. And...I think I should really, really want the VBAC. I've tried to talk myself into wanting it, but...I don't.

I have no regrets about my section last time -- all in all, it was pretty great and easy and absolutely the right option at the time. I have nothing to prove in its wake; I have no empty space on my Major Life Accomplishments trophy shelf that I'm dying to fill with the PUSHED CHILD SUCCESSFULLY OUT OF NETHER REGIONS 2008 AWARD. I just want us both to get through this thing okay and onto the really important stuff. (Like breastfeeding! And co-sleeping! And infant Mandarin Chinese classes! Ohhhh, and now I'm just cranky.)

The Princess & the Pantyhose (aka Blogher '08)

I lugged about 10 pounds worth of camera and lenses to Blogher, and the only photos I have in my possession to share with y'all are these two, taken with Kristen's iPhone. During our impromptu Floor Party in the pantyhose department at Macy's:

After realizing that I was simply not getting nearly enough attention, I decided to have a dramatic fainting spell en route to the shoe department portion of the Blogher cocktail party. (For anyone who wasn't there and is thinking...Macy's? Shoe department? Cocktail party? What? Yeah, I don't really understand either, and I was both THERE and SOBER.)

The party started out in Handbags, and I started out very horrified by the sight of hummus and various hors d'oeurves plates perilously close to the Marc Jacobs, I was soon distracted by this vague feeling that Oh Shit, I've Possibly Gone And Overdone It, and started meekly asking people if they knew where I could get some water. Various people went on a search mission for me, but returned with the news that champagne appeared to be the only option available. (Pregnant traveling ladies, I highly recommend you get yourself a whole posse of Danas and Catherines and Traceys and and Isabels and a couple Laid-Off and/or Backpacking Dads, who will ignore your protestations that you are FINE, stop FUSSING, and bring you chairs and shake down cocktail waitresses on your behalf.)

And then, while walking through the aisles of pantyhose, I found myself grabbing the nearest elbow and hissing that I needed someone to GET ME ON THE FLOOR, RIGHT NOW, and...I remember spinning, high-kicking, thigh-highed mannequin legs and very cold marble and Catherine rushing off to find water and returning with a little thimble of a Starbucks cup and wailing that it was all they'd give her, and then I laughed so hard I thought I would puke, and that's when I noticed pretty much every conference attendee filing by and staring at me strangely. After awhile a nice group of people joined me on the floor, where we accepted bottles of water and Luna bars from anyone who could scrounge one up for me, like some kind of really fucked-up Nativity scene.

(TANGENT! For anyone who has been to Blogher, you know how you go with a List? That List of bloggers you're just really jazzed about and hoping to meet, and you possibly rehearse what you'll say when you meet them [because OF COURSE you'll recognize them, being so excellent with names and faces already] just so you don't do something lame like SCREAM DIRECTLY INTO THEIR FACE [sorry, Cecily] or otherwise make a fangirl ass out of yourself? It was at this moment, there on the floor of the pantyhose department, that Jenny the Bloggess sat down next to me. All I can say is that I'm very happy I was having some kind of horrific Blood Sugar incident at the time because at least I am not forced to live with very detailed memories of what a spastic dork I was -- it's all lost in a glorious haze of dizzy spells and those weird spots that cloud your vision. Ahh.)

(TANGENT, PART TWO! I missed all the drama, is all I can say about all the drama. I was TRYING to rest up and take care of my delicate little self and missed the keynote.)

THEN the party moved up to Furniture, where I at least got to recline on a sofa while signing books with Cagey and Kristen (the Non-Dramatic Pregnant Lady) and...oh God, everybody else, until I 1) kicked over somebody else's glass of red wine all over the rug, and 2) really really really really really had to pee and had to take an ELEVATOR to another floor and it was like I was back at the airport and once I found the bathroom I was completely baffled by the stall doors (they didn't look like doors! and you couldn't tell if they were occupied unless you hurled your body at them and after slamming myself into the third locked door I turned around and randomly screamed to the heavens and scared a lovely group of young 20-something non-mommybloggers before spotting a slightly open door and peeing for oh, about the entire running time of Juno.

On Sunday my friend Julie (some of you may remember her as Bunny. Met her in Gymboree, bonded over our hatred of everyone else at Gymboree, moved to California in February, broke my heart, is total whore) picked me up at the hotel and whisked me off to her house/decompression chamber, since she knows about my blog but doesn't read my blog, doesn't read ANY blogs and if I dared spend one second trying to rehash some kind of OMG DRAMZZ! moment from the conference she'd...she'd...well, probably just call me an asshole and change the subject. Perfect.

Now I'm home, surrounded by the dozens and dozens of business cards I picked up, marveling at how many new people I met, old friends and whores I reconnected with however briefly, and then there were the people I technically met for the first time who already felt like old friends, in that weird Internet way.  And that's just culled from my memory (haaaaa) and the cards I stashed in my camera bag (well, I had to use that bitch for SOMETHING)...I'm pretty sure I have about a hundred more in my actual suitcase, but opening that one means I would have to do laundry. And...it is not time for laundry yet, I don't think.

Jason and Noah met me at the airport last night, and Noah pointed and screamed (he gets that from me -- he'll be a huge hit at business conferences!) and came barreling at me for a huge hug, and then pulled back and said (for the first time ever), "I love you, Mama."

(That one goes out to all my peeps at the Blogging About Special-Needs Kids panel, who both refrain from playing the Pain Olympics AND are okay with me cornering them at parties to talk about SPD Manifestations in Poop without batting an eye. All we need is a gang sign that somehow incorporates what Miralax dosage we use.)

(Regarding Every Other Photo Of Me Out There: Look, I forgot lipstick, AND I brought sample-sized everything, including foundation, which I guess was a TAD PALE, bordering on TRANSLUCENT REFLECTIVE POSSIBLY UNDEAD. The persistent double-chin, however, I have no excuses for.)

Well, At Least I'm Not In Newark

Or, How I Almost Missed Blogher Completely

As we pulled up to the airport early this morning I sighed and whined (for the zillionth millionth squillionth time) about how much I hate airports. Flying, I can deal with. I was actually looking forward to this flight, since I'd managed to score a fairly awesome deal on a nonstop trip via Virgin America (of the leather recliners and touchscreen entertainment consoles and wheeee, self-serve bottled water minibars), but first, I had to get through the fucking airport.

"I'm just always convinced something is going to go terribly wrong, you know?" I continued, chewing nervously on my index finger. "Like I'll get bumped to standby or find out that my reservation never went through or...or..."

I paused, trying to think of a few more worst-case scenarios, but lo, we were at the gate and it was time to say goodbye. I begged Noah not to grow up any and squeezed in as many kisses for everybody as I could before finally making my way to check-in.

The self-service kiosk was out of ink and served me up a blank boarding pass. Glitch for the trip, I figured. Pretty okay as glitches go, especially since the Virgin counter was absolutely devoid of anyone else checking in and I was able to walk right up to my choice of Actual Human Ticket Dispenser Types.

Which...hmm.

The woman behind the counter frowned a bit, and asked if I was going to LA.

"No, San Francisco."

She stared at me. "Then...why are you here NOW?"

"8:40 am? Boards at 8:10?" I helpfully suggested.

"We don't...have an 8:40 am flight to San Francisco. Our morning San Fran flight has already left."

I pulled out my Travelocity confirmation email, the tiniest bit of panic starting to creep into my brain. See, when I'd originally booked the flight, I could have SWORN the departure and arrival times were slightly earlier than the ones listed on the confirmation, but I'd just assumed I'd gotten them mixed up or that the flight had just been pushed back 20 minutes or so. It had never occurred to me that I was booking a flight that apparently, just didn't flipping EXIST.

Oh, but it turned out it DID exist. And I was very, very, very, very early for it.

A good 12 hours early.

"PM!" I screamed in horror. How...what...no. No way did I do that. Just...no. Fucking shit ass no.

I started hyperventilating. "Oh my God oh my God oh my God."

I now had two Virgin America employees frantically tapping away at their computers, telling me not to panic...the morning flight to San Francisco was delayed and was still at the airport, although boarding had already started.  I had a crystal clear vision of myself waddling frantically up to some remote gate just in time to watch the plane taxi away. I put my hands over my face and wailed.

But the employees were all, NOT ON OUR WATCH, LITTLE PREGNANT LADY, and in lightening speed, printed out a new boarding pass, scribbled PREMIUM all over it, and then one of them jumped over the baggage scale and said they were going to take me through the employee-only security line. The other picked up the phone and called the gate, begging them to hold the plane. By some BLESSED MIRACLE of UNPARALLELED COMMON SENSE on my part, I'd kept my suitcase small and within the carry-on limits, right down to my little Ziploc bag of Sephora sample cosmetics.

"GO GO GO!" hissed the guy on the phone. Then he looked me up and down with a bit of concern. "But don't, like, run."

(Translation: Please don't give birth here.)

The female ticket agent calmly yet briskly led me past the INSANE security lines and down some escalators to the employee security check, which was 1) short, 2) downright effing jovial, with everyone discussing their hangovers and such. I struggled to extricate my laptop, completely befuddled by the zippers on my stupid bag, like I was in one of those nightmares where you're trying to run away from something but your legs are made of cement. The security guard looked at my name and was all, "Storch? Like Larry Storch? Like from F-Troop?"

AMY'S BRAIN: OH MY FUCKING GOD ARE YOU KIDDING ME.

AMY'S MOUTH, WHICH IS BETTER IN A CRISIS THAN SHE OFTEN GIVES IT CREDIT FOR: Yes! Exactly! Ha ha! Props for the recall!

I got through the line without a frisking, at least. I only sort-of shoved my stuff back into my bags (which felt like they were multiplying by the minute, and my shoulders suddenly seemed to be coated in Crisco), and booked off towards my gate, taking a couple seconds to watch the ticket agent disappear into the crowds and wishing I'd gotten her name. Or given her a hug, or managed to squeeze in a few more dozen breathless thank-yous.

My gate was...up an elevator.

Get on, hit button, pound CLOSE DOOR CLOSE DOOR, doors start to close, guy dashes through and -- thinking I'd held the door for him -- says "thank you!"

Pound CLOSE DOOR CLOSE DOOR, and oh my GOD, it happens AGAIN, right down to the "thank you!"

I gurgled out a semi-stifled scream in response.

And then...oh, OF COURSE, I had to take a shuttle. I got on and made my way to the opposite end, snagging a primo seat by the door. I called Jason and told him to pray for me, and for the first time I tried to replay everything and figure out what, exactly-the-fuck, had gone wrong with my reservation. How I had only asked for Travelocity to display morning flights. How the original time I thought I'd booked wasn't even the one on my reservation, be it AM or PM. How this was the only nonstop flight remotely in my price range -- booked mostly because of the nice early arrival time, which ALSO changed by the time the confirmation email showed up. And how I could have POSSIBLY read that email so many damn times and NEVER NOTICED the flight was clearly marked as PM, or at least listened to the alarm bells raised by those weird non-jibeing, not-what-I-booked times.

The shuttle crawwwwwwled across the airport and approached the gate and...oh for the love of crackers, it decided to turn around and pull in so I was on the OPPOSITE end from the exit. I shoved my index finger back into my mouth and bit down. Hard.

I dashed out, spotted my gate and took off. The plane was...was it still there? oh, please still be there...STILL THERE! IT'S STILL THERE!

Of course, the doors were closed and the monitors said closed and the attendant was making announcements for the next gate over and put her hand up to shush me when I lumbered up to offer my boarding pass (which was now marked "PRESHSDKJDFHU" since the ink had smeared all over my desperate, sweaty hands).

My eyes were probably the size of dinner plates by this point, I was half-gasping and half-just-trying-not-to-cry and I could NOT believe this: ME, the girl who arrives at the airport hours early for everything, including the fucking commuter shuttles, and who always checks and double-checks her reservations to the point of compulsion, standing at a closed gate for a closed flight that was supposed to have taken off an hour earlier, and oh, crap, here come the waterworks.

It turned out they HAD been expecting me -- "This is Amy," the attendant said to some guy with a walkie talkie, who ran down the hallway ahead of me to tell the plane that there was indeed one more person, hold up.

I got onboard, blubbering out thank-yous and apologies to just about every person on board, in between likely whalloping a lot of heads with my bags, which were in complete disarray and hanging from my elbows. An attendant got me to my seat and kept asking if I was okay (what, is a sweaty, crying and hyperventilating pregnant lady a WEIRD THING, or something?) and I tried to get out something coherent about changed flights and Mistakes Being Made and how It Wasn't My Fault, At Least I Don't Think So, I Don't Knooooowwww Anything Anymooooooore Sobbbbb. She patted my back and told me everything was okay now.

So I made the flight, barely. I was dehydrated and starving (the two big no-nos my doctor had warned me about when clearing me for travel on Wednesday, but of course I'd assumed I had TONS of time to get water and breakfast before my flight, since I was all early and conscientious and HA HA FAIL) and was having occasional Braxton-Hicks contractions. My index finger, chapped from all that nervous chewing, was split open and bleeding. There was no time to call Jason and tell him I'd made the flight.

(Hi, baby. I made the flight! Hooray!)

I still have no idea what happened with the reservation. I am pretty sure Travelocity shoulders some of the blame, since there did seem to be something pretty glitchy with the confirmation containing flight times I'd never even seen online, and I ended up arriving right at the time I THOUGHT I'd originally booked. But I am certainly not going to pretend that there isn't a decent chance that I just fucked it all up, start to finish, in addition to NEVER NOTICING that the flight was marked PM on the confirmation. Which: Jesus Christ, girl. Remind me to slap you once you're no longer in such a delicate condition.

Huge huge props to everyone at Virgin America, though -- I've never ever had any sort of preference for one airline over another, in fact, I'm generally an equal-opportunity hater, but...goddamn, they did not have to help me get on an already-delayed flight that may have cost a lot more than my cheapo Travelocity deal, especially since I was the moron standing there with piece of paper that was clearly marked PM and acting like I had no idea how that possibly could have happened.

Every time I went to the bathroom (which was a lot, as you can imagine), someone from the crew double-checked that I'd calmed down and was okay and did I need more water? And oh yeah, they've TOTALLY heard of PM flights getting marked as AM online before, or reservations just going completely haywire, happens all the time, sweetheart. Which: probably a lie, but sometimes lying is just an essential part of good customer service, you know?

Capture the Phonetic Moment

THIS MORNING'S OB APPOINTMENT:

Glucose. Gluuuuuuuuuucose! Bzz! Slump. Zzzzzzz. Drool. Wha?

I am...exhausted, little Internet. Prepare for even more ellipses than usual as I am in real danger of falling asleep in between words. Goddamn orange glucose dreck drink. And...goddamn...other stuff. Like...zzzz...human rights violations and...shit.

What?

God. So I actually had about half of an entry written yesterday about Blogher and how I keep reading entries about people's pre-travel packing flip-outs about what to wear and how pregnancy really solves this how mess, since I don't really have many options about what to wear. Essentially: I will pack what fits. Perhaps it will match, perhaps it will be vaguely cute. Perhaps not, but BY GOD, it will fit. See? Easy and flip-out free, and hey, I'll be the sober and sort-of round one who does a lot of sitting. Come sit next to me! Really. Allow me to engage you in an uncomfortable conversation about skin tags and c-section scars and then maybe glaze over and fall asleep on your hair.

I decided against posting this ultra-laid-back puff piece on How My Pregnancy Cured My Social Anxiety right around the time I realized that I'd only really written three sentences and yet had gotten up and gone to the kitchen to consume a chocolate pudding cup at the close of each of those three sentences. And now my face is breaking out, AND I have decided to do my own pedicure. So maybe I am not quite the cool cucumber I think I am.

And wait! Did I mention c-section scars? SCORE. Even in the wake of absolute blood sugar annihilation I am still rocking the segues.

Let's back up to my OB appointment again. We are, at this moment in time, leaning towards a scheduled c-section.  (I know, I know. You totally thought I was going to go with the dolphins.) And my doctor mentioned that while we certainly have some time before we need to actually schedule anything, he would recommend that I deliver about a week before my due date, soooo sometime in the first full week of October. How's the 10th look?

Gluuuuuucossssssshit what what WHAT? Bzz..zzt?

I staggered out of the exam room where Jason and Noah were waiting, calmly made my next appointment and shuffled out to the car, where I proceeded to FLIP MY SHIT at Jason because we just lost a WEEK OF OUR LIVES, and that week CHANGES EVERYTHING, and we are now LESS THAN THREE MONTHS from having a baby and the way this pregnancy has been flying by I might as well go home and pack for Blogher AND the hospital at the same time. Quick, take me to Target so I can buy a bathrobe and some Soduku puzzles.

Jason stared straight ahead and handed me a paper bag he'd gotten at a nearby coffee shop. There was a donut inside. I stared at it, knowing that my body already contained enough sugar to bring down an oompa-loompa, and then ate it anyway and immediately fell asleep.

Deodorant Wars II: The Aluminator Strikes Back

(Warning: reading Part One will probably still not help you make much sense of this nonsense.)

DEGREE CLINICAL PROTECTION: RIGHT! DUDES, ARE YOU READY TO GET FUCKING SERIOUS ABOUT UNDERARM PROTECTION? HAVE YOU HAD ENOUGH OF PUSSIFIED DEODORANTS THAT LEAVE YOU RANK AND SWEATY BY MID-DAY? ARE YOU INTERESTED IN THE HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF ALUMINUM ZIRCONIUM TETRACHLOROHYDREX YOU CAN BUY LEGALLY THIS SIDE OF FUCKING MEXICO? ARE YOU READY FOR THE INSANE AMOUNT OF POONTANG THAT'S ABOUT TO HEAD YOUR WAY?

DEGREE ULTRACLEAR: I am like, so totally turned on right now.

SECRET FLAWLESS: Bitch! You're from the same product line! You're practically related! Also, he's mine!

DEGREE ULTRACLEAR: No way, he's mine!

DEGREE CLINICAL PROTECTION: GIVE IT UP FOR TRISOLID^TM, LADIES! HIGH FIVE, STEVE HOLT! LET'S GO BENCH PRESSING!

SECRET FLAWLESS: Oh, you wanna start something now?

DEGREE ULTRACLEAR: Oh, it's already been starterated. The caps are coming OFF, Vag Head.

DEGREE CLINICAL PROTECTION: CATFIGHT! NIIIIICE.

TOM'S OF MAINE: You guuuuuuys.

TOM'S OF MAINE: You know, so maybe I don't offer all the fancy promises you guys do. Maybe my label doesn't have a lot checklists and benefits and made-up sciencey-sounding words like yours. Maybe the warnings about aluminum in deodorant are pretty stupidly overblown and okay, maybe I don't actually "work" as a deodorant in the "traditional" sense. But I do have one thing I'd like to share with you. A song. From my heart. It goes a little something like this...

La la la la lavenderrrrr ladiessssss
I want to respect you, I want to make you feel good about your purchasing decisionsssss...

*KICK PUNCH BLAM BLAM THUD*

DEGREE CLINICAL PROTECTION: THIS WAY, LADIES. HOW 'BOUT WE HEAD BACK TO MY PLACE AND LOOK AT MY COLLECTION OF CVS SALES CIRCULARS?

DEGREE ULTRACLEAR & SECRET FLAWLESS: *scandalized giggles*

DEGREE CLINICAL PROTECTION: (ASIDE) (TO AUDIENCE) ...and no one will ever have to know that I'm actually preferred by close to 100% of pregnant women who have to steal their husband's deodorant in order to not stink by lunchtime! I'm so ashamed, and yet...and yet it feels so right.

TOM'S OF MAINE: I...I heard...that.

To be continued?

(Oh God, I hope not.)

Things. Lots of Things.

THINGS I AM TERRIBLE AT:

1) Choosing the correct-sized plastic container for storing leftovers

2) The metric system

3) Closing dresser drawers all the way

4) Painting my own toenails

5) Anything involving the post office

THINGS THAT ARE CURRENTLY BUGGING ME A LOT:

1) That damn haircut

2) Our defective Wii

    a) Which would scratch a ring onto every game we played after a few hours of use.

    b) Which would render the game completely unplayable.

    c) Usually right at some critical moment, like right when you were about to fight Darth Maul in Lego Star Wars.

    d) Which you were totally kicking ass on, by the way.

    f) And yeah, I know it's geared for 10-year-olds, I WAS STILL RULING AT IT.

    g) Anyway, we'll probably get our repaired console back in about six weeks.

3) No one around here who is not gestating is willing to move furniture around and get the new baby's room set up.

    a) Or help me with my plan to rearrange the dining room, which I also feel is an essential pre-baby endeavor.

4) This irrational feeling that our ultrasound wasn't completely definitive and we're actually having a girl.

5) Also ants. In the kitchen. I hate ants.

THINGS MY DOG HAS EATEN WITH NARY A SINGLE NEGATIVE EFFECT:

1) Chocolate cake

2) Chocolate Easter candy

3) Four paper towels

4) Seven butter wrappers

5) Approximately 428 crayons

6) A roach trap

7) Packing peanuts

8) Shoes of various materials and price points

9) An entire bag of baby spinach

10) Houseplants

PLACES I FOUND TRACES OF THAT ENTIRE BAG OF STALE HAMBURGER BUNS SHE ATE:

1) Laundry pile

2) Linen closet

3) Under decorative throw pillow

4) All over living room floor

5) Bottom of my foot

Bite me, Atkins.

Hair Today

We interrupt all this fancy Hollywood talk to bring you a good old-fashioned hysterical mommyblogger moment of complete and total overreaction:

OH MY FREAKING GOD LOOK WHAT THEY DID TO MY BABY.

Compare that with a photo taken last week -- right after I attempted to take him for a haircut but chickened out because there was kind of a long wait down at the local kiddie salon, OH WELL! NO HAIRCUT TODAY, let's get us some tacos instead.

I know little boys with long hair are not everybody's cup of styling gel, but oh. I love Noah's curls. I love his shaggy little moptop and while I try to keep his bangs trimmed up and the back from getting too mullet-y at home, there does come a point where I have to admit that he needs a real and actual haircut. Usually around the time that other kids start mistaking him for a girl at the playground, or when I find myself playing with his hair and subconsciously pulling it into pigtails.

Fine, I said. I'll take him for a haircut.

I've actually been That Person and taken him to see MY stylist -- piggybacking on my own appointment, all innocent and oh! Look! Here's my husband and my adorable child! I bet they brought cash! Hey, while you've got your scissors out and everything, would you mind giving my son back the gift of unobscured sight? Thnx.

But then my stylist moved to Utah and I have lived in fairly blissful denial since that ANYONE in this house needs a haircut, myself included. And oh yeah, there's that whole sensory THING, meaning Noah freaks the fuck out over haircuts and I feel guilty taking him to any salon that doesn't 1) regularly deal with freaking-the-fuck-out toddlers, or 2) have the mighty mighty power of Thomas the Tank Engine videos on little televisions. Also, hair-covered lollipops.

Fine, I said. I'll take him to the kiddie kut-n-kry.

The first sign that this was a Mistake came right as Noah's name was called and my phone rang and oh, dear, jesus, lord, it was my NEW salon calling to cancel my own desperately-needed pre-Blogher hair appointment this weekend. I hoisted Noah onto the booster seat while begging and pleading for Sunday? Monday? TUESDAY? You can't DO THIS TO ME, MAAAAAN.

Noah concurred, maaaan, and took a flying boneless slither-leap off the chair and started running for the door.

"Shit!" I said.

"Coughahemshhh!" the mother of the four-year-old at the next station said.

Noah ended up on my lap for his haircut, completely disinterested in Elmo on the TV, while I tried to hold still in a full-body lock and hissed to the stylist that it would be great if she could switch the television over to T-H-O-M-A-S or maybe D-O-R-A.

"Thomas?" she barked. "I don't think we have any Thomas. Is that the one with the train?"

"THOMMMMMMASSS!" Noah wailed. "I WAANNA THOMASSSS!"

"M-O-T-H-E-R-F-U-C-K-E-R." I hissed.

I asked her for a trim. "We like it pretty long and curly. He just needs a little cleaning up is all, around the ears and neck, mostly."

I don't know whether this woman was in the midst of a personal tragedy that was, in fact, interfering with her ability to do good hair, or was maybe just a robot whose styling programming was limited to:

If [GIRL] Then
    [consider listening to words coming out of mother's mouth]
Else [BOY] Then
    [chop hair to hell]
End If

But she started cutting and like, 14 seconds later Noah's curls were covering every inch of my stupid black leggings (I am pregnant and I have developed a passionate dislike of pants, okay? lay off). I sat there blinking in shock over this...child...who did not look like my child anymore and I realized we needed to get the hell out of there before I had a complete hormonal meltdown over a couple stupid inches of hair that would grow back, I know it will grow back, but...but...oh my God. I need a burrito right this instant.

After lunch, Noah accidentally let go of the balloon he'd gotten post-haircut and was weeping again. When we got to our car he caught a glimpse of his reflection in the window. His hands went up to his head and his brow furrowed as he tried to make sense of what he was seeing.

"Oh Shelby," I sighed. "Your hair. Is so short."

"I a big boy," he informed me.

I suddenly had a vision of a day when Noah comes home with a military buzzcut he'll have gotten out of rebellion from his hippie hipster parents who are always on his case to leave his hair long, and concurred that yes, he was, while silently swearing that scissors are not going near that child for the next six months, and I don't care that I am being ridiculous or if it gets long enough for a French braid, I am so not ready for the big boy hair.