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Cate woke up yesterday with some phenomenal sneezes. You know the kind of sneezes that shoot clear across the room? Or cover the child’s entire face? Yeah, those. So apparently it’s Cold Time again. Fun fun fun.

The one perk is that she’s now old enough that when she sneezes, she doesn’t immediately try to wipe it away with her hands (thereby spreading the mess around even worse). Now she waits for me to come running with a tissue. She’s trying to figure out how to blow her nose when I hold up the tissue, but… yeah. Not so much with that milestone just yet. We’re working on it, though.

I’m a little brain-dead from dealing with a sick kiddo, but here: this article is kind of fascinating. I’ve never really understood why some Americans (um, mostly Republicans, I think) are so anti-France, but most of their system sounds pretty good to me.

I should probably do a political post at some point and expand on my thoughts about our American government and the upcoming election, but I think I’ll save it for when I’m a little more coherent. Good night, y’all.

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Weather man says a windstorm is headed our way. Everybody please cross your fingers or say a little prayer or something that we keep our electricity, ok? If we have another nine-day power outage like last winter, I may not survive it.

Or at the very least, my credit card may not survive it, since Miss Cate and I will be checking our butts into the nearest hotel I can find. Dave can do as he pleases, he’s made of tougher stock than me and likes playing around with our generator and circuit breaker. But I’m declaring right now that my baby and I will not be freezing and miserable, thankyouverymuch.

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Scene: last night, our living room. Dave was sitting on the couch with Cate, giving her a bottle. I was sitting on our over-stuffed chair with my laptop, trying to catch up on blogs, because I have fallen hopelessly behind. There was some old sitcom rerun (Friends, maybe? Or Will & Grace? I forget) on the TV. During a commercial break, an ad came on for a local jewelry company.

Dave: Sh*t. When is Valentine’s Day? Tomorrow?

Me: Yep.

Him: Um, happy Valentine’s Day! I sort of forgot to get you a card or a present.

Me: It’s ok, hon, I didn’t get you anything either.

And that pretty much sums it up. Aren’t we just the most romantic couple ever?

Actually, I think we’ve already got our little valentine, and it’s way more precious to me than any bouquet of flowers. Although, to be fair, flowers wouldn’t wake me up at four in the morning demanding food. Which, seriously kid, could you please just eat more during the day so your mommy can sleep for longer than two hours at a time? I’d really appreciate it if you could work on that.

Oh, and happy Valentine’s Day. Now I’m going to take a nap.

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Today was an odd day for a few reasons. To recap:

1. After I woke up and went to the bathroom, I came back and saw a puddle in our bed, in the general vicinity of where my torso would have been just a few minutes before. It was small, but it was still sort of alarming in that “um, surely if my water broke, I would have noticed, right?” kind of way.

Upon closer inspection, there were signs of cat hair in the puddle. So no, my water didn’t break. It was just Teenie’s obsessive grooming of her winter coat finally catching up with her. Kind of a relief, but still, I hadn’t planned on doing laundry today. So much for that. At least she waited for me to get out of bed and leave the room before she barfed, I suppose that was courteous of her. I don’t even get upset when this kind of thing happens anymore, I just kind of shrug and figure that it’s good practice for when we have a baby in the house.

2. Around 1 a.m. last night (so, technically today), I decided to cut my own bangs. Don’t ask me why, they were just bugging me. About halfway through, I thought of some of the blogs I read and how other women have talked about doing things toward the end of their pregnancies that were totally out of character, which made them think that they had lost their damn minds, and it occurred to me that I was having my own little Crazy Moment. I guess I lucked out (the Hair Gods have smiled upon me), because my bangs look fine today. But I still don’t know what possessed me to try that, since I am not the type of person who should ever be trusted to cut her own hair. And I’m a little paranoid that my stylist is going to notice and comment on them the next time I see her.

3. When I went downstairs for the first time this morning, I saw that my amazing, wonderful, lovable husband had put together the baby’s changing table for me. I started it yesterday and got thoroughly frustrated and left it half-assembled in the dining room. I love that he finished it for me before I woke up, without me asking him to do it. (That doesn’t count toward the number of odd things that happened today, since he does random nice things for me all the time. I just thought it was worthy of a little blog shout-out. Gotta make the other ladies out there jealous, y’know how it is.)

4. I was supposed to have an OB appointment this afternoon, but when I called my old dermatologist’s office about the hives, they were like, “can you come in now? We can squeeze you in.” Right on. The dermatologist’s office is in the same building as my obstetrician, just two floors apart. So hey, why not? Two birds, one stone, etc.

The dermatologist diagnosed my hives as PUPPP, which is apparently a common pregnancy rash. Of course, for most normal pregnant women, the rash starts on the belly and then works its way down the legs. But not me! Oh no, for me it starts on my knees and is working its way up. Because, you know, apparently I like to do all things pregnancy-related completely ass-backwards. I lose weight when I should gain, my rashes spread in the wrong direction, whatever. She gave me a prescription and sent me happily on my way.

5. Because of the last-minute dermatologist appointment, I was about 45 minutes early for my obstetrician. I figured I’d be sitting there for a while, but they actually saw me early and had me out of there in no time. Very cool. It occurred to me, though, that it’s a very odd day when you drop your pants for the dermatologist (since the rash is on my legs), but not for the ob/gyn. (I’m not sure why she didn’t check me today to see if I’d dilated any more. But I was relieved, since having someone see how many fingers they can fit inside your cervix is not exactly the most pleasant sensation in the world.)

Because of my recurring tummy problems, I lost the two pounds that I had gained at my last appointment. It didn’t surprise me, but my OB is now alarmed enough that she brought up the subject of induction (which I tried to talk about last week, and she acted like I was insane). So, the verdict is that if Baby Girl hasn’t made an appearance on her own by January 29th – that’s two weeks from today, folks! – we’re going to induce.

It’s not really that early, since I’ll be in my 39th week then. In fact, it’s only a few days before my February 2nd due date, but my understanding is that under normal circumstances, induction would only be considered if I was more than a week past due. But as I have proven time and again – throughout my entire life as well as this pregnancy - I don’t do normal.

Dave asked if I was happy about the decision to induce, and I honestly am. I know, logically, that pregnancy can’t go on forever, but I’ve been feeling so horrible that it’s been hard to fathom any kind of end in sight. And the fact that my activity has been so restricted because of my energy level has made me feel pretty depressed – I want to get out and do more stuff, I just can’t. I know the risks of induction, but the idea of finally putting an end to my suffering is far more appealing. Of course, I made the mistake of saying to Dave that I’m happy because it feels like there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, which made him snicker. Ok, fine. I suppose a light at the end of my birth canal is more appropriate. Ha.

6. Oh yeah, today is also the last day that I get to call myself 30. I turn 31 tomorrow. It’s funny, I’ve been so preoccupied with literal birth days (as in giving birth) that I’ve hardly thought about my own. I might’ve forgotten it altogether if Kris hadn’t emailed me a couple of weeks ago asking what I want to do to celebrate. To which I said: nothing, please. I might send Dave to fetch some nice take-out for dinner, but that’s enough. I did the big party thing last year, and 31 is not some major landmark number, so I’m fine with leaving it at that.

P.S. That subject line is a reference to some John Lennon song that my mom likes to quote/sing. Random, I know.

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Very, very good news: Dave is flying home today! A whole entire day early! Hoooray!!!

He told his boss that I was showing “early signs” – which I suppose is true if you count all of these Braxton-Hicks contractions that I’ve been having like crazy for the past few days - and his boss agreed that Dave should be home. (I believe his words were, “I really don’t want your wife to hate me for the rest of your career.” Ha.) Honestly, I’m not sure if all of these little contractions are a sign that anything is happening at all, but I know they were making Dave (and me) nervous. I’ll feel much better having him nearby.

Not-so-good news: We got somewhere close to 6 inches of snow last night. We didn’t lose power, so I really have nothing to complain about, I’m just a bit nervous about the fact that I’m about to have to get in my car and drive to the airport to pick Dave up. I’m not so worried about myself – I’ve lived in snowy climates before (hello, Worcester, Massachusetts! I hated living in your city!), and I feel pretty safe with my little Subaru’s four wheel-drive. I just worry about other people on the roads, because Seattleites aren’t famous for being great drivers.

Last night I was supposed to go meet up with the girls for dessert, which I was really looking forward to. Just a chance to get out of the house for an hour or two and remind myself of the good old days when I felt like normal, functional human being, you know? We ended up cancelling our get-together because of the snow, which was probably wise. But still, kind of a bummer.

Later that night, I was talking to my mom and she said, “So, if you go into labor right now, when you’re alone and it’s snowing out, you DO know to call an ambulance to come get you and that you shouldn’t try to drive yourself, right?” Um, thanks, Mom! I hadn’t even thought of that possibility until you mentioned it! Now I think I might put 911 on speed dial, just in case. Sheesh.

But seriously, I was thinking about how insane this winter has been: the flood in November, the windstorm last month, and now this snowstorm. (I know six inches of snow doesn’t seem like much to most people, but it’s practically unheard of in this part of the country.) I just can’t imagine what’s next. What do y’all think, locusts or frogs? Maybe we should have people start placing bets now.

(Another quote from my mom, ever the optimist: “Hey, at least it hasn’t started raining blood yet!” Um, yeah! Ok then. We’ll send up three cheers for the one plague we’ve managed to avoid so far.)

I did take a lot of photos of the snow this morning, because it was really beautiful. (I’m very conflicted about the white stuff: I love it as long as I can stay home and not go anywhere. If I have to drive in it? I’m not so much feeling the love anymore.) But I’ll get the pictures uploaded after I get back from retrieving my husband from the airport.

Aside to Shannon: Tell Gaby she can bloody well have all of our snow that she wants. It’s only January and I am so over winter. I’m ready for spring.  

Update: Snow pictures are here. (Or you can click the photo below and go to the set.)

Also, Dave is now home. I’m happy.

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More bad weather?? I don’t know if God is trying to test my sense of humor or what, but this cannot be happening. I’m trying really hard to think of it as “oh, the stories we’ll have to tell Baby Girl about the last few weeks before she was born!”, but it’s really hard to think in those terms when you’re in the middle of it.

We had a windstorm blow through here this afternoon, and (of course!) our power went out. I had gotten an email from Cara yesterday inviting me to crash with her & Scott in Seattle if that happened, which was very sweet of her, although I do wonder how many of those post-root canal painkillers she’s been taking. (Seriously, who in their right mind invites cranky, hormonal, weepy 9-months-pregnant women to stay in their homes?) And Kris called to remind me that I have a key to her apartment, in case I needed to let myself in while she was still at work. So I had some options. But when I called the power company to report the outage, they promised that they had already dispatched a crew to work on the problem. It was still early evening, and it wasn’t that cold (yet), so I decided to take a nap on the couch and wait for a while before making any decisions about what I was going to do.

Our cat Beaumont curled up against my belly while I was lying on my side, and he has this weird asthmatic purr that he does every 10 seconds or so. (It’s such an odd sound, like he needs to clear his throat.) But since he was leaning against my stomach, he’d do his little purr thing and then I’d feel a little kick-kick-kick response from the baby. I thought it was funny – like “get used to the sound of cats, kiddo, because you’re going to be hearing them a LOT.” So I was enjoying the little “conversation” that the cat and baby were having with each other, and I guess the rhythm of it must have eventually put me to sleep. The next thing I knew, I heard the auto-scooping litter box start up in the laundry room, and I opened my eyes and saw that the lights were back on. 

So, our power was only out for about two hours total. Not too shabby. Certainly a heck of a lot easier to cope with than nine freakin’ days.

But right now it’s snowing out, so who knows how much longer my good fortune will hold out. If nothing else, I expect that I’ll probably lose my Internet access after too much snow accumulates on the satellite dish. I know how to get the extension ladder and use a broom to brush the snow off the dish, of course. I’m just not sure if I’m up to it. Or if it’s even advisable for me to be scaling ladders at this point.

Oh, and I postponed my doctor’s appointment until Thursday. I was exhausted, I knew the bad weather was approaching, and the idea of sitting in a doctor’s office waiting room two days in a row was quite honestly too much for me. I haven’t even decided if I’m going to go the appointment on Thursday, or if I’m just going to resign myself to the idea of feeling like crap until this baby comes out. We’ll see.

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So there’s this little thing that I haven’t mentioned, because I’ve been trying not to think about it myself. Dave is going out of town next week. For the entire week.

Remember last month, when he left town for one measly night – just for one final interview with the company that later hired him - and how all holy hell broke loose? Can you imagine what kind of catastrophic mess I’ll end up in when he’s gone for FOUR nights instead of just one? And all because this company needs him to come back for “new employee orientation” or some such nonsense. (I’m kidding. We love his new employer. They are lovely people who gave him a lovely job doing exactly what he wants for a very lovely paycheck.)

The funny part is that in our relationship, Dave is normally the calm, rational one and I’m the one who freaks out over every tiny god-blessed thing. But right now, with me feeling as miserable as I’ve been lately, I think he’s the one who’s starting to worry about the idea of leaving me alone for a week. I honestly don’t have the strength to get all worked up about it. I’m more like, “oh, just leave the frying pan over there on your side of the bed, and let the serial killers come get me.” He’s been talking about postponing the trip, but I think that would just be worse, because I’d rather not be left alone with a newborn for an entire week.

I think he’s also concerned because I’ve started showing signs that I might be starting to dilate (cramps in my hips, inner thighs, and… um, well, let’s just say that there have been some internal twinges too). I won’t know until my OB appointment on Monday afternoon if I am or not, but even if I’ve dilated a centimeter or two, it could still be weeks before I go into labor. But over the past several days, I’ve suddenly shifted gears from talking about February as the timeframe for the baby to being all, “I don’t care if it’s early, get this kid OUT of me, NOW!” So I can see why he’s a little worried.

We’ve already worked out our contingency plan. Kris is “on call” in case of emergencies, and my friend Janet is around too. And Dave knows that he absolutely has to keep his cell phone on him at all times, and if he gets a “911″ text message from me, it means that he has to stop whatever he’s doing and get his butt on the next plane back to Seattle. It’s only a two-hour flight from the Bay area, and my understanding is that first labors generally take a while, so even in a worst-case scenario, he should still be able to get back here in plenty of time.

But so help me, if we lose our power again, I’m packing up my body pillow and the cats and checking into a hotel until the day my water breaks.  

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