Category Archives: Friends & Family

confession time

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Ok, this is where my nesting instinct has led me:

Oh yes, the boxes in the garage, they will be labeled. In various fonts. And then, perhaps I will stack them alphabetically. I haven’t decided about that last part yet.

You can make fun of me if you like. Believe me, Dave mocked the label maker plenty when I first bought it. Then he decided it would be a good idea to label all of the cables on the surround-sound system/home network in his office, so he can actually find what he’s looking for when he needs to go un-hook or re-hook something. Which he does all the time. Because he’s a guy.

So, ha! The label maker shall eventually be loved by all. Except Teenie, who clearly expresses her disdain for it in that photo. (Although honestly, as much as I love her, I admit that “disdain” is sort of her default setting. Not with me, of course. She’s all cuddles and purrs with me. The rest of the world? Not so much.)

Moving on: I have no idea why my father seems to be such a recurrent topic on my blog lately, but here he is again. The other day, we were having a conversation and he asked me if I was showing more now than in the last photo he saw of me. (I sent him that picture of me when I was 12 weeks pregnant. Six weeks ago.) I was like, “Um, gee. What do you think?”

But since my dad doesn’t have much of an imagination, he asked me to take more pictures. So I did. And here, we have the belly at 18 weeks.

Before you judge me, remember that I have a very short torso.

Although even considering that, I figure that at my current rate of expansion, by Christmas the circumference of my waist will be approximately the same as my height. Terrifying.

Also noteworthy: yesterday morning I was lying in bed during that decadent eight-minute stretch before the snooze alarm goes off. Unlike most mornings, I was actually awake during this little snooze-break. Dave and I were talking about feeling the baby move; people keep asking me if I’ve felt it kick yet, and it bothers me that I always have to say no. As if I’m going to get graded on the progress of my pregnancy or something. (No kicks before the 20-week mark: C-minus!) The problem is, what with all of the other “tummy issues” that I have on a regular basis (which we won’t discuss here), I really wasn’t sure if I had felt it move yet or not. I was waiting for some really obvious sign. Like, I don’t know, the outline of a footprint on my stomach.

I told Dave that the night before, as I was trying to fall asleep, I felt some fluttering that felt a bit more front-and-center than my usual tummy stuff, and I thought that might have been the baby moving. But I wasn’t sure.

Dave got up and went downstairs to turn the kettle on. (Those Brits love their tea, dontcha know.) I stayed in bed, lying on my side, with one hand sort of on top of my stomach. As soon as Dave left the room, I felt something bump my hand. I’m almost positive it was a foot. It shocked me so much that I yanked my hand away, and it took me a few seconds to recover to even realize that, “Hey! That was it!” So that was pretty cool.

Of course, I’ve been totally unable to re-create it ever since. It’s not like I can teach the baby to kick on demand. Yet.

granddaddies

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My paternal grandfather died when I was 4 years old. He was 74. Obviously, I was too young to remember it, but I’ve heard the story since reaching adulthood, and here’s how I understand it happened:

It was July in Mississippi, and the temperature was at least 100 degrees that day. Lord knows what the heat index was. In spite of the heat, my grandfather and his friends went out to play golf, because that’s what they did every day. At some point, my grandfather felt sick, so his friends took him home. He went to lie down, my grandmother left the room (either to call the doctor or get him some water, I don’t remember which), and when she came back into the bedroom, he had died.

I’m still angry that he died that way. A man his age had no business being out in that weather, but he was stubborn and wanted to play his stupid daily golf game. (This is just one of many reasons why I despise the entire “sport” of golf.) I feel cheated that I never really got to know him. I have a few vague memories of him, but mostly, all I know is what other people in my family have told me about him. And that’s lousy.
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vindication

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Friday evening, a nurse from my doctor’s office called me about my bloodwork. I’m completely annoyed that it took two weeks for them to notify me of the results. I suppose that’s probably normal, but still, it’s irritating. Of course, I’m ten weeks pregnant, so everything irritates me right now. Last night, I woke up because I heard Dave sniffling (he’s having allergy problems) and I was all cranky and said, “Ok, you need to do something about that right now.” What a sweet, empathetic wife I am, no?

Apparently this particular nurse only handles the results of genetic screening, because the reason she called was to tell me that I do indeed carry the gene for cystic fibrosis. I have a cousin who died of CF a couple of years ago, so I wasn’t entirely surprised to find out that I’m a carrier for the disease. All it means is that Dave now has to go have the blood test done too. In order for our child to have CF, not only would we both have to carry the gene, we’d have to carry the same strain as well. (There are something like 300 identified strains of cystic fibrosis.) Dave doesn’t have a family history of CF at all, so the odds of our child having the disease are pretty slim.

So, I’m trying very hard not to waste any time or energy worrying about something that is such a remote possibility, although I must admit that the worst-case scenarios do tend to keep popping up in the back of my mind. (They always do.)

Since I had the nurse on the phone, I asked her about the results of the rest of my bloodwork. I know that every woman who has ever been pregnant (including my own mom) keeps telling me that it’s normal to feel this tired during the first trimester, but I’ve had all of these little internal alarms that were telling me that something is abnormal. I have to take so many supplements because of my gastric bypass surgery, and I know how easily those balances can be thrown off. Also, I’ve had an underactive thyroid all of my life, and I’ve taken medication for it since I was 9 years old. My medication has been pretty stable for the past couple of years, but if anything should throw it off kilter, I think pregnancy would do it.

This is how the conversation with the nurse went, after she gave me the news about having the CF gene:

Me: Ok, and I was sort of wondering about the rest of my bloodwork…

Her: (very chirpy and perky) Everything looks good! You’re HIV-negative, and your gonorrhea and chlamydia tests both came back negative too!
(All of her sentences ended in exclamation points. Too bad there isn’t a font that will let me dot my i’s with hearts, because it would be totally appropriate.)

Me: (what I thought) Duh? Christ, I should hope so.
(what I said) Um, I was thinking more about my vitamin and thyroid levels.

Her: Well, let’s see… Oh actually, it looks like you’re a little anemic! And your thyroid is off too! I’ll have to have the doctor review this on Monday and have her adjust your medication!

Finally!! I’m not crazy, there really is something wrong. It was actually a relief to hear that, because it made me feel vindicated that this hasn’t been all in my head this whole time. My internal alarm system isn’t completely whacked.

And for the record, a normal thyroid level would be .3 or .4. Mine is .06, so it’s way off.

So, I’ve doubled my iron supplement, and I’ve been eating a lot spinach and lean red meat for the extra iron. I won’t know what to do with my thyroid meds until I hear from the doctor, but I’m going to call them this afternoon if I don’t hear from them. I’m really looking forward to starting to feel semi-human again.

New Orleans recap

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First order of business: the photos from the trip are here.

Friday, we flew most of the day. It sucked, because I hate to fly and I developed a bad case of motion sickness. Yuck. That night, we went to a family gathering at my aunt and uncle’s hotel suite. This particular aunt and uncle (Pam and Mark) are the parents of the groom (Kevin) whose wedding we were all there to attend. It was nice and low-key, just family, lots of catching up and all that good stuff.

Saturday, we got up relatively early and went out sightseeing with a different aunt and uncle (Susie & Stanton, my cousin Cat’s parents) (aside: Hi, Susie!). We drove around to some of the more devastated areas – the lower 9th ward, St. Bernard parish, etc. We saw Mark and Pam’s house in St. Bernard parish, totally destroyed. We went in and took pictures, and it didn’t occur to me until later that it might not have been the best idea for someone who’s allergic to mold (such as myself) to go in there.


We drove around a bit longer after that, and I was ok with seeing all of this devastation until we passed City Park, and I saw that the little toy train ride was gone. I know they’ll rebuild it, I just had this idea in my head of someday taking my kids on the little train ride that I had ridden when I was a kid, and I started to cry.

Right after that, we went to my grandmother’s old house, and I lost it. That house wasn’t even the one that I generally associate with my grandparents, because my grandmother moved there when I was probably about 10 or 12 years old (after my grandfather was already in a nursing home), and it’s not the one that I associate with my childhood as much. But something about it got to me – it was such a cute little neighborhood, and it was just completely in ruins. I couldn’t even get out of the car for a good 5 minutes because I was crying too hard.


Everyone else went inside to see it – seems weird, sort of like trespassing, but the house was totally abandoned, so I guess there’s no harm in looking around. Dave sat with me in the car while I cried. It occurred to me that although it was probably fine if I didn’t want to go in, this was almost definitely my last chance to ever see the inside of my grandmother’s house. So we went in. The people who bought it after her had remodeled it, and you could tell that it was beautiful. They had added a den and bathroom onto her kitchen, where she used to just have a little carport. And… it’s all gone. I mean, it’s there, but destroyed. My sister took photos, but I couldn’t.

Also, I don’t know if everyone has seen pictures of the post-Katrina houses with big X’s spray-painted on them? In the top part of the X is the date that the house was inspected, to the left is the code of the crew who inspected it, something else on the right (can’t remember what) and underneath the X is the number of bodies found in the house. Most of the houses that we saw were zero’s, but we saw the occasional 1 and 2 here and there. The one that would have killed me if I hadn’t already cried my eyes out was one of the last houses we saw, which had a “1 dog DOA” spray-painted on it.

Is it weird that I’m more affected by the animals than the humans? I guess I just tend to think that the humans have more options for escape available to them. They can open doors that allow them to run away, that kind of thing. That’s not always the case, of course, like with the nursing home in St. Bernard that wasn’t evacuated. But for the most part, I tend to cry more for the cats and dogs who were trapped in their houses than the owners who were too stubborn to leave. (Yes, I know a lot of them were poor and didn’t have options. I’m just talking in generalizations.) And this was in a relatively nice neighborhood, so my assumption is that the owners evacuated and left the dog alone in the house, figuring they’d be back in a day or two and the dog would be fine. If something like that ever happened to one of our cats, I’m not sure I’d ever forgive myself.

After emotionally exhausting ourselves, we had lunch and went back to the hotel to take naps and get all fancied up for the big wedding. The ceremony was absolutely beautiful, in this really huge old church that somehow survived the hurricane. My mom didn’t bother to mention until after the wedding that it was the same church where my grandparents got married. I wish I had known that in advance, because it’s a pretty cool part of my history. I also wish that I had taken pictures of the church, but sadly, I had left my camera in the car.

The reception was a lot of fun too. Very loud and boisterous. And man, if you get either my father or Dave around an open bar, you are in for one hell of an entertaining night. I don’t think I’ve ever seen either one of them dance as much as they did that night. It was a riot.


Sunday, my folks and my brother dropped Dave and I off at the airport along with my sister (who was flying out around 10 minutes before us). We ate brunch there and headed in our different directions. I had motion sickness again, all the way home, which sucked. But when we landed in Seattle and it was only 70 degrees? Both Dave and I nearly kissed the ground the minute we stepped outside. Seriously, this trip was emotional and wonderful and a lot of other things, but it was also a great reminder of why I try to avoid the south during the summer months.

sweaty family weekend

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Tomorrow, Dave and I are flying to New Orleans for my cousin’s wedding. I’m a big ol’ mix of emotions about the whole thing: happy to see my family, some of whom I haven’t seen in a very long time; sad that some family members won’t be there (for example, a certain cousin of mine who is hugely pregnant right now); and dread over the fact that we’re going to be flying for eight hours on both Friday and Sunday. Yuck.

And one more thing to dread: my dad told me that the forecast for Saturday (the day of the wedding) is “sunny and 95 degrees.” Doesn’t that sound like fun? Aren’t you jealous of me, getting to wear pantyhose in that climate? Especially knowing that I tend to get migraines in extremely hot weather? I know you’re all just pea-green with envy.

Oh well, I’m not planning on spending too much time outside or anywhere that isn’t air-conditioned. (Speaking of which, the installation of our central a/c was finished yesterday. It’s so quiet sleeping in our bedroom without the big ol’ window unit running all night. And so chilly! I had to pull the covers up under my chin. It was awesome.)

We’re staying close to downtown, which was relatively unharmed by Hurricane Katrina last year. However, my mom wants to drive around to some other parts of the city to check out the damage first-hand. I don’t know how I feel about that. I’m sure some of it will be interesting, but I worry that if I see my grandmother’s old house (even though she sold it way back in the 80’s), and it turns out to be damaged or gone or something, I just may burst into tears. I’m bringing my camera, but I don’t know if I’ll actually take any pictures or not. It may just be too weird and surreal to photograph.

So, this trip is happy and stressful all at the same time. Like so many things in life, I suppose.

Oh, and you know how I wrote a couple of months ago about how I was all stressed out about finding something to wear? Well, I bought a dress for our anniversary last month, so you’ll probably soon see many more photos of me wearing the exact same damn dress. Because it’s pretty, and I don’t feel fat in it.

shattered illusions

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Hypothetical situation: let’s say you have this friend, who you’ve known for, oh, the last decade. And she’s a good friend – in fact, if someone asked you to name your top five closest friends, she’d be on that list.

While we’re at it, let’s say that this friend lives approximately 2,500 miles away from where you currently reside. She’s planning to visit the town where you live, and she bought her plane ticket about two weeks ago. But she booked it for this coming weekend because “it’s the only weekend [she] has available all summer,” even though she knew before she bought the ticket that you were going to be out of town that weekend.

(Let’s also say that this friend is a bit flaky, and you suspect that it has nothing to do with what weekends she has free during the summer, and everything to do with the fact that she can’t commit to anything more than two weeks in advance.)

And even though you know that this friend is much closer with your Other Friend who recently moved here, and she’s probably primarily coming to visit Other Friend because let’s face it, she’s never come to visit you in the five years that you’ve lived here, wouldn’t that still bother you? Maybe hurt your feelings a little bit? Or piss you off?

Then you find out (via Other Friend, because your friend can’t be bothered to pick up a phone or write an email) that your friend is actually not leaving until Monday morning, and you get back from your own weekend trip on Sunday night, so Other Friend suggests that maybe the three of you should get together for dinner on Sunday night. It feels sort of like a consolation prize, and you know that Other Friend is probably only suggesting it to avoid any future awkward scenarios. But by Sunday night, you will have been on planes for the past 8 hours (not to mention that you’ll be recovering from a crazy family weekend), then you have a 45-minute commute from the airport to your house, plus you have to get up early for work on Monday, and OH YEAH, let’s not forget that your friend has completely pissed you off and hurt your feelings. Would you be totally out of line in just telling your friend (also via Other Friend, since two can play at that game) that she can just go to hell, because if she can’t be bothered to make an effort, then neither can you?

You’re I’m not being totally irrational, am I are you?

the Couch of Good Times and other stuff

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Kris moved out yesterday. Moving day was pretty uneventful since she hardly has any belongings here. I don’t know if I mentioned this, but the job she got is as an accountant at a retirement community. One of the residents there recently lost his wife, and he wanted to downsize from a one-bedroom to a studio. He offered Kris his sofa, but she insisted that she couldn’t possibly take it for free, so he said to give a donation of $50 to the hospice that took care of his wife. (Aww.) Obviously, she did. And the couch is really nice, because apparently the stereotype about how old people take good care of their stuff is actually true.

Yesterday, Kris and I, along with our rented U-Haul van, went to the retirement community to pick up the couch. I was parked illegally, so I stood guard by the van while she and the maintenance man went to retrieve the couch. Two funny things transpired inside that I truly wish I had seen:

1) The little old man who gave her the couch? Wouldn’t let her pick it up. Because she’s a woman. Of course. So the maintenance guy and this 80 year-old man with a bad back had to lift it all by themselves. (I asked Kris if he knew that not one but TWO women would be solely responsible for unloading the couch at our destination point. She said, “No, I was afraid he’d try to hop in the van and come with us.”)

2) As she was leaving, he got a little emotional (remember, this poor man lost his wife less than a month ago) and he told her, “Well, I hope you have as many good times on that couch as we did.” Kris said that if he hadn’t been a very frail 80 year-old man, it would’ve sounded totally inappropriate, but still, her first thought was, “eww, thank God I’m getting a slipcover.” Apparently even the maintenance guy had to stifle a giggle on that one. I don’t know that I would’ve been able to hold it in, so it’s probably best that I wasn’t there.

After the Great Sofa Expedition, we headed back to our house to get her things here. Dave helped us load up, and came along to help us unload at her new apartment, which was great because it seemed to go ten times faster than it would have if it had just been Kris and me.

Anyway, her new apartment seems really nice, and I know it’s good for all parties involved for Kris to have her own space – it makes her feel more established about living here, and Dave may not wear pants around the house for a month. (Poor guy, I think he really missed Underwear Time.) But honestly, when we left her at her apartment last night, I felt like I was abandoning her, and I don’t know why. It was a pretty awful feeling, though.

Then we got back home, and there was no dog crate in our dining room anymore, and the house just seemed totally empty. I sat on the couch and cried. Yes, I love our cats, but I totally fell in love with Lucky, and I’ve been getting doggie kisses every day for the past 2 1/2 months, and I’m going to miss them terribly. Dave suggested what Angie said last week – that maybe we could get a puppy. I think he’s also hoping that it’ll distract me from this whole desparately-wanting-a-baby thing, although I don’t know if that’s the best motivation for getting a new pet. Last night, I missed Lucky so much that when he suggested it, I almost jumped off the couch and said, “Ok, let’s go to the shelter and get a dog now!” But I know it’s a big decision, so I’m going to think about it for at least a few weeks and then see how I feel about it.

The other reason I was upset last night is because Beaumont disappeared on Wednesday morning and I hadn’t seen him since. Dave’s cats (not Teenie, since she has no claws) spend most of the day outside hunting for mice, but they always come in at dusk when I stand on the deck and do the “here kitty-kitty” yell. Beaumont had been gone for well over 72 hours, and even though Dave told me not to worry because he was probably just out having fun, I kept having visions of him getting mauled by a coyote or hit by a car. He finally turned up late last night. I cried again when I found him (obviously, I’m a tad hormonal), although he seemed to care way more about his kibble than in apologizing for his extended absence. Dave called him a “dirty little stopout” – I think that’s his official new nickname.

Oh, and I might have spent the rest of the evening online looking at dogs on Petfinder and our local paper’s pet listings. Maybe.