I’m not from a very sentimental family. We don’t tend to cherish hand embroidered pillows with platitudes like “If You Weren’t My Mother, You’d Be My Friend,” nor do any of us refer to our weddings as “The Happiest Day Of My Life.” Hell, I had the most traditional wedding of any of us, AND I’m the only one who actually boasts an engagement ring.

The other two women in my family proposed to their (now) husbands (my brother and my father), if that gives you any indication of how traditional and/or schwoopsy-poo we all aren’t.

It should then go without saying that with my two previous pregnancies, I did nothing that would be even remotely considered sentimental to commemorate them, assuming that the stretch marks and loose vaj-jay-jay paid enough tribute to my children. Dave and I jokingly discussed commemoration in the form of those soft-focus maternity pictures, where he and I would look serenely down onto my (heavily airbrushed) belly, assumably imagining the future of our second child together.

And before either of us choked on our own vomit, we agreed that the only way that this would happen is if we were both wearing KISS masks. Because THAT would be something worth commemorating. And also? HILARIOUS.

I’ve seen ads for these things called Belly Casts, and although I haven’t seen one in person, I’m shocked by this. Maybe I’m the only one who grows to Oompa-Loompa proportions, in a way that I can only consider shameful, or maybe I’m the only one insecure enough about it to not want to immortalize the immense shape of things. I’m not sure.

I’m even less sure of what I would do with one in the event that I cast one in my sleep (or semi-conscious waking state, as the case may be). Hang it on my wall? Use it as a serving tray for festive holiday dips? Occasionally pull it out and remind my children, using my most guilt-ridden voice, that THIS is what they did TO ME?

Not gonna happen.

But, Amelia (if all goes well) will be our last child before Yee Old Uterus closes up shop permanently (or gets a fancy piece of expensive, hormone-covered metal stuffed up there), and I do want to try something I’ve only ever seen other bloggers do.

A 3D ultrasound.

Yes, my friends in the computer who keep me sane during long, long days, I am getting one of those new-fangled ultrasounds that will invariably make my daughter look as though she might be part alien. Which, if you’ve seen the shape of her father’s head, may not be entirely far off.

But, I digress. This is not an entry about how my husband may or may not be descended directly from aliens, it’s about my entirely selfish desire to see my daughter before I meet her come January. Because the ladies in my family (namely me) have a uniquely interesting affliction post-birth. We’re ugly. Really, really ugly.

Now, you might argue, most babies, especially those that come rocketing down the old Love Hole, aren’t exactly gorgeous at birth. Unless one happens to find garden gnomes or teeny-tiny old men to be perfectly lovely specimens, which I do not. Ben was a forceps child, and while I will spare you for this moment, the lovely side-effects that a forceps delivery entails, that method of being plucked out quickly meant that he was a beautiful newborn.

(before you think I’m bragging about the beauty of a child who was born wearing what appeared to be a toupee, let me assure you that he was beautiful for about a week. After which, he got acne and lost the bottom half of his hair. And got incredibly fat)

With Alex, the doctor was kind enough to let me labor down, so that when it came time for pushing, I pushed a total of maybe 2 or 3 times before he was born. Let us not speak of what that says about the general size of my delicate girly-bits, okay? But a side effect of that was that he was born looking….kind of funny. Sort of like a tiny, balding version of The Daver, with a head that we often joked could be used to chop ice or bang dents out of cars.

(Now he is a much larger, hairy version of The Daver)

However, when *I* was born, back in 1980, a much different story was told. Specifically, after I was expelled from my own mother, she said (and I am not kidding), “Well, now THAT is a face only a mother could love.” Apparently, then she told everyone in earshot that I was a hideous baby for the remainder of her hospital stay.

Gee. Thanks, Mom. It’s a friggin’ miracle that I have as large an ego as I do.

So, Saturday I will gather up the elder sausages and trek forth into the land of 3D ultrasounds prepare myself for the (possible) Grendel-like baby I will be birthing soon enough. Have no fear: I will love her just as much if she’s weird looking and squiggly than if she’s not.

She is MY daughter after all, so she’ll be fabulous.

———–

All righty, my friends who live in the Internet whom I love more than I ever should, it’s GIVE AUNT BECKY ADVICE TIME. I’m makin’ my list, checkin’ it twice (who am I kidding, I’m totally NOT making a SINGLE LIST because I hate them) and I need your input:

What baby goods do I absolutely require this time around? What did I miss out on? What should I make damn sure I’m stocked up on? Because this Soft Focus Brain isn’t lending itself to logical thoughts, so I’m using your brain instead. Thanks for that.

Help a sister out?

I’m no huge fan of Soap Operas, never have been. I’ll occasionally leave the television on for awhile after I watch one of the morning shows, and I’ll come back to see the newest bizarre love triangle between a mother, her long-dead son, and a broom, and for a split second between laughing mockingly and turning off the television, I admire the soft focus camera work.

I used to associate that look with porn, but after seeing the likes of “Debbie Does Dallas” and “Anal Clinic,” I’m pretty certain that I was highly wrong with that assessment. Porn is intended, I think, to make feel like you’re there (which, in the case of those particular movies, couldn’t be farther from the truth) whereas Soaps make me wish that *I* was always seen in such favorable lighting. I’d need less makeup and have shockingly fabulous hair that way.

An interestingly unrelated phenomenon that, for lack of a better term, I will call Soft Focus Brain has taken up residence in my body and I’m not quite sure why.

I go through the motions of a regular day, but rather than feeling such things as “boredom” or “anxiety,” I merely float through the day as though on a cloud of fluffy pink marshmallows. Some days, I find this to be a quite pleasant change from feeling both bored and restless, whereas others, for example, when I realize that Christmas is a mere four seconds away, I wonder what the bejesus is going on with me.

I know that things haven’t exactly been great for me these past couple months. I mean, on the one hand, things are FINE: I (mostly) have my health, I have a husband who (smells) adores me, my children are all well, and I have access to as much Cap’n Crunch as I want. And on the other hand, I’ve spent the last several months minimizing all of the shit that really IS going on with me. As much as I may appear to enjoy complaining, I don’t. Not really. And I enjoy listening to OTHER people complain about as much as a digital rectal exam, so I just eke by, aloft on a sea of cotton balls.

Wait, what was I saying? I totally forgot.

I mean, I’ve barely gotten enough stuff for this new baby I’m going to be expelling, oh I don’t know, NEXT MONTH. By “enough stuff” I mean, bottles and a crib mattress, not $4,000 onsies made from albino elephant tusks. It’s not that I don’t know what I need by now, because I do, it’s just that I haven’t done anything about it.

Hell, “I haven’t done anything about it” should be my new-yet-not-improved motto these days.

I’ve done most of my Christmas shopping by shear stroke of luck–and the availability of online shopping, which is perhaps the best invention for someone such as myself, whose ass has worn a permanent groove into the cushions of my couch–but haven’t even thought about hauling up the Christmas decorations stored neatly in my basement. Or, rather, I’ve thought about it for the briefest moment only to sit on my ass while not doing anything about it.

The likelihood of me sending out a gigantic batch of Christmas cards, by this point, is slim to none, with an emphasis on the NONE, and if I could pay someone to come over and wrap the presents, I would. Shit, I’d pay someone to decorate my house at this point. And that’s only because my kids are dying to have it done and I’m determined not to be a Grinchly beast this year.

Without that pull, however, it’s doubtful I’d do anything besides show up and eat for the holidays this year. This is horribly out of character for me.

Short of speed or cocaine, I’m thinking that I’m pretty stuck in Soft Focus La-la-la Land, and that I probably should just go ahead and right the festivities off for this year to the best of my ability (what with having a bazillion Christmases and all the Joyful! Holiday! Fun! that involves). Unless, of course, I can find a stand in for me, which would allow me to sleep peacefully while Fake Aunt Becky does all that needs to be done.

Anyone care to volunteer? At this point, I’m not even going to object to someone who looks nothing like me, so long as they can show the hell up.

Or perhaps, there are better suggestions to my flighty plight (hehehe). Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?

Several years ago, when Dave and I still lived in a Oak (No) Park (ing), I was making a trek back from St. Charles, when Dave called my cell phone. When I answered, he asked if I needed anything from the local CVS–mecca well before there was my delightful Target within spitting distance–as he was there picking up Twizzlers.

“Yeah,” I told him. “I need some Slim-Fast. The strawberry shit, not the chocolate stuff. It’s delicious AND refreshing.”

“If you say so,” my husband said. “I think it tastes like donkey ass. But whatever, where is it?”

“It’s over by the dietary stuff, against the south wall,” I informed him. “I thought YOU were all directionally superior to me!”

“Dude, not here. The layout to this place makes zero sense,” he snipped, annoyed that I was mocking his directional sense for the eighty five hundredth time that month, after he’d gotten lost in Wisconsin, WHERE HE CAME FROM.

“Okay, so do you want the 200 calorie or the 300 calorie stuff?” He asked me, standing in front of the dietary aids.

“Wha…?” I asked him while lighting a cigarette. “SlimFast comes in one variety and it’s all about 200 calories.”

“Well, all they have here is generic in your high falutin’ STRAWBERRY flavor,” he replied. “Do you still want it?”

Knowing that drinking the generic stuff was far better than being tempted by the bacon and eggs he and Ben would be having for breakfast the following morning, I reluctantly agreed to have him grab the 200 calorie stuff.

About a half an hour later, I pulled into our shared garage, about 4,000 years away from our actual building and about 20 minutes after that, I was finally up the twenty billion stairs, and standing in our teeny-tiny kitchen.

Where I noticed, sitting jauntily on the counter, was a case of Ensure. Generic, Strawberry flavored, ENSURE. Which, were I a geriatric with digestive issues trying to pack on the pounds, would probably be a delicious and high calorie snacky-poo. But, since I was a 23 year old with digestive issues trying to REMOVE the pounds, I wasn’t so thrilled.

“Dave…” I trilled into the house, “Honey?”

He walked into the kitchen to give me a hug hello.

“Baby…” I asked him hesitantly, wondering if he were punishing me for singing Rod Stewart at the top of my lungs when he was in a bad mood the previous night. “Baby, are you mad at me?”

“No,” he replied, genuinely confused, “why?”

“Because you bought ENSURE. Not SlimFast. Are you trying to fatten me up? Or are you just trying to give my guts a low-residue treat?”

“WHAT?” He asked, now looking more closely at the box of cans. “I totally thought this was SlimFast!”

“No baby, that isn’t even close to SlimFast. This shit is for people who have no colon left. And maybe in 30 years, I’ll need it myself, but for now? Not so much.”

———–

That same box of ENSURE sat on my kitchen counter, then moved into my fridge, until months later, we sold our condo. We’d forgotten to return it, because it was far more a pain in the ass than it was worth, and neither of us knew a soul that might have a use for it.

Today, however, the box long gone, and my Maybe Crohn’s flaring up mightily, I’m thinking that perhaps suddenly I really COULD use it. Which is perhaps the LAST situation I ever thought that I might be in. Especially a mere 5 years later.

Goes to show you never can fucking tell.

I totally remembered Faith No More’s “King For A Day, Fool For A Lifetime” album last night, and when I found a copy of it and turned it on, it was a thousand times better than even running into a good friend and catching up with them. Suddenly, I’m 15 years old again, all skin and bones and odd angles, completely sure of myself that whatever I do is the Right Thing to do.

It’s like reliving those days without having to be there again. Because no matter how self assured I was, the teen years just aren’t something I care to relive. Even if it mean I could have my 26 inch waist back.

What albums do that for you?

30: Posts completed (however worthlessly) in the name of NaBloWhatever

5,476: Times I swore that I would “give up the damn ghost, already” and stop posting every day because it was a gigantic pain in the puckered pooper.

0: Times I actually didn’t publish something of some worth, and without (I proudly add) using the cop-out Post Pictures of my Kids posts that I do so badly

1: “Awards” won last year during NaBloWhatever

1: Day blog was down last year during same month due to some technological problems I don’t pretend to understand or care about.

0: “Awards” received despite having won one last year thanks to blog breakage

2: Thanksgivings celebrated, with or without requisite good cheer.

0: Times people mentioned caring about lack of good cheer, leading me to believe that Chubby and Surly is the way to handle all holidays.

1: Thanksgiving celebration canceled due to inclimate weather.

357: Meatballs consumed happily by yours truly during our White Trash Thanksgiving

5: Different doctors seen this month, thereby rendering me a Freakshow of Epic Proportions

89: mg/DL result of glucose tolerance test suffered through at 29 weeks pregnant.

12: donuts consumed within a 36 hour period, that had I not had a mouth available for that purpose, I might have rubbed all over my body, which makes the results of my GTT even more amazing.

5: bloody noses that nearly sent my pathetic-y freakshow ass to the ER for cauterization.

2: shirts that I have left that cover my huge self, leading me to actually have to purchase additional clothing despite the fact that barely have 2 months left of my pregnancy and don’t plan on requiring them again.

1: time I had to Mark All As Read on my Google Reader in order to regain my sanity.

2,377,976: approximate amount of spam messages that I had to moderate before tossing them ruthlessly to wherever deleted blog spam goes. Blog Spam Heaven?

Thoroughly rejected ideas for posts today include, but are not limited to, the following topics:

*Animals; special focus on my particular animals who must follow me around trying to sit on my (lack of) ass after I clearly inform them that no, in fact, I am in no mood to have a cat make love to my leg. No matter how cute or charmingly they attempt to rub my face with their paws. Or shine their butt-hole in my direction, perhaps hoping for a sniff?

*Toddlers; emphasis on why mine insists upon taking a massive crap about 10 minutes after he lays down for the one, one hour long nap he takes each day. Re-emphasis on the fact that this child never! sleeps!

*Holidays; extra-specially Thanksgiving which is perhaps on par with Fourth of July and/or Columbus Day in terms of Becky’s Level of Enjoyment. Which is only very, very slightly more enjoyment than a coffee enema. But with bonus turkey!

*Tags at the bottom of the post. Mainly, why do I not understand anything remotely technologically oriented? After one marries a geek, you’d assume that the knowledge would, by miracle of osmosis, pass through the air while we sleep, and for that you would be wrong. Plea to Internet At Large to explain this phenomenon.

*Shipping Costs for the presents I am too lazy to go out and purchase. Reiterate why laziness is completely justifiable touching particularly on:

-Ample girth and lack of abdominal muscles with which to support large breasts and (one can only assume) thick skull.

-Mention moon boot, but emphasize the delicious codeine pills that go along with it

–Asshole Willful toddler who happily would run far, far away from his (frightening) mother given the slightest opportunity

-Not-so-jokingly bring up birth control options after baby is expelled from her comfy home in my ribcage.

-Finish with a complaint that shipping costs ought to include oral sex from hot delivery drivers. Bemoan lack of hot delivery drivers, and make a pledge that Someday When I Rule The World, all delivery drivers will be smokin’ hot and provide oral sex as a bonus!

*Apologize profusely that comments may have been inadvertantly deleted due in no small part to the 400+ spam messages that I moderate daily.

*Ask The Internet if NaBloWhatever is as annoying to them as it is to you.

I mentioned in passing the other day that this year we were doing 3! Thanksgiving celebrations, and while I may have made it sound like I was irritated by it, I’m not. Not really. I’m happy that we split up the holidays once again, as it has made for a much less stressful holiday. It took a bit of Trial By Fire for Dave and I to realize that our families will probably never get along.

And, of course, the “not getting along” is far more insidious than screaming matches and pimp slapping, which made it that much harder for Dave and I to realize what the hell was going on. It was a showdown of passive-aggressive behavior and it made it incredibly stressful for both Dave and I to please our families WHILE successfully avoiding suicide by means of chocolate chip cookie. Not exactly the fun holiday we’d have liked.

So yesterday, we hosted my parents for Thanksgiving, and because they are hosting us today with the traditional turkey + stuffing gluttony Dave and I decided to mix things up. While I do, in fact, like turkey and stuffing, if I tried to cook it myself, I’d never be able to eat it again. I’m neurotic and have A Thing about raw meat.

Last year, while hosting both of our families, we decided to be all high-falutin’ and make us a damn side of beef and all sorts of pretentious side dishes. Horseradish twice baked potatoes, bourbon pecan pie, all the good shit. And when I served it all up, all fancy-style on my Haviland china, my eldest son began to weep.

He has massive food issues, as you probably know, and obnoxious to cook for is a given and a way of life for me.

Well, it was exactly the wrong thing for him to do at that moment. We’d prepared, and cleaned, and prepared, and spent a veritable fortune on the beef, and to have him openly weep over this enraged me. I’m surprised that my skull cap didn’t pop off from the fire raging within and spew grey matter all over the side of my freshly dusted china cabinet.

Sure, I’m accustomed to this behavior, but I’d deliberately chosen dishes that he would and did like, given the opportunity to try it. But, of course, the minute I began to harp on Ben in my most controlled yet fury-filled voice, both families finally united. To yell at me for yelling at my son on Thanksgiving.

Which was now exactly the wrong thing for THEM to do at this moment. The food issues + Ben go back for ages, and if they all had their way about it, Ben would still be eating his White Stuff Only diet. The Daver and I have spent many hours with a weeping Ben to make him try such disgusting kid food as “hot dogs” and “pizza.” We’re not exactly insisting on foie gras and prosciutto here.

But whatever, they all jump down my throat, and the fire of a thousand suns burns within my belly for the next year. What, me have issues?

So this year, in approximately July when the winter holiday schwag begins to hit the store shelves, I informed Dave that I will not be doing any heavy duty hosting this year and he immediately agreed. But on Thanksgiving, living in a suburb, there’s very little open for us to shamelessly order takeout from, so I decided that I’d cook. And I’ll cook things that are both easy and that my children will eat.

Hence, White Trash Thanksgiving was born.

The menu?

BBQ meatballs
Hawaiian meatballs
Mac -n- Cheese

Cupcakes with canned frosting for dessert.

(the mac and cheese, I must divulge, was fancy ass, and I did make it from scratch. It was so incredibly rich that it made an audible THWUMP! when it hit our stomachs. We all ate approximately 2 tablespoons before we could eat no more. But hey, it was a TASTY two tablespoons)

I bought generic ingredients whenever possible, and was sad that I hadn’t thought to make a jello mold salad (complete with the most generic fruit cocktail suspended creepily inside) OR a ranch, iceberg and baco-bits salad, as that would have added a new and extra-special dimension of trashiness. Perhaps next year I will also serve generic Kool-Aid in wax-covered cups. The red flavor. And we will eat of Chinette.

My parents, my snobby, NPR-listening to parents, loved it. As did my children and my husband.

Ladies and gentlemen, I think we have a new tradition. Any thoroughly white trash suggestions for next year?

So, I’m pretty done with being sappy for the day. But hey, maybe with the 3! times we’re celebrating Thanksgiving this year, at some point I’ll get bitten by the Cheese Monster. Who knows?

But, that doesn’t mean I don’t have a sentiment brought to my un-creative mind by our friends at Somecards.com. Here is the link: http://www.someecards.com/upload/thanksgiving/this_thanksgiving_cherish_the_time.html

This Thanksgiving, cherish the time spent with your family as a reminder of why you moved away in the first place.

See, heartfelt AND true!

Happy Thanksgiving, Internet. Aunt Becky hearts you all madly.

Last week, in a sea of what can only be described as Hormone Soup, I had an appointment to go to my OB, for all of my least favorite pregnancy treats. Not only did I get to do the 1 hour glucose tolerance test, but I was also given a shot in my ass, AND (this is where it gets TRULY AWESOME) a repeat Uncle Pappy.

Back when I was about 5 minutes pregnant with Amelia, right after my dueling chemical pregnancies, I got the results back from my previous Uncle Pappy. And for the first time ever the results indicated that my cervix was now growing some pretty interestingly abnormal little critters. Being full of the Hormone Soup back then, too, I promptly lost my shit for about a day and a half before I reminded myself (and the Internet bitch slapped me with love) that this was a pretty normally abnormal experience.

It was recommended that I get something done called a “colposcopy” after I hit Week 12, but when that rolled around I decided against it. I mean, if there wasn’t anything the doctor could do until I delivered anyway, why go through the pain and cramping and general Reign of Worry? Shit, I told The Daver at one point, they can take the whole bad boy and throw it the hell away once this wee one is born. Otherwise it’ll be sitting there with a Vacancy sign lit and humming slightly until I go through menopause.

So last week at around 29 weeks, when I trudged off to the OB’s office, high on sugar and sick to my guts, I really wasn’t concerned about my normally abnormal self. I was far more concerned with not passing out while getting my blood drawn (not something that normally bugs me) and where and what I would be eating after I left.

But yesterday, buoyed by my anger towards doctors in general, I decided to be the World’s Worst Patient in the Squeaky Wheel Gets The Grease category, and harass my OB’s office into prescribing me some pain killers where my GI would not. I wasn’t even thinking about my cervix and the State of Things Down There when I began my Rampage of Terror.

Which, for once, worked out to my advantage: not only did I find out that a prescription for codeine had already been called in for me, but my newest Uncle Pappy WAS NORMAL.

Dude, between the clean bill of health for at least one part of my body, and the prescription for painkillers, I’m a happy damn camper. Happy Thanksgiving to my vagina, indeed.

—————

What are you thankful for today, my homies?

Repost from October of 2005 that I found to be particularly disturbing. Please share your Rager comments with me to wrap me up in Internet Lovin’. I’m still a little disturbed re-reading it.

This afternoon, upon picking my son up from school, I decided to venture to the Greatest Place On Earth when you’re dieting. The Grocery Store. Our shopping experience was uneventful; I drooled over the non-diet food, even the stuff I wouldn’t have touched anyway, Ben pleaded for candy and no! vegetables! and my cart looked like a schizophrenic had gone shopping. Absolutely no different from any other time I’ve hit the store.

The true excitement only began when I tried to leave the store.

I’m waiting at the stop sign to turn on to North Blvd, about to head home. A car is approaching from the left with its turn-signal a-flashin’. I inch forward a bit, still in the parking lot, as I was taught to drive by The Most Anal Man Ever To Walk The Planet, his lectures still fresh in my mind, ‘œDon’t turn until you see the other guy’s wheels turn,’ “Signal Your Intent!” and the always super corny “Better Safe Than Sorry!”

When I look back at the other car, after checking to make sure the right lane was clear, the other guy has turned off his signal.

And stopped the car to honk loudly and gesture wildly.

At me.

This, being a pet peeve of mine, the Incessant Honking After I Have Clearly Stopped The Car and Thereby Present No Danger To You, irritates me. I’m not only a competent driver, I’m not reckless in any way–especially if my child is in tow–and I haven’t done a single honk-worthy thing. My car is standing completely still.

So I do the most mature thing possible, because I am as the French would say, ‘Grown-Up’, and I give him the ole One Finger Salute. I’m highly annoyed by his attitude and the one thing that’s keeping me from diving head-first into a bag of jelly beans.

Stupid fucking move, Aunt Becky, stupid fucking move.

If he was mad before, now he is on fire with anger, and he promptly sprints out of his car, headed straight for my car. To do, I don’t know what. Yell at me for flicking him off? Holler at my audacity to inch up at a stop sign to better visualize the cross traffic? Tell me about how I’m an idiot for not buying organic produce and bringing my own bags?

I just can’t be sure.

Let me make it absolutely clear that I had not gotten even CLOSE to hitting him. I was still physically in the parking lot, behind the white line at the stop sign. You wouldn’t have had to so much as swerve to avoid me.

So, all signs flashing ‘œDanger, DANGER Will Robinson!’ I take off like a bat outta hell. I’m not interested to find out if the man had gotten out of the car to tell me how beautiful I look today, offer me a bazillion dollars, or threaten the life of my son and I. Nope. Not interested at all.

I look back in my rearview mirror to see him standing in the middle of the road on his cell phone, likely trying to call in my plates. My heart pounded freakishly the entire way home, and I tumbled back to the condo as freaked out as I’d ever been.

What.The.Fuck.Man?

Ed Note: It’s been over 3 years since this happened, and I haven’t flicked off a single person since. Nor have I had any follow-up whatsoever from this incident, which one could hardly even call an “incident” since nothing happened.

But it still freaks me out to remember that. Rage, road or not, directed at the right or wrong person, is still damn frightening.