While I’m not quite there yet, I’m getting dangerously close to third trimester territory. Hell, for all I know I could be in it already. Pregnancy math confounds even Calc 2 passin’ me, and depending on where I go for information, I can get any number of answers. So rather than sweat it, I’m just gonna roll with it (baby), and sometime within the next couple weeks say that I’m “in my third trimester” to the rando’s that ask.

Shockingly, no one has asked me if I’m pregnant with twins yet. Or made any other disparaging remarks. I suppose their stares say it all, right?

NEARING my third trimester now, I’ve been nesting like crazy, but without actually being able to do anything about it. Instead, I think about all the things I’d really LIKE to do to nest properly and sigh because for one reason or another, I cannot.

Take for example the nursery. Also known as Alex’s bedroom. Alex of the “horrible sleeper” variety. Here’s where bedroom math gets complicated (and also where I ask you again, What Would The Internet Do?):

Our upstairs has three bedrooms:

A huge master bedroom. Obviously ours. And ridiculously oversized, to the point where I seriously wonder what the shit the architect was thinking. I could easily fit an entire living rooms set in the empty space in that room. Which annoys me because…

The Nursery. It’s approximately the size and shape of a closet. It does fit the crib, a glider rocker and an armoire, but it’s seriously the armpit bedroom of the house. It works well as a nursery because as any seasoned parent knows, babies don’t spend a lot of time in their preciously decorated nursery. It’s also where Alex sleeps currently.

Ben’s room. It’s a decent sized bedroom, probably SHOULD be a little bigger (if I could only redesign the floor plan of my upstairs…).

Our “4th” bedroom is in the basement, and located in what I call the Teenager’s Lair. While I suppose we could move Ben down there now, it seems weird to have him so far away from us.

Which brings us to the Bedroom Math.

I don’t particularly care to put Amelia in our bedroom except for perhaps the first couple of months. Why? Because I hate sneaking around a sleeping baby, and Alex’s (lack of) proper baby sleeping has made me incredibly gun shy of disturbing the molecules in the air around a sleeping child.

We’re planning on moving Alex into Ben’s room as soon as we get another crib, because they sleep for roughly the same amount of time at night. There are several issues with this:

*Ben is unbelievably scatter-brained. I can tell him to “please be quiet” when he goes upstairs, and he IS quiet for about 25 seconds, before he starts singing loudly, banging around, and generally making my blood pressure rise.

*Alex and Ben do not go to bed at exactly the same time every night, which means that unless I can make sure Ben is asleep BEFORE I put Alex (a.k.a. Mr. Crappy Sleeper) to bed, I’m dealing with Ben banging around like the heard of thundering elephants only a 7 year old boy can mimic and waking Alex up.

*Ditto for the morning.

Sadly, Alex being the not-amazing sleeper he is, can’t share the nursery with his sister, which would be the best alternative, because of the sleeping issue. New babies get up a lot and I don’t need my not-so-new baby up and about WITH his sister. Because I will totally nurse a baby, but I draw the line at nursing my (nearly) two year old, who has been weaned since he was a year.

I’m not quite sure if there’s any better arrangement to be had, but I’d love to hear what The Internet has to suggest. Or perhaps you have a suggestion as to how I can virtually nest, so as to alleviate some of this unharnessed energy (while I am supposed to be letting my foot heal and REST, dammit.). Or maybe you’d like to come to my house and help me nest! I’d pay you in Halloween candy and beer and the pleasure of my (chubby) company!

Long before I’d really experienced any sort of real loss, likely before I’d experienced any losses at all (except for perhaps the loss of a My Little Pony or three), I remember reading or hearing that death causes you to lose people in small ways for a long time rather than BOOM! all at once. I don’t have any idea why this stuck in my memory banks for any reason at all, but it has, and the older I get, the more I realize it’s true.

I was driving back from voting today, marveling at how this Indian Summer we’re having makes the warm breeze feel stolen and therefore better, I was noting how the trees were finally the shocking orange and red of fall, and suddenly as I was flipping through the radio stations, it came on.

‘It’ being the crappy 70’s song “Low Rider.”

Between the beautiful fall weather, which always makes me feel nostalgic, the fact that I saw in person my signature from 1998, the year I turned 18 and voted proudly for the first time, and the sudden funky rifts of “Low Rider,” I inhaled sharply and had to remind myself that the year was 2008, not 1998.

And it was remembering how I stole my friend Steph’s copy of the soundtrack of Dazed and Confused and never returned it. How she and I would cruise around in my Honda DelSol, hard top off no matter how cold it happened to be, smoking cigarettes and reeking of Opium perfume, while we jammed out to “Low Rider.” We’d laugh about how my tiny car would be our coffin in the case of a crash.

If any car could have a soundtrack, that one would be War’s “Low Rider” cranked to 11.

Those were good days, back then, back when our biggest worries were if we had enough smokes or cash to grab a cup of coffee. Back before anyone was addicted to anything besides nicotine and caffeine and potentially The Rolling Stones. Back before we had ex-boyfriends, or SURPRISE! children, or welfare stamps.

As I drove home, I wished desperately that Steph could be here, here on Earth, if not with me, to appreciate what an absolutely fucking beautiful day it was today. Because while other people might be rushing around too much, too obsessed with the election to notice how glorious it simply is today, she would have.

It made me so sad to realize that I can never hear “Low Rider”–potentially the world’s corniest and least sentimental song–again without feeling a deep sense of longing for my friend whose bones will never hear it again. I’ll never be able to smell Opium perfume without being harshly jangled back to the Good Old Days which, of course, as teenagers, we never realized WERE good old days, without wanting to cry for my friend. Who will never douse herself in it again. I’ll never be able to appreciate the true beauty of a stolen late fall day without being reminded that she’ll never again feel the breeze rippling across her skin.

Today, I will listen to “Low Rider” in honor of Steph, who should be here listening along side me.

Maybe, just maybe, she is.

It’s day three of NaBloWhatever and already I’ve begun to suspect that I’ve made a major mistake in signing up for it. Sure, I could simply NOT DO IT but then I would probably beat myself up for saying I would do something that I DIDN’T do. I’m not only stubborn, but stupid too. And a healthy dash of neurotic mixed in. Feel sorry for The Daver. I do.

Part of the problem is that I normally post during the daytime hours–which have been dreadfully shortened thanks to DST, that wily jerk–and my blog was down during those hours. It’s encroaching on 4:30 here and it’s getting dark out. Which inhibits my writing mojo. Because I’m the anti-vampire?

But I digress…

Last week, I got a bee in my proverbial bonnet (because seriously, I haven’t had an actual bonnet since I was a baby) about sending Alex to preschool for toddlers several mornings a week. I cheerfully looked up the area churches figuring that Dave’s early life in the church could probably hold enough sway to admit my son. And I came to one of many impasses: it appears that not only is my son too young to be admitted to their programs (he has to be 2), he must be potty trained.

Which, hahaha.

Right.

Moving on to Plan B: a couple mornings a week at a local (chain) daycare.

It wasn’t my first choice (hence the Plan B), but I figured that toddlers were toddlers and he’d be able to work off some of that energy a couple of hours a week. And even (praise Jesus!) maybe even take an ever-loving nap once in awhile. Because I have THAT KID, the one who doesn’t nap, ever.

Let’s just go ahead and say he sucks at the whole sleeping thing. Still.

And as anyone who has had a high-energy toddler knows, sometimes a couple hours a week WITHOUT said toddler truly makes even the coldest of hearts (read: mine) grow fonder. He’s just so BUSY and I’m just so GIMPY and he’s bored and I could just use a damn break from him.

So, Friday morning, before my OB appointment, Daver, Alex and I trooped off to the daycare center where I learned several things:

1) Holy SHNIKES is it expensive. I know you’re not supposed to discuss costs or anything because it’s considered rude and low-brow, but holy SHIT is it expensive.

2) All of the toddlers were dwarfed by my mammoth son, who I didn’t even realize was large.

3) All of the toddlers were sick.

THEREFORE:

Now Alex and I are both sick. We have a nasty cold, nothing that’ll leave a permanent mark or anything, but it bodes ill for the coming months.

I have a pretty crappy immune system anyway, always have, so I usually catch pretty much any and everything that the (Big) kid brings home. So, if I enroll him in daycare several mornings a week, it’s pretty much a given that we’ll be sick the entire time. While not the end of the world, it certainly sucks to be sick without the ability to imbibe the Green Death Flavored NyQuil and sleep for 47 days straight.

And Alex isn’t exactly resting, and getting better, no, not MY son. He’s running around, crabby as hell, boogering on every available surface like the slime from Ghostbusters II but less pink, while still NOT sleeping.

So, my friends in the computer, whom I have pledged at least an hour (read: 10-15 minutes) a day for the next 30 days to, give me your wisdom.

What would The Internet do?

(Park district activities are not an option here. Sadly. Nor is sending him out to work, or to the bar. Damn toddler can’t even DRIVE yet.)

In a stunning fit of brilliance, or possibly sheer stupidity, I once again signed up for NaBloPoMo, or some such acronym. I’m not so smart as to remember which is which. Well, okay, so I’m just not that smart.

So, who is with me? Who has promised to post every mother-humping day for the entire month of November?

Anyone…Anyone?

Since I would feel lame doing my inaugural post about posting every month (is it just me or does that seem a bit…lacking?), I will give you a recent Ben story.

Before we transferred Ben away from the Hippie Nut Ban! school, he attended summer camp there. The phrase “summer camp” implies that it was more than just school during the summer, but it sounds fancier, doesn’t it? Well, either way, the teachers saw fit to discuss the election and the candidates with a group of children.

And while you know, someone believes children are our future, I’m still not quite certain what possessed them to do this. I mean, I do discuss such important issues as “what Dora REALLY puts in that backpack” and “which is better, a survey of milk versus yogurt.” But kids are young and impressionable enough (especially my own) to make whatever you say is right complete dogma. If I say “Dunkin’ Donuts coffee is the best on the planet,” HE’LL BELIEVE ME.

The power is mighty and fierce and must be wielded appropriately.

I had no real idea that they done this until a couple of weeks ago when we were casually driving along in the car and Ben pipes up from his car seat with “I want BarackObama to win.” His name, all one word, just like that.

Unsure as to what I’d heard him say, since we rarely discuss politics especially in front of someone who is, oh, I don’t know 7 years old (and autistic. And lacks a proper idea of most of the political issues. Or a working knowledge of the government), and extra-specially since I knew who I’d be voting for BEFORE all the campaigning began in earnest, I tentatively asked for some clarification. It was then when we learned that he’d been exposed to Election Fever at his Hippie Nut Ban! school.

Pleased that we’d all be campaigning for the same side, we left things as they were and occasionally Ben would see something about his beloved BarackObama and pipe up “HOORAY BARACKOBAMA! YOU’RE GREAT!” And conversely, “Boo! John McCain!” (I assure you that I do not shriek at the television unless Deal or No Deal or Engaged and Underage is on. Oh, come on. Just because you don’t admit it doesn’t mean that you don’t watch it. How can you not?)

Nickelodeon announced that the BarackObama was the Kid’s Pick The President Winner, and Ben mistakenly believed that the election was over. He rushed into the other room where I was hiding from Dora and Diego to tell me shriek at me of the news and for the briefest of brief moments, I incorrectly believed that the election was, in fact over.

Pipe dreams and all. But his victory dance/ass-shaking was hysterical and made the hard return to reality a little easier on the equilibrium.

So Friday, when the kids were out trick-or-treating in earnest, Ben met up with our next door neighbor who happen to have a John McCain proudly displayed on their lawn. I’ve never said boo about the sign to anyone, I’ve never commented on the sign in any way shape or form, in front of Ben or not. Neither, I’m positive, has Daver.

Ben came home a couple hours after he departed and inter-spliced with his rambles about candy, his class party and Storm-troopers, and which of our animals had a stinkier butt he made mention of our next door neighbor’s son. You see, HIS mother had been smart enough to sit outside on the porch stoop and pass out candy while I lounged about with my foot on ice on my nice comfy couch. Wait, perhaps *I* am the clever one after all.

And then he dropped the bombshell, “Can I still be friends with [next door neighbor’s son] if he votes for McCain?” I explained that not only was [next door neighbor’s son] a mere 3 years old and thereby incapable of voting, but that it did not matter one way or another how someone else voted.

Apparently he missed the memo (as did a whole fuck-ton of people) that the way someone votes does NOT dictate whom we can or cannot be friends with.

It was then that I knew in my bones that he must have said something in front of my next door neighbor about the sign, and I began to feel like Those People. The people who cannot be friends or neighbors with someone who votes the “wrong” way and insists that their children behave the same way.

I guess we didn’t get him out of that hippie Nut Ban! school soon enough.

With one of my children far past the age in which I can dress him in whatever costume is either cute or hysterical blackmail fodder, the other one bears the brunt of my Psychosis, Halloween Variety. As you might have guessed, it’s the little one that I’m referring to.

Exhibit A: Last Year’s Costume

Name: Halloweenier

Exhibit B: This Year’s Costume

What the hell IS that costume?

Uh….

Name: Hedgehog.

Go here if you want to see some more photos of Alex in action.

And in a stunning display of choosing a costume I would *never* have chosen, and furthering the notion that biology plays hardly any role in Ben’s life, Ben was a…

I don’t have a reference photo for last year, since I couldn’t catch him before he ran off, but he was Darth Vader. Exactly the OTHER costume I wouldn’t have chosen for him. Ever.

Between my busted foot and Alex’s decision to get up a whole 2 hours earlier than normal, we were in no real shape for Trick or Treating. Thankfully, other people were able to take Ben, saving Dave and I from the delightful and titillating screams of my second son.

Alex, it seems, is just simply not old enough for Halloween. And apparently I am getting too creaky to do it myself. To top it off, those damn kids were on my lawn again. Me, without my cane.

Based on my clear lack of good blogging material, or to be more honest, the right outlook with which to write about anything at all, I’m yoinking one from the vaults to share with you. This was written about 2 months before I got married in 2005 and has been updated somewhat by moi. Because I’m good like that.

With my impending nuptials lurking stealthily right around the corner, I am consistently reminded of how over half of marriages these days end in divorce. According to the *ahem* interesting folks at livejournals Virgins Over 25 site, that number is markedly decreased for those involved in church. And the number is even less than that for people who raise their children in church.

What this means is that I’m totally fucked.

I don’t WANT to get divorced, too much nasty social stigma attached to that, plus, I’m too lazy to go to court over and over to divide up our animals and dishes, so I have carefully devised a plan to help me stay married. Because if anybody in the family requires the label ‘œTemperful’ it is I. (okay, so it’s not a word. Yet. But it should be)

Ergo, I alone am the danger for divorce.

As most old people will creepily point out to you, the sex and passion tends to die out after a number of years leaving in it’s place a bleak type of emptiness, fulfilled either by really dull pursuits like, ‘œstamp collecting’ and even worse, ‘œbird watching.’

Or an affair.

That’s right, folks, screw the birds and the stamps, the way that I am going to beat a divorce before marriage is through an illict affair, carefully mapped out over the next couple of years. I mean, why WAIT to scratch the itch? Nip it in the bud! That’s what I say.

So I am carefully screening, through an intensive application process (think the Meyers-Brigg crossed with Cosmo quiz) potential candidates for my pending affair and possible illegitimate love-child.

Some candidates in my pool:

Mick Jagger– he may be as old as Jesus, but the man can still MOVE. Plus, he’s got bank vaults full of money and is freakishly fertile, so the child support checks would pay for a big house for Dave and I to live in.

The Garbage Man– perhaps his fragrance is a little on the shitty side (get it?) but he’s got some sexy muscles, and I don’t exactly have a milk-man to fall back on. (Ed note: we have since moved, and I’m no longer inundated with smoldering hot garbage men. I can’t be sure I’ve ever even seen my new garbage men. Sadly)

Anthony Bourdain– While I don’t exactly envision steamy sex fantasies with the guy, I imagine we’d do a lot of drinking, smoking and making each other laugh. Any man who uses the phrase “pube in my drink” on television is a man I’d like to hump. Or at least hang out with.

Anna KorniwhatsherfacedatingEnriquewhatshisface– she’s super, super, super hot. I mean, smoldering hot. I totally want to make out with her, and I’m not remotely gay.

Okay, okay, okay. So I don’t have a crazy long list. Sue me. I mean, it’s not every day that you get to carefully choose AND screen a potential lover, right?

Oh like YOU’VE never thought of doing this! Haven’t you?

Haven’t you???

There was a commercial awhile back, I don’t remember what it was for really-perhaps a bank?–in which a man offers to paint his (presumably) wife’s toenails. The tag line was “Because you’re not THAT GUY” (THAT GUY being the one who paints toenails), and it made me laugh.

Because I totally married THAT GUY.

I’ve never actually asked him to paint my toenails, but he swears up, down and sideways that he would if I did. In the past he’s also volunteered to help me shave my delicate lady bits when a burgeoning stomach is preventing me from taking care of the ole undercarriage properly, and would probably shave my legs if I begged. Or bribed. Whatever.

This omission makes him sound like a complete and utter pushover, who without a complaint, says “yes dear” to anything, EVERYTHING I say, but it’s simply not true. (SADLY. I WAAANT A PONY.) People who haven’t shared a lot of time with us together have remarked that Dave is “pussy-whipped” or perhaps “Becky wears the pants in THAT marriage,” but it’s just wrong. They miss the indelicate back and forth that Dave and I tend to do in private.

He does call me fuckface or asshead when the moment strikes and the kids aren’t awake, and he does so unapologetically. And I’ve never seen him shy away from me unless I was especially hormonal and chasing him around with a butcher knife. Which is funny, because we HAVE NO BUTCHER KNIFE.

And being THAT GUY doesn’t mean that he does any of the following:

*Hanging up his laundry
*Throwing his socks down the laundry chute
*Remembering any present buying holiday ahead of time
*Ever buying an anniversary card
*Ever calling to tell me he’ll be late UNTIL he’s already late as hell

But he’s THAT GUY all right.

How do I know this for sure? Well, The Daver is suffering once again from Couvade Syndrome. Otherwise known as a sympathetic pregnancy. It happened when I was pregnant with Alex, and his donut consumption may or may not have been responsible for his elevated cholesterol, and it’s been happening since I got pregnant with Amelia.

While his behavior when stricken with a Man Cold (which pretty much involves moaning a lot, reminding everyone within a 20 yard radius that he HATES to have a cold, and sniffling deeply whenever I ask him to take out the trash, and generally being a pain my in ever-loving ass) leaves much to be desired and may be the only time I delicately suggest that he go to work by kicking him out of the house and locking the doors, I’m lucky that this is not indicative of his behavior while “pregnant.”

This isn’t to say that he religiously reads “What To Expect While You’re Expecting” book-marking the relevant chapters (we don’t even own it) or dreams up color combinations for the nursery, hell, he’s barely interested in baby clothes or deciding on a middle name for our daughter. No, he’s just as emotionally labile as I am these days. And is nearly as interested in donuts and hot dogs and squishy chocolate deserts.

Honestly, I find the whole situation rather adorable. After being pregnant by a dude who was downright abusive during the whole gestation, it’s such a refreshing change of pace for me. If you’d told the pregnant-with-Ben me that I would one day find a man who was going to be pregnant with me, I’d have rolled my eyes bitterly and probably laughed without any humor behind it.

At that point in time, I’d have settled for a guy who was even remotely interested in his child and not interested in sticking his penis in other women. His TINY penis.

(sorry, I had to)

It reminds me that I hit the jackpot when I met Dave, something I’ve always been acutely aware of. Sure, we might not ever be the romantic couple of the romantic comedy genre, we may never refer to what happens between the sheets as “making love” unless we were trying to be sarcastic and make the other laugh, and we may never compose love letters OR poemes, but it doesn’t matter to me. It never mattered to me.

Anyone who shares a fleeting 9 month obsession with encased meats and sweets is more than enough for me.

I’m full of The Cranky today, and I’m not really sure why specifically. It’s partially because I’ve reached the point in pregnancy (for me) when I turn from a reasonably cute pregnant lady to growing out of all of my clothes. It’s also because I can’t get around too easily with my gigantic boot, and it gets pretty frustrating.

Or maybe it’s just because I’m tired. It was a long weekend for Gimpy McCripple here.

So, help a sister out. What’s making YOU cranky today?

Becky: “Do you like my manicure?” (playfully wraggles black fingernails in Daver’s face)

Dave (grabs hand for closer inspection): “Ooooh. Freaky! Won’t Ashley be mad that you had black nail polish put on for her wedding?”

Becky: “Nah. It’s perfectly vogue now. It’s no longer JUST for goth chicks.”

Dave: “Ah.”

Dave (grabs her hand again. This time her right hand, although not unkindly): “Wait a minute…is your wedding ring STUCK ON?”

Becky (sheepishly, in a small voice): “Yes.” (pauses) “I kept in on to long after I got pregnant with Amelia. And now I can’t get it off.”

Dave (eyes take on a mischievous gleam): “You know what this means, right?”

Becky: “Please don’t take me down to the fire station to get it cut off. I’m so ashamed. I HAVE FINGER FAT NOW.”

Dave: “No, no. I wouldn’t do that. And your finger looks great. But…”

(pauses dramatically for effect)

Dave: “You SEE this ring? IT MEANS I OWN YOU.”

Becky: “That’s MY line, assface.”

Dave: “And look at how badly it blew up in your face.”

Becky: “Touche.”

As I close down Week 2 of being pregnant and crippled–wait, is that a Lifetime movie? Because it totally should be–I find myself to be more and more empathetic toward the handicapped community. Which, considering I tend to have pretty non-existent sympathy/empathy/whichever one is better toward the majority of the population, is saying quite a bit.

I mean, I always got angry and perhaps occasionally called the police on cars illegally parked in the handicapped spaces. Or if I didn’t call the police, I’d shake my fist angrily AND menacingly at the offending car. Because how scary is that for that car?

But now Going Out has gone from “ooh! Maybe I’ll see something adorable I HAVE TO EAT at Target and buy it! Then EAT it!” to “Fuck, do I really have to leave?” And it’s not because it’s incredibly painful for me to walk, it’s a combination of other factors.

First, I look stupid. This I’m aware of. I go out, wearing this gigantic moon boot of doom, obviously pregnant, and lugging a 30 pound toddler–who is likely screaming in my face–through the store. I knew I looked stupid before I made 70% of the store patrons and staff stop and stare at me, but after making several small children cry (although that might have been because I told them that there was no Santa Claus after they called me a “retarded gimp”), I’m suddenly aware of how people who have real handicaps must feel on a daily basis.

Second, just because I am pregnant and crippled for the moment–and perhaps ugly for the rest of my life–doesn’t mean I am stupid. I mean, okay, okay, I’m kind of stupid, and perhaps even emotionally crippled but really, my IQ is not in the low 30’s. I don’t think. But people see a huge boot on a person and assume that I must be one of those Special People bussed in from an institution on my Big Day Out. Where the toddler and 7 year old with me come from is anyone’s guess.

They occasionally cluck sympathetically, raise their voices to speak to me slowly and loudly in small sentences, “Aaaarrreeee yooooouuuu reeeeaaadddyyy tooooo cccchhheeecckkk ooouutt?” I may look stupid, people, but I assure you that my mental facilities are as intact as they were before I injured my foot. Take that to mean whatever you’d like it to.

And my least favorite of the people that I come across on my brief ventures out into the Real World are the ones that walk behind me impatiently as I gimp along, muttering about how slow I am, practically touching my ass with their crotch, grumbling the whole way along. While I can relate that being frustrated by being behind someone slow is annoying, what I cannot understand is why on Earth they don’t go around me in the miles of space to my left. Slower traffic keep right, and all.

But then, just as I’m accepting that the person behind me really would like to be my hemorrhoid (mental picture is awesome), the minute I head toward a checkout, they speedily zip around me, practically knocking me over to get in front of me. Being slow at walking does not mean I’m slow at getting checked out.

Now, normally I let most anyone with less items go ahead of me, but now that my foot makes me gimpified, I honestly want to do nothing more than get the hell outta there so I can ice that puppy down. I’ll still let people with a couple of items in front of me, but the people who speedily zip past me ruthlessly cut in front of me always seem to be doing one of a couple things:

a) trying to write a check without proper identification (i.e. driver’s license)

b) trying to get the cashier to okay 4,595 expired coupons

c) arguing over a 2 cent price difference between “marked on shelf” cost and rung up cost

d) trying to use a declined credit card by arguing with the bored looking cashier

e) baffling the hell out of the cashier by whipping out food stamps

And I stand there, behind them, chanting “serenity now, serenity now” in my head as Alex attempts to scramble out the cart, shrieks when I dare detain him, as my foot throbs merrily.

I tell you, this whole “being injured” thing is getting more and more annoying. Especially since I have neither good drugs nor a handicapped sticker for my car. Perhaps I’ll get a cane and whack people with it just to make me feel better.

Misery loves company and all that, right?