Highlights of the long day at the doctor:

Some days are tougher than others. Today is one of those days. Hell, it’s been a whole lot of those days all squished together.

View the rest of this entry…

Heard said by one of the announcers during the rainy Patriots game:
“Now they’re going to have to deal with wet balls in the fourth quarter.”
*snicker* I’ll never grow up.

We’re home from LI. Got to spend wonderful quality time with the folks, my brother, his wife & our precious little nephew.
Haven’t felt too talkative lately, so… the occasional randomness:
1. In case you haven’t noticed, snazzykat had a bit of a chokefest over the holidays. Perhaps the server ate too much turkey and pumpkin pie, but apparently it was down for the count. It wasn’t a pretty sight, but things should be back to normal now. I hope.
2. Speaking of pumpkin pie, I’m addicted to pumpkin pudding. Easy-peasy – pumpkin, vanilla pudding, cool whip. My new favorite thing ever.
3. We’ve adopted a new member of the family, one Max & Princess aren’t all too thrilled about. My folks needed to find homes for their cats, so we scooped up Turtle and brought her home with us. Max is walking around with his tail perpetually puffed up, and Princess can be found under assorted furniture with a pissed off grump in her face. Turtle isn’t even fazed – she walks around like she owns the place. Jay said she’s got that “I came from a house with a dog who shit bigger than you” look in her eyes. Definitely makes for some good holiday entertainment.

View the rest of this entry…

I had a dream last night that I gave birth at home by myself. I did it perfectly and even wrapped him up just right, and handed him to Jay like a present when he got home from work. And man, Sammy looked just like Jay. In my head, I knew we had only a few hours to get him to the hospital for his surgery, and I was holding on to every moment of normalcy that I could in the meantime.
In the dream, I got to breastfeed the baby right after he was born – something I desperately want to do but likely won’t be able to. And the whole delivering at home I know is a manifestation of my disappointment at having a very medical birth, when I so wanted the complete opposite.
I know all this comes from being stupid and reading the labor & delivery section of What to Expect last night. Dumb, dumb, dumb.
They’re talking of inducing me about a week before his due date. I feel like I’ve given up so many things with this pregnancy, and as silly as it sounds, I really want a Pisces baby. I feel like it might be the one thing I have some control over – unless he decides to come on his own, which is a different story and which I’d be perfectly fine with. His Daddy is a Pisces, he was meant to be a Pisces, even his song (“Danny’s Song”) talks about him being a Pisces. I gave up my midwife, my small birthing center, the ability to experience the natural progression of childbirth… I know, I’m gaining a son, but in the meantime, I’m still resentful of the rest of it. Not of Sammy – but of the way the last few months have gone and the way the next few will likely go.
Maybe it’s early on a Monday and I’m not fully awake yet. Maybe it’s the dream that’s still lingering. Either way, I feel a little in limbo.
Blech.

So Samson got a very special shout out last night at the Eddie from Ohio show. A very sweet aunt and uncle got in touch with the band before the show and made a special request. EFO started off talking about how they had gotten many requests, and they weren’t going to do any, except for one. This fan, they said, was an unpaid member of the audience, since he had snuck in in-utero. Then they said his name! They went on to talk about creating EFO fans nice and early on, and that babies who like EFO have been proven to attend Harvard as young adults – typical silly EFO. Then they went into “Hey Little Man” – an a cappella favorite of mine.
Needless to say, I cried through the first half of the song. We’re waiting to get in touch with someone who taped the show – he figured we’d be able to have a copy of it this week or next. I’ll be sure to put up once we do. In the meantime, here’s a version from an older show and the lyrics.
Eddie From Ohio – Hey Little Man

View the rest of this entry…

We’re meeting Su & Reilly for dinner tonight, and then we’re off to see Eddie from Ohio. This will be our 10th (or so) time we’ve seen them, so you know we love ‘em, and if we love ‘em, you know they’re good. (Let’s leave my recent Hall and Oates obsession out of this, ok?)
Anyway, in case you’ve only ever heard me talk of EFO, here’s a sampling of what I hope we’ll hear live tonight. If you like it, be sure to snag yourself one of their cds – we recommend Three Rooms or Looking Out the Fishbowl, for starters.
Please right-click and save or else all my bandwidth will go byebye, and I’ll be very sad, and I’ll have to give up my morning decaf hazelnut coffee with cinnamon to buy some more bandwidth so I can continue to bore you with inane daily ramblings and pregnancy whines. And besides, do you really want to make a pregnant woman sad?

1. Woman of Faith (live version from Three Rooms)

2. One Thousand Sarahs (live version from Three Rooms)
3. Adios, Lorena (from This is Me and my favorite as of late)

Enjoy!

Our students often come to us with large gaps in learning. Many of them missed large chunks of years of schooling, so we’re never quite sure what they know and what they don’t. The positive side is that while they’re learning how to be students with us, they’re often absorbing lots and lots of knowledge for the first time. They tend to latch on to things and hold on to them for dear life. Hell, my Gatsby kids from last year still compare people to Daisy! It’s nice, though, because for the first time, a lot of them are finally confident that they CAN and DO learn.
A few days ago, I finished A Streetcar Named Desire with my students, and I wanted to go beyond the basic “reality vs. illusion” theme that runs throughout the play. So I pulled my, “This is the college interpretation” bit and headed down the “Northern aggression vs. Southern decay” path.
“So – who was involved in the Civil War?” I asked.
They stared at me. Silence.
“Ok…” I said, recognizing that most of them may have skipped that month of school. “How about slavery? That sound familiar?” I asked, hoping to pull from the standard association of slavery and the Civil War.
Silence. This wasn’t pretty.
Finally, I heard a voice peep up: “Was that with the French, Miss?”
Huh?
Apparently, I learned later, the history they’ve covered so far this year involved the French and Indian War, and they hadn’t yet gotten to the Civil War. Needless to say, class turned into a lesson about the South’s decline after the war and its resentment towards the North and how that’s reflected in Blanche’s nervous breakdown and blah blah blah.
Fast forward to today. One of my rather bright students had been out for a few days, so I tried to fill him in. We finally got to the “college interpretation” and I said to him, “So… the Civil War, right?” assuming he’d know what I was talking about.
He cocked his head and looked at me. “That was with the French, right?”
Man, I love these kids.

Ummmm… 100 days until his due date. Tomorrow, we’re in the double-digits.
If you need me, I’ll be in the girls’ room warding off a panic attack.

I’m looking forward to having my body back. Isn’t that awful to say? I still have months, and by no means whatsoever do I want little Sammy here any earlier than he should be. But I’m not particularly enjoying the “sharing my body” aspect of pregnancy. Occasionally, it’s cool, but most of the time – I just want to be me again.
Besides, falling over while simply trying to put on underwear doesn’t constitute a “good start” to the morning in Ekaland. No. It makes for one frustrated and upset Eka who can’t even dress herself anymore.
Hope Sammy’s happy being spoiled as an only child because I’m not doing this again. Nuh uh. Glowing second trimester? Mother-to-be calm? Bite my big left toe – while I can still see it.