CostcoWarrior

Back to Posting and New Pregnancy Symptom 27 May 2009

I just realized that it’s been nearly two weeks since I’ve posted anything.  So much for my goal to post at least every other day.  I’ve decide to place the blame for this writing drought squarely on the shoulders a new pregnancy symptom:  Rage.

Well, it might not be RAGE in all it’s true Hollywood glory, but it’s definitely more in that neighborhood than any of my normal emotions.  In the last two weeks I have noticed my fuse is shorter.  Okay. Fine.  In all honestly, “shorter” is a generous description: My fuse is pretty much non-existant. 

Someone says the wrong thing = irritation extreme. 

Someone coughs in the wrong way = total annoyance. 

Someone “looks” in the wrong way = complete infuriation.

Someone is incompetent or inconsiderate = eternal frustration.

Someone drives stupidly = broiling anger.

Someone interrupts me = bulging eyes and steaming ears.

Someone questions my wise and niavely glorious opinion = death to all.

Our birthing class instructor’s son recently injured his tongue pretty badly by falling and biting it.  I did that when I was 2 or 3 too.  I’ve done it again and again in the last two weeks.  It’s pretty much an hourly occurance nowadays, and kind of amazing that I have any tastebuds left.  I’ve also relearned the child-like teeth-clamped-shut-eyes-smooshed-closed defense mechanism…not really in my defense, but in defense of all living things around me.

And I tell you, this Rage Frustration Irritation Impatience Want-to-Kill-’Em symptom is just as strenuous as all the other physical pregnancy symptoms I’ve dealt with so far. 

**It’s tiring to always be thinking the meanest, most clever, most horrible, most true comments, and then to have to restrain myself from using them…most of the time. 

**It’s wearing to reign in the lightning quick backlash reactions to the idiots that surround you.  And sadly, these days, the idiots have multiplied exponentially.

**It’s arduous to keep from rolling my eyes 10,000 times a day, worrying that if I roll ‘em once more they might actually get stuck. 

**It’s demanding to have to keep apologizing for all those times the raging reaction takes out those around me that I love.

**It’s exhausting to have to make up fake apologies for all those people I DON’T love that the irritation offends.

And so, the blame:  I haven’t been posting because I’m sure none of you really want to read day-in and day-out rants and rages and generally negative material.  I haven’t been posting because I’ve been busy trying not to kill everyone and everything around me.  And I haven’t been posting because I’ve been tired from the exertions so associated with this new pregnancy symptom.

I do have some fun posts brewing, though, so stay tuned…especially if you’re interested in baby name bashing…  

Baby Pictures 14 May 2009

Nearly a week ago we went for the routine 20 week ultrasound.  Only I was 19 weeks, not 20.  Now a week later I’m 20.  On a side note, 20 was a good year for me.  I really liked being 20.  It’s been a good pregnancy week so far too…but I digress.

So, anyway, last week we went to the ultrasound and this is what we saw:

If you have a hard time with these black and white modern art specimens, this is the baby’s profile with a little nose pointing north.  I like the nose.

We also got a pic of the baby’s first halloween costume choice:

That would be a scary skeleton…but at least the kid has a face, right? 

We chose not to learn the gender of the baby, but we heard tons of “they always slip up and spill the beans to you” stories, so I knew I had to prepare.  I made up a sign that said “Shhh…it’s a SURPRISE!!”  TW was a bit embarrassed by it and wouldn’t hold it, which I found just fascinating considering the fact that he has no problem holding my purse. 

At the appointment, I waved the surprise sign at everyone who came into the room.  Apparently that made me famous, because when the OB came in toward the end of the appointment she laughed and said “Yeah, I heard about the sign.”  Everyone was really kind and extremely informative.  We learned a few things about the kid too:

1. Baby is real.  If all the other clues could be explained away, the picture stands firm.
2. Baby really likes its feet–was just holding on to them and wouldn’t let go even though the doctor needed to see the appendages separately.
3. Baby is really relaxed and mellow (remind anyone of TW ??) just likes lying in a ball at the bottom of the uterus.
4. Baby is really stubborn (remind anyone of WW??) just doesn’t want to move from its warm comfy spot even if the doctor keeps poking and jiggling and bouncing.  Just.isn’t.going.to.cooperate.
5. Baby is really healthy and has all body parts in appropriate places (as verified by the doctor, since it just looked like black and white fuzz to us most of the time…)
6. Baby is right on schedule with estimated dates. 

Whether it was the sign or the intelligent staff, we made it through successfully clueless on the gender topic.  We dropped the sign off at our doctor’s office afterward, so they could tape it in my chart to avoid any future slip ups.  (Yes, I watched them put it in the chart…)

Sorry if the missing gender announcement disappoints you , but we just couldn’t ruin the suspense and give up the END in the MIDDLE.  You know you hate it when someone spoils the ending of a movie or book, so we won’t spoil the surprise of this story either.  Also, we apologize if the missing gender announcement makes gift giving more difficult for you, but we totally believe that the color gr$$n goes with just everything. 

Where I Become Moses’ Sidekick 8 May 2009

A blast from the past…(originally posted April 21st 2006) I was reading through some of WarriorWifes old blogs and ran across this one. I thought it was hilarious, so I thought I would re-publish it for your entertainment. enjoy!

To any and all professional or amateur psychologists, psyciatrists, dream-readers, and fortune tellers–prepare for some entertaining, here is my dream from last night….

(for those that want to continue believing I’m normal, read no further.)

I’m living in bible times with the Children of Israel. We’ve just conquered the Land of Canaan and contrary to historical accuracy, Moses didn’t get “taken up in a cloud” or “buried by the hand of God”; he’s really still alive and I’m his sidekick. Joshua is still the main leader-guy, and Moses is retired. He’s gone just the tiniest bit wacko in the head from the stress of wandering 40 years at the front of 3 million whiney children. But with the bit-o-wacko he’s become a genius inventor in his retirement years….just picture DaVinci and Merlin combined in the religiously powerful Moses and that’s the guy I’m working for.

So we’re out at the top of a mountain and Moses finds this amazingly pure and nutritional stream of water. He mutters and mumbles (in hebrew of course, but I’ve got one of those wicked cool sci-fi translates any language to English gadgets) “You know, WarriorWife, the middle east is kinda hot and dry. The children need some better water. But this little stream is not so efficient in getting to them. We’ve got to find a way to make it better.” Whereupon I agree and ask him if he wants a sandwich for lunch. He does, and while I make it, he gets to work on his new cleaner-water-to-the-people project.

This turns out to be COLOSSAL, way more far reaching than Moses ever thought it would be. (side note musing: I wonder if DaVinci would think that of his MonaLisa…”Gosh I just painted someone sitting on the side of the road and look what kind of freakish attention it’s gotten over the centuries!”) Okay, back on the ranch/mountain Moses has built a big aquaduct-like track that looks very similar to the twisty kind of “play with marbles on a fast track” game that we had as kids growing up, but it’s on a HUGE scale. He’s also come up with some cool and secret way to take regular bible-times sandals and make them into a white-brown ultra clean marble (like the rock) lining to this track to keep the nutritious water pure on it’s travel to the people. We’re talking some serious patent material, folks. Water flows into all of the cities on this awesome track and the whole thing just explodes into a NASA-habitates-a-barren-planet-sized operation.

Anyway, now the dream gets interesting. See Moses decides he could make some retirement money off of this and wants to start charging the people on a consumption basis. That doesn’t go over so smoothly and he becomes the evil and hunted fugitive extortionist. So we’re on the run (yes, I go to, since I’m the sidekick). He’s getting his secret plans from the top shop safe and I’m busting into Housewarden’s place for some good fugitive journey snacks. I find her eye-glasses in between the gold fish and the trail mix in her kitchen cupboards and I take those too, since they’d probably come in handy for two fugitives in case my glasses break.

And the rest of my dream Moses and I are sneaking around sabotaging this ultimate water plant barely escaping multiple lynch squads by busting through chalk walls and running across thatched roofs. I found I was pretty talented at the whole fugitive thing too, considering I was packing two huge supply packs (one on front and one on back) while Moses just carried a little knap sack. But I guess that’s how it goes since I was just the sidekick and he was an old guy.

I woke up a little sore in my legs and really thirsty. But I drank milk instead of water.

Hot Chocolate? 5 May 2009

Last night TW told me one of the funniest stories.  We had just left a fast food drive-thru on our way to school.  I had ordered an oreo milk shake, and I complained to TW that they literally hadn’t mixed it:  all the ice cream was on on the bottom, all the crushed cookies on the top.  He laughed and told me that it reminded him of a similar fast food drive-thru experience he’d had years earlier:

It was the night before Black Friday sales and he had given up waiting in the freezing cold extra long line for what ever electronic deal he was interested in.  On his way home he decided to stop at a nearby fast-food place for a hot chocolate to warm up.  He pulled into the drive-thru lane, ordered the hot chocolate, pulled up to the window and paid $1.25.  They then proceeded to hand him his hot chocolate which literally consisted of a cup of hot water and a packet of Swiss Mix.  He didn’t even get a stir stick.

Um.  Thank you.  How convenient and “fast”.  I always wanted to OVERPAY for an unmixed hot chocolate packet on a freezing cold night.

Blog construction 2 May 2009

During the past few weeks the blog has been undergoing some minor changes.  Since I am not the best with web design and html I often make minor changes then refresh the page to see how it looks.  Sometimes it totally screws up the entire page and I have to undo the changes made.

Anyway the reason for this post is to apologize to those that have visited the blog and seen things that weren’t quite right.  It has been fun to learn some of the ins-and-outs of webdesign.  Now I just need to teach WarriorWife, so she can have some fun to.  Maybe I’ll wait til we’re both done with school…