The Final Countdown

November 26th, 2007

We just had a conversation that went something like this:

Me: “It’s time for you to start researching the things you’re going to research.” [This would be car-seats and a few other items.]

Stevel: “Yeah, I know. Not today, but yeah.”

Me: “It’s time. We’re in the final countdown … The Final Countdown … That’s a good song, I’m buyin’ that.” [Opening iTunes]

Stevel: “Don’t do it!”

Me: “Why not?”

Stevel: “It’s Europe.”

Me: “Yeah. Check it out: the ‘Popularity’ rating of this song is so high it’s off the iTunes table.” [Purchase complete]

Europe: [Half-hour keyboard intro] “Dn dn dn dn, dn dn dn-dn-dn …”

Stevel: “We could have spent that 99 cents on our baby.”

Me: “I’m not the one who bought ‘The Rainbow Connection.’”

Stevel: “[Incredibly, defending that purchase---blah blah blah]”

Europe: “We’re leaving together, but still it’s farewell …”

Stevel: “Open that album artwork in a bigger window so we can see it.”

Me: “Wow.”

Stevel: “Oh man, I bet they got so much game.”

What She Says I Have to Look Forward To

November 22nd, 2007

My sister called tonight at 9:30 p.m. That’s after midnight her-time. I could tell she was in her car. I said, “What are you doing calling so late? Where are you?”

“I’m going to Wal-Mart,” she said, “to get night-light bulbs.”

She was jealous to be reminded that Stevel and I live across the street from a 24-hour CVS.

There is a Rock Band in Our Living Room

November 22nd, 2007

After pre-ordering in July, after checking the shipment status online obsessively, Stevel is now in possession of the long-awaited Rock Band for PSIII. Tonight, Courtney and I are playing fans while Jeremy sings vocals, Stevel works the drums, and Jeremy Jr. rocks the guitar. Courtney says it’s like having a back-stage pass. They have named their band Tikka Mausoleum.

Junior pointed out that it’s funny that Steve plays this game, knowing that he actually does play all of these instruments. Steve’s reply: “But you don’t get points when you play the real instruments.”

You must all come over and try this game. :)

I M Yr Baby, Right?

November 20th, 2007

You put together this bouncer 4 me, yeah?

(Don’t worry, readers; it’s machine-washable.)

Amazing How Quickly It All Unravels

November 19th, 2007

Last week was a good week. I was hungry and ate, and I felt great. Friday evening, we had some friends over. Our house was all clean, and I was able to stay up “late” (11?) and enjoy the company.

It is now Monday morning. Our house looks like it was ransacked by six-year-olds. There’s dried puke on the sides of all sinks, toilets, and in a bucket by the bed. And in my hair. Which by the way is eclipsed in grossness only by the clothes I’m wearing, which are the same ones I wore to sleep in Friday night and haven’t had the energy to change since. It was a bad, bad weekend. Oh, so bad. I threw up and threw up, and I’m plagued by a new, fun pain, which Stevel and I researched and found to be caused by ligaments stretching in my abdomen.

I think it’s time to rethink high school sex-ed. Instead of just talking about STDs, we should take the girls aside and teach them about shifting pelvic bones, stretching abdominal ligaments, puke, and all of the other gross surprises of pregnancy. My sister told me about a comedy bit she heard on the radio recently, in which the comedian was eating chips made with Olestra and noticed as he ate that there was a warning on the side of the bag: “May cause anal leakage.” He said we should start putting that on cigarette boxes to keep teens from starting up. Even if you’re a teen who feels immortal in the face of warnings about death and cancer and STDs, you don’t want a habit that means you have to carry around extra underwear or feel your pelvic bones moving.

Anyway, back to my life. The one in which I drop Stevel off at work this morning, and, still wearing said PJs from Friday night and sporting dried hair-puke, I decide to stop at the grocery store for some quick supplies, because it’s not like I’m going to see anyone I know right?

Hi, Rachel. I hope you enjoy the frozen meal you bought for your lunch today. Hope it’s tasty.

I had to stop at the grocery not because Stevel hasn’t been working double-overtime taking care of me—because he has, shopping and cooking and fetching and cleaning as much as he has time for—but because I was hungry and craving some things, and I try to go with that as much as possible. Stevel is truly my teammate in all of this, suffering just as much as I am with my discomfort. Partly because he doesn’t like to see me suffer, and partly because I’m “expressive” about it. Big baby when I’m sick, always have been. I look forward to someone else taking over the big-baby title very soon. Anyway, having just celebrated four years together, Stevel and I feel equipped to handle as a team whatever this new adventure brings us. Just this weekend, we put together this bouncer, and it only took us, like, an hour. If we can figure out a diaper in half that time, we should be left with a good twenty minutes a day for sleeping and eating, right?

Some Fresh, Unrevised Poems

November 14th, 2007

GROUP WORK

The task assigned, classroom order
breaks into mumbly chaos.
They convene and are
uncomfortable.
The hardest part
is overcoming inertia,
getting in the mood, but once
they do, it’s not
about English (capital E) anymore. Now
is for making
each other laugh and admire, and English
can be useful for that.

WATCHING THEM WRITE

Whatever you believe, this
is spiritual. Inward,
with breath-work.
Each one is elbows
and inkpen, bent
like a desk-lamp
illuminating empty
paper filling, emerging
something of the brain-soul,
and all I have to do
is say it:
Ready, Set, Write.
Bow your heads in prayer.

POOR WOMAN’S ROSES

Did she
really like
carnations,
those flowers of
disposable boutonnieres,
of teenage prom corsages—
squeaky-toys for puppy love?

Or did she let him think
they were her favorites
because she believed
they were the most
she deserved?

PAINT

Wall, wall, do you mirror
us? Sterile canvas
for dents and stains.

Let’s patch and spackle,
roll on a thick coat
of fresh green. The best
money can buy.

FOR SALE

Player Piano
Works Great
or it did, anyway, until
I started carting it around
in the back of this pickup truck
trying to sell it.
This duct-taped sign bites
its finish, this city’s soot
clogs its keys.
But once, when Rita Hayworth
came over on the arm of my father’s
coworker’s brother,
it played, and held highball glasses,
and was a novel entertainer.

It is Official

November 12th, 2007

We have entered the Third Trimester. This babe is due in exactly three months.

DS Dunk

November 9th, 2007

I don’t know how anyone lives without a Nintendo DS. If I had to choose between my cell phone and the DS, I would choose the DS. If I had to choose between my computer and the DS, I think I would choose the DS. I’m not much of a gamer. In fact, I mostly play Solitaire on the DS. Sometimes I do crossword puzzles. I don’t know why, but it’s such a relaxing little device to play a game on. Ask my niece, Erica. She only likes me for my DS. (It’s fine because she’s 8, and really, when you’re 8, no one expects you to like an aunt more than a Nintendo DS.)

Steve has a category into which he puts certain devices, ones we no longer feel we can live without, like iPods and now his iPhone, and the DS. He calls this category, “If it fell in the toilet, we would replace it immediately.”

Yesterday this category was tested somewhat. My DS, perched precariously on the edge of my bedside table, tangled with the phone cord as I reached to answer the phone and, horror of horrors, it fell into a bucket of puke.

It wasn’t even fresh puke, but puke from hours earlier that I hadn’t yet felt like dumping and rinsing. Fortunately, it hadn’t been a high-volume puke, just some orange juice, and I was able to clean the DS with Q-tips and Wet Ones and get it into perfect shape again. It passed the pregnant-girl-smell test, so I’m pretty sure all trace of puke is gone from it. Of course, the wrist strap had to be trashed, as I’m sure you can imagine. (Are you imagining it? Because the whole point of this post is to make you go, “Ew.”)

Hearts

November 6th, 2007

My dad had a heart catheterization this morning to remove a little bit of blockage and look around with a tiny camera. He called right after. Everything looks good, no worries. He’ll be home in a few hours.

I dreamt last night that we had the baby, and she was made out of chocolate. The doctors were like, “Ummmm. We have never seen this before.” And we took her home, and it was really hard to keep her from melting or getting smooshed.