a fever and a beaker and a shot in the dark.
Oh man. I want to respond to everyone's comments about Doctor Who, mostly because it's like, as I read them, that Michael Jackson song started playing and I really did feel like I was not alone, you were all here with me, and though we are far apart, it's OK not to like River Song.
But instead I'm just going to make an update about Disneyland this past weekend and then talk about how fucking ready I am to have this baby. Everyone get psyched, right.
This is the fourth year my family has done the Disneyland half-marathon. It gets bigger and more ridiculous every year, but if you're in to running at all, you should do it and then tell me and I will cheer for you really loudly usually from the overpass at mile 6ish and the stretch between mile 11 and 12! Except for this year, I did not hike to the top of the over pass because I am nine months pregnant and also no.
Here's the expo!
And then here's our group after they had completed the race! Every single one of them set personal records, which is nuts and awesome. Al ran it in 1:59:50, and his goal was to break 2 hours (last year he ran it in 2:00:14 and was super pissed), but seriously: exercise is not fun, I don't understand this impulse.
The two in the middle not in neon green (which: my mom made the boys get matching shirts. I can't even. ACTUAL MATCHING SHIRTS) are a married couple and my brother's best friends. She's been running a lot lately and training really hard and so they ran the whole race together, like side by side, and then at the fucking finish line, he didn't tell her and pulled ahead, to hit the finish mat 7 seconds before her. She was not happy and everyone gave him a hard time about it. As it should be. Some macho thing or something I guess, but mostly bullshit.
Here's Al and I at the 2008, 2010 and 2011 race. He didn't register in time for the 2009 race and it sells out quickly, so we just cheered together that year and I don't have a photo of it, but I'm sure it looked exactly like this. 2008 was the only year I ran it and I got my one fucking medal and I will never run 13.1 miles again because why. Why would anyone do that.
DJ discovered a few months ago that his astrological sign is sometimes described as "having a love of pageantry." He has embraced this whenever possible. A love of pageantry translates to poses like this.
My dad and Al are BFFs, but also in that way where if my dad is having a beer, Al will have one, too, or if Al is juggling in the Tomorrowland gift shop, my dad will juggle, too.
And then we stuck them in their own row on Small World and it delightful in the way that little things are delightful.
Sometimes I look at the things my family does and I'm like, what.
And FLYNN'S ARCADE! This is 24 weeks (uh, on the left, if that's not clear from how much smaller I was) and 37 weeks. She did not, obviously, decide to come while I was standing in front of her namesake arcade. We did actually get to go in this time though, and now we all have a ton of Flynn's Arcade tokens to do -- I'm not sure what with. Give to Flynn when she's born? Except babies can't have arcade tokens, so I guess hold on to as nice keepsakes.
We both played the actual TRON game in Flynn's and they, every so often, play Journey and the wall behind it lights up and that's fun. Al is pretty good at TRON because he plays at the Pinball Museum here all the time, so there was a line to the left of this photo waiting for him to finish playing. Whoops.
This photo is to be like, can we talk about my fucking ankles? Let's talk about them. Where did they go? Like, at this point I had walked around Disneyland all day the day before and for half of this day, so it was easily 10 hours of walking, which is a stupid thing to do this pregnant, but WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY ANKLES
This photo is for bogged's boyfriend, Ken. Ken and Al text message each other and play video games and earn trophies and this is what Al looks like when he's doing this, 3,000 miles away from Ken. Al will get a text and I'll be like, "Who's that?" (not in a controlling way, Al is his own person, nobody get upset) and his face will light up and he'll be like, "Ken! He said good job on my race!" And I'll be like, oh my god.
So, there's that. Now let's talk about how I am ready to have a baby, jesus, let's do this thing.
I'm 2.5 weeks out according to my original due date, but my original due date wasn't based on any actual knowledge of anything on our part (you may remember this from such stories as "The Ultrasound Tech Announcing The Date of Conception Was Probably My Mom's Birthday" and "No I Do Not Chart My Menstrual Cycles, Thank You For Asking?").
Anyway, they've measured her and stuff in there and she's already full term height/weight wise (she was six pounds on the nose two appointments ago) and my, uh, stuff is all kinds of favorable and has progressed rapidly, so my end of the bargain is held up, but she's still just chilling, being like, I'm going to hang out in here and weigh more than the dog and make you uncomfortable, haha, sucker. And I'm like, WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS.
I shouldn't complain about anything, because I've had a very easy pregnancy, and am actually pretty good in terms of how I feel. I can still get myself up off the floor, from sitting cross-legged (which, I should stop sitting on the floor probably). And the doctor never has to help me up from lying off the exam table (and then she's like, "wow, you're strong still! Some ladies need help to get up and groan the whole way!" and I'm like, bitch please and I tell Al how strong I am all the time and he pretends to be impressed. Occasionally I do get trapped in the couch a bit though. But that's more the couch than me, just saying.)
So I'm still trying to be like, I CAN HAVE IT ALL, but seriously, I can't, because I am over being pregnant and I want to have the baby because I am uncomfortable and can't eat as much (tragic) and can't sleep and can't breathe, although that's lessened because she's lower now and her head is in my pelvis or something. Which, as a society, as a species, what the fuck is this. Like, oh, I have a baby head in my pelvis, THINGS ARE GOOD? Mostly it's that I don't want to be at work anymore, which is a normal feeling for the entire world, I'm sure, but I'm maximizing how much I don't want to be at work because there is a fat chihuahua sized human in my stomach.
My contractions are frequent, like my stomach gets all hard, but they're not painful, and there's this part of me that's like, uh, clearly I'm a superhero and they're just not going to hurt for me and thousands of years of ladies are wrong and I'm a goddamn medical marvel, but I think we all know that's not true and this is going to hurt like a motherfucker when it's actually time. So clearly it's not time yet.
Everything is basically ready though! And you know what smells good? Baby laundry detergent. I just want to smell that all the time, but I think that would be weird, to smell like a baby. Unless you were a baby, obviously.
I feel like I just bored myself talking about this, so I've got to imagine it's pretty boring for everyone else. Let me tell you though, if you get pregnant and then you're 38 weeks, you're going to remember this entry and then come back and re-read it. And do you know how I know that? Because I've reread old Facebook posts from people I went to high school with where I was like, shut the actual fuck up about your pregnancy as they were happening, but then now I'm like, oh wait, I am living this and trolling for information and don't think this means I like you or even really want to engage with you, but I appreciate your tendency to overshare because it gives me a good baseline.
Here are some things I've discovered about myself and/or Flynn while pregnant:
&. The TRON: Legacy soundtrack is one of the only things she responds to musically. This is obviously because she knows her name is Flynn. Even if she's named more for old TRON, whatever, it was exciting when we discovered that. WHATEVER IT MEANS SHE'S SMART (It's actually all Daft Punk that she likes, something with the bass, I think?)
&. She also hates any new Kanye, and wants to listen exclusively to 'All Falls Down' on repeat. This was the most recent music discovery, just a few weeks ago. She'll punch around to The Clash, but I think that's because the only volume I'll listen to The Clash on is, "Loud enough for every baby everywhere to hear, sorry, babies."
&. I used to hate breakfast and bacon was only good for sandwiches, but now I love breakfast and want to eat it all the time and bacon is like, wow, bacon is delicious (understatement?). I don't know if this is her or what, but BREAKFAST FOOD IS TOPS, GUYS.
&. I had a period where I really only wanted to eat Oscar Mayer all-beef, bun-length hot dogs and some sort of potato side. This seems to have passed, but I ate a LOT of hot dogs.
&. Potatoes. All the potatoes. But that's got to be me not her, because they've been my favorite food forever, so she was getting them either way. Best mom in the wooooooorld. I just really love potatoes.
&. I don't know, I feel like I should be remembering more about this pregnancy. I bought some lingonberry juice boxes from IKEA when we were in California because I'd been craving lingonberry juice from California, sort of.
&. I've eaten a lot of strawberry Pop-Tarts? This is in no way different from regular, non-pregnant life.
&. I miss scotch. And beer. And Red Bull. But true story: we were on our fourth ultrasound and I drank a Red Bull to try and get her moving. And it didn't work, but it was glorious, even if it used up basically my entire recommended caffeine intake for the day in one 8 ounce can. And sometimes I miss smoking a lot, which I know is a horrible thing to miss, and I won't go back to it, even after she's born, but it's just a thing and a truth.
I think what this is indicative of is that 30 years from now, Flynn is maybe going to have a baby and she's going to be like, "What was your pregnancy like, Mom?" And I'm literally just going to have to make everything up, every single thing, because I can't recount this for her. It makes me seem crazy.
The good news is, none of this kind of updating will happen while planning our wedding because guess what I give no fucks about? Planning our wedding. Boom.
I HOPE THE NEXT TIME I UPDATE IT'S BECAUSE I'VE HAD THIS KID, YOU GUYS
But instead I'm just going to make an update about Disneyland this past weekend and then talk about how fucking ready I am to have this baby. Everyone get psyched, right.
This is the fourth year my family has done the Disneyland half-marathon. It gets bigger and more ridiculous every year, but if you're in to running at all, you should do it and then tell me and I will cheer for you really loudly usually from the overpass at mile 6ish and the stretch between mile 11 and 12! Except for this year, I did not hike to the top of the over pass because I am nine months pregnant and also no.
Here's the expo!
And then here's our group after they had completed the race! Every single one of them set personal records, which is nuts and awesome. Al ran it in 1:59:50, and his goal was to break 2 hours (last year he ran it in 2:00:14 and was super pissed), but seriously: exercise is not fun, I don't understand this impulse.
The two in the middle not in neon green (which: my mom made the boys get matching shirts. I can't even. ACTUAL MATCHING SHIRTS) are a married couple and my brother's best friends. She's been running a lot lately and training really hard and so they ran the whole race together, like side by side, and then at the fucking finish line, he didn't tell her and pulled ahead, to hit the finish mat 7 seconds before her. She was not happy and everyone gave him a hard time about it. As it should be. Some macho thing or something I guess, but mostly bullshit.
Here's Al and I at the 2008, 2010 and 2011 race. He didn't register in time for the 2009 race and it sells out quickly, so we just cheered together that year and I don't have a photo of it, but I'm sure it looked exactly like this. 2008 was the only year I ran it and I got my one fucking medal and I will never run 13.1 miles again because why. Why would anyone do that.
DJ discovered a few months ago that his astrological sign is sometimes described as "having a love of pageantry." He has embraced this whenever possible. A love of pageantry translates to poses like this.
My dad and Al are BFFs, but also in that way where if my dad is having a beer, Al will have one, too, or if Al is juggling in the Tomorrowland gift shop, my dad will juggle, too.
And then we stuck them in their own row on Small World and it delightful in the way that little things are delightful.
Sometimes I look at the things my family does and I'm like, what.
And FLYNN'S ARCADE! This is 24 weeks (uh, on the left, if that's not clear from how much smaller I was) and 37 weeks. She did not, obviously, decide to come while I was standing in front of her namesake arcade. We did actually get to go in this time though, and now we all have a ton of Flynn's Arcade tokens to do -- I'm not sure what with. Give to Flynn when she's born? Except babies can't have arcade tokens, so I guess hold on to as nice keepsakes.
We both played the actual TRON game in Flynn's and they, every so often, play Journey and the wall behind it lights up and that's fun. Al is pretty good at TRON because he plays at the Pinball Museum here all the time, so there was a line to the left of this photo waiting for him to finish playing. Whoops.
This photo is to be like, can we talk about my fucking ankles? Let's talk about them. Where did they go? Like, at this point I had walked around Disneyland all day the day before and for half of this day, so it was easily 10 hours of walking, which is a stupid thing to do this pregnant, but WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY ANKLES
This photo is for bogged's boyfriend, Ken. Ken and Al text message each other and play video games and earn trophies and this is what Al looks like when he's doing this, 3,000 miles away from Ken. Al will get a text and I'll be like, "Who's that?" (not in a controlling way, Al is his own person, nobody get upset) and his face will light up and he'll be like, "Ken! He said good job on my race!" And I'll be like, oh my god.
So, there's that. Now let's talk about how I am ready to have a baby, jesus, let's do this thing.
I'm 2.5 weeks out according to my original due date, but my original due date wasn't based on any actual knowledge of anything on our part (you may remember this from such stories as "The Ultrasound Tech Announcing The Date of Conception Was Probably My Mom's Birthday" and "No I Do Not Chart My Menstrual Cycles, Thank You For Asking?").
Anyway, they've measured her and stuff in there and she's already full term height/weight wise (she was six pounds on the nose two appointments ago) and my, uh, stuff is all kinds of favorable and has progressed rapidly, so my end of the bargain is held up, but she's still just chilling, being like, I'm going to hang out in here and weigh more than the dog and make you uncomfortable, haha, sucker. And I'm like, WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS.
I shouldn't complain about anything, because I've had a very easy pregnancy, and am actually pretty good in terms of how I feel. I can still get myself up off the floor, from sitting cross-legged (which, I should stop sitting on the floor probably). And the doctor never has to help me up from lying off the exam table (and then she's like, "wow, you're strong still! Some ladies need help to get up and groan the whole way!" and I'm like, bitch please and I tell Al how strong I am all the time and he pretends to be impressed. Occasionally I do get trapped in the couch a bit though. But that's more the couch than me, just saying.)
So I'm still trying to be like, I CAN HAVE IT ALL, but seriously, I can't, because I am over being pregnant and I want to have the baby because I am uncomfortable and can't eat as much (tragic) and can't sleep and can't breathe, although that's lessened because she's lower now and her head is in my pelvis or something. Which, as a society, as a species, what the fuck is this. Like, oh, I have a baby head in my pelvis, THINGS ARE GOOD? Mostly it's that I don't want to be at work anymore, which is a normal feeling for the entire world, I'm sure, but I'm maximizing how much I don't want to be at work because there is a fat chihuahua sized human in my stomach.
My contractions are frequent, like my stomach gets all hard, but they're not painful, and there's this part of me that's like, uh, clearly I'm a superhero and they're just not going to hurt for me and thousands of years of ladies are wrong and I'm a goddamn medical marvel, but I think we all know that's not true and this is going to hurt like a motherfucker when it's actually time. So clearly it's not time yet.
Everything is basically ready though! And you know what smells good? Baby laundry detergent. I just want to smell that all the time, but I think that would be weird, to smell like a baby. Unless you were a baby, obviously.
I feel like I just bored myself talking about this, so I've got to imagine it's pretty boring for everyone else. Let me tell you though, if you get pregnant and then you're 38 weeks, you're going to remember this entry and then come back and re-read it. And do you know how I know that? Because I've reread old Facebook posts from people I went to high school with where I was like, shut the actual fuck up about your pregnancy as they were happening, but then now I'm like, oh wait, I am living this and trolling for information and don't think this means I like you or even really want to engage with you, but I appreciate your tendency to overshare because it gives me a good baseline.
Here are some things I've discovered about myself and/or Flynn while pregnant:
&. The TRON: Legacy soundtrack is one of the only things she responds to musically. This is obviously because she knows her name is Flynn. Even if she's named more for old TRON, whatever, it was exciting when we discovered that. WHATEVER IT MEANS SHE'S SMART (It's actually all Daft Punk that she likes, something with the bass, I think?)
&. She also hates any new Kanye, and wants to listen exclusively to 'All Falls Down' on repeat. This was the most recent music discovery, just a few weeks ago. She'll punch around to The Clash, but I think that's because the only volume I'll listen to The Clash on is, "Loud enough for every baby everywhere to hear, sorry, babies."
&. I used to hate breakfast and bacon was only good for sandwiches, but now I love breakfast and want to eat it all the time and bacon is like, wow, bacon is delicious (understatement?). I don't know if this is her or what, but BREAKFAST FOOD IS TOPS, GUYS.
&. I had a period where I really only wanted to eat Oscar Mayer all-beef, bun-length hot dogs and some sort of potato side. This seems to have passed, but I ate a LOT of hot dogs.
&. Potatoes. All the potatoes. But that's got to be me not her, because they've been my favorite food forever, so she was getting them either way. Best mom in the wooooooorld. I just really love potatoes.
&. I don't know, I feel like I should be remembering more about this pregnancy. I bought some lingonberry juice boxes from IKEA when we were in California because I'd been craving lingonberry juice from California, sort of.
&. I've eaten a lot of strawberry Pop-Tarts? This is in no way different from regular, non-pregnant life.
&. I miss scotch. And beer. And Red Bull. But true story: we were on our fourth ultrasound and I drank a Red Bull to try and get her moving. And it didn't work, but it was glorious, even if it used up basically my entire recommended caffeine intake for the day in one 8 ounce can. And sometimes I miss smoking a lot, which I know is a horrible thing to miss, and I won't go back to it, even after she's born, but it's just a thing and a truth.
I think what this is indicative of is that 30 years from now, Flynn is maybe going to have a baby and she's going to be like, "What was your pregnancy like, Mom?" And I'm literally just going to have to make everything up, every single thing, because I can't recount this for her. It makes me seem crazy.
The good news is, none of this kind of updating will happen while planning our wedding because guess what I give no fucks about? Planning our wedding. Boom.
I HOPE THE NEXT TIME I UPDATE IT'S BECAUSE I'VE HAD THIS KID, YOU GUYS