i backed my car into a cop car the other day

The beginning of pregnancy is a lot like starting a new job. You know you should probably understand what's going on, but you have no idea what's happening. There's a whole new vocabulary full of terms that don't make any sense (morning sickness), and you realize you probably should have done some more research before your first day. I should have known how to work a computer before starting my job, and I should have known basic anatomy before creating new life. The day I saw the + on the p-test, I called a nurse and asked her forty-five minutes worth of questions. I asked her to tell me all the rules of pregnancy. There are a lot of rules. And then I asked her what to expect, and bless her heart, she tried. The term "expecting" is hysterical, because so far nearly everything about this adventure has been unexpected. I won't go into details about the all these special changes because I don't want to alienate the male readers more than I already have, and no one wants to read about the embarrassing noise I made in public yesterday. (Oh man, see what I did there?) It's all exciting, because as embarrassing as the noises are, and as badly as I hate broccoli lately, and as grouchy as I get at about 10:00p.m., it all means that there's a little nubbin of a human growing within. That's all I really have to say about that. Peace.

you float like a feather

Our GPS, who we've named Madge, is losing patience with us. We try really hard to follow her directions, but sometimes we mess up (allegory much?). When we make a wrong turn I swear the volume increases and in a curt tone she says, "Recalculating," then in complete exasperation she sighs, "When possible, make a legal U-turn." I'm just waiting for the day when Madge says, "You're hopeless, buy a map." Or maybe if she gets really annoyed, "Drive into oncoming traffic you incompetent fools."

you need to change your name

I heard that Mitt Romney was going to be at Hires Big H, which made me crave a Big H. So while in Salt Lake we parked in the car hop lot and turned out lights on. While waiting for the waitress I said to Stephen "Mitt will be here tomorrow" so that he would be impressed with my political knowledge. And he was impressed. Then when the waitress appeared Stephen said, "Hey, we heard Mitt will be here tomorrow," because Stephen is friendly and enjoys making conversation with strangers, unlike myself, since I usually mutter "Thanks for the onion rings" and avoid further eye contact. "What? I haven't heard anything about that," the waitress said. And I felt like such an idiot. Serves me right for trying to impress my husband with the political knowledge I've never had. Slowly I chewed the onion rings, feeling fully defeated and embarrassed. The waitress was probably telling the entire Hires staff about the blond in the Honda Civic making up lies about presidential candidates. Then she returned to the car and said, "You're right. He'll be here tomorrow at 3:15." CHA-CHING. I'm the most political savvy person the world has ever known. Or maybe just the world's biggest Hires fan.

i aint got no crystal ball

He keeps running into walls. He forgets that he has to hold his head up and ends up toppling over as the cone drags on the carpet. He tries scratching his ear but scratches the cone instead. He keeps growling with frustration. It's the funniest/saddest thing I've ever seen.

And now news from the baby growing front: Baby loves cold pizza and everlasting gobstoppers. Baby hates vegetables and chicken. I love sleeping ten hours a night.

don't underestimate

One of the worst things about puppies is their totally trusting nature. Ollie thought that we were just going for another fun car ride, one of his favorite things. And because he's so trusting, he never suspected that we were headed to the Pet Hospital, and that he was enjoying his final few minutes as a true boy puppy. I tried explaining to him why it's necessary to have this particular procedure done. That he's really not in a great position to be a father. That it will prevent disease. That it will really improve his relationship with other dogs. But I just don't think I got through to him. 

George, we're bonding

I didn't really expect Doctor B. to help. I figured I'd tell him I was nauseas, and he'd tell me to bathe in turnip juice, stand on my head, eat only ginger, or just deal with it, because in the words of Bren, Juno's stepmom, "Doctors are sadists who like to play God and watch lesser people scream." But not Dr. B.
"I'm nauseas," I told him.
"I'll write you a prescription," he said IMMEDIATELY. He didn't even ask if I'd tried bathing in turnip juice or standing on my head or eating only ginger. He didn't tell me to wait it out or buck up. That blessed man, like me, is a believer in pills. And now I credit him with my every happiness because today I am medicated and walking on sunshine. I'm smiling at every stranger and laughing at every joke and I haven't gagged once.

meg is preg

Over the past two months I've developed some super human powers. I can smell even the faintest smell, whether it be spoiled milk at the other end of the grocery store, the garlic bread you ate yesterday for lunch, or the Vietnamese restaurant a block away. I can vomit on command. Really. It's awesome. I can also fall asleep on command. And finally, perhaps the most supernatural of all, I've become two people in one. There is actually another being growing within my abdomen. I know. It's unbelievable.
Stephen has become somewhat of a hero, picking up the slack since one of use (read: me) really isn't carrying their weight around the house. He's a master vacuumer, dish doer, take-out food-picker-upper, and all around moral supporter.

We're both thrilled to announce that Baby Walter is due January 30.

have a heart

Oliver loves cheese. At the sight of cheese he starts doing every trick he knows in the hopes of being rewarded with a morsel. If that doesn't work, he barks his desparate bark. The desparate bark is long and howlesque, and really sad. And then he looks at you with his desparate look, as pictured. Ears back, eyes wide, body ready to jump at any snack that should be tossed on the ground. If none of these techniques work, he walks away, snorts, and shoots dirty looks from the other side of the room.

business or pleasure

I never know what to think when the patron ahead of me in line to buy groceries looks back, gives me the up and down, then reaches for the divider to place between their food and mine. Even if I was the sketchiest of sketchy grocery buyers, and even if I somehow managed to sneak my groceries into their pile and get them to make my purchase, how would I proceed to retrieve my items? Reach in their bags when they aren't looking? Follow them home and take the groceries from their pantry? Punch them in the face and grab the pineapple juice while the lay writhing on the ground? Sounds like a lot of work no matter how I slice it. Kind of like pineapple. That's why I buy the juice.

so this is it then

I recently learned something about Stephen that I believe has brought us much closer as a couple and to a higher plane of understanding and equality. As a child, he too was terrifed of ET.
I think I watched ET for the first time at an age just slightly too young (my parents are not to blame for this, I'm fairly confident I snuck out of bed and watched it from the doorway of the living room). I now realize that ET is meant to be an endearing, sweet, and lovable friend from another planet. But when I was four, ET was the scariest, ugliest, most unholy creature to be depicted on film. I would close my eyes at night and ET's face with those bulging eyes and disproportionate neck would stare at me. And I would cry. Our local library had a poster of ET holding a book as part of the READ campaign (maybe you saw the Michael Jordan version). I saw it once and flipped out, then refused to step foot in the library again until Mom called and requested that the poster be removed from the wall. I reluctantly agreed to attend story time again, but only after thoroughly inspecting the empty spot on the wall where my worst fear previously hung.
It was a long time before I gave ET another chance. I think I was 15 before I sat down and watched the entire movie. And while I didn't have nightmares or check beneath my bed that night, I still felt unsettled and I haven't watched it since. There's just something not right about that dude. Does that make me racist? Or specist rather?

yesterday was thursday

Just a couple of things to help you get through today.

1. Muppet Annie Hall

2. Don Draper

You're welcome. Happy Friday.

it's fun for you

I lost a follower and as a result I've had so low blog self esteem lately. It's made me act like a nervous seventh grader. Like on Monday I posted and then removed the post thirty minutes later because I felt it was the stupidest thing ever written and no one would like it and I'm the worst. But I'm going to post it again because it actually took a significant amount of time to draw the chart.

I know. It's not mind blowing. But those lines are very straight, if I do say so myself.

cause i'm a creep

It took all of my brain prower and a solid hour of concentration during the latest X-Men installation to finally recognize Hank:

as the boy in About a Boy

When I see a slightly familiar face on screen it nearly kills me when I can't place it. I stop paying any attention to the story and focus solely on the single actor like a kid who has taken way too much of that study drug. I really couldn't tell you what happened in X-Men, but I'm satisfied all the same because I NAILED IT. Just in time, too, because SPOILER ALERT, about 2/3 through the movie Hank transforms into Cookie Monster/Sully from Monsters Inc. and no longer wears the adorable face that once sang Killing Me Softly in front of an entire middle school audience.

Bird is the word

Happy Friday

It doesn't come in a jar, bug juice comes from who you are

Sometimes I wake up with very nostalgic songs stuck in my head. This morning it was the Bug Juice theme song. Bug Juice was Disney Channel's first (and I believe only) reality show. It followed a group a pre-teens through their adventures at summer camp, and contained what was probably the most controversial occurance in Disney Channel history; Jessica was sent home from camp early. We never found out why, but my friends and I all had our theories (boys, drugs, espionage), and we talked about it for months. Bug Juice was second only to Heavy Weights in terms of aweseome media representation of Summer Camp. Oh wait...no...Salute Your Shorts was also pretty solid (and completed the Nickelodeon trifecta with Hey Dude and Clarissa Explains it All). And so were both Parent Traps. So I guess it's hard to determine the order of awesomeness in Summer Camp shows. They were all amazing. But does anyone actually go to summer camp? Or is it a fictitious world that exists only in art (Like Narnia or whever it is that the hobbits live)? And how tragic is it that I spent five years at a university studying the greatest writers and philosophers and I've spent the last two hours reflecting on the artisitc merits of Heavy Weights?

so come on, and bring your juke box money

I'm a much better dancer in my head than I am on my feet. My brain knows exactly what my body should be doing in accordance to any given beat, but there is some sort of nueron malfunction when the time comes for my limbs to execute on the orders given by the brain. The result is often catastrophic.
"Are you drunk?" Stephen asked while we danced at a wedding reception. I thought it an absurd question at the time, since I've been sober for 25 years. However I later saw a video of the evening and understood his query. My attempts to shake my booty looked more like the swaying of a town drunkard upon leaving the bar.
I started dancing in the living room and Ollie became extremely upset. He growled and barked his angriest bark and started attacking my feet. As soon as I stopped the dancing, he stopped the barking and went back to chewing a stick.
From what I can tell, my body trying to dance looks something like a tree trunk with four cooked spaghetti noodles attached, moving independently of each other with no particular rhyme or reason.
I guess I could blame my roots. The Scandanavians aren't really known for getting their groove on, cutting a rug, shakin what their mamas gave em, or what have you. More for knitting mittens and baking streusel. That never did my any favors at the Friday night High School dances.
Even slow dancing was often more disasterous than not. It was during "My Heart Will Go On" while my arms were draped over some poor boys shoulders that my nose started pouring blood. It was the most dramatic nose bleed Timpview High had ever seen. Blood all over me, all over the floor, and probably all over my dancung oartner. A janitor rushed me away to a room with a cold compress and surprisingly comfortable chair. The number of boys wanting to dance with me reduced dramatically after that evening.