Alright, gametime. Let's do this.

Leeeeeeeeeeeeeerooooooooooy. Jenkins!

Glitter is the Trojan Horse of the Holidays

Admittedly, this is entirely unrelated to babies; but I need to get it off my chest.

Glitter. No, seriously, there's glitter on my chest and I don't know where it came from. It's under my fingernails, in my hair and there's a single speck of it on my cheek.

You can't wash it off, you can't pick it off, and you can't avoid it.

Me: Oh, look a delightful card from my [insert relative].

Card: Open me. Do it, do it now.

Me: *tear open the envelope in a way that abby says is "weird"*

Card: Muahahah! I have you now!

Me: huh. it's spine-up, and if I want that precious gift card guilt free, I have to handle the card, open and read it, and then act like the gift card is a secondary bonus to the love and affection scrawled on the card's inner folds.

Card: You will notice that my face is made of one gigantic snowflake, made of blue and white glitter.

Me: *Gasp*

I'm as guilty of giving glitter as anyone. It makes a card look classy and unique, like the pearlescent ice crystal it pictures. The problem is that once glitter passes through your door, it's harder to get rid of than some sort of lice-bedbug hybrid. It's easier to burn the carpet and bathe in turpentine.

The worst part is that it never occurs to me that I'm accepting that nice wooden horse until hours later when I find a few shiny things in a bowl of malt-o-meal.

Hearts, Stars, and Horseshoes; Clovers and Oh-my-god-another-damn-sparkle!

Sadly, at some point someone told the entire holiday based industry that 'tis the season to bedazzle. So everything is a logjam of twinkle and cheer, used interchangably. Ornaments, cards, Puff Paints, cookies, baby powder, wrapping paper, toilet paper, kitsch; if it's holiday themed, it will leave an unremovable legacy.

I think I like that I'm going to be reminded of the holidays in a few months when I find glitter at the bottom of an infrequently used glass.

Merry Christmas

I was going to try to write a big holiday post and rhyme thematic words such as stocking, nutcracker, and Organized Crime. However, as I started writing I realized that I'm n vacation, and that sounded like a lot of friggin work. Instead, I'm going to list off a few of the things that have developed, as we're getting close to the "Yank Day." By the way, I'm totally going to put that on the birthday cakes until the girls learn how to read. "Happy First Yank Day!" Actually, that could backfire...

Anyhow, the scheduled C-section is on the 28th, and we're plunging right into the face of it. If we make it without the celebrations triggering a bad case of nature, we'll have beat the twins average by almost 4 weeks.

Our parents are worked into a fine lather about these babies. It's understandable, as they're the first grandkids on either side. It's delightful, and endearing. If we play our cards right we may be able to swing 5 "date nights" a week.

The tree is up, and it looks lovely. As we were buying it, the teen working for the tree farm helped us fine a beautiful, and he claimed, long lasting tree. He then loaded it to the car and tied it down. Only as he awkwardly put his hand out and said, "Merry Christmas" did I realize we were probably supposed to tip him. Neither of us carry cash very often though, and I panicked. It flitted through my head to offer him the Safeway coupons I had clipped and stashed in my pocket for dinner makings. I quickly decided that would be bad form. My mind went blank, and I could come up with was, "Uh... Yeah... Go Jesus." shook his empty, pine tar covered, hand and got in the car. We debated getting cash at the grocery store and going back to tip him the accustomed couple bucks, but decided he probably had already written us off as ungenerous jerks and moved on with his life.

Abby has started swelling more often now. When she's up and moving it's the legs. When she's laying down or napping it's the hands. Most of her day is spend delicately balancing the fluids in her extremities. I imagine it as a teeter-totter with overstuffed bags of ground beef on either end.

We're both very ready to not have pregnancy as the defining characteristic of our lives. I suppose it with be replaced very shortly by parenthood, but that supposedly is "emotionally rewarding" and "biologically imperative." Also, it's not like watching an A&E prime time special on battered women with terminal diseases.

Regardless, we're doing well, and there's no babies yet. If we don't talk to anyone this holiday season it's not because we're trying to insult your honor, it's because we don't think you're important enough to talk to. Not really, it's probably because we're elbow deep in mustard colored poo.

Toil And Trouble

Abby has realized that as she's getting close to delivering, she's getting puffier. Puffy isn't the same thing as big, fat, or rotund. I want to make that very clear; she's a svelte and shapely person, that just happens to have a pair of stowaways.

As a result, she decided to finally take off the wedding ring. She did it to avoid all sorts of things that could happen if she swelled up and couldn't get the ring of with the normal combination of spit and pulling. Some gruesome examples include, but are not limited to:

-Finger amputation

-Gangren

e

-unsightly sausage fingers

-having to cut the ring off

-Loss of ability to play the piano

-Loss of

ability to give a proper high five

Anyhow, she decided that it was time to finally put it away. I have to give her credit, she ditched her other rings a couple months ago, but "Valued our bond" (groan) so much that she was reluctant to take it off. Plus, the guys at the Applebee's bar wouldn't hit on her as much without the wedding ring.

Pictured: Proof I'm a good Husband... oh hey, can I buy you a drink?

So she globs some slobber on her ring finger and gives a gentle tug to get it to slide free. No dice. It's worn out a delightful rut, and begun to integrate into the matrix of her hand-flesh.

Ok, no problem, we'll just throw som

e hand soap on there to help it slide up the proverbial hill. Sadly, being an engineer I know that thinks don't tend to slide up hills. I do not mention this though, as I don't think she's in the mood for a newtonian physics lesson.

Soap is unsuccessful, and now her finger is swollen from being rubbed, abraded and squeezed. Cue the anxiety attack.

A: "It won't come off."

M: "Don't pick at it, and calm down, it's ok."

A: "I can't calm down. My finger is goign to pop, there's too much blood in it!"

M: "I doubt that's true."

A: "Shut up. Look at my finger."

M: "Holy smokes, there's too much finger on the end of your finger. You could pick your nose while you pick your nose."

This is a joke about this.

After some research (By research I mean googling "How the crap do I get my wedding ring off?") Abby was sitting with her hand in the air holding an icepack for a few minutes. Then, she went all Lady Macbeth on that ring and she got out that damn spot.

End of story: her ring finger is bruised and scratched, the ring is safely stored, and the Gestation continues.

Cocked Pistol

Ok, I'm not sure how long we're going to be able to handle the "imminent" thing.

I feel like I'm watching a little kid playing with a jack in the box. He's turning the crank really slow though, so it's not a tune, just the occasional "ping" of a tang slipping free, signaling progress is being made. It's going slow enough that you can't readily tell where you are in the song, but you know a big smiling joker face is going to come flying out at you soon.

The main difference is that ours has two little jokers slammed in there. A womb full of surprise. Waiting to pop. And the suprise we're waiting for is going to be covered in blood and slime.


I guess that's not that out of the ordinary for clowns.

Alternate jokes (I couldn't decide):
-"I think the birthday planner misheard my desire for a juggling clown"
-"C-Sections! How do they work?"
-"Ladies and gentlemen, I present Violent Julia and Harper 2 Dope."
-"Congratulations ma'am it's a social deviant."
-"They certainly seem interested in breast feeding."



In addition to playing chicken with Abby's biochemistry, we've spent a lot of time updating people on the lack of activity. Quite a few of our friends and relatives seem to be at DEFCON 1 and are just waiting for the call from the president. Abby gets at least three calls and 2 emails, and a handful of Facebook messages asking if we have babies, how she's doing, or making sure we'll let them know when it happens.

We're working on figuring out the logistics of getting people in to see us , without overwhelming the room's heating/cooling systems, the post-op patient or the frazzled new father. We'll try to let everyone important know when we have babes in hand. (There's got to be a joke about two in the bush here, but I can't pull it together.) As things develop, we'll try to put the information out through reasonable channels.

Holy Crap.

At our last appointment, the doctor told Abby she's likely to deliver, "Within the next two weeks."

Then, today, he said she could pop any moment. My first response was:

Holy crap, holy crap, oh shit, oh F*#k.
Wait... No... yes, holy crap.
Ok, calm down, breath.
Ok, I'm doing better now, wait ... nope, oh crap, oh shit, holy crap.

But then I though about it, and we're pretty ready. She's very tired of being pregnant, and I'm ready to play nurse for a post-op patient, getting better everyday; instead of taking care of someone slowly declining and constantly finding new depths of discomfort.

At the appointment she had put on 4 pounds since last week. Then today, she had put on another 4 pounds. As far as we can tell, it's all gone to the babies. However, her rate of growth is amazing, it feels like I can see a difference just after being at work all day.





"Oh my goodness, You're radiant!"






But, she's holding on like a champ. A prize fighter, coming up from the lowly welterweights to fight for the heavyweight belt. (I'm not sure where boxing weight classes cut off, so I hopefully didn't say she started off fat.)