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Finding The Happy

Looking for joy in all the right places

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November 2010

Do not operate heavy machinery when grouchy

…as this will likely result in angst. Such as running into the back of a shiny silver ooh-I-import-all-my-bits-from-Europe Volvo while in your 1998 Mazda 323.

When grouchy from shopping and hormones, and tired from growing an entire nervous system, do not attempt to second guess what driver in front is thinking when trying to filter into a main highway. Do not, for instance, assume that he will commit to driving off once he’s made all sounds and actions of doing so. And then do not assume that you can take off from a standing start while inclining your head to oncoming traffic, only to be able to stop in time when said driver in front has changed his mind because he is a numpty and cannot recognise an empty road stretching out before him, even if said expanse of space came up to him and yelled, “You can move now!!!”.

Also, do not be a silly git and jump out of the car to apologise, BEFORE belatedly remembering that you are mad with him for being so indecisive. However, it is good to keep calm and take plenty of photographs with your camera phone, and not to return with a glib gibe – no matter how tempting – when other driver gleefully tells you that he will make a claim from your insurance because he gets cars running into the back of his behind all the time, “and the insurance people are about to increase his premium”.

Try not to feel too embarrassed that you and said driver are the poster children for Bad Asian Drivers everywhere as you stand there in broad daylight with camera phones in hand – you a Bad Asian Lady Driver from Singapore, he from China.

Work on appeasing even grouchier husband who will be sorely inconvenienced during the Christmas break – and $450 poorer.

Tell all your friends, so you can learn to start laughing about it. And then praise God that it was only a tiny tap, that you were taking off in first, and that nothing horrible happened while operating heavy machinery when grouchy.

Sartorially challenged

Okay, so Canberra is the absolute nadir of maternity fashion. Seriously.

I just spent about 3 hours scouring shops for comfy-but-chic work clothes (thinking ahead here…), and am left with the following conclusions.

  • Ratio of baby to expectant-mother paraphernalia – 8 kabillion to 1
  • If you’re pregnant and want to buy lovely clothes for yourself, you’ve got a better chance of wearing a size 14 dress or a Sheridan bedsheet. (1,000 threadcount. Comfy.)
  • Great kitten heels that don’t look daggy: Diana Ferrari. (Okay, so it’s not all bad.)

I also had a squiz at other maternity blogs that use the phrase “yummy mummy”. Chanced upon this one, and now realise that I do NOT qualify as being a yummy mummy because I don’t spend anywhere near enough dollars on “high end fashion and shoes”. Tony probably thinks this is debatable, but as I’ve just discussed – we live in Canberra. There ain’t any high-end fashion and shoes to swing a cat at.



So now I’m wondering what else rhymes with Mummy.

Crummy.

Dummy.

Gummy.

Rummy.

Hmmmmm.

“Look, ma! No tail!”

Blob is now looking less Tadpole, more Cashew Nut by Dali. Congratulations, kiddo.

Also, did you know that “‘fetus” means “little one” in Latin? Forshizz.  This is the first week that Blob gets to be called a fetus officially, and stops becoming an embryo. Sneef. They grow up so fast.

Today was also the first day I felt green pretty much the whole time I was at work. It came and went, but there goes my theory about nausea starting from mid-afternoon. I’m hoping it’s just a one-off. It’s one thing to feel uncomfortable during the remaining 3 hours of the work day. Quite another when you’re reviewing work and want to barf. Just sending completely the wrong signals here.

Met up with Fertility Friend last night for coffee, and spilled the beans. FF is a treasure trove of baby trivia, and has the gift of condensing complex biological processes in 10 dot points or less. Already, I’m given names of competent obstetricians and websites and tips on reading up about baby routines and the importance of progesterone during gestation and how there’s this other bunch of pregnancy supplement pills that completely kick Elevit’s shiny beige butt.

Best of all, she was completely delighted for us. And knew that Mama Wear now has a 40% discount because they’re relocating.

On a completely different note… my colleague recently bought a new pad with his partner, and just learnt that their new neighbour is a Ralph model. Which is such a great reality check for me because until this revelation, I figured they’d always lived on magazine covers.

The things you realise you don’t think about, until you do.

Links from FF:

The ones who’ve been there, done that, lived to tell

So it’s probably not the best idea to read labour horror stories right now. Because all I can think about now are words like “pain”, “trying not to swear”, “tearing” and “stitching”.

But I chanced upon this old blog and read the gruesome details of an actual birth with morbid fascination. And yes, I know it’s all worth it at the end, but geez. Now I’m thinking about who I can call if Tony passes out in the middle of stupendously ouchy contractions, or if I can single-handedly bundle an unconscious grown man into the back seat, and then blitz down Tuggeranong Parkway to Woden in a 13-year-old manual car, while dilated at 6cm. You know, just in case Calvary’s maternity ward happens to be on fire.

But then I read the blog the husband built, and his thoughts about the days ahead, and then it was meltsville. See, this is why fathers-to-be should blog more.

Power plums

Because anything that can mitigate nausea deserves to be recognised as having “limitless magnificence”.

Emo Demo

To add insult to injury, my latest party trick is to get rather weepy over everything and nothing.

Skip ahead to Kaz Cooke’s chapter on baby distress leading to emergency C-section, and my eyes start to water.

Watch Hamish Blake cradle the tiniest puppy dog on Talking About Your Generation, and the corner of my lips start to droop.

Oprah gives away the latest VW Beetle to each and every one of her 275 show audience. I whimper.

Seven o’clock news bulletin about a world gone mad – the usual, really. But I’m about prying my eyes open with toothpicks to keep from openly sobbing.

Cerebrally, I’m writhing on the floor in humiliation from the emo overshare, and on occasion, can just feel myself tipping away from the right side of The Reasonable and Proportional Response. Which only makes me get even tetchier for living up to the World’s Oldest Cliché of a blubbering, hormone-riddled pregnant woman, but hey. Don’t knock the stupefying power of raging hormones. It’s the same as the Sudden Drowsy – hits you like a drug, and before you know it, you’re curled up in bed sound asleep before most seven-year-olds, or dabbing your eyes in the name of “hayfever” because someone might have been an absolute cow to you at the shops. Whatever.

Paradox

I feel nauseous AND hungry, hot AND cold and… yogurt! *nom nom nom* bleah

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