One of these things is just like the other!





And be sure and check out Aaron's blog for some video of Z giggling!

Have I mentioned I have the best husband in the world? I certainly had the best husband in the room today, at any rate. Of course, there were only three, but I bet if there'd been more, he'd still have ranked right up there. Why?

Today we took a class called "Baby Essentials," so now we know, theoretically, how to change a diaper and bathe and swaddle a baby. Provided, that is, that the baby's made of plastic, doesn't move, and doesn't cry. Aaron did a fair job w/ the swaddling, but that wasn't what qualified him for the "Best Husband" award.

No, but here's what did: as the other couples straggled into the room, two, it turned out, knew each other from work. The wives greeted each other in those high-pitched, enthusiastic feminine tones; the guys, on the other hand, gruffly exchanged, "hi, how ya doin's?" There was talk of other classes the couples had taken, and one guy exclaimed to his colleague's wife, "You're makin' him do too much!" The words "dragged in by my wife" were uttered. And so on, like that. One insisted on taking pictures, with his cell phone, of the other dad swaddling and diapering, etc, to pass around work for the purpose of embarrassing him.

And this, friends, is why I had the best husband in the room. Aaron never once has complained of me "dragging him into" a class--he knows just as little about babies as I do, and is pretty damn excited about this whole baby thing, and is not too testosterone-laden to admit either one. I did all the research and scheduling, but he's right there with me all the way.

In Mr. Cell-Phone Camera's defense, he did pretty well w/ the bathing and swaddling and all, and asked a number of quite intelligent questions. Which leads me to believe that this whole "dragged in by my wife" thing is merely a smokescreen, so men don't have to give up their rough, tough, uber-masculine mystique. Oy. Mundanes.

The Creature has been extraordinarily active for the last several weeks. In addition to thumps and bumps, I sometimes get these long, protracted squimy motions, like he's rolling over. The kicks are getting stronger and more frequent, and often occur in several places at once. Either he's growing extra limbs, or he's simultaneously playing DDR and Guitar Hero.

The midwife said on Wednesday that everything is progressing normally, and my measurements are just right, though I seem to be gaining a bit too much weight--I'm up to a 35 lb gain already, which is supposed to be enough for the entire pregnancy! The baby, she siad, weighs about 3.5 pounds right now. He's turned head down, with his butt on my right side. We even got to hear his heartbeat speed up when he kicked, and slow down slightly when he stopped. :)

Once night I was lying in bed, spooned up behind Aaron, and got one of those mega-thumps. "Heh-heh," I giggled, "The baby's kickin' your ass."

Squee! Aaron felt the baby kick for the first time last night!!

Aaron: 15-inch Macbook weigh like brick. Bang on table.
Me: Why you not use articles?
Aaron: Not like. Articles bad.
Me: Why you not use auxiliary verbs?
Aaron: [pause] Not know what is.
Me: Ha! Why you not use pronouns??
Aaron: Pronouns evil. Stole lunch money. Vow revenge.

Why our child may never speak standard English:

Aaron: what clocks BPUGAO? what clocks plane zoom zoom?
Me: plane go zoom 10:30 clocks

All he needs is a pair of sandals and a magic lamp!

Conversation between me and Aaron last night:

Me: How come our silverware drawer is stuck open?
Aaron: Is it?
Me: Yeah, it won't close farther than this.
Aaron: Huh.
Me: I think this is a Boy Job. C'mon, you're an engineer.
Aaron: I do electrons.
Me: Well, maybe there are some stuck in the drawer.

Public Broadcasting Atlanta covers the local filk scene. And Aaron's in the video! (So am I, but only very briefly, singing with a group.)

He's gone and designed another Special Topics class!

I have the best husband, ever. That is all.

Rules here, if anyone else wants to play.

Questions from kitanzi

You are one of the busier people I know - I'm surprised that you do get sleep. How many hobbies do you have actively going now?

Well, they sort of rotate. Right now, let's see...choir, filking (on a very sporadic basis), dancing of various sorts, paper crafts, puppetry in the spring, costuming usually in spring and summer...Acting, if DCTV counts. :) There's reading, but that's more of a default state. Blogging, likewise; fiction writing once in a blue moon. Learning languages isn't a hobby, now that I'm going to school for it. :) There are probably more I'm forgetting...

Which of those hobbies would you choose to give up, if you had to give one up?

Well, I'm about to give up choir, but only temporarily. If you mean permanently...well, I've already given up fencing and archery, and I doubt I'll get back into those. Of the ones I do now? Maybe the paper crafts; that's not s bound up in my self identity.

You recently said that you taught yourself to be sociable - you've obviously succeeded. How did you do that, and what prompted you to?

The why is easy: I had to live up to Aaron! I didn't want people saying, "Wow, that Aaron sure is a nice guy, but what's up with that bitch he married??" ;)

The how is related: I learned by watching Aaron. He's a bit over the top sometimes, but I noticed early on that no one dislikes him. He has a knack for walking into a roomful of strangers and striking up conversations with everyone. He knows the barristas at three local Starbuckses by name--also their life stories, in some cases. It was a real revelation to me that you could regard people as people and not just obstacles. I had a lot early childhood conditioning to unlearn in that regard.

Given that you taught yourself to be sociable, do you consider yourself naturally an introvert or extrovert?

Given the semi-official definition I've read, I'd say I'm an introvert. Social time is lots of fun, but it doesn't charge me up, it runs me down. Eventually I need cave time to recharge.

Out of the many skills you've taught yourself (or learned from others), what was the hardest? what was your favorite? are there any you wish you hadn't bothered with?

The hardest: fencing, though I never really got good at that. Lindy is turning out to be the hardest dance form I've ever tried (and I'm not really very good at that yet either).

I have a hard time sticking with things I'm not really good at. When I was a kid, things usually came to me easily; when they didn't, it was socially embarrassing for the "smart girl" to show something was hard, so I just completely disdained anything that might require effort. So I guess the hardest thing I've learned is how to stick with something hard!

I wish I hadn't bothered with all that algebra last fall. :P

As a break from all the dance posts:

If you're on my flist but not Aaron's, go read this!

Aaron and I bundled up around midnight and went out for a walk through his parents' subdivision. The nearby highway was almost empty, and the houses were still lit up; one entire street was lined on both sides with glowing luminaria. As Christmas eve turned over into Christmas morning, we paused to kiss under a streetlamp, breath pluming in the cold night air.

To quote Robert Fulghum: "We came upon a midnight clear. The silent stars went by. And heaven and nature sang."

It's been that kind of holiday. Merry Christmas.

Conversation with airport security guard last night:

Guard: Sir, can I see your boarding pass, please?
Aaron: [sheepishly] I'm sorry, I sent it through the machine with my stuff. I do that every time.
Guard: If it's something you do every time, we'll need to break you of that habit. Big George! Bring the Big Gloves!
Aaron: [big eyes]
Joyce: [giggle]
Guard: At least you get the joke...most people just look at me.
Joyce: You're going to get yourself blogged about, you know. That's the price for that kind of humor.
Guard: [covering name badge]: My name's...uh, Fred!

As we collected our belongings and moved off, I heard him call to another guard, "No, no alarm!" He's going to get more than blogged about if he keeps that stuff up. But we found him amusing.

That wretched night shift made me feel like I hadn't seen my husband in two days. Sunday I'd been out all day (and he'd been sick), and when I got home I immediately went to sleep--in the upstairs bedroom, no less, so I wouldn't disturb him! He was still up when my alarm went off at 1:30, but I had to stumble around getting the IP phone and laptop set up, and getting a breakfast (?) snack into me. He did drive me to the doctor when my shift ended, but I was half asleep and loopy on valium besides...which is why I went to bed immediately when we got home. Then I got up, had dinner (?), and we rushed out the door to choir practice, after which--bed, again.

So yesterday, since I'd actually had a full night's sleep, I declared it to be Date Night. We went out to dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen, brought the travel Scrabble with us, and lingered long enough for me to whup his cute little *ss. Just like old times...Then we went home and exercised our conjugal rights. (We took in the trash cans and put out the recycling. Folded a little laundry, that sort of thing.)

Except the whales, it seems, save me.

Aaron is on the planning committee for an IEEE conference downtown this week (ironically, it's at the Marriott, one of Dragoncon's homes, but no one's in costume). Last night they hosted a reception in the Oceans Ballroom at the GA Aquarium.

Ooh, my favorite thing: loud music, conversation with strangers, eating while standing and juggling itty bitty plates. I was mainly off the hook for the conversation with strangers part, at least, since talking too much sets off more coughing.

But...Admiral! There be whales here!

One wall of the ballroom looks into the beluga whale tank. There are four of them, graceful, sinuous, majestic, gleaming white with aquamarine highlights as they glided through the water. They were like dancers, like birds, like angels...I was mesmerized. I sat myself down cross-legged where the glass meets the carpet, dabbling my hands in the reflected waves of rainbow light, and found all the soothing calm and peace I've been missing these last few weeks.

I want to get a year's pass to the aquarium, so I can visit the whales whenever I'm stressed. Put something new-agey on the iPod, find a comfortable spot, and drift away with them.

(This would mean finding time to get to the aquarium. I'll work on it.)

Because Aaron actually posted something!

Poor Aaron is sick. Not just sick, but dreadfully, wretchedly, vilely ill. He was in bed all day yesterday, and probably will be today also. I am sleeping upstairs in the hopes of warding it off, and hoping desparately he'll be well enough to go to DragonCon for at least part of the weekend.

Airborne in the morning, Airborne in the evening, Airborne at suppertime...