Coming Soon...

On December 3, The Dot returns with the final chapters in this epic saga (After his Dad finishes National Novel Writing Month)

See you guys soon!!!

12.03.08

THE DOT RETURNS

Singulitis: The spasmodic contraction of the diaphragm that repeats several times per minute.

Or for you laymen out there...

I had the hiccups the other day. 

Now, while I have had the hiccups on several other occasions, this is the first time that Dad was able to feel them. 

People...you have had the hiccups...you know how uncomfortable they are. Now, imagine being an innocent baby...floating around in your tiny little world, and suddenly you start these things, and can't seem to stop. It's pretty annoying, mildly uncomfortable, and completely undignified.

However, on the outside world, it is apparently a fascinating thing to behold. You can apparently feel me having little shivering hiccups through Mom's stomach, which Dad felt the other day for the first time. You can also see her stomach jumping around as I have my hiccups. 

Dad thought it was pretty awesome, and I even heard him laughing. Outrageous. You just wait until i get my driver's license, pal.

Laugh it up, people... apparently it's even cuter for you and more annoying for me when I get them on "The Outside..."

Something else to look forward to for the both of us.

A Pleasant Surprise & A Retraction...

It is not often that I am wrong. This is a fact that I, and others around me, have learned to live with. In fact, many around me thrive due to the fact that they can always count on the Dot being right...it's often I hear: 

"What do we do?" 

"Well, ask the Dot...He'll have the answer!!"

And yes...typically I do. Granted, my answer always comes in the forms of pre-birth gurgles, kicks and what-not....but I think that what I'm saying comes across as having a deep thought process that I can truly utilize later in life when I have discovered the power of speech.

And you know...when I've been born.

Anyway...really, I'm just waffling here...the fact of the matter is, I was wrong. In my previous post, I said that I would like a Teddy Bear...heck, I even said "Please"

Almost immediately, my people received two phone calls...one from Da Grandma....and one from my Mom...both were singing the same tune:

"You GOT two Teddy Bears at the baby shower thrown in your honor!" 

Suffice to say, I was chagrined, and I apologize wholeheartedly to the kind-hearted individuals, groups, or corporations that purchased these soft wonders for me. I am beyond excited at the prospect of getting to meet them. Know that I would never have asked for them if I had been informed in a timely manner of their existence...

Mom...Dad...I'm looking at you.

I have 2 teddy bears...life is good.

Also...

I would like a Teddy Bear, please. I saw one in my last post in that Tupperware, bassinet thingie...and I looked it up, and decided that I want one forthwith!! 

I predict that I will be a huge fan of stuffed animals!

Mom "Ease" Class

So, this past weekend, Mom and Dad took another class to try and teach them something that they can't possibly be taught in a classroom setting. Much like when one works at McDonald's, and are shown a training video that presents a world that CLEARLY doesn't exist, Mom and Dad went to a class which was, while helpful and very informative, showed them a world far calmer than the one they will probably encounter in merely a few weeks.

In a McDonald's training video, for example, there is typically only one customer in the restaurant at a time...they are ordering in complete,intelligible sentences, and the person behind the counter is answering in complete, intelligible sentences. The grill area is spotless, the employees are wearing clean and freshly pressed uniforms fit for the the pope to eat off of. 

The reality? No one on either side of the counter knows what's really going on...the grill is a greasy, chaotic mess, staffed by people who are greasy chaotic messes themselves.

Yes...that's what giving birth is all about, cats and kittens! Now, don't get me wrong...the instructor was fun, and had a lot of experience. She was

 also honest about how distasteful, gory, and unpredictable the experience could be. It was just funny to try and put something into a lesson, when the person teaching you admits that certain things "May not go this way at all" while others "Almost always happen this way"

Mom and Dad learned a lot, and Mom got some good massages out of it (Calm Mommy=Calm Me....get it? Dad...I demand more massages for Mom!)

(Dad got a lot of material for his planned book: "Your Baby Is Transparent! And Other Things No One Tells You About pregnancy." He has even planned a follow-up: "Giving Birth is Gross! Oh...and also kind of miraculous and beautiful...")Many of the partners were late to the class because something called "The G-20" was meeting in DC. In addition to that, there were people protesting members of this "G20" I'll tell you what...I don't think these people are going to actually get anything helpful done that warrants over two hours for Dad to drive just over 2 miles...I think Bush wanted to extend one last middle finger to a city he hardly actually spent any time in, before he leaves in January...

He (My Dad...not current President Bush) finally had to abandon the car and walk the rest of the way, which was not surprisingly much quicker. He looked a bit ridiculous walking past bar-goers in the GW University restaurant/bar district with two pillows and blanket in a huge bag for the class, which  never actually got used.

Dad is so silly sometimes.

Either way...Mom really wants to try and have a natural birth (Though, if my first breaths are taken in this world with a small cocktail tickling the ivories of my little brain, I wouldn't necessarily complain...) and they learned a lot about being able to do that. They felt better in some ways after the class, but were also a little scared. That's natural, I guess. Heck, I was a bit scared myself...I had no IDEA that I actually had to do a little work in this endeavor to get outta here...

The class also included a tour of the birthing wing which was fun. The staff seemed nice, and the rooms were nicer than they anticipated. There are also private bathrooms and showers in the rooms for Dad to get his Singing on...

Mom and Dad got a kick out of the "VIP" room, which costs, like, a billion dollars....Picture this if you will: A typical hospital room...slightly bigger, private, with a bed for Mom, a few chairs, a private bathroom and shower, and a view of the huge hole in the ground that is a construction site. Now....add slightly nice sheets, some kind of armoire, a couch, and cha-ching!!! That costs you almost $300 bucks a night.

Blech.

All in all, a great and very useful class....though Dad has already forgotten nearly everything, and I wonder if I am gonna make it through having him as a Dad...Though the hospital was nice, I am disconcerted by the fact that after I am born, I will spent my first days in, what is essentially, a tupperware container. Are you kidding me? Unacceptable.

And what's the deal with the creepy baby dolls being used as "examples" in these classes? First the CPR kid, now THESE??! Those things bug me out, and I know what I actually look like! Imagine they showed those things to people BEFORE they got pregnant? Outrageous! No one would EVER have a kid on purpose. They are clearly not designed by anyone who cares about what people think of babies...Ugh...I just got a case of the heebies with a  side of the jeebies...

And for God's sake...Please remember....the BABY goes here...

And The leftovers go HERE....

What's in a Name?

Yeah...that's right...I'm throwing down a little Billy Shakespeare for my peeps...

Speaking of my peeps...Several of my fans have pointed out that I alternate between calling my parental units "Mom & Dad" and "Mother and Father" in my posts. I even mix  it up by sometimes going so far as to calling them "Mom and Father" or "Mother and Dad" I may even call them "Chuck and Bob"

Are Chuck and Bob my parents' names, you may ask? And rightly so you would...you may even ask yourself...why would one decide to call two people by a bunch of random names in an effort to figure out what they would best be called. 

Well....I'm doing it because they're doing it to me! That's right. We're in the home stretch, people, and my parents have narrowed my name down to three. Their requirements were simple: It couldn't be in the top 20 for the past few years, it couldn't be on the upswing,it had to go well with the middle name, and while remaining unique, didn't get me beaten up. (Hello Apple...Hello Pilot Inspektor....OK, Pilot Inspektor is a pretty bad-ass name, I must admit.) 

Because fate works the way it does, Mom and Dad had a girl's name picked almost instantly. The name popped out and they both agreed, and it was settled.

What was actually settled was that they were then inevitably going to have a boy. Meaning that they would then have to continue the aborted discussion on boy's names which ended with "Ugh...let's just not talk about this right now."

So they have gone through about a dozen names that they both brought to the table, and even put them in an excel spreadsheet (Dad is not a geek....he's just geek-inclined. He assured me of this himself...) to be able to move them around and interchange them with different middle names. Once they got it down to just a few, Dad would actually put his hand on my mom's tummy, and ask for taps in reply to names that I liked. (Considering the fact that even I know that my taps are pretty random depending on which organ I want to lodge myself against) they abandoned this methodology fairly quickly. They may end up going into the delivery room with a few names and just seeing what I look like.

I bet I look like a wet, wrinkled infant that looks like every other wet wrinkled infant...but we'll let them keep thinking that it'll work out that way. ;)

I am also trying out an English accent in here, and believe that "Mother and Father" just sound better with the accent. If the accent works out, I may just ask to be named after Phillip Pirrip, the protagonist of Charles Dickens' semi-autobiographical novel "Great Expectations". I can then be called "Pip"...and how delightful would THAT be? I wouldn't get beaten up AT ALL!!

I have also been attempting an Irish accent, but it just sounds like a combination of Australian and Scottish. I think I'll stick with English, or if I must, North Eastern U.S....

For the record, I already know what my name is. I hope my parents guess it correctly.

01.20.09

I am coming into an exciting world, full of possibilities...

Never have I been more sure of that than now...

Even SQUIRRELS get it. Dad's friend Justin found this picture for him...I mean....

EVEN SQUIRRELS GET IT!!!