The Seversons

It has been over a week since the last infestation.  Besides a few minor skirmishes, it’s been mostly quiet.  Except for the bathroom, which has become a no-man’s land of sorts.  There are a small handful of them there, now and then I see one near the sink, there’s often a couple that are disturbed when you turn on the shower.  But you rarely see more than one or two, even if you’re looking.  This doesn’t mean I won’t still have some kind of attack there, I’ve found their place of entry and should I see an increase in forces, I will retaliate.

There used to be a few more ants in the bathroom.  I suspect their numbers have decreased not because of the ant trap I have in the corner, but because of a third party into this conflict.  A couple of days ago, I saw a sizable spider on the wall right next to the bathroom.  It was low, near the floor, just above ankle height.  It just sat there, it didn’t move, but it looked very intimidating.  I admit that every time I walked into the bathroom I was just a little concerned.  99% of me saw this spider as no threat.  But a persistent 1% was convinced that one time when I walked by, the spider would launch itself off the wall and land on my leg.  Not only that, in my mind, when this would happen, the spider would let out a battle cry, “Yaahhh!!”  (This isn’t the first time I’ve imagined bugs can talk.  Once in my parents house when a roach was living somewhere in my room, I imagined it humming to itself as it walked across my sheets at night.)

The next day the spider was gone.  I asked Eric if he’d seen it, but he’d never noticed it.  I told him I was worried that it was lying in wait somewhere, waiting for an ambush.  He didn’t take me very seriously.  But sure enough, the next day, after Eric left for work, the spider was back.  Except now it was on the door frame on the OTHER SIDE of the entrance to the bathroom.  Once this happened, at least 10% of me was now convinced that the spider would hurl itself at me.  I even walked a little faster every time.  The spider has disappeared again, and I’m only a little relieved.  There have been a couple other smaller spiders in the apartment as well.  Perhaps the word has gotten out among the spider population that there are lots of yummy ants in our bathroom?  And yes, if you’re wondering, I definitely watched Arachnophobia too many times as a kid.

In non-bug news, Eric just had his last day of his medicine rotations today.  Next month he’ll switch to an outpatient rotation and he may actually have weekends off.  Shocking!  Congratulate him if you talk to him for making it through a rough couple months.

And now for my obligatory pregnancy-related paragraph.  You’ll be interested to know that the Nugget has graduated.  For weeks, Nugget has been compared to a fruit for size.  A blueberry, a raspberry, a grape, a fig, a peach, an apple, etc.  We’ve wondered what’s going to happen once they get bigger.  Will it be a cantaloupe nugget?  A watermelon nugget?  But as of yesterday, the Nugget is now a vegetable.  It is an avocado Nugget.  Which just makes me hungry for an avocado, sprinkled with a little salt and pepper.  And since everyone is always asking, it’ll be another month until the big ultrasound.  Don’t worry, you’ll all know as soon as it happens.

Perhaps you’ve seen some of the satellite pictures from the inauguration floating around on the internet.  Pictures like this one:

It was a familiar sight to me by the time I saw it yesterday evening because it looked so much like something I saw yesterday morning.  Except when I saw it first, it wasn’t Washington, it was my kitchen.  And it wasn’t bunches of people, it was bunches of ants.  I wish the ants had a good reason to be in my kitchen, maybe they had some kind of big celebration going on, too.  However, if it was some big party, it ended tragically with many deaths.

I wish this was the first time I’d seen such a sight, but sadly it was the third.  Our building apparently has an infestation.  And despite two visits from the exterminator (who is very nice) they keep finding new ways to get in.  It’s kind of like there’s some valuable diamond in my kitchen and the ants are a crack team of spies and criminals who will not be stopped no matter what security measures I take.  According to management, the ants seem to be getting in the building by way of some tree branches hanging on to the roof.  Allegedly, they’re going to get rid of the branches and this should stop everything.  However, I still wake up every morning with trepidation, wondering what my kitchen will look like now.

I was particularly annoyed that they chose Tuesday as their big day.  Eric had been home on Sunday and Monday, and if he was around I would have avoided my third go of wiping up ant carcasses (not my favorite job).  And I actually had plans on Tuesday, so I had to hurry up and get to the store to get my ant fighting tools so that I could have the kitchen in at least a little better shape before I left the house for the day.  My previous ant killing jobs were much more limited and required only Windex and paper towels.  (The exterminator taught me this trick.  He says the ammonia kills them pretty effectively.)   Windex wasn’t going to cut it on Tuesday (remember, we’re taking inauguration-level infestation) so instead I had to go for the hard core ant-killing stuff.  I was very careful, and limited my spraying to the one major inlet into the kitchen, leaving ants in the laundry room safe to live another day, but it seemed to work.  I have a few traps out now, though I’m not overly confident that they’ll do any good.  And the exterminator will probably be back tomorrow to try and cut off their new way of entry.

I could tell how badly the ants had taken over my life last night when I was laying in bed talking to Eric and the moles on his arm looked like ants.  Any speck of anything I see now looks like ants.  Yes, I’m a little paranoid.

As for other news, I’m feeling better since my last entry in the mental health department.  Eric was home a lot for a few days.  I have actually left the house a few times.  I have my knitting going (almost finished, I think).  I did something social.  And I have started the ball rolling on volunteering at a museum not far from my house.  (I think it will be extremely fun.  It sounds like I may be able to run tours of some exhibits.)  I also spent an entire afternoon and evening getting a bunch of baby-prep stuff out of my system.  I have picked out the crib and the stroller and all kinds of fun things.  (I say fun in a completely sarcastic way.  I am not a shopper.)  The hardest thing, actually, was going through crib bedding.  Apparently there is some rule that crib bedding has to be really ugly.  They also don’t seem to have received the memo on how boys can like things besides trucks and girls can like things besides flowers.  I looked for more gender-neutral things and weirdly, they are almost all brown.  I don’t like brown, but apparently brown is the big thing in babies now.  I finally narrowed it down, then submitted what I had to Eric, who I knew would probably throw them all out with his insane picky-ness.  He did agree to one.  So now we just have to hope that the one kind of bedding we like is still around for purchasing once we actually get around to purchasing it.  (I know when it comes to these types of baby things that some people will now be dying to know what the bedding actually is.  So fine, here’s your link.  And yes, those are worms.)

If you are wondering whether Eric is still alive, I can assure you that he is.  He is 75% of the way through his medicine rotation, which has been pretty time-consuming.  He had a nice little break over the weekend, and I think he’s going to make it through these last few weeks pretty easily.  It’s actually been weird how much I can relate to the work he does.  I know very little about medicine, but his patients in an inner-city hospital are very similar to my clients as a public defender.  So when he vents about his patients, I completely get it.

In law-related news, I got my first grievance filed against me.  You’re probably wondering why I’d write such a thing publicly.  It’s actually surprising only because I spent two years working with prison inmates and criminal defendants and I haven’t had a grievance filed until now.  They tend to be pretty normal in that kind of work.  Mine actually came from a Texas client, which meant I wasn’t worried at all.  My practice in Texas wasn’t too hands-on most of the time (a lot of it was done via correspondence) and I left there over 3 years ago.  I received my letter from the Bar the other day letting me now that the grievance had been dismissed, and giving me a copy of it.  As you’d expect, it accuses me of conspiring with the Parole Board and the entire criminal justice system.  Obviously someone thinks I’m far more powerful than I am.   Then again, I think ants are conspiring against me so who am I to judge?

It can’t be a blog entry because I said I wasn’t going to make my blog all about pregnancy and that’s kind of the only thing I have to talk about today.  So let’s just live in denial for a little while.

I went to my 14-week appointment today which took about 5 seconds and the word of the day was “good.”  Everything is good.  And when I was asked if I had any questions, I realized I had hardly any.  This is weird.  Because in all my previous appointments I’ve had tons of questions.  And because I’ve been feeling more taken over by the pregnancy lately.  I feel like my life revolves around it.  I feel like it is the only thing my body is bothering with these days.  It’s strange.

I’ve spent a lot of the month so far in doctor’s offices.  I have been seeing a physical therapist to deal with some lower back pain.  It was kind of funny because as a kid I saw a physical therapist who told me that I had lordosis, meaning the tilt of my back and hips is over extended in one direction.  It’s been mostly corrected over time, but I’ve had problems with lower back pain throughout adulthood and I always figured it was just that pesky lordosis.  Except that now they’re telling me I’m not lordotic at all anymore, that the tile of my spine in that way is actually pretty normal.  And instead I have some problem with alignment.  It isn’t quite a shock of finding out I’m adopted or anything like that, but it does mean that I’ve been acting under an incorrect assumption for a really long time, which is kind of sad.

On Monday they put giant strips of tape on my back to help me get a “neutral spine.”  I think it worked surprisingly well, since I haven’t had any pain since then.  Except for the pain when Eric pulled it all off last night.  That hurt.  I’m doing little exercises and such, and I go back in for another appointment tomorrow.  The saddest thing about it is that I’d just found a really great exercise video for pregnant women and now I can’t do it.  My lower body exercise can’t get more vigorous than walking (and not on an incline) or the stationary bike.

I am still able to eat, though I still feel just slight twinges of morning sickness now and then.  It’s still hard for me to eat veggies, though I’m making strides.  But food is definitely the biggest thing where it makes it seem like pregnancy defines my entire existence.  I eat all day.  I don’t eat much, but it’s relatively constant.  So my existence seems like little more than constant monitoring of my hunger, followed by eating, then back to monitoring, followed by more eating.  It is a full-time job.

Speaking of jobs.  I am bored.  And lonely.  Eric has a rough rotation this month and he’s been coming home pretty late and is exhausted by then.  I am not teaching this month or next month, so I have little to do.  I am knitting and reading and such, but it’s getting old.  I’m trying to take active strides against it.  I’ve put in an application to work as a volunteer at the Margaret Mitchell House, which should be way fun and pretty low-impact and have lots of sweet old ladies.  I’ve also signed up for a cooking class on basic knife skills, which I’ve wanted to take for a super long time.  When I make stir fry it feels like I spend hours chopping and I hate it, so soon I will be chopping up a storm.

I have also (finally!) started to see people again.  I have 3, count them 3, people that I’m planning to hang with (or planning to plan to hang with) in the next month or so.  Still, I do feel rather support-system-less.  I have kind of an absence of friends here.  And the internet is not going to do it, especially if I feel like venting about pregnancy stuff.  Pregnancy forums and websites on the internet remind me of the Disney Princesses.  They’re all cheery and peppy and there are lots of little decorations everywhere.  It all makes me want to puke.  Surely there are intelligent women out there bonding and exchanging information without having a pregnancy ticker at the bottom of every post.  So instead I’m just making an effort to be more social in my very limited circle of friends.

And I’m venting on my blog.  I am having trouble tying my shoes.  There is simply no comfortable way to do it.  I feel like there is an apple-sized rock stuck in my abdomen somewhere and it makes every position uncomfortable.  My sleep is all weird and messed up, alternately crazy deep or far too light.  And I’m trying to make myself not look forward to when I’m actually obviously pregnant, I’m trying to remind myself that this is supposed to be the good time when you’re not miserable.  But instead I feel all lump-ish and insanely bloated, and look forward to when I will not look chubby but pregnant.  I have very little energy, which sucks because what I really should be doing is unpacking the leftover stuff that still needs to be unpacked.  And I am only at 14 weeks!  I feel like I should be sitting pretty for at least another month, and yet I’m not.

I promise to try and keep venting posts to a minimum.  As you were!

With all the time on my hands the last couple months, what with the sitting and not moving for weeks on end, I have taken up a new hobby and started knitting.  This was an uphill battle.  Knitting is actually very easy but I have a bad history with it.  Since I was a kid I’ve been taught to knit several times and never really got the hang of it.  I was determined this time to actually figure it out.  I read books, I watched videos, and I figured I was doing okay.  To test out my new skills, I decided to make the easiest pattern available to me: coasters.  They’re very small, with only a few stitches on a row, and involve only the most basic knit and purl stitches.  I spent a whole day working on my first one and had to start over so many times I can’t even count.

Knitting and I had a rough start but the problem with these kinds of things is that once you think you’ve finally got the hang of it there is a danger of overconfidence.  My new project is making sure this does not happen.  I am making a baby blanket for my nephew, and if it goes well, there may be additional blankets for the Nugget.  I found a good, simple pattern and thought I could do it easily.  I’ve been working off and on for a couple weeks now and I’ve made a little progress.  Today I thought I really had the hang of it because I worked on my knitting while watching a Bergman film in Swedish with subtitles.  If that’s not multitasking, what is, right?

The gods of knitting must have seen my hubris because moments later I realized that I’ve messed up somewhere along the way and that the third section does not match the first two sections.  Granted, I already knew the first section was knit too tightly and the second too loosely and I was all proud of how the third section was finally going to be okay.  So much for that.  Still, it is a blanket for a baby, right?  Babies do not know the difference between stockinette stitch and reverse stockinette stitch so I think it’ll be okay.  And if you’re interested, here’s a sneak peek:

If you cannot tell, and it’s likely you cannot, those are supposed to be hearts.  And if you’re a knitter, you can probably see my mess-up with my stockinette/reverse issue.  But I’ll just assume that the rest of you think it looks perfectly acceptable.

Meanwhile, if you are as bored with the internet today as I am, feel free to peruse this fun little site.  It reminds me very much of a roommate of mine who left rude notes constantly that were completely obnoxious and yet littered with smiley faces.  (She always ended them with a cutesy “Gracias!”)  Kind of like this one.  Or this one.  I think one of the beauties of marriage is having a roommate who will not leave you annoying notes.

I’m taking a break in the middle of what promises to be a busy day since half my mouth is still numb, but I can already feel the onset of insane pregnancy hunger, so I’m waiting for the novocaine to wear off before I start chowing down.

You can probably tell already that my morning sickness is over.  Yay!  In fact, “yay” is nowhere near enough to describe the insane sense of relief that I feel.  Especially since it went away right before our trip to Mexico, where I was really looking forward to sitting around in my hotel eating Cheerios all day instead of chilling by the pool.  I’m actually pretty shocked, I was feeling so bad that I started to assume the worst.  Everyone tells you it’ll be over at 12 weeks, but everyone is always wrong when it comes to these things so imagine my surprise when I felt better at 12 weeks, almost to the day.  When Eric and I were renting a movie and I said, “You know, I think I want some chocolate,” we didn’t dare hope that I’d actually start feeling better.  But I did.

It’s been a busy few weeks since the last update.  Earlier this month I suggested to Eric that maybe, just maybe, our one-bedroom apartment just wouldn’t quite cut it when the baby came.  A day later we looked at bigger apartments in our complex, and within an hour we found one we liked and signed the papers.  Things like this tend to happen quickly with us.  It ended up being really lucky because we were given the opportunity to move over Christmas break, the only significant amount of time Eric has off for the next several months.  Moving within a complex sounds easy, but it ends up being weirdly complicated since you end up doing a lot of walking instead of just getting a truck.  To make matters worse, my morning sickness was in full strike mode so Eric had to do about 95% of the work himself.  I would sit on the couch and feel terribly guilty, so I’d stand up and try to help pack a box and then I’d remember why I sit on the couch all day.

I got better right at the end and was able to help out with the final steps.  And then the next day we left for Mexico.  So you can imagine the state of our place right now.  Empty bookshelves.  Empty cabinets.  A room full of stuff waiting to be unpacked.  A refrigerator full of condiments and nothing else.  But we’re very happy with the new place and I’ll spend the next few weeks gradually unpacking everything and getting it in its place.

We just had a lovely weekend in Cancun where Eric’s brother Lee and our new sister-in-law Elycia got married on the beach.  (For those interested in all of our pictures (even the weird looking ones) they are posted on our public photo page, the link’s on the right in our menu.  If you’re on bump-watch, you can go right here.  I have a highlight reel posted on my facebook profile.  And if you want the full versions, Eric can email a zip file to you.)  It was a nice trip, great to be with family, and lovely weather.  The wedding was gorgeous, of course, and Eric demonstrated that he took notes from the photographers at our wedding on the diagonal shot:

Side by side, he did quite the professional job, eh?  If this whole doctor thing doesn’t pan out, at least I know he could have a steady gig as a wedding photographer.  (P.S. Thanks for the new camera, Bob & Jeanine!)

Now that we are back home (which is almost a miracle considering how insane Customs was) Eric is back to the grind and I have a long list of errands, including washing several pots and pans required for the dinner I’m going to cook with the groceries I need to buy.  If you’re keeping track, it has been nearly 2 months since I last cooked.  It’s nice to be me again.   Once I get that done, I expect to make my cookbooks an early priority in the shelving that is to come.  In Mexico I was considering buying Mexican Vanilla, but when I did a little googling it looked like too risky of a proposition.  So instead, we stopped at the duty free store on our way out, bought some vodka, and I’ll be making homemade vanilla myself.  I’ll keep you updated on the probably-very-long process.  I’m already planning for these to be my Christmas presents next year, assuming all goes well.  Mostly I’m looking forward to buying large quantities of vodka when my belly is really huge.

I would like to ask my readers’ advice on one last dilemma.  Our new apartment is a mirror image of the old one, which is a little weird.  Our bedroom is flipped, and since I get the side of the bed near the bathroom, this means I’ve switched sides with Eric.  This would be no problem except that Eric has a sleeping disorder.  A disorder where he doesn’t understand that his side of the bed is his side and he always ends up on my side instead.  Before this was just a slightly annoying trait (especially since I’m a light sleeper who tends to wake up when someone whacks me with their arm) but now it’s a little more of a problem.  Now since I’m sleeping on Eric’s side of the bed, I’ve realized that he’s actually messed up the evenness of the mattress.  So on my side now, I sleep on an incline with the outer edge higher than the middle.  I am a little torn about what to do.  Should I stay on this side and wait for it to eventually even out the same way as it did on the other side?  Or should we rotate the mattress so I have my side back and let it get even more lopsided?  I am torn, but mostly I’d like us to be able to keep our mattress as long as possible and I’m worried that if I do the wrong thing we’ll have to get a new one sooner rather than later.  Any thoughts?