"If you write it, they will bitch."
A friend who is considering starting a blog asked me if I had any tips from my experience with Buttafly and this blog. The only thing I could think of was this: "If you write it, they will bitch." There are a lot of sensitive, angry little people in the world, and they all have internet access. There is no subject too pointless, no topic too ridiculous that you won't offend somebody by writing about it.
For those of you who have any doubts about that statement, read the comments from my posts about Tiffany and Fat Joe. Yes. It's true. There are people who get hysterical when you talk about 80s teen idols and Top-40 pop rappers. (One of my friends asked if I wrote those myself to have something to talk about. I swear, I did not. These people actually exist.) The best part is that for some reason these people tend to come back, thus providing endless entertainment for the rest of us. One wonders what the thought process is here. Perhaps: "I must now check this blog hourly so that I can jump in if she dares to speak of P.Diddy!"
And the offending message doesn't even have to come from you directly. You wouldn't believe how upset some people can get by a talking coffee cup, as I found out when I first posted the Oracle of Starbucks. For a while my name wasn't on it as author so people would write the Oracle directly. Some emails were just filled with expletives, some were stern admonishments that the Oracle's predictions were offensive, but my favorites were the ones that filled a couple pages telling the Oracle how completely inaccurate his assessment of their personality was. I realized then that if a picture of a coffee cup with a face drawn on it powered by a crappy PHP script could send people through the roof, anything was possible.
I like to think of this blog as a sort of living monument to that concept. One of the downsides of Buttafly is that other readers can't see all the emails I get. But thanks to Movable Type's fabulous comments feature it's like sharing my inbox with all my readers. The good, the bad, and the you-just-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it.
I'm really starting to like this whole blogging thing.
The Rockaway: Dumber than the Macarena?
Bad news, people. Remember the Macarena? That insidiously lame song with the too-stupid-to-think-about dance that reared its ugly head at every single wedding, office party or school dance you went to from 1995 to 1998? Remember how our only consolation was to tell ourselves that, yes, the human species has now hit rock bottom, but at least it can't get any worse? Well, it has.
Aptly named rapper Fat Joe has created a new dance called the Rockaway. Though the title says it all, he explains the dance moves in detail in his new single, Lean Back:
Said my [African-American friends] just pull up our pants
And do the Rockaway, now lean back, lean back, lean back, lean back
I said my [African-American friends] just pull up our pants
And do the Rockaway, now lean back, lean back, lean back, lean back
(Pardon my rough editing for decency. The original lyrics are much more eloquent.)
This song has been #1 on the Billboard rap charts for weeks. Has nobody else noticed that the Rockaway is just a discrete motion? It's just leaning backward. As a rule, if it's less complicated than the Hokey Pokey, it's not a dance. (It's amazing to watch them try to make it look cool in the video. The video ho's who look impressed and aroused while watching Fat Joe and his posse sway slightly in a backward direction deserve an Academy Award.)
OK, I admit, I'm just bitter that I didn't think of it first. Fat Joe can't maneuver his corpulent body to dance like the other guys at the club, so he gives a name to the limited range of motion he does have and makes millions. If I had known that this would actually work I would have been all over it years ago. I can't dance but I'm great at hovering by the bar and nodding my head to the music. This could have been the Drink 'N Nod, or perhaps the Booze Shuffle.
Maybe it's not too late. I'll end this post now so I can go work on my new dance, the Lie in Bed and Watch Seinfeld Reruns.
Finally, a true glimpse into motherhood
As I may have mentioned, I am the first of my friends to have a child and I've never been around babies or new mothers very much, so I don't really know what to expect over the next few months. But luckily our friends at Maidenform have an ad campaign going that offers an uncensored glimpse into the realities of being a new mother (click on photo to enlarge). I promptly showed this picture to my husband to prepare him for what I am going to look like when our baby is a few weeks old.
An obligatory update
So evidently sitting around and willing yourself to go into labor instead of updating your blog or doing anything else productive doesn't work. I still haven't had the baby (which I guess shouldn't be surprising since he's not due for three more weeks) but I definitely think the nesting instinct has finally kicked in. Now instead of just walking into my room to take a nap and watch mindless television I glance around and say, "Man, this place is a dump" first. That's probably about as much as I can expect to nest. Millions of years of evolution that have hardwired the females of our species to meticulously clean every square inch of their home before they have a baby is no match for my laziness.
On an administrative note, I had a fabulous new post ready to go but I think I'm going to have to skip it. In it I confessed that I'm not really a big fan of the New Kids on the Block's catalogue of work. But I think such crazy talk might be a little too heavy for some of my readers who get pretty flustered when you make negative comments about washed up stars from the 80s. Kudos to Ryan for defending Tiffany's honor, and I'll be sure to delete those half-finished posts I've been working on where I slam Silver Spoons for being too predictable and rail against Full House for not being upbeat enough.
Anyway, I have high hopes that I'll be productive this week, and hopefully that'll include a few posts to the blog. Stay tuned.
The 3rd Trimester: my chance to be the jerk I've always wanted to be
More random thoughts while running errands today...
After my slow, painful journey down Austin's one-lane thoroughfares I finally made it to the grocery store. In my cross mood I semi-accidentally cut off a little old lady with my shopping cart. To my surprise, my brusque maneuver was greeted with a deferential smile. I realized that now that I'm hugely pregnant my slot in the social hierarchy has changed, and I'm right up there with the elderly and infirm in terms of people feeling obligated to be nice to me. Sweet! I blew right by old men, women, and children without the usual niceties such as saying "Oh, no, you go ahead" through clenched teeth or not giving a death stare as I squeeze past people drifting aimlessly down the middle of the aisle. I might have been pushing my luck when I beat the guy in the wheelchair to the last jar of Mushroom Ragu though.
Now that I've realized this major advantage of the third trimester of pregnancy I'm looking forward to trying it out some more. I need to get my oil changed tomorrow; maybe they'll rip me off less than usual. And perhaps I'll sigh and do my best to look uncomfortable while rubbing my belly when J. and I go to a crowded restaurant with a long wait. Surely I can guilt some sucka into giving up their seat.
Who said the third trimester is all bad?
Planning a route to the birthing center
Random thoughts while running errands today...
I had my 35 week appointment at the birthing center today. It's a good 10 miles from my place, so I decided to use this trip over there to plan the best route for the big day. After timing my trip and thinking carefully about my options, I think the best ways to get to the birthing center when I'm in labor would be:
- Having Scotty beam me over there with the teleporter
- Being spirited through the clouds by winged angels
- Riding my bike
Thanks to the City of Austin's amazing road construction planning abilities, driving is not an option. Getting from where I live in central downtown to the major highway on the west side of town is a Homeric epic. There's laughter, there's tears, shattered dreams, frustrated ambitions, and occasional graphic violence (OK, only in my fantasies). And it seems like it never ends.
Both major east/west roads to get to the highway are under construction (6th St. and Enfield, for those of you who know Austin geography). But that almost doesn't even matter, because the road I would take to get to either of those roads, possibly the most major street in Austin (Lamar Blvd.) is down to one lane. Fascinatingly, none of these streets are being expanded. With Enfield they're fixing potholes, the 6th Street mess is for the new Whole Foods complex, and the Lamar construction is just to screw with us. (I'm positive that it's some 'burb-dwelling city council member's idea of a sick joke.) Each project in and of itself is pointless, but together they represent an unfathomable colossus of moronic management and lack of foresight.
If Scotty or the winged angels don't come through I need to read up on how to give birth in a car. Traffic will be worse then with UT back in session, and first labors only last a dozen or so hours. On the bright side, it is possible that my feelings about the road construction will distract me entirely from the pain of contractions. Rather than deep breathing I can just shake my fist and hang out the window yelling, "This road is down to ONE LANE for a few POTHOLES?!"
Who says I don't use my time productively?
I spend way too much time scrolling through the customer reviews of this product on Amazon. I submit that there is nothing funnier on the entire World Wide Web.
Best of the Inbox: Dukes of Hazzard
[Note: this is the beginning of a new category, Best of the Inbox, where I'm just going to copy amusing email exchanges. Perfect for a lazy blogger like myself. As always, read from the bottom up.]
-----Original Message-----
From: Chris B.
Sent: Monday, August 02, 2004 10:00 AM
To: J.
Subject: Re: awesome
Nor has Father Malboro or Father Jim Beam.
-----Original Message-----
From: J.
Sent: Monday, August 02, 2004 9:58 AM
To: Chris B.
Cc: xxxx
Subject: awesome
That's funny. Jen's response was, "Father Time has not been kind to Daisy."
-----Original Message-----
From: Chris B.
Sent: Monday, August 02, 2004 9:50 AM
To: J.
Subject: Re: awesome
Yikes. Daisy is looking a little worse for wear.
-----Original Message-----
From: J.
Sent: Monday, August 02, 2004 9:49 AM
To: Jennifer, Chris B.
Cc: xxxx
Subject: awesome
The Dukes of Hazzard are back!
http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/
I pity the fool who offers me ice chips
Last night I finished reading Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way for the second time. This is about the 1,000th childbirth preparation book I've read. One thing all these books have in common is that they're geared mostly for women who give birth in hospitals, since that's the norm, and since I'm going to a birthing center a lot of the tips don't apply to me ("What to Do When Your Doctor Tries to Give You an Episiotomy as You Walk in the Front Door").
Luckily for all involved, one of the main things that doesn't apply is the frequent suggestion of sucking on ice chips during labor. This is recommended for hospital births because they won't let you have any food or drink during the entire labor. Your body is in the middle of the hardest work it's ever done -- some of the hardest work a human being could ever possibly do -- and it may last for 10, 20, even 30 hours. What you need to energize you through this marathon of agonizing toil is not food or drink but some refreshing ICE CHIPS!
One book cheerfully suggests to husbands, "If [your wife] has been in labor for more than 10 hours she may need refreshment to keep going. This is a good time to offer her ice chips or a cool wash cloth to suck on. But remember, no food or drinks!" Sucking on wash cloths? Ice chips? I pity the fool who offers these options to me when I've been dealing with contractions for hours and hours. I cannot imagine the carnage that would ensue if I wanted food or Gatorade and was given a wet rag instead.
The no food or drink rule is as pointless as it is ridiculous. The "logic" is that if you had to have emergency surgery where they put you completely under (which is unlikely, even if you end up with a C-section), there is the possibility that you could choke on any food that's in your stomach. And what is that possibility? Well, in one study in the late 80s and early 90s, less than 2 out of 1,000,000 pregnant women in the U.S. died of any anesthesia-related complication (not just aspiration). Anesthesiology best practices have the doctors treat patients as if they have food in their stomachs either way so, unless your anesthesiologist is an idiot, you'll be fine in the unlikely event that you're put under.
Anyway, this is the type of thing that drove me to start considering a birthing center. I just can't stand the hospital mentality. My husband was fascinated by the decision making process because, once my researched showed that the safety factor would be the same at either place, it became a contest between spite and sloth. Which would win: my hatred of hospitals' unnecessary rules, or my hatred of pain and any sort of physical activity?
Well, spite won and I'm going to a place that can offer me nothing but good vibes to help with the pain of childbirth. (I should add that the decision was fueled by a lot more than spite, but that's another post.) So J. and my birth assistant needn't worry about being decapitated because the only thing they can offer me is ice chips.
...Although, now that I think about it, it could be an equally bad situation if anyone points out during labor that I gave up the option of an epidural so that I could have a glass of water and a candy bar.