Cravings (part 1) - Vermont /Boston

I'm 90% sure this is not the real Ben Franklin.

I was astounded when I realized that I think cravings have now crossed another dimension. Vermont provided us with a two fold opportunity to cross off 2 of 3 highly coveted cravings. The first which you might have heard was pumpkins and their descendants. This quickly morphed into eating anything fall related.
Pumpkins - Lattes (spiced and other), Pie
Apples - Pie, Cobble, weird B & B casseroles, Cider, donut

However these were to be expected, all but the shocker was the cold. I soon realized that we also were there to cool this pregnant person. While I was freezing in the sub 50 degree weather, Renee was making noises and running outside with no coat.

The video was taken from the Apple Barn (a ridiculously corny roadside stand) selling overpriced apple products to pregnant people. As you can see I was enjoying my time. The highlight came when we stumbled upon a semi-annual high stakes bingo tournament. Needless to say I made many Bingo faux pas but I thought we really needed to show some highlights.

Getting my foot dabbed.
Luck Trolls.
Almost winning 2K on a coverall.

Another Milestone

Today marked the day that I had to start helping Renee out with her shoes. When I finished putting them on and tying them she says the cutest thing ever. "Are you going to double knot them?" This felt like Captain Pickard had just warped us into hyper drive till I will have to tie the Nueffer's shoes. So once the shoes were on we were off to check out the city of Boston.

Renee's decisions are usually based around availability. I would like to issue Pumpkins and Lobsters a terrorist alert red. Also the city itself was partially selected due to climate. It was 50 degrees when we left and she was outside with a t-shirt making this noise of enjoyment. I was in 3 layers.

One other interesting thing about pregnancy is pillows. I thought that we where already at max capacity for pillows before pregnancy, but I was very wrong. As you can see by the photo that another body pillow was purchased for this trip. Now that is not so bad, but when we got our bags at the airport we had to wait another 15 minutes for a checked body pillow wrapped in plastic bags. At the same time a women comes behind us with wailing twins. I used to travel with a carry on.

These new bedtime friends presents a new way that I have to enter the bed. Its kind of like bed Tetris. I place one L - leg in there, try to put the weird two level block arm in around these things. You know when you have compromised the integrity of the system when you hear some "Hey what are you doing?". Once inside this contraption you will realize that it is designed to immobilize everyone involved. Night Night.

A monkey revisited...

This week was the ceremonial baby shower. This also gave me the opportunity to reflect back on some past moments during the pregnancy. I remembered a huge part of the early pregnancy partially based on this photo from the shower. I remembered the monkey. The delivery of the monkey calling/sighting is just as important as the actually event. A "Monkey" is when your Wifefriend awakes between the hours of 2-4 am and starts eating bananas. These monkeys were particularly abundant early on and have now been making a comeback during this final trimester. The only way to properly corral a monkey is to identify it by muttering monkey (munnnnnnnnnngkeeeeeeeeee). If you can't see a monkey it is easy to identify by sound. It sounds kind of like a T-Rex walking through a tar pit. You know when you have identified a monkey properly by a slight giggle and bed re-entry.

You may be thinking that these monkeys are comical, but let me assure you during the monkey's early stages of development they will experiment with many types of foods. The worst food in a monkey's diet for the mate is salted crackers. These young monkeys will tear through about 6 or 7 packs between midnight and 5 am and it sounds like someone is stealing your Christmas tree. One morning I woke up expecting to find an entire box eaten. However not a trace remained. These highly evolved monkeys instinctively cover their tracts and verbally deny any and all recollections of these events.

Guest star appearance

Finally we have received our first actual view of this little alien disturbance. She decided to show her face a little for the 3d/4d ultrasound. The excitement is definitely building and we have just attended our birthing class here in Atlanta. This provided me with a much needed dry run of what was going to happen. We did a very interesting exercise with an ice pack for Renee to hold so she could practice on the relaxation and not the feeling of the ice pack in her hand. This let me try to freeze her when the teacher wasn’t looking and to try to cool her body down as she normally hovers around the temperature of the sun. I couldn’t help but think that the class could have been taught with some realism during an actual birth. I think that it’s really important to expose yourself to the random stream of profanities that you haven’t encountered since middle school.

My favorite part was learning the transitions in the phases of labor. More specifically that the women’s face is just as much as indicator as the interval between contractions. This began to scare me as the large portion of labor involves faces that mimic the exorcist. Even further on, the faces change again and really not for the better. In the last phase of labor the eyes were crossed and the cartoon mouth was jagged like a Halloween pumpkin. I turned to Renee and said that my whole life I have been conditioned to run when I see a face like that and now I have to rub its back. Bob Dylan you were right. The times are a changing.

When pregnancy becomes dangerous...

A special thanks to the Nuffer for making so many hormones this week and making Renee crazy. Either spankings or I'm going to chop off your umbilical chord. Post birth of course.

Despite the numerous weird ailments, pregnancy can be dangerous for the partner. I did have one recent almost heart attack this week when Renee had told me we were leaving on Monday and not Tuesday. After she assured me that this was the correct day I then came to realize that her statistical margin for error on days has been extended from 0 to now +/- 1.

Best dialogue of the week.
R-"Our water pump isn't working right?"
T- "I turned it on, but I don't think its coming on."
R- "Yeah its broken or needs to be reset"
T- "Did they show you a reset switch?"
R- "I'm sure there is one, there are all those wires hanging out the top just tug on those".

Goodbye cruel world.

In all honesty I have to say that I am proud of Renee. Although I make countless jokes about her having to wake up at 5:20 to be at the trainer at 6:30, she still is trucking along. Going to the trainer 3 days a week and doing yoga for 2. Pretty impressive as she is out of the bed before me most days of the week.

We take our pregnancy antics to U.S. soil this week.

Guest Blogger Abandonment

This week was supposed to be a guest blog featuring the mommy of the nuffin noffin, but at the last minute she pulled out citing some weird ailments. So for a quick fix I did a quick video to sum up the week.

We're still working on the name for the boy baby and I have discovered that I veto about 100/1 names. The one is really still a veto with me just elongating a noise so I don't veto every single name. Can you name a baby a sound and just leave the spelling up to interpretation?

Heaven on Earth

-Food Predator

Heaven on Earth. This phrase was used 2 times today to describe the apple pancake cooked at breakfast and again for the beef tenderloin for dinner. I realize fully that this could not be at all related to pregnancy and could be what was called "Life with Nay Nay" before and now "Pregnancy with Nay Nay".

Baby name for a girl has been solidified so we have began searching for boy names. Don't be amazed at the book 50,001 baby names because its pretty much BS. I think that about 1000 of the names are your ordinary names and the other 49,001 are split between food and feudal lords. Funniest name so far has been Chicken Burger (not listed). Now I'm not sure how this really works out or if I need to go to the Municipal Court for a name change when I return, but it almost makes us wet our pants with laughter. -We know that we are the only ones that think this is the funniest thing ever.