This part’s painless.

Someone in my local mommy group gave us a heads-up that the National Marrow Donor Program is currently waiving the registration/administration fee for people to get typed and cataloged, so I figured I’d do my part (being a generally nice person, and all).

As I’m pregnant if I get immediately matched with someone in need of marrow I wouldn’t be able to donate, so for the time being I’ll be red-shirting.  I’ll be listed as “active” after this little girl makes her very non-traumatic, peaceful, painless arrival into the world (think happy thoughts, happy thoughts).

If you register online and request a kit, they’ll mail you sterile swabs that you swipe your cheeks with and then return in the postage-paid envelope provided.  They do ask for some general medical information when you sign up, but it’s nothing particularly invasive.  That’s it.  If you’re picked, you’ll either be asked to give marrow or a blood cell donation.

Apparently, 90% of the people on the registry are Caucasian (according to one of my Facebook peeps).  Since 90% of Americans are not Caucasian there’s an obvious imbalance.

Check this out:

“Because the markers used in matching are inherited, patients are more likely to match someone from their own race or ethnicity. Adding more donors and cord blood units from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds to the Be The Match Registry increases the likelihood that all patients will find the match they need.”

I suppose I have a bit of morbid curiosity over whether I’d be a close match with someone because of my racial admixture (which I can’t really explain simply).  Honestly, I’d be shocked as hell if they ever matched up six markers out of six.  Oh well.  Happy to help if I can.

Just swipe your cheeks and press the buccal swabs into the holders.

Fold the holder together and close it with the biohazard sticker.  Then just mail it in.

When you go, use this promo code if it isn’t already filled in and that’ll waive any registration costs: PIF070109.  I don’t know how long that’s good for, so jump on it.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/31 at 02:48 PM
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I didn’t teach him that - I swear.

Rosco to Scott: “Not.  Another.  Word.”

See, my usual line when he’s being a smart-mouth is “Please stop talking.”  So…this one is his own.  Sorry, Scott.  He strung that together just for you.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/29 at 09:49 PM
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Preparing for Snowmageddon

Oh, you like that?  I made it up yesterday during my pre-Target planning ritual.

NC is supposed to get smacked with some significant snowfall starting late tonight, and snow is simply one of those concepts that provokes feelings of terror in Central and Eastern North Carolinians.  It’s not the snow we’re afraid of - it’s the ICE that is left behind when it starts to melt and refreeze.

Way back when Scott and I were living in Carrboro (2002-2003) we got trapped in an ice storm that had us without power on several of the coldest days of the season.  Foot-long icicles were dangling off the power lines and made them crash to the ground.  We were living in a third-floor apartment, so it wasn’t like we could go outside and start up a generator.  Everything was shut down, and the whole situation was miserable.  That’s probably the only time I wished we’d spent the extra money and got the fireplace apartment.

We spent a couple of days under comforters or in the bathroom with the door shut where body heat made a bit of difference.  We ate peanut butter sandwiches until we ran out of bread, and by then I think Food Lion opened back up.

Our power was probably out for only 3 days, but due to our close proximity to the University and a major hospital, we got our power back much sooner than many others.  There were other locals who went *weeks* without power and ended up moving in with friends and family members who did have power for the short-term.

It was simply miserable.

Ice also makes people drive like effing idiots, which is another reason we don’t appreciate the frozen precipitation.  A true native (or almost-native) would simply stay at home until the roads clear OR until they’re desperate for bread, diapers, toilet paper, whatever.  We’re heat-loving people: we’re not going to force ourselves out into the cold for Mission Impossible (e.g. checking to see if the McDonald’s has opened back up yet).

I’m not going apeshit with preparation this time, but I did make sure we have a few necessities yesterday when the news bulletin was issued.  We have toilet paper.  I went out to get some bread and milk.  We’ve got enough peanut butter to last us a few days if we lose power.  I bought a jumbo-sized box of fudge rounds (gotta keep that blood sugar up, you know).  I bottled up some water.  Our neighbor offered us as much firewood as we need (if we need it…unfortunately, our fireplace hasn’t been used, cleaned or inspected the entire time we’ve lived here so that’ll be interesting).  The Subaru has enough gas that if we need to drive somewhere and squat in a heated environment we can.  I made sure to do enough laundry this past week that we have clean underwear and socks.  I did the dishes just in case we lose hot water (smelly food-clogged drains are not cool).  I’m going to charge up our battery-powered lantern and all of my semi-essential hand-held electronics.  Etc.

My hope that it’ll be just snow and it’ll melt into water that seeps immediately into the ground instead of re-freezing.  Hermit that I am, I at least like having the *option* of leaving the house.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/29 at 01:51 PM
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Weird.

One weird thing about having a fetus press your innards up into your chest is feeling the exact locations of chunks of food moving through your digestive system.

ETA: WTF?  Why does my iPhone weather thingie say that today’s high will be 61 degrees and that on Saturday it’s going to be 38 and snowing?!

Posted by Tiffany on 01/25 at 01:44 PM
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Scairt.

R needs a babysitter.  We don’t go out much without him, but every now and then I’ll have an appointment that I need to go to [alone] or I’ll have some social commitment where my attendance depends on Scott getting home from work at a reasonable hour.

My fear in the past was that I wouldn’t trust anyone with my sweet, innocent baby (which daycare amplified).

Now my fear is that the babysitter won’t want to come back.

Okay - Rosco is no Dennis the Menace, but who knows how he’ll act one-on-one with someone who’s a perfect stranger.

I’m even looking into drop-in hourly childcare places where he can go play for an hour or two while I do my thing.  Those would work better and be less expensive than a babysitter, but a lot of them don’t open early enough.  I tend to schedule my appointments for as early in the day as possible - around 8 am.  If the place doesn’t open until 9, it ain’t helping me.

I wouldn’t even be thinking about this right now, but I have an ultrasound scheduled for Tuesday morning and:

“Due to seasonal flu and H1N1 flu concerns, and for the safety of our patients, please do not bring children 12 and under with you to your appointment.”

And then I have an OB appointment the next morning.  The last time I took Rosco to an OB appointment he hid under the chairs in the waiting room and refused to listen.  It was one of those days where the office was really backed up so we waited about an hour to get back into the exam room.  So, the next time, of course, I made Scott keep him at home. 

(On an unrelated note, WTH is going on with GoDaddy’s hosting servers lately?  They withhold my email all day and now I’m having problems accessing my site to post.  Not cool, GD.)

Posted by Tiffany on 01/22 at 05:26 PM
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I feel better now.

So, I just typed a long post about Rosco and then deleted it.

I think we all understand that he has a bit of an attitude problem, yes?

Okay.  Moving on.

In more upbeat news, he has an official preschool space for the fall.

*yes!*

That’s six hours per week when I can write in a quiet house.  The only downside is that I’ll have to get up before my usual roll-out-of-bed time to drop him off.  Wait…I’ll have a baby then.  Nevermind.  There’s no such thing as a “roll-out-of-bed time” when you have an infant.  You get up when they get up.  And up.  And then up again.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/21 at 09:05 PM
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“Do you want to go to school?”

So, I took Rosco on a tour of a preschool this morning.  He pretty much has a spot there, but I just need to call tomorrow and confirm that we want it.

He would be in a two-day/week program and the curriculum for three-year-olds is pretty loose.  That is to say there is a daily schedule and themes, but at that age there’s not a lot of didactic blathering going on.  He’d basically be there to socialize and get glue and paint on someone else’s furniture.  It’s a church-affiliated preschool so he’d have to go to chapel every other week.  The more intensive kindergarten prep starts in the 4-year-old room (which “academically” he probably should be placed in, but missed the age cut-off by a couple of months for).

Rosco behaved “okay” during the tour.  He demanded sort of loudly a couple of times that I let go of his hand so that he could go play, to which I responded “Yeah right, bub” (paraphrase).  He didn’t like it when people walking past would rub his head.  That seems like a reflex for people for some reason.  (I know he’s cute and fuzzy, but what if he was a biter?)

He didn’t really start acting up until we were leaving at which point he decided to try to lay down in the parking lot whining “I don’t want to go home!”  I had to threaten him with promises of time-out, a nap, and the ever-vague “Do you want me to give you something to really cry about?” (he’s too young to be afraid of that, though, so I might as well stop using it).  When none of those worked I just strapped him into his car seat and he clammed up about 30 seconds later.  I understand he has cabin fever and is sick of being in the house, but he understands that public whining and tantrums don’t work on me.  I don’t know why he tries, because he never gets the result he wants.

So.  Hope nobody saw that.  Don’t want him to get expelled before he’s officially enrolled.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/20 at 12:09 PM
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My hands are clean.

Ok.  Maybe I’m just a highly-paranoid-type person, but when I’m cooking with raw meat my hands get washed at least 47 katrillion times during the preparation process so that I don’t cross-contaminate anything.  I consider the prevention of violent stomach ailments a good thing, especially when you’re cooking for small children and women in ... er ... delicate conditions.

Last night I was working with chicken, and so my standard operating procedure is to wash hands (with soap) before handling and then wash hands (with soap) before touching anything else.  Because I was working on a couple of different things at once, I ended up having to wash my hands at least five times before the chicken went into the oven.

I saw one person who went straight from handling chicken to mixing a salad without hand-washing in between.  Now, in her defense I did hear her say, “I need someone to teach me how to cook!”  But still, is that really cooking-related knowledge or is that just common sense?  I think people there probably thought I was squeamish (I’m not).

I know my appropriate reaction should have been to ask her to wash her hands again, but I would have felt like a schmuck.  I wasn’t the project leader and I would have felt like a tiny dictator.

Would you have said something?

Posted by Tiffany on 01/19 at 02:17 PM
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I’m slightly disturbed.

Tonight I completed my Give a Day, Get a Disney Park Day volunteer project.  I came home afterwards, had Taco Bell take-out, and took a nap.  When I woke up from my nap (7 minutes ago) I had a startling revelation.

Of the 10 people working in tonight’s group, only one could claim to be a true North Carolinian…and that’s only if she lies.  The rest were from various points up north, the Midwest, and I think one was from Texas.  None had been here any significant amount of time: with the exception of me.

[I don’t regularly tell people I was born out-of-state.  In fact, my OB asked if I whether born at the hospital in Ahoskie (a boonie town in NC - only I can call it that, ‘cause where I’m from isn’t even a town so I have privilege) after finding out where I grew up.  I just shook my head “no.”  I can count how many (non-contiguous) years I spent in New York on one hand.  In fact, I don’t even need all the fingers to do so.  If memory serves me correctly, if I said “4 years” I would be being generous.  I’ll tell you that story one day.  It’s sort of boring, though.  But, in a nutshell, I’m NOT one of those people who has lived in NC all her life and yet tells people “I’m from New Yawk.”]

Where the hell are all the natives…and pseudo-natives?

Posted by Tiffany on 01/18 at 11:17 PM
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*scratches head*

I don’t know how I feel about this: Expecting Comfort delivery gown.

The premise is you wear them to feel pretty during delivery instead of being turned into a frumpy lump by the hospital gowns.

Here’s why I would buy one:
-1) I could get something my size.  I had to wear an XL gown when I delivered Rosco because that was the only size left.  It kept drooping off my shoulders and adjusting it was a bit cumbersome given I had that special juice line inserted into my back.

Here’s why I wouldn’t buy one:
-1) I went home within 24 hours when I had Rosco.  Just long enough to have the baby, take a shower, go to bed, and get up to wear my own clothes the next morning.  Barring complications, I ain’t sticking around for 2-3 days this time either.
-2) If anyone comes to visit me in the hospital they should expect that I’m going to look JACKED.  UP.  I welcome people into my home while wearing holey pajama pants with my hair sticking up in uneven clumps.  Vanity is not an issue.
-3) If Scott takes pictures of me where I look like a beast, they simply get put into a “special” file on my computer or else heavily cropped or enhanced.
-4) After delivering Rosco I could have used my own personal hospital room janitor.  I won’t elaborate.  I’m not taking home a heavily-stained $30-$50 single-use gown.  It’s going into the trash *or* the hospital will bleach the hell out of it and do what they do for the next patient.

Hmmm….......you know, I wouldn’t mind if someone bought me one (size small, thanks).  I just don’t see me placing an order for myself.  The practical side of me wins out.  Better yet - find me a bored little old lady with a sewing machine.  I bet she’d make me one at cost and Scotchgard it for me.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/16 at 11:58 PM
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Wee little pokes.

That’s just a belly-button - don’t worry.  And don’t try to click on it.  You don’t need to see that any larger.  Yes, it’s popped out already.  I’m so lucky.  Oh, the horizontal scar on top?  That’s called a “college mistake.”  Navel piercing.  I took it out in 2001 or so and that’s how it looks now.  Awesome, right?

Felt the baby moving around today!  It’s such an “a-ha” moment when you realize it for the first time.  With Rosco, I was around 18 weeks when I made the connection.  I was actually at an ultrasound and saw on screen his movement at the same time I felt the thump.  I was like, “Oh…that’s what that was.”  I wouldn’t have been confident before then.

This time, I sort of knew what to feel for (and where).  Obviously if you’re 12 weeks along and feeling little thumps higher than your belly button, that’s digestion - sorry to piss on anyone’s parade.  (Unless your uterus is just huge for some reason, it isn’t that high before 20 weeks or so.)

What I felt wasn’t like gas flutters (besides, it was 9 am and I hadn’t eaten in something like 12 hours), it was like wee little pushes.  You know how a cat circles around a spot and kneads it before laying down?  That’s what it was like - just left of and below my belly button.

I would have cried if I wasn’t such a soulless witch.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/15 at 12:38 PM
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Probably the most un-P.C. thing I’ll write all month.

I’ve figured out what I need.  It’ll just never happen, especially since there’s a such thing as a truancy law.

I need a 14- or 15-year-old girl with limited ambitions and low expectations to be my maid.  Ideally, this child would be an uneducated orphan whose only goal is to stay warm at night and to eat three meals a day.

The job wouldn’t be that hard.  She’d scoop the cat litter daily, wash dishes, sweep floors, do laundry, and that’d be about it.  (I do my own cooking.)  I’d provide her with food, clothing, and a semi-private room to sleep in.

Unfortunately (and fortunately) this isn’t 1840, so this ain’t going to happen…..........unless I adopt a teenager and keep her at home to “home school” her.  Yeah, that’ll work.  *rubs chin*

Just kidding.

Sort of.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/13 at 02:16 PM
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zzzzzType-type-type.

There are certain conversations that you just can’t have with three-year-olds.  I should know.  I have the “You’re not being mommy’s friend” discussion with Rosco probably 3-4 times every week.

You see, he won’t let me take a nap.  For that matter, when Scott tosses him into bed with me in the mornings he doesn’t let me sleep then either.  He shakes me, tries to suffocate me with pillows, pokes me, and repeatedly asks “Are you sleeping?  Are you waking up now?”  (He’s recently figured out that one way to get me out of bed is to tell me he needs to pee.)

Naps are a joke.  I don’t have any energy right now.  I spend most of my day on my ass because I just don’t have it in me to do much else.  If I do a load of laundry it’s because someone’s down to their last pair of underwear.  I try not to nap in the middle of the day, but do you know what it feels like to be so drowsy that your face hurts?  That’s how I felt today.  I just needed one hour to lay down and clear the cobwebs.  The entire hour of my nap today Rosco tried to beat me up.  He threw toys at me, slapped me with his blanket, and so on.  I got up pissed off and even more cranky.

It’s not like I’m making him nap.  All he needs to do is carry on with business as usual and NOT shriek like a banshee or leave the room.  When I threaten him with restrictions he flicks his hand at me in this “Whatever” manner, so apparently his intention is to not let a nap happen as long as his father is at work.

I’m so tired that I’m weepy.  I’m not sleeping that great at night (mixture of pregnancy insomnia and the inability to find a comfortable position to sleep in), so I’m just zombieing through the day.

I’m going to go drink a Sprite.  Maybe the sugar will pick me up for ten minutes or so.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/12 at 06:07 PM
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I need this.

Or parts of it, rather.

I’ve been deliberating on it for a couple of months now.  I’m sick of shit piling up on my desk.  I can’t throw it out or put it away because it’s stuff I constantly refer to when I write/surf the web/whatever.  Problem is, my home office is situated in what was supposed to be the living room, so everything in here is in full view of the front door and hallway.  I don’t have the luxury of having a room door to close, so we toe the line between having the room look like a dedicated office (e.g. Scott’s home office), or it being a sitting room.

I worry that if I put a bunch of organizers or bulletin boards up it’ll clash with the family photos and whatnot that are already up.  I’m probably overthinking this, but seriously - I need to get this shit off my desktop.  It’s making me twitch.

Posted by Tiffany on 01/11 at 05:07 PM
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What preggo dreams are made of.

So, there’s this hormone abundant in preggos called progesterone.  It does a couple of things (sorry for being so, so technical).  One of the weirder effects it has is causing you to have crazy-ass dreams.  Here are three that I had last night:

1) That we had about 15 cats and three tropical fish and lived in a very small trailer.  Bodie and Puffy, our original cats, weren’t too pleased with this arrangement.  Some of the cats kept running away…and we actually cared.

2) That I was in the witness protection program and my job was to be a burlesque dancer - a fat, bloated, pregnant burlesque dancer.

3) That a group of proselytizers followed me home and held revival on my front porch.  I called 911 to come out and disperse them, but apparently the 911 operator thought I needed Jesus and wasn’t going to do anything even though they were blocking me in with their vehicles and causing a nuisance.  Two of the group members were driving old-school police cars with sirens and were dressed in brown “sheriff” outfits.  I think the “badges” on their doors said something like “Jesus Committee.”  I asked the 911 operator if they should be arrested for impersonating officers of the law, but again, she didn’t care.  One of the committee members slammed one of our 15 cats’ tail in the front door and laughed about it.

So much fodder here for my next book, donchathink?

Posted by Tiffany on 01/09 at 02:09 PM
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