Welfareloser's Blog

so the whole presidents’ day thing begat a lesson on george washington and abraham lincoln in evilgremlin’s first grade class. the bullet list of lincoln factoids included his nickname, “honest abe.” this led to a discussion of what nicknames the kids in the class had. evilgremling proudly announced that his nickname was b-change, that he wrote it on a card, and that he hung that card up on the wall of his classroom along with all the other kids’ nicknames. then, apparently gunning for some extra credit, he got another card and wrote all the nicknames of others that he could think of.

EG: like spazmonkey’s nickname is leify-poo, and dramaqueen’s nickname is uli.

me: yep!

EG: and is “rastus” dad, or nodamnsense?

me: (my spider-sense goes on red alert… we are now in dangerous territory.) uhh, that’s your dad.

EG: okay. i got that right. so nodamnsense is dickhead!

me: yeah. please tell me you didn’t write that down.

EG: nope.

me: *sigh of relief, thinking the worst is over. stupid me.*

EG: i just told everyone, but i didn’t write it down. but i did write down kim’s nickname!

me: you didn’t.

EG: i didn’t get in trouble!

me: don’t do that again.

EG: but that’s his nickname; i was just telling the truth!

me: *gritting teeth painfully* anything else you need to tell me?

EG: and chinese people have chinese names, and their american names are actually their nicknames. that’s what my teacher said. so i put down xboxninja’s, too.

so this actually hung in a 1st grade classroom for a week:

we got nearly two feet of snow here between monday evening and wednesday morning; more snow than we’ve seen in a long time.

school was cancelled on tuesday, and positiverolemodel and i got all excited… i mean, what kicks more ass than no school and snow up to your waist? we got a little over-enthusiastic and bundled the boys up to go out while it was still actively snowing tuesday afternoon. evilgremlin opted out at the last minute; spazmonkey started howling the minute he got a faceful of snow at 30 mph, and came inside not long after… dramaqueen ran in and out of the house a dozen times looking kind of shell-shocked, but stayed out for quite a while to help daddy shovel the walk and eat snow.

today was much nicer – sunny, no wind, and the boys stayed out for quite a while. the snow wouldn’t pack well enough for a snowman, but they had fun sinking up to their waists, getting dragged on the sleds, and throwing snowballs at each other.

i briefly considered bundling trogdor up and throwing him out the back door for a fat-baby snow-angel photo op, but my impulse control is in good working order today, so he stayed warm and dry.

i took some great movies of the fun on the new video camera, but i haven’t sat down yet to download them to the computer and shrink them down to a size suitable for sharing. here’s a brief rundown of today’s video, tho:

00:00 – 01:00 as prm helps eg get his boots back on, eg having promptly lost them in his first few steps into the snow, sm repeatedly pelts daddy in the face with large chunks of snow.

01:30 – prm yells at me to whitewash a certain boy’s face and see how he likes it.

*cut scene*

02:00 – 05:00 sm is happily throwing snowballs at the house, the patio table, and lots of other inanimate objects. dq is facedown in the snow, this apparently being the most efficient way to eat the snow.

07:30 – with all the boys at one end of the screen and prm at the other, prm says, “look… three slow-moving targets in a row…” and starts making snowballs.

08:00 – 15:00 lots of running in circles, with the occasional call for parental assistance in extricating short legs from deep drifts.

not much to report here… life goes on for the three big boys – a somewhat more entertaining life. there’s usually a crowd of 2-3 for any diaper changes, squalling, cross-eyed head-bopping, or anything else trogdor does (which isn’t much.) comments from the twits range from “what a cuuuuute baby!” to “that’s my brother!” to “EEEEEWWWWWWW!” (this for both poopy diapers and feedings.) eg’s commentary is, of course, much more verbose. he has declared that he *really* likes his new brother, and that we should summon him any time the baby opens his eyes so they can look at each other.

the boy is the most efficient eating machine i’ve ever seen… he can fill up his tank in 10 minutes flat, he has yet to spit up, and i don’t even have to burp him… in the middle of pounding his milk, he’ll suddenly open up a corner of his mouth, blow out a huge belch, and then latch back on and get right back to business. he’s pretty easy at night – one advantage to being the size of a 3-month-old is that he can go 3-4 hours between feedings.

anyway, he’s looking less battered and swollen and splotchy as of today, so here are some “proof he’s not an alien” pictures:

and one final picture, just to prove he’s mine… okay, i can’t offer you actual proof since i don’t have any of my own baby pictures handy, so you’ll just have to trust me: every single baby picture of me from birth to 3 months (with the exception of a few shots of me sleeping) looks exactly like this one (i had a monster case of colic.)

felix heiko larson, born 2:50 PM february 1st. here’s the fun part… 9 lbs, 9 oz, 21 inches. and no, i didn’t gain too much weight, i wasn’t even close to diabetic… he’s just that freakin big.

TLC’s A Baby Story, episode #207: “Trogdor Hatches”

feb 1st, noon: prm and i lay down for a nap. i feel a contraction that kinda hurts a little more than the other 2347 i’ve had over the last month.

1:00pm: after being awakened every 15 minutes by a contraction that makes me think, hmmm, maybe this is it, i suddenly realize that the last interval was not 15 min, but 7.

1:20pm: i can barely talk. i tell prm to call jokerjitsu and get our shit together because it’s time to go.

1:35pm: jokerjitsu arrives to babysit the twits.

1:50pm: we get to the hospital. contractions are now 3-5 minutes apart. i feel some shit peeking out and am not entirely convinced that i can walk across the parking lot. trying to remember why i thought this was a good idea.

2:00pm: get checked into a room, nurse checks my cervix, and it is 4-1/2 cm dilated. perfect! plenty of time for an epidural. i feel guilty about the second thoughts.

2:10 pm: nurse checks my cervix again. it’s 9 cm. contractions are now less than 3 minutes apart. she cancels the call to anesthesiology and tells me to get ready to push. i don’t think i speak another actual english word for an hour.

2:50 pm: there he is!

that’s the nice version. here’s the really fun 30 minutes or so that i left out…

the doc said that, as the head crowned, and then as it moved farther and farther down, it just kept getting bigger and bigger, and by the time the full size of his keg head was apparent, she was really damned impressed that he fit at all. when she found out the weight, she said, “jesus mary and joseph, woman, that’s your limit. don’t try to have any bigger than that.” (she’s from a family of 13 and just laughs when i say i’m done. she loves telling me about how 3 of her brothers each had 4 boys before having a girl at #5. yep. i love that story. she’s mostly fucking with me, though, since she stopped at 4 herself.)

labor and delivery was absolutely horrific. no anesthesia with the twins sucked, but i was still able to put together coherent “fuck”- and “shit”-laden sentences. this time, i was just screaming in terror. i was so panicked that i had to have an oxygen mask. the nurses did a pretty good job of keeping me calm enough to not pass out. he was just so damned BIG, and that was the most god-awful feeling. once you get the head out, the rest is supposed to just slip out…yeah. not these shoulders and this chest. so the fun of pushing and screaming in terror just kept going for a good 15 minutes! i think i probably convinced the shell-shocked med student in attendance that ob/gyn was not for her. but the aftermath? you know the feeling of relief after you take a huge shit? multiply by 1000x and add in angels singing. wow. amazingly, i needed no stitches, and i honestly don’t feel bad at all. as soon as he was out, life was good. a little scraped up, and i’ve taken a little ibuprofen, and in the mirror this morning, i saw something that kind of approximated my actual body. damn, it’s nice to have him out!