I laughed so hard I choked at this overheard in New York item. Holy crap that is funny. 

Allow me to rat on several citizens of the New York City commuting public. Visibly pregnant me was not offered a seat on the subway, and for some reason, that always shocks and appalls me. It’s not like I “need” the seat - I’m just fine. But when faced with a train full of men who sit with their legs spread like any minute they’ll have to leap directly into the saddle and ride horseback to work through the subway tunnels, I get a little pissed. Either get your behind up, or sit like a lady. It’s not even 8 am. Surely your balls don’t need air-drying already. Jeez.

Of course, I am at a stage where I don’t always look Absolutely Pregnant. It depends on what I’m wearing and what time of day it is. In the evening, I’m bigger and rounder and clearly something is a-bakin’ up front. But in the morning, I’m not as round, and if I’m wearing a shirt like the one I’ve got on today, I look mildly-fashion-challenged OR pregnant, and really, given the amount of muffin top and tight jeans camel toe on the subways lately, I can understand someone assuming that I’m merely a fashion idiot and not a pregnant lady. I could plead my case - really, really, I am NOT a person to wear empire waist shirts with big poufy fronts because I KNOW this makes me look like an overly-buxom dairy maid! I do know that, I do! - but it’s not that big a deal. Soon I will look Undeniably Preggo, and perhaps I’ll get a chance to sit down. 

1. Want some whine & mixed metaphor with your coffee? I have a cough that won’t go away, and have added head congestion as a happy sidecar to the motorcycle that is my cough. This bites.

2. Despite getting to bed late, I feel totally fine otherwise. Baba O’Riley is enjoying the coffee and doing calisthenics. I imagine Freebird is causing havoc at school.

3. Mother’s Day weekend, despite my trepidation, was very, very nice, and I ended Sunday night with a very happy smile on my face. We had plenty of time to ourselves on Saturday, thanks to Freebird’s Awesome Non-Stop Four-Hour Holy-Shit Nap. I played with my camera* and Photoshop, Hubby finished cleaning the basement** and when the Bird woke up we set off for Connecticut to visit the in-laws for Mother’s Day. Freebird got serious amount of clothing from his Grammy and Aunt Denim, courtesy of Woodbury Commons Outlets, (Where Mórag Fears to Tread™). I was gifted with a very pretty scarf and a pair of black mary-jane style crocs, which I wasn’t sure as to the use of until I tried them on with black socks and realized (a) they are very comfy for swollen pregnant lady feet and (b) don’t look like crocs when I wear black socks, ergo (c) I could totally wear them to work. Undercover incognito footwear?! Boo YAH!

4. *My camera is sending me the signal that it might seriously be time for me to upgrade the laptop. My PowerBook is 4 years old, and while otherwise it’s fine, iPhoto and dealing with digital images is a Slooooooooow process. And since I am taking a lot of photos of the toddler, and probably will be taking even more in the next few months, this is a challenge. I don’t particularly want to spend the money since Macs are holyshit expensive, and I fear that many of the programs I have on the PowerBook, which are courtesy of the late, great SuprNova, won’t transfer successfully, leaving me in a large hole when it comes to doing all the things I normally do. But taking so long to upload images? Oy. That gets old.

5. ** Cleaning out the basement was step one of getting ready for bedroom #2 renovation. Now that the basement is clean, we’re going to remove all the piles and piles of books from the office, relocating them to other parts of the house, or giving them away. I have a LOT of books, as does Hubby, so Stage Two will take plenty of time. I’m 22 weeks pregnant today, and while it seems to me sometimes that 22 to 40 is a long, long time, it’s really not that much. We better get a move on.

Because the lolrus bukkit series cracks me up like you have no idea, Hubby gave me the best Mother’s Day card Evah!

Living in Jersey is so difficult. It’s dirty, everything smells like sewage, there’s nothing but industrial factories around here. I can’t even tell you how awful it is.

There’s really never anything beautiful to look at.

Everything is dull and drab and grey.

It’s really very unpleasant.

Certainly there isn’t anything that smells good.

I don’t know how I stand it. 

The hospital where I delivered Freebird did not have wireless internet. I think at that point they were lucky to still be open - and they still are from what I’ve read. I hope they stick around because aside from the lack of internet OMG WTF BBQ, I did love delivering there. It was marvelous.

Erin, on the other hand is liveblogging her birth, and the last post was that she was at 8cm after two days of off-and-on labor pains.

Go Erin Go! A safe, easy, and blissful birth to you!

I just talked to the architect we hired to design an addition on our home. Yes, I am due in September. Yes, he’s working on initial drawings. Yes, we’re clearly out of our ever-lovin’ minds.

It was like placing an order (which it really is since we’re designing exactly what we want) for my dream kitchen - and potentially dream master bath.

2 sinks, please. Medium rare! Bidet, oh please, oh please! Big bubble tub? Sure! Separate shower! As for the kitchen, wall oven and cook top! Space for 4 in the kitchen to eat? Sure! There were some things I am totally flexible about - I care more than there’s space for the immediate resident to eat in the kitchen than for there to be acres of room for an entire team of people to come through the kitchen for a buffet. It’s not like we live in a 50,000 sq.-foot house or anything. So when the architect asked me all these specific questions I was like, “Either is fine, but a minimum of this. Bottom line whatever works best.” It’s weird - most of the time I think I’m easy to get along with, and very flexible about how things work. I don’t insist that everything and everyone adapt to my demands, but on the other hand, if I’m paying for the customization, bring me a bidet and a jacuzzi tub, please thanks! (But not in the kitchen.)

“Placing the order” was really kind of exciting because it made me start thinking about what will change, what will be better, and how we’ll move the existing space to accommodate the new space.

Of course, when there’s a hole in the wall and dust everywhere and I’m living in a Pod storage unit parked on the driveway, I probably won’t be so excited.

The last time we did a kitchen, we hired a contractor who worked well for us at the time, but who had control issues - as in, she had to be in control of everything, and made most of the decisions as to what went where, what cabinets to buy - no I’m not kidding - what sink to put in, that kind of thing. She made the right decisions for us, but really, the most decision making we did involved picking a counter top color and a wall color. It was a total budget renovation so I understand the limitations, and it’s not like we had a clue in the first place. When it was finished it looked good, but going through the experience now, with a completely different set of professionals, has made me realize what a very, very different experience this will be.

I might be marking time on my calendar to leave the Pod storage unit on the driveway to go admire sink fixtures. And faucets. And, like, counter top samples and stuff. With my shopping tolerance, I’ll want to make that a 30-minute trip, if possible. Because damn. After awhile they all look the same.