A Few Thoughts on Travel

Recently we were made privy to yet another heretofore undiscovered way that Beeber has impacted our lives.

The day before Thanksgiving we drove to Connecticut to see my parents. I have been making this trip a couple of times a year for the last several years, but this was the first time with a baby in tow. Under the best of circumstances, this drive would take between 9 and 10 hours and we figured that it would likely take longer with an increased number of stops for diapering and such. As it turns out, this was correct. What I didn't realize was that we would need to pack a trunkful of accessories and supplies to accommodate Beeber while we were away. The abbreviated list included: a stroller, a bouncy chair, a pack-n-play, diapers, formula, bottled water, baby monitor, clothing, toys, books, bottles, bottle brushes, etc. It was a mountain of stuff.

I cannot stress how much of an adjustment this was for me. Previously I was able to travel with little more than a backpack. I could get on a plane, get on a bus and find my way around for days with all my necessities on my person. Having to bring a carful of stuff to appease a being that accounts for 5% of my body weight blew my mind. Unfortunately, I have a feeling that this will get worse before it gets better.

Having made the return drive from Connecticut, I was at home for less than 12 hours before I had to leave again for a week for a conference. This is the first time I've been away from home since Beeber was born, and I cannot stress how much it sucks. I usually have to take 2 week long trips a year, and previously they we somewhat welcomed experiences that would allow me to see new places and/or old friends and family on the company dime. It also helped that I had a (now ex-)wife at home that was happy to see me go, and that I was happy to leave behind. Having people at home that miss you makes traveling a real kick in the groin.

Oh yeah, I have this blog thing...

Despite abandoning this blog for the last for months, I do have every intention of making regular updates. In fact, I just renewed the domain for another year.

Since Beeber's birth four months ago (when I last posted) we have adjusted to life a newborn, moved (twice, technically), plus dealt with work, school, and various other distractions, so I guess if nothing else, I have a litany of valid excuses for not updating you with the daily minutiae that you're dying to read about.

I applaud Pete Nez for finally updating his blog which spurred me to return to this, and hopefully I will begin updating regularly soon. Now that we have had a baby around for a while, I have started to crystallize some observations/points of view, that I will be happy to expound upon. Just keep watching this space please.

At Long Last

She's finally here. The most beautiful thing I've ever laid eyes on. It's a long story how she got here, and I don't have the clarity of mind to tell it right now. But soon. very soon.

Enough Already

Here it is, nearly another month since I've updated this. I think so much of our time has been split between running around preparing for joybundle's arrival and trying to have a "normal" life, that I don;t get much of a chance to slow down and reflect.

At this point, B and I are both getting very impatient with waiting for our little girl to come out (B possibly more so than me). We had a false alarm a couple of weeks ago, where we ended up going to the hospital and staying overnight. I think that may have pushed us over the edge on the patience front. Everything ended up being ok, but still no baby.

We know she's going to get here eventually, but we'd like for this journey to end and the new one to begin. Aside from the actual delivery, there doesn't seem to be much more to experience other than being tired and uncomfortable.

c'mon already sweetheart, we're ready for ya.

How we intend to spend our holiday weekend...

Cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning sleeping cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning eating cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning resting cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning sleeping cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning eating cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning resting cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning aching cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning sleeping cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning cleaning ...

Right Man's Burden

I often say that it is a terrible burden to be right MOST of the time. People usually bristle at this phrase and miss the subtext. I'm not so arrogant as to think that I am right ALL the time, but I am smart enough and self-aware enough to realize that my batting average is exceptionally high.

Here is the point to me bringing this up-

One of the few unfortunate things to happen as a result of Joybundle's imminent arrival is that I had to surrender my dog, Dudley, back to the rescue I adopted him from in the fall. To describe him as completely nuts is probably being generous, in that he is a 26lb. black and white bag of neuroses and anxiety. That being said, he was wonderful with me and adorable to boot. In the few months that I had him, I became very attached but very simply he could be a little erratic in his behavior, and occasionally bitey. This was never a problem with me, but we did not feel right taking a chance on him with the baby.

Last weekend he bit a little girl at his new foster home. The little girl is ok, and so far as I know, there won't be any consequences for him other than lots of training, but it reinforced the fact that I have made the right choice in giving him up.

There's not really any solace in that knowledge. I hope they can straighten him out...

On a related note

In completing Phase 1 of Operation:Nursery, it occurred to me that I owe an amount of thanks to my old college friend Andrew Huff. It was he (and his wonderful wife Cinnamon Cooper) who introduced me to the wonders of IKEA several years ago on a trip to Chicago. Seeing as we have outfitted the baby to be's room with at least 2/3 Sweden via Asia furnishings, I feel like I should give Andrew a shout out for providing me with my first taste of lingonberry preserves.

Andrew is one of the creators of a successful Chicago-oriented website Gapers Block please take a look if you are so inclined. He also took me to Kuma's Corner on a trip to Chicago last fall. I probably ought to send him a thank you card for that too.

OPERATION NURSERY:PHASE 1

This weekend we were FINALLY able to take advantage of the fact that B's roommate has moved out and got to work on the nursery.

This involved:
Carrying a number of large flat-packed boxes of furniture down a flight of stairs from my apartment.
Driving those items across town.
Carrying those items up two flights of stairs to B's apartment.
Cleaning every surface in the soon to be nursery.
Vacuuming and steam cleaning the carpets in the nursery.
Assembling the furniture.
Moving a number of baby related items into the nursery.
Full body aches and pains.

The very good news is that this is all done. Phase 2 will be complete next weekend when the dresser and side table we bought arrive, and Phase 3 will be finished when we get all of the assorted decorative stuff one. Phase 4 involves a baby moving into that room, so I think the longer we have for that, the better.

So far it's very nice and homey, and I think it will be a welcoming place for our bundle of joy. I hope.

I should also add that the electricity for that room has mysteriously stopped working, and that whatever breaker controls it does not reside within this apartment. All of this work, and we cannot wait to move. That's irony, right?

Oh jeez...

So apparently, almost a month has gone by since the last post. I suspect this is the sort of worm-hole like time loss that we will have to accustom ourselves to when squeak arrives.

Anyway, many changes are hand. Within the next few weeks a nursery will be cobbled together out of much flat-packed ready to assemble furniture and inexpensive vintage pieces. Updates will hopefully become a little more prevalent when things normalize a bit.

SH*T,FU$K,D@MN,P#SS,H%LL!

We've had some preliminary discussions about our (mostly,my) usually filthy mouths and how to deal with them uponst the arrival of our little bringer of joy. This article on Babble shed a little bit of insight into how to deal with it.

I'm really on the fence about this one. I have made some effort to reduce the aggregate amount of curse words that fly out of my mouth, but the fact is, I LOVE swearing. PHOOEY! and RATS! can really only bring so much satisfaction, and they're pretty bland in comparison to the refreshing minty flavor that comes with broad and flowery use of the usual suspects.

Between us and our associates, I reckon our little pipsqueak will hear her fair share of bad words from birth onward, maybe the "these words are only ok at home" strategy will be the way to go?

Entering the Home Stretch

We've turned the corner on the beginning of the third trimester, and if the early signs are any indication it's going to be a little rough. If someone has any big ideas for heartburn other than eating Tums like candy, we'd love to hear 'em!

On an unrelated note, a trip to Collinwood took us to Shoparooni and they have some really cool hand-made onesie/legwarmer sets amongst all of their other cool wares. Check them out!

Keeping Busy

From Dave and Janine:

Not exactly edgy (Dave's words) but this is still something pretty useful

Things To Do In Cleveland

Thanks guys!

Not just for babies

B found this link for some awesome mommy clothes

Rockstar Moms

In particular she's a big fan of this Skull Tunic.

I think I might need to buy it for her.

More Cool Clothes

Found another site with cool clothes for kids.

Sourpuss

Enjoy!

The opposite of too much information

Haven't made any posts lately because there haven't really been any developments. Baby-to-be's aunt bought her a sweet hat yesterday though. It looks like a cake with a candle on top. (get it, sweet?)

Register This

We started our registry today. Totally overwhelming. If anybody has tips on what is necessary and not necessary send them on in. PLEASE!

Green Mind

Here's a cool link that was forwarded to us:

Inhabitots

If you're so inclined, it's probably a best practice to start showing them a responsible way to live while they're young...

No Gnus is Good Gnus

Sometimes there's just not much to write about. On a positive note, we had another ultrasound yesterday and little grrl is doing just fine. By that I mean she is big and healthy and making her mother increasingly uncomfortable. Our doctor gave us some encouraging news about the results of our 3D ultrasound, so that's good too.

20 weeks. We're halfway there. Holy crap!

Layout Madness

Yeah yeah yeah,

We're new to this blogging stuff so the little things are still amazing to us.

Thanks to Holly at The Sweetest Pea for pointing us toward the Cutest Blog on the Block.

More good stuff

Very cool handmade toys and clothing here:

Bla Bla Kids

Keep the links coming!

Pancake Mountain

This is certainly old news, as well as a total no brainer, but here's a link anyway:

Pancake Mountain

Any kids show that has the Evens and the Melvins on it is ok by us.

Another contribution

These are exactly the kinds of links that we were hoping to collect and share, thanks to the Blazes! for the heads up:

Black Wagon
Little Ruler
Little Boy Chic

Also, since it hasn't been said explicitly yet, please share the link and invitation to contribute to any like minded people you can think of.

The more the merrier.

Signs of life

The last few times I have been to Columbus I was disturbed to find that nearly all of the character ( both good and bad) of High Street had been gentrified away. Here's some hope

What the Rock

I suppose it says more about me than High Street that I find a place like this store more interesting than, say, the upstairs room at the Import House, but that's probably a good thing.

Our First Contribution!

Thanks to Pete Nez for this. www.daddytypes.com  

A large part of blogging seems to be linking through to other blogs, so who are we to rock the boat?  On the other hand, this is exactly the sort of thing we thought a blog like this would be good for.

Cross your fingers!

This isn't much more than an idea right now, but ideally in the very near future punkparent.com will become a collaborative blog for anyone who would like to contribute. As the name suggests, there is certainly going to be a focus parenting from a non-traditional point-of-view.

Stay tuned.