(And I don’t need no Bearded Lady jokes, thankyouverymuch.)

After my last mini-post (sorry about the picture debacle – my bad.  The photo showed up in one browser window but not another and I’m just not even close to being smart enough to figure out why or what to do to fix it. Trust me, he’s cute) the lovely Lady in Waiting commented that I have lots of exciting stuff going on.

And boy, is that an understatement!

In addition to growing these two little tiny things (who need better names, it would seem…) inside me, and being thrilled about my sister’s baby, and trying to avoid having a nervous breakdown because of all the work I have to do, and being worried about not discussing my hoped-for maternity leave with my boss yet, we are also smack in the middle of selling our condo and trying to buy a house.

Good lord in heaven, woman, what is wrong with you??

I know, I know.

We were going to sell in the fall, but when we decided to do IVF we postponed until spring. And then WHAM! it was spring and holy crap we’re pregnant and if we’re going to do this, it better be now. Before I’m too big or we have two tiny babies and everything is just a mad-cap dash of crying and poopy diapers and breastfeeding woes and all the other good stuff…

So we put our place on the market and have only had one open house, and I think we have close to ten people wanting to make offers.  Which is pretty cool.

But of course that means we now have a couple of months to find a house we can afford, which in the Bay Area is no easy task.

I had to do another IVIG infusion on Tuesday, the day of the brokers’ tour when 30-40 people would be traipsing through the place.  I cried the entire way down to the medical office, calling BeBop and sobbing into the phone that I was SOOO stressed out and I just couldn’t take much more.

Well, the only good thing about those damn infusions is that it forced me to sit on my ass for over three hours, tied to the reclining chair with IV tubes, and do nothing but read, listen to my iPod or chat with the other ladies there.  So although I loathe these things, I have to admit in the end it was a pretty good stress reliever.

So one more open house this weekend, and we take offers next week.  Only a few days of me running around like a crazy woman every morning before work, frantically cleaning and dusting and making sure the shower drain isn’t clogged with my hair* and that the dog’s slobbery toys are hidden and the plants look fresh and the wood surfaces dusted and the place is just glowing with an all-over BUY  ME vibe. I complain to  share with BeBop incessantly about how tired I am, how it’s hard for me to just get my fat ass up and out of the door in the morning without all of this extra pressure and how "I’m growing our TWO babies inside of me so YOU CAN DO IT YOURSELF" which, really, there’s no good response to so he has to pick up any slack.

OY.

In other news, did you know that if you literally get no exercise other than opening pickle jars** and waxing your own face nightly, you pretty much lose all muscle tone, coordination AND aerobic ability?  I did not know this. Until today, when I decided to go to the pool for a swim.

Do you remember the The Great Swimming Debacle of 2006?  For some reason, I momentarily forgot the humiliation that comes with getting into a bathing suit in public and decided to swim some laps.  ‘Some’ meaning about three because Sweet Jesus, I am in terrible shape.  Just the sheer exertion of putting on said bathing suit and turtle-like goggles made me tired. Which is why after about four minutes of swimming I was done.

But I’m hoping to build up to, say, ten laps and fifteen minutes because, really, this is just too pathetic.  Even for me.

On the little sister new baby front, it seems all is going pretty well and my sister got to go home yesterday, which was great.  She said she’s not too sore from the c-section, which is also good. When I spoke to her soon after the birth, she said, "You know, Mom’s not too great in a crisis situation…"

I did know this.

Despite being trained as a nurse, she’s really not that comfortable in a medical environment,  but maybe it’s just when family members are involved. My sister said once they decided on doing surgery, they were rushing around getting her ready and my brother-in-law had gone home to walk their dogs, not expecting the c-section.

My sister said she was trying to get my Mom to call him and tell him to haul ass back to the hospital STAT, and my Mom was sort of dawdling around, all the while they were shaving her pubes (my sister’s, not my Mom’s, which would have been really weird!) and rolling her gurney down the hall towards surgery.  In the end, her husband did get there, just in time.

In a startling development, it seems my Mom is actually being fairly helpful.  I guess she’s going to cook and maybe even clean for my sister, but I’ll have to see that to believe it.

In true Watson’s Mom fashion, she’s been rubbing sacred ash from an Indian Guru on the baby’s forehead, which I’m sure will go over REAL well with the pediatrician who must wonder what in the HELL that grey chalky substance on the kid’s head is?!? 

See what I have to look forward to?

*Not to sound all annoying and complainey, but it does seem a TAD unfair that while I would LOVE some of my facial hair to fall out on its own accord, it seems like someone glued it into the follicles with cement, while the hair in my head is falling out by the fistful each morning so that the bottom of my shower looks like a bear skin rug.  GA-ROS.

**Can I just mention that my pickle craving is gone?  GONE I tell you.  Almost the second I got to thirteen weeks, that was IT for the pickles.  Before this, the sheer mention of a dill pickle would cause my mouth to fill with saliva, like some kind of freakish pregnant Pavlov experiment subject.  I mean, literally, when I thought of eating a pickle, I would start to drool uncontrollably.  And now? Pickle shmickle.  And I have about seventeen jars of unopened pickles to prove it.

Can someone please get this woman to STOP feeding me pickles for dinner?  Really. 

It’s getting redonkuluos.

OMIGOD, work is so busy!

It is literally kicking all three of our asses. I barely have time to read and comment on your blogs, much less write any of the tripe I usually try to fill up this space with.

So I’ll update you, The Oneliner Style:

First of all, THANK YOU oh so sweet people of the internet (she says shyly, kicking her right foot back and forth along the ground and looking up at you from under her eyelashes…). Thank you for saying I’m not boring. I love you. And now I’m reconsidering my self-imposed ban on posting any belly pictures, only because even if I DO bear an uncanny and very disturbing resemblance to one of those whales recently stranded in the Sacramento Delta, I think you would all lie and write very nice things about how I’m not huge at all, and how I’m crazy I’m soooo not big and so on and so forth, and who wouldn’t love THAT.

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Next up:  I think the NT scan went well, although they don’t really give you the official results there. Knowing that, I told BeBop he didn’t have to come with me, because why have him take yet another day off?  Well, now I know why. Because I showed up in a crowded waiting room filled with couples, as the only single lady there.  And people looked at me with pity in their eyes, like I was the poor single knocked up girl.  (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.) Only they DID look at me like I was alone and pathetic, unless I’m totally imagining all that which is entirely possible.

The technician totally reminded me of an Eastern European gypsy of some sort. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.) With a thick accent, a colorful head scarf and huge jangly gold earrings. I was afraid she would pickpocket my fanny pack while I was looking at a map.  (Was that tasteless?  Probably.) Anywhoosers, I kept trying to hear the stats and it seemed like everything was under 3mm, so I guess I’ll wait for the results to come back, but in general I’m feeling fine about everything.

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Next:  The movie!  It was GREAT!  Great, if you don’t mind starving your ass off and not eating until after 9:00 PM!!  I forgot that normal people (read:  non-pregnant people) can actually have a few drinks and some light appetizers and watch a movie and then eat dinner at 9:30 at night. I, on the other hand, cannot do that.

I had my emergency set of crackers in my little black clutch, which I scarfed as soon as the movie started. Then my two Mentos, which I always carry also in case of emergency.  Then I started to freak out and was about to devour the lint at the bottom of said purse I was so hungry…but I managed to make it until the party started, only to realize with sheer horror that because Rata.tou.ille is set in Paris, the party had a Parisian theme.

Did you know that lots of French food is not so good for pregnant ladies?  I did not know this.  The caterer provided tons of wine (natch!) and crates of soft cheeses and fish and cold cuts in the form of Croque Monsieurs.  I had to eat the damn sandwiches for fear of literally starving to death and/or starting to devour BeBop’s left arm. (Note to Listeria:  You can SUCK IT.)

But the movie was awesome and if you can get past the idea of a rat in a kitchen (which, to be perfectly honest, did take me a sec.) the story is amazing and creative and the animation is just gorgeous and I will definitely see it again in the theater, when I’m not exhausted and stuffed into a tight dress and tight shoes with an aching tail bone.

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Moving on: my little sister is being induced on Monday — yikes!  My Mom is flying down to LA on Monday, and is already inquiring about the proximity of  Sherman Oaks to my sister’s house because, apparently, there’s a fabulous chiropractor there and my Mom thinks a newborn should be seen by a chiropractor to get his little head and neck CRACKED back into place. And that’s just the beginning…Lord help us!

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Since I rarely dress up these days, I asked BeBop to take a photo of me at the gala and here it is, for your viewing pleasure. I’ll write more when I have ten seconds to put a cogent thought together!

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