Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Okay, so I lied

I hope nobody died holding their breath out there, waiting for me to elaborate. I've been busy and processing and generally procrastinating.

So the way it happened. I was surprised at how nervous I was beforehand. The tech called us back and sent me to empty my bladder. I remember looking at myself in the mirror thinking, this is it. I'm leaving this bathroom and I'm going to find out what my future holds. I couldn't shake the feeling that my life was going to be substantially different when I walked out of that office. I was going to have a son or a daughter. My heart was pounding, I was having trouble catching my breath, and I felt utterly ridiculous. I guess I was also scared of finding out that something was wrong - I don't think I've gone to an appointment yet this pregnancy without being kind of convinced that I was going to find out the baby had died. So of course I was worried the ultrasound would show a missing leg or sixth and seventh finger or a tail or some such anatomical disaster.

Moving on. Once I was covered and goo and the scan started, I relaxed a little, but I was still anxious about the money shot. I had been thinking from the moment I suspected I was pregnant that it was a boy - and all the old wives tales seemed to back that up. But over the 24-48 hours before the ultrasound, the little voice inside my head started in on me. You know it's a girl, don't you. It's a girl and you're dead meat. Your poor sweet husband is going to suffer for all of YOUR sins. Which is why, when the tech said, "see these three lines? That's the labia," I completely froze. Oh CRAP. Since Husband and I were both sitting there like a couple of mutes, she added quite helpfully, "so it's a girl." I was so stunned. I was stunned, grateful, and self conscious that I wasn't reacting correctly all at the same time.
And if you know me at all you know I don't often have an immediate emotional reaction to anything. There is always a bit of a processing delay. But this was a big moment, and all I could give the tech was a fairly unenthusiastic sounding "oh wow...it is a girl."

Don't get me wrong. I am - we are - thrilled to death to be having a little girl. It's just a bit of a shock. But as much as I thought it was a boy and wanted a boy, there was always a part of me that longed for a baby girl, with all the sweet names, pretty nursery colors, cute outfits and what have you.

Plus I always thought Pork Chop was a cooler nickname for a girl than a boy.

Monday, December 28, 2009

It's a Girl!

Wow, we really didn't see this one coming. Pork Chop is a girl!

I'll post the whole story tomorrow. Right now suffice to say I've already given the baby girl department at Nordstrom a good once over.

Sunday, December 27, 2009

For those of you concerned with my nutrition (ahem, Mavis), I present you with this evidence: I ate an orange.


There, aren't you proud of me? In the interest of full disclosure, I have to admit that the little satsuma was part of a larger plot. In my most interesting craving story to date, I was suddenly, urgently overcome with the urge to eat oranges and popcorn. I never eat oranges. I would estimate that I have eaten approximately four oranges over the course of my lifetime. And that includes the 1.5 oranges I have eaten since I marched my happy ass to the grocery store last night to buy me a five pound box of satsumas. As for the popcorn, also not an everyday choice for me. But last night, I had to have both. Together. I really must recommend the combo, if you've never tried it.

In other healthy eating news, check out what I made tonight for dinner. You see, just because I post all my pictures of my delicious binges doesn't mean that's all I e
at. I promise.


Mmmm, look...tasty
turkey meatballs in marinara sauce. What a wonderful source of lean protein and lycopene.

But wait! What's this? Now I've added some whole wheat linguine! Hooray for complex carbohydrates!


And lastly, the piece de resistance - cheese on top! Really, what's not better with cheese on top. And I will have you know that all my pregnancy books tell me what a wonderful source of protein cheese is during pregnancy - so suck it, haters.

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Three deluxe, three cheese, four fries, two shakes and two cokes...

What better way to celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus than with a feast of Dick's burgers? I sure can't think of anything.




All irreverence and blasphemy aside, Merry Christmas. I hope Santa brings everything you asked for. And now, as a special gift from me to you, I give you Pork Chop's big debut (aka my belly at 18 weeks):




Only four more days 'til The Big Ultrasound!!!

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Paula Deen

I just saw Paula Deen make a quiche with hashbrowns for crust and a coffee cake sweetened with a packet of butterscotch puddin'. I missed the method for the quiche, but I'm pretty sure there was at least a stick of butter involved. Pretty sure because of the crispy GB&D-ness of that crust, and also because it is Paula Deen we're talking about, after all.

I didn't so much watch the rest of the episode of Home Cookin' (or whatever her show is called) as I did zone out on the TV, fantasizing that Paula Deen was actually my mother and that she had insisted I come back home to Savannah and take to my floral chintz-and-toile-replete bed, so that she might feed me properly for the duration of my pregnancy. Just so long as she kept those idiot boys of her away from me, it could be the perfect set up.

Monday, December 21, 2009

Only a Week to Go!

We are now in the final countdown to the Big Reveal - the anatomy ultrasound which should tell us what we're having.

(for the record, I'm hoping human child with all appendages accounted for and in place, and not alien or kitten, as I have recently dreamt)

(additionally, for the record, I am hoping that my use of the phrase 'final countdown' now has the song stuck in your head, and, in a perfect world, images of Gob Bluth's magic show)

The appointment is set for 10:15 on the 28th, and is meant to be a fabulous late Christmas present for Husband and myself. I will have you know that I could have scheduled the appointment for this week, but I showed (completely out of character) patience and restraint to make it a special little occasion all its own.

So now for the big question: Boy or Girl? Vote in my poll and see if you gain bragging rights. And since there are only roughly two or three of you reading this, feel free to vote over and over again to make it look like I'm really popular and everyone cares. Thanks.

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Weekend Roundup

I didn't really set out to keep a public food diary. I guess you can tell a lot about what else interesting I've got going on, seeing as all I want to write about is what I've been eating. Maybe once we find out the sex of the baby, or I start buying stuff, or I start to feel it move more regularly - maybe then food will take a backseat.


That being said, check out that bagel sandwich. It doesn't look like much - the iPhone picture doesn't do it justice. But that bagel sandwich is worth putting a cooler in the backseat of your car and driving to Bellingham. Which is what I did. WAIT. Before you think I'm too crazy, we had another, way better reason to drive to Bellingham yesterday. But you can never go to Bellingham without stopping at the Bagelry, a lesson learned from one of my Besties - a Bestie who got a sandwich of her own put in that cooler.




And there you have Eggs Benedict at The Cheesecake Factory.
Normally I avoid that place like the plague, which should give you some indication of the quality of people we were meeting there. It actually turned out to be quite good Bennies, worth the undercooked egg warning in every bite. Do you realize that my avoidance of The Cheesecake Factory is so pathological as to result in my husband having never eaten there before? I mean, granted, I've only known him for seven years, so it can't be all my fault. But something to think about. I wonder what sort of things my children will fail to experience growing up because of my neuroses.

*SPECIAL NOTE TO QUALITY PEOPLE (AND FAITHFUL READERS) WE MET AT CHEESECAKE: I actually have no real problem with Cheesecake Factory. I actually like the food. I just generally avoid it because of the twenty page menu and giant portions -- and the fact that they will give you cheesecake to go. I mean, that's not a problem now, but normally? That's a temptation I try to avoid.

Friday, December 18, 2009

Me Gusta Enchiladas

Today I accomplished what I believe to be the last of the shopping I need to do before Christmas, which means I can avoid retail areas for the remainder of the shopping season. That is very good news, because I was nearly killed three times today in the Target parking lot, and I'm sure it's only going to get worse over the next week.

I celebrated my successful morning of errands by meeting Husband for a late lunch. He asked me if I was in the mood for Pho, to which I responded, "Pork Chop wants Mexican." I'm telling you, if there's a perk to being pregnant, it is definitely the getting to eat whatever you feel like and blaming it on the baby. Every. Time. And all you have to do to be a hero is just once in a span of four months tell your husband you'll make him whatever he wants for dinner. But I digress. Enchiladas, halfway through (I forgot to take a picture before I started wolfing, go figure):


And again, upon completion:


And, in a related story, here is how my pants now close:





Thursday, December 17, 2009

No Sandwiches Today

No sandwich report today, sorry. Just didn't happen. I had to eat some leftover potstickers so that I could quit yelling at the dog for farting every time the refrigerator opened. Yes, I realize there are two questionable premises within that sentence; number one, what kind of idiot thinks it's going to help to yell at a dog to stop farting and, number two, who would eat something that smells that bad. I can't account for myself on the first question, but I can tell you that Husband and I have long marveled at how something that smells so bad in the fridge can taste so good on the plate. Call it the mystery of the potsticker. Or blame the cabbage in the filling.

At any rate, there is much bigger news to discuss. That would be that today marks seventeen weeks of pregnancy down, only...uh..23 to go. Yeeeeaaaaaaayy. I am beginning to think that the point of pregnancy, if not life in general, is learning to adjust expectations. I am only just now beginning to realize what a haul this is going to be. In my mind this whole thing was going to be done, I don't know, two weeks from now.

However the good news is that the "baby brain" effect sometimes causes me to lose all sense of time and/or reality, so maybe it will pass by quickly. Like today, for instance, I had to sit down and THINK about WHETHER OR NOT CHRISTMAS ALREADY HAPPENED. Yeah. Only the single biggest holiday of the year which involves about four changes of venue for me to celebrate completely. Seriously, losing it.


Wednesday, December 16, 2009

I didn't go to Arby's

I resisted the urge for Arby's last night, but that doesn't mean I have steered clear of temptation.
That, my friends, is a Sarducci's sub. An Italian sub to be precise. And it was my oh-so delicious lunch today. For those uninitiated, Sarducci's is a little strip mall sandwich shop in Kirkland, most famous for being the favorite lunch stop for members of the Seattle Seahawks - for years anyway, before they moved their training facility from Northwest College down to That Thing They Call the VMAC. So you can see how a place that keeps NFL linebackers coming back for more is also the perfect joint for a pregnant lady to frequent.

My sandwich of choice is the Italian, a symphony of pig in the form of ham, pepperoni and salami that somehow manages to bring in just a hint of the bologna flavor you remember - in a good way - from your childhood Oscar Mayer sandwiches. The meat trio is just pork fatty enough to give you a very contenting mouth feel, and it doesn't hurt that they slather (yes, slather, it really is the perfect word here, they use a spatula for crying out loud) the fresh made bread with mayonnaise and deli mustard. It is such a big, rich, satisfying sandwich that my eyes were too much bigger than my stomach for once and I still have a half waiting for me in the fridge.

But wait, you are saying, aren't pregnant women supposed to avoid cold cuts LIKE THE PLAGUE?!?! Aren't you in fact KILLING YOUR BABY WITH EVERY BITE?!?! Yes, listeria is a risk with cold cuts. Yes, some doctors say to avoid them completely. But reasonable -er, some- doctors, like mine, say that you can have cold cuts every once in a while as long as they come from a reputable establishment. If you have ever eaten a Sarducci's sandwich, then you understand that I trust those people like I trust my own family, because they feed me delicious food. And I figure that a sub every 2-3 weeks surely qualifies as "once in a while." I don't mean to offend by being glib about the health of my baby and my responsibility to keep pork chop safe, but c'mon...have you had one of these sandwiches?!

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

And the Craving of the Moment is...

Arby's. French Dip n' Swiss. Curly fries. I actually just googled the Arby's menu to see if they still had it, and they do. It's currently on the $5.01 menu. Then I made myself look at the nutritional info, in an attempt to shame myself out of actually getting in my car and driving cross town in the dark and cold and rain to get it. The sodium content is obscene - 2080 milligrams before you even get to the fries. I told myself that was only if you drank the au jus and contemplated going for it anyway, but I think maybe having confessed the craving here will help it pass.

I may have a bit of an issue with french dip addiction, however. As I admitted (well, actually crowed) to my facebook friends, last Wednesday I had two french dips for lunch. Two. In my defense the particular deli serving said french dips serves them on very tiny little french rolls - they're basically no better than hot dog buns. However, on this particular day, the french rolls were out, forcing me to order the sandwiches on croissants. I'm not going to lie and say it wasn't delicious, because it was, but it was also just a little bit of a gut bomb. I had to force myself to eat a salad at 9:30 at night because I still had not had one teensy desire for any dinner.

If I were a good wife, I would ignore these french dip cravings. Husband is off flying his airplane tonight, and I told him I would make a pot of chili so he would have something to eat tomorrow night while I go and sub at my sister's bunko game. I imagine him in the wee hours of the morning, making the hour drive home with visions of chili in waiting causing a rumble in his belly. He comes in the door, expecting to be greeted by the lingering smells of cumin and onion...but instead, no food odor at all. That's okay, he'd figure, it must just be overpowered by the Christmas tree. But then he would see me, sleeping away like an angel with ten plump sausages for fingers, and find the aftermath of the Arby's feast in the garbage. He would be crushed. Crushed, maybe, but not entirely surprised.

Nope. Not working. Still want the Arby's.

Monday, December 14, 2009

If I Felt What I Feel Like I Felt...

Over the past few weeks, there have been a few instances where I thought maybe - just MAYBE - I might be feeling the baby move. It's so hard to tell for sure, what with all the ways that my body feels different these days. I really can't think too hard about it, or I start to want to barf - all those organs shifting, intestines slowing, baby growing and what not. But there have been a few times where I swore I felt the little popcorn popping sensations that I've been reading about.

Then, Saturday night, I finally felt one that made me pretty sure it was the real deal. I was lying in bed, having just finished the ice cream and oreo sundae that has become a staple of my diet. I felt something that felt sort of like when you can feel a gas bubble ricochet through your gut (oh please, like you don't know what I'm talking about), except it was all in one place. I had the distinct impression that it was the baby doing some sort of flip, something like when a whale comes up for air and then dives with a flip of his fluke. In all honesty, it was not a moment of wonder and sentimental tears. I kind of wanted to vomit, and daydreamed briefly about what it would be like when I was admitted to the mental hospital the next day, screaming "get this thing out of me!"

Unsettling as it was, it was also very exciting. Yes, I do have a heart after all. And now that I felt it, I spend all my free time trying to feel it again.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

What I've Been Eating: The Early Weeks

It seems that everyone who finds out I'm pregnant wants to know what sort of things I've been eating. The most common question I get by far is "so, any crazy cravings yet?" and because I'm socially awkward I usually just say no, not really and the disappointed questioner goes off to find someone more interesting to talk to. And there I am, left wishing I could really sparkle with some story about the tuna fish-raspberry jam-banana-onion ring panini I just had to get up and make at 3 am.

But once I stop and think about it, removed from the pressures of simple conversation, I realize that I have been eating some strange things the entire time. The trouble is, when people ask me about crazy cravings, I immediately think of the weird pickles and ice cream combinations that we've all heard about on every sitcom that has ever gotten desperate enough to get one of the characters pregnant (i.e. all of them). I haven't craved anything like that, but I have craved specific food. I would say they are more like obsessions than cravings. To wit:


In the beginning, it was breaded chicken products. Chicken fingers. Wendy's chicken sandwiches. Anything that combined batter and some semblance of chicken breast, I had to have it. I think that I must have had some form of breaded chicken at least 10 times during the last two weeks of September. It was chicken fingers and Dr. Pepper at a baseball game that gave me away to my first friends to find out. I remember calling Husband as I drove home from Pilates to tell him that I was going by Wendy's for a chicken sandwich and I was powerless to stop myself. And of course there were the hospital chicken fingers, from the week my grandfather was in the hospital. I took this picture with my phone to show my husband that yes, I was having chicken fingers AGAIN.

After the chicken obsession came the ramen phase. I had to have some form of noodles and broth at least once daily. When the noodles that came in the cup o' noodle or the ramen pack ran out and I had leftover broth, I put leftover spaghetti noodles in my bowl and ate them, too. The ramen obsession culminated with our supposed-to-be-romantic anniversary trip to San Francisco, which I spent curled in the fetal position in the dark hotel room due to a sinus infection. I sent Husband out on a noodle hunt with the aid of Urban Spoon, and luckily he was able to secure me some form of noodles and broth from a nearby Thai place.

By the time the noodle phase ended, I was feeling a little bit more like a normal person than a newly pregnant woman, and my food obsessions petered out. The one thing that has remained: a serious downgrade in the quality of my diet. I'm supposed to be eating vegetables and whole grains and growing the baby's brain, right? That ain't happening. All that I want is fast food, ice cream, cookies, more fast food, and pizza.


Under normal circumstances I am very much a whole grain, lean protein, local fresh produce kind of girl. These are not normal circumstances, however, and I CANNOT go to bed without a giant bowl of ice cream and at least two oreos. We have had pizza Friday night for the last three Fridays and I can tell you I have no intention of stopping that trend anytime soon. Husband has noticed the surge in junk food purchases when I grocery shop and actually felt the need to tell me I didn't have to try and finish off said junk food without him seeing it.


So there you have it. No outlandish concoctions, just a bunch of junk, and a husband who is worried I have become some sort of Secret Eater. I'll update here though if I do start going for anything crazy.

Saturday, December 12, 2009

By Way of Introduction

This is a blog I've been meaning to get started for a while now, which is really just an extension of a general intention to start blogging as a daily writing exercise. I have failed to master the art of applying the ass to the seat, as Dorothy Parker put it, and had a variety of excuses for that failure. I think the best one probably being that I couldn't think of a good name for a blog. Besides that, I have not written anything longer than a facebook status update for over a year now, and having been a pretty good writer for most of my life, I could not stand to think of posting sub-par compositions on the interweb for all to see.

So time went by and the blog failed to name itself or write itself, and morning after morning passed without waking to any revelation of the Perfect Thing to Write. I told myself that was fine because I didn't have anything important to say anyway, all the while reading other peoples' blogs and caring intently about the mundane little details of their lives, getting upset when I'd navigate to their pages and find no daily update. How could they?! Didn't they know I counted on them for my daily entertainment?!


Finally, I've come to realize that there is nothing to be done but to jump in. I'm not sitting down to write my 30 minutes every day (like I was going to, you see, to get back in writing shape before starting the blog) and I'm not coming up with any brilliant concepts just by wishing I would. The only way to go is to put this out there.


Luckily, the Universe has gifted me with a theme: I'm pregnant. Hence, the baby pork chop blog. You may be wondering "why baby pork chop?" which is a valid query. I am guessing that there will be more than a few people who stumble upon this blog in search of a delicious pork chop recipe who will be quite disappointed. Basically, Husband and I started calling the baby pork chop for some silly reason that I really can't recall and it stuck. If that's the sort of thing that you just "don't get," you're probably going to want to find another blog to read. If, on the other hand, you totally get that, you will probably get me in general and you'll want to bookmark this page.


Hopefully I'll come up with lots of interesting things to say and this will become one of your favorite blogs. At the very least I hope to have a fantastic record of my life in the last six months before I became somebody's mother. Worst case scenario I will never write another post - scratch that, worst case I write a bunch of dumb posts and all my friends laugh behind my back.


Either way, welcome, hope you enjoy it.