Wednesday, May 15,
2002.
Amy's due Date:
TWO DAYS AGO! Wanna
guess?
Hi Cami !!
NOT YET
ME (on cellphone): "Hey baby, you have the baby yet?"
AMY: " ... No."
I just wanted to say that to someone else for a change, since I've been hearing it about a dozen times every day at work lately. (Except for the "hey baby" part of course.)
PREGNANCY FROM A GUY'S PERSPECTIVE
COLLEAGUE: "So how's your wife doing?"
ME: "She's been feeling pretty good ... no nausea, just some leg cramps, and fatigue, and back pain, and sciatica, and .... Damn."
SEX, LIES, AND DUE DATES
(only without the sex part)I learned the other day that Amy has been lying to me, pretty much throughout this entire pregnancy.
She's been telling me her due date was May 14th when it was really May 13th all along!
She said she didn't like having the date on the 13th. So she changed it.
(Her other excuse, after seeing I didn't really think much of that one, was that an internet scale told her she was due the 13th.)
I was a bit annoyed that she's been able to look me in the eye and purposefully tell me the wrong date all this time. I know it's not a huge deal, but still. Plus, I didn't realize Amy was that superstitious. It's not like we're going to have the Omen baby. And even if we did, at least the kid would be able to take care of himself.
No, I'm not very superstitious.
TOO SHY SHY
Amy saw her ob/gyn yesterday. She's not dilated one bit (I'm vaguely aware that this means baby is still shy.) They strapped her to a monitor for a bit to make sure Baby Boy was fine. After a few moments, the doc came back and told Amy the baby was good but she had just had a HUGE contraction.
Amy's response was,
"I did? I thought I was just hungry."
Her back also hurts but it hurts all the time so she can hardly tell the difference.
Amy had an awful night last night though. She said she couldn't get any sleep. She was having severe contractions every two hours!
"It felt like my back was breaking," she said.
(Savvy people may want to consider this before making their bets below.)
PORNO FOR PREGGOS
(or ... The Less I Get The More I Write About It)
Amy's libido seems to be back but the actual "having sex" part is a no-go, unfortunately. She's just been too uncomfortable.
I saw her looking through this Good Vibrations catalog we got in the mail today. (I have no idea how they got our address, honest!!) Amy's not really that naive (especially after listening to me for the past several years) but I did have to explain a few definitions for her again.
AMY: "What's that mean - Four Finger Lesbian Club?"
ME: "That's practically what your ob/gyn does during those exams."
AMY: "What's fisting?"
ME: "That's what it feels like your ob/gyn is doing during those exams."
Later, rummaging through my room....
ME: "What are you looking for?"
AMY: "Don't you have any sex videos here? I know you do!!"
ME: "What the -- ? I'm not some kind of smut peddler! I never buy porn DVDs. ... I download them off the internet. Wanna see?"
A few video clips later....
AMY: "Where's the story?"
ME: "Story? This guy meets this girl and they have sex. That's the story!"
AMY: "Will you go to the Family Video store and get me one with a story?"
(NOTE: Our local video store is really called Family Video and they really have a back room of porn movies.)
ME: "Me? Why don't you get it?"
AMY: "I can't be seen renting a porno. I'm pregnant!"
ME: "What better excuse? Pregnant people get horny. It's alright for a girl to rent porn. No stigma. The other girls behind the counter will think you're all like 'Miss Confident Sexual Woman' and GRRL POWER. And the guys will just drool."
AMY: "What's wrong with you getting one?"
ME: "Yeah, right ... I'd be pegged as one of those creepy pervs who stays in his room all day and wacks off to porn videos ... even worse, I'm married and my wife is pregnant and I'm wacking off to porn videos."
(That looks a lot worse in print than it really is, I think.)
NOT SO SECRET ALIAS
We're still working on baby names. We have a short list. His last name will be Liles of course, mine or my dad's I guess. Quite English.
But his first name will be a Korean one. Amy and I have given it a lot of thought for the past eight months and she is very much for a Korean name. Like her nieces and nephew. As am I.
Some people really don't like the idea of it. I get surprised looks or the ubiquitous, "You're going to give him an American name too, right?" (Even from Korean-Americans.) They say the child will be teased or he won't fit in. The name will be massacred during role calls.
I've considered this. But kids will get teased regardless - because of their hair, their height, their weight, their eyes, their parents, their pants, their skin color, their shoes, their backpacks, their lunches, ... whatever. And frankly, I figure the people who do the teasing are exactly the kind of people I won't want my boy to hang around. I'm not going to name Baby Boy with a difficult to pronounce name. Or one like Hyung So Lo. Please.
More importantly, I've known a lot of people of other ethnicities growing up who use names from their own respective backgrounds. Chaldeans. African-Americans. Indians. Some other Asians even. And these friends of mine have become the most shining examples of persons I know. Even with their "different" names.
I just feel a Korean-based name will be more applicable than a European, or Greek, or Christian, or English name or whatever. Christ, he's already got an English/American last name anyways.
Baby Boy can always pick his own English name if he prefers once he gets older. For Amy and myself, this choice just feels better.
But we're reserving the final name selection for when we see Baby Boy. I'm bringing my list.
If you've any Korean name suggestions, we'll add them to the list as well. Thanks.
BIRTHING FOR DOLLARS
Rasee actually started a Baby Liles Pool on another site.
Since Baby Boy hasn't poked his head out yet (and two days late already), I'm going to give anyone who actually reads this a chance to put in a guess for when Baby Boy arrives (date and time ... Eastern Standard Time, John).
The closest person to guess without going over will get applause, a link (if applicable), and maybe a duplicate k-pop CD I have around here, or some old PC games I haven't played in over a year. Or just the satisfaction of having some latent mutant ESP baby-predicting powers. Something.
So if you feel lucky, then send in a guess.
