Kaitlyn's Christmas Letter

Dear friends and family,

When daddy read a few Christmas letters out loud to me and mommy, I decided I wasn't going to write one this year. At nine months I just didn't think anything interesting has happened in my life. I didn't get a new job; nobody gave me a raise or a bonus; I'm not building a vacation home or fighting with tenants; and no matter how hard I try, nobody has bought me a new car. I can't even write to tell people how many hundreds of thousands of dollars I lost in the stock market because I didn't have any invested. I dismissed the idea completely until, after reading the last letter, daddy insisted that I should write a letter of my own. Let's see if I have the hang of it.

I think you all know by now that Kaitlyn moved in March. It wasn't as stressful as people make it out to be, but I totally did not even see it coming. One day I was floating blissfully along in my own little world and the next...BAM!, welcome to your new home. The hardest part has been the climate change, it's so much colder here! I'm getting used to it though, and I seem to have no shortage of clothes to keep me warm. Sometimes I change three times a day!

In May Kaitlyn took her first airplane ride. I pooped on the plane. Those bathrooms are pretty tiny and it was funny watching daddy try to maneuver. We had a layover in Dallas. Our destination was sunny California for my baptism. I was baptized at the same church where mommy and daddy got married. After the baptism, we went back to my Nana and Papa's house for a big party. Daddy had to go to the store first and pick up the keg and more guacamole. On his way to get the guacamole though, his friend Chris that he went to high school with picked up the guacamole instead.

Unfortunately, the airplane ride was not so good for Kaitlyn. She had a little cold and by the time everyone arrived back home in San Antonio, the pressure changes on the airplane caused an ear infection. My doctor missed it when I went to see what was wrong and mommy and daddy ended up taking me to the emergency room. We went to the same hospital where I was born. It's a beautiful hospital and everyone there is very nice. We are so lucky to live in such a lavish area. We were back home in less than two hours with our prescription. Mommy and Kaitlyn waited in the car while daddy got the medicine. The pharmacist recognized him from the childbirth classes they took. His baby is doing well.

I had several visitors to San Antonio this year. Shortly after my birthday, both sets of grandparents came to visit me as well as my aunt Shannon. There has been a lot of debate about what my grandparents want me to call them. My mommy's parents are going to be grandma and grandpa. My daddy's parents are confusing. Grandma doesn't like grandma, and grandpa wanted to be called Cozy Bear. Daddy has been calling them Grandma Daisy Nana and Grandpa Cozy Papa in order to cover all the bases. I think we've finally decided on Nana and Papa, although Grandma Daisy Nana still seems a little unsure. I usually just call them both "eeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhh!".

In August, daddy went to Ireland with Nana, Papa, my aunt Shannon and uncle Patrick. They had to bury my Great-Nana. While daddy was gone, Grandma came to stay with mommy and Kaitlyn. We had so much fun! In October, Nana came to visit Kaitlyn with her dad, Great-Grandpa. We had four generations together in our house! I got to paint a pumpkin at the pumpkin patch. Great-Grandpa stayed home and read the paper.

A few weeks ago, my friend got to take a fabulous week-long vacation to Disney World in Florida with her entire family and all of her grandparents. They had a blast and got to see all our friends from Playhouse Disney. They brought me a Minnie Mouse Santa hat. Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is my favorite show. I love to watch it in my big beautiful house. I have three rooms and my very own pink bathroom! Daddy says it's a good thing that I love my house because after his trip to Ireland and mommy being so sick while I was in her tummy, we can't afford to go anywhere for a very long time.

Kaitlyn seems to be a pretty smart little girl because I'm only nine months and I'm already standing up, walking with help, and writing my own Christmas letters. By the time I see Nana and Papa again, I'll probably be walking on my own and talking!

I think that's all, it's been a pretty dull year. I hope to have a more exciting letter for you all next year! Merry Christmas!

Love,
Kaitlyn

How To Bathe a Child

Step 1: Recognize the child needs a bath.

This is also called "try to get out of giving the child a bath". This may sound pretty obvious and straight forward, but it's not. It's deceptively complex, because it involves your spouse. If you're a single parent, you probably never have to worry about bathing your child. Good for you.

The key is to get the other parent to recognize the need for a bath without you.  This usually occurs by way of a poopy diaper blowout, excessive spit-up or projectile vomit, or playing with dirt, all while you're not home.  If you find yourself a part of any of the following phrases, you've past step one and signed up for bath duty: 

"Honey, is this Tuesday?"

"Did we give [insert child's name here] a bath last night?"

"Daddy's little girl needs a bath, doesn't she?!"

Step 2: Prepare the Bath

We've reached the point in my house where step two now requires a full-fledged bath tub. I am fortunate in that I am able to dedicate an entire bathroom to bathing the child. If it's in the budget, I recommend it. I also recommend getting the other parent to prepare the child while you prepare the bath. 

Plug the tub, add warm water, and make sure you have a clean wash cloth and towel. Under no circumstances should you allow a spouse, grandparent, in-law, or anyone but your child to feel the temperature of the water as it will undoubtedly be too warm, too cold, or too wet.

Step 3: Insert Child

At this point we are ready to place the child into the bath.  Hopefully the child is delivered to you ready to just add water.  If not, you'll have to deal with taking off clothes, diapers, etc.  Hint: remove the diaper only at the very last minute to avoid any messy "accidents".

Step 4: Mutter Muffled Colorful Metaphors

I forgot step 2.5: change your clothes.  Hopefully at this stage you're not wearing anything you don't mind getting wet.  I don't just mean with water.  If you didn't have the good sense to read all the steps before you started, well, hopefully you had the good sense to know what to wear.  Once in the water, the child may do one or more of the following:

• "Spank" the water
  
• Try to climb out of the tub
  
• Throw water-laden toys at you
  
• Unplug the drain
  
• French-kiss the faucet
  
• Try to drink all the water
  
• Practice the breast stroke
  

As with those water rides at the theme parks, you will get wet, you may get soaked.  Don't let mom hear you cursing in front of the baby.

Step 5: Clean the Child

Oh yeah, do you have a cup or bucket you can use to wash the soap out of the child's hair?  I guess that was step 2.6. It's just no fun if you have everything you need the first time.  

You'll need to use soap in this step.  I use Johnson's Multi-Purpose No More Tears and thank God for the pump action dispenser.  I usually start with the hair. Cleaning it is easy.  Rinsing out the soap is hard. I recommend a firm but gentle grasp under the child's neck and head with one hand, and the cup or bucket filled with warm, clean water in the other. Now, lower the back of the child's head to the surface of the water.  Just as you're about to dump the clean water over her hair to wash out the soap and she squirms out of your grasp falling face first into the tub, use another colorful metaphor. "Nothing" is what you'll shout to your spouse in the other room who responded to your colorful metaphor with a concerned "what's wrong?" 

Grab the child out of the water. Make sure she's still breathing (yes, choking counts). If the child appears dazed or stunned, use this to your advantage and finish rinsing the soap out of her hair. If the child is not yet dazed or stunned...well, let's just say this works better if the child is dazed or stunned.

At this point, if you had the foresight to bring a cocktail with you to this event, drink it.

Use a washcloth to finish cleaning the rest of the child while she plays in the bathtub. Try to minimize the following:

• Diving
  
• Gulping
  
• Attempting to breath underwater

Step 6: Dry the Child

Here's where it gets fun. If the child has not already done so, unplug the drain. As the water drains, use the bucket or a cup to rinse off any remaining soap. Grab the towel. Stand up and stare at the child in the tub for a moment while pondering how to wrap the towel around the child without getting yourself soaked. Good luck. When the child gets bored and realizes she's in an empty tub and tries to climb out, the brainstorming session is over.  Pick up the child and wrap the towel around her. You should now be completely wet. Bring her to the nursery and set her in the crib so she can't escape. Try not to drop her as she attempts to wriggle from your drunken, frustrated and shivering (now that you're soaked) death grip.

Step 7: Dress the Child

NASA invented Velcro for the benefit of the world, but retailers from Babies "R" Us to Wal-Mart sell baby clothes with no fewer than a gazillion snaps on each outfit. These people clearly don't have children. 

Begin by placing the "snappy" outfit flat on the crib. Lay the child on top of it. Try to keep her flat on her back while you wrestle one arm into the sleeve. This will involve leaning over the crib rail and cutting off blood flow to your lower extremities. When you get the first arm halfway through the sleeve and the child's fist opens up, catching her thumb inside the sleeve and stopping the arm from moving any further, curse loudly. Stand up and look around the room incredulously for the hidden camera as you mutter "what am I doing?" Now grab onto a solid, immovable object as there will be a moment of light-headedness when all the blood rushes from your head back into your legs. Once it passes, grasp the child firmly and quickly remove her from the crib and place her flat on the floor. She should now be temporarily disoriented from trying to figure out why she is not still in the crib. Use that moment to get the first arm through the sleeve. If you haven't finished that cocktail, now is a good time.

With one hand holding the baby down, use your other hand to fish her other arm into the sleeve. If you start to sound like you're in an episode of COPS ("stay down and quit resisting!"), you're doing it right. Use the same approach with the legs. 

If the outfit is equipped with "feet" it gets a little trickier because you have to continue to hold the child down, put her foot in the pajama foot, and snap it closed enough to prevent her from removing the first foot when you move on to the second. It helps to utter a few more colorful metaphors. It also helps if you have three hands. 

Once you get both hands and both feet in place and the outfit snapped securely, hold the child upright. She may smile and/or giggle at you. This is not because she loves you or has gas. You misaligned some of the snaps and will have to redo a good portion of them and she thinks it's funny. If you finished your cocktail, you may have to redo some portions more than once. 

In that case you get the last laugh--unless you forgot to put on the diaper. That was step 6.5.

Stand!

The Day The Air Force Lied To Me

Every year, two of the local Air Force bases, Randolph and Lackland, take turns hosting an air show. This year it was Lackland's turn, which happens to be the one near where I work. I have never actually officially been to an air show, at least not in the sense that you drive a distance in traffic, park far away, take a crowded shuttle bus and stand out on the hot pavement looking into the sky, trying not to blind yourself by the sun or pass or pass out from heat exhaustion. That's why I've never bothered going. Usually, if I'm going to "go", I watch from a distance, be it the home of a relative living nearby, a close-by park, or a freeway I happen to be driving on that goes by the base at the right moment. And after all the visitors we had last month, and all the drama, I was looking forward to spending a weekend sitting at home doing absolutely nothing. Fighting crowds in the hot sun was not in the cards.

On Thursday they parked a NATO AWACS jet on the ramp right next to the street I use to drive to work every day. That piqued my curiosity. Then, Thursday afternoon, the Blue Angels began practicing and I found myself in a golf cart parked as close as I could get to the runway without getting shot...a front row seat to the weekend aerobatics to come. On Friday when the F-22 was flying ear shattering, window rattling, car alarm triggering maneuvers 1000 feet off the ground with afterburner, I was sold. I came home and told Jen we were going to the air show on Saturday. I am an idiot.

We arrived at the air show to a line of traffic, as expected. We parked two miles away and took a shuttle to the front gate.  No surprises so far.  When we got to the gate, Jen went through the metal detector first.  She had our stroller and diaper bag filled with dangerous weapons.  The machine beeped like a dump truck backing up, but nobody cared.  

Kaitlyn and I went through next, but before we did, I emptied my pockets of all metallic contents: my cell phone and the car key.  The car key was on a $30,000 key chain (came with a free car!) with my Swiss Army knife that I purchased in Geneva back in 2003.  The pocket knife would be the point of contention, as the astute MP who just let in three Uzis and a blender informed me: "the Army Swiss knife is not allowed."  

Dammit.  If only I had placed the keys in the diaper bag, next to the grenades.  I was given two choices: 1) return to the car and secure the item there or 2) drop it into a box and pick it up when I leave.  

The trip back to the car was definitely a one way proposition at this point, I had no intentions of making more than one round trip.  The no-brainer here was to drop the knife into the box and pick it up on my way out.  Thinking it would make the knife easier to find later, I asked the guard if I should leave the key on the ring.  This is where I think I really went wrong.  Here's a woman who just let 25 pounds of C4 onto a military base disguised as a stroller, calls my knife an "Army Swiss", and I'm taking her at her word.  I must be a sucker for a woman in uniform.  She responded, "you probably shouldn't".  

Now, I spent six years in college, passed all the AP English classes in high school, and consider myself to be a halfway decent writer.  I'm not trying to toot my own horn, but I like to think I have a mastery of the English language most people just don't have.  If you tell me I "probably" 

shouldn't do something, that to me indicates that I could do it.  We could call it option A even, and option A would be a perfectly valid option because it would accomplish the end goal, but you're suggestion is that we consider option B.  Again, I could drop the key chain, $400 laser etched key, and $30 pocket knife with sentimental value that makes it priceless into the box and pick it all up later, but you're suggesting an alternative.  You're wearing a uniform, a sidearm, a funny looking hat, I'm going to go ahead and pursue option B.  

So thankfully, I removed the key from the $30,000 key chain and pocket knife with priceless sentimental value.  I dropped the latter two items, attached for easy visual identification later, into the box.

Kaitlyn had a blast, although I don't think she really cared about the planes.  She likes to be outside, people watch, and sleep in the stroller.  I like to take pictures of the sky where, moments before, jets were flying by.  By the way, the Blue Angels performed with only five of their six jets. You can read why here.

At 5:00, the air show was closing and we were hot, sticky, sunburned, and ready to go home.  I stopped at a port-a-potty to pee.  When I came out, I walked up to the portable sink, the kind with one of those foot pedals you use to pump the water.  I dispensed soap on my hands, rubbed them together, and pedaled. Air hissed out onto my dry soapy hands.  I tried the other sink.  They were both out of water. With dry soapy hands we walked back to the gate from whence we entered.  

There was an officer standing at the table where just a few hours ago I dropped my $30,000 key chain and pocket knife with priceless sentimental value into a box.  There were now several of the boxes on the table.  Upon seeing me, and before I had a chance to say anything, the officer asked “are you hear to pick up a knife?”  

How Nostradamus of him.  I told him I was.  He told me, in so many words, "tough shit". I honestly thought he was kidding and said as much.  He told me that he was not kidding; entering a military base is like entering an airport and he is not able to return anything surrendered to the “amnesty box”, as he called it.  He apologized for the "miscommunication".  I was speechless.  

Suddenly the box that I "shouldn't" drop my car key into had become an admission of guilt and a means of reparations and absolution--amnesty, if you will--for the high crime of buying a pocket knife in Switzerland five years ago and attaching it to my key chain.  I almost cried.  

I found the guy's supervisor and pleaded my case to him.  I expressed my extreme dissatisfaction at the situation only to be "reassured" that it had been happening all day to lots of other people. Celebrate your incompetence.  Good strategy.  We use it a lot where I work, too.  Now I sort of felt a kinship with this asshole, and it was clear to me by now that I was never going to see my overpriced key chain or priceless pocket knife again.  So I did the only thing left to do; I thanked the man for his service to our country, and I shook his hand.  

In retrospect (hindsight is always 20/20, isn't it?) I should have also told him to check the water supply in the portable sinks.

It's the Teeth, Stupid!

After the last post, I got no sympathy for the fact that my new cell phone now swims with the fishes, but I got a couple of nasty emails from folks wanting to know if the baby is OK, as if that was the point of the story.  I wasn't intentionally leaving everyone in the dark.  When caution is thrown to the wind, you don't readily know what the outcome is going to be.  Now, a week later, I can tell you that the child is fine.  I took medical school pass/fail, but in my professional opinion, it was the four teeth that recently appeared causing most of her symptoms.  

Since her discharge from the ER, Miss K has maintained a normal temperature and is pretty much back to her usual self, chasing the dog around the house and working on the manuscript for her book: Physics and You, a Babies Guide to the World.  This past weekend she went Trick Or Treating for Halloween and took in an air show on Saturday afternoon, which you will be hearing all about tomorrow. Until then, enjoy the Halloween photos.

From Miss K's First Halloween

A Few Bumps In The Road

It's been over a month since my last Speed Bump Update, which I'm sure you've correctly deduced by now means we've hit more than a few speed bumps since September 15th.  I think I mentioned in a previous post somewhere that I tend to be a little obsessive compulsive about things I can control.  One of those things is usually my writing, which is why I like to take the time to publish polished, well thought out updates.  I am now conceding here publicly that polished well thought out updates will net zero updates when speed bumps are present.  So I'm throwing caution to the wind in an effort to increase the frequency of writing.  Bear with me.

Our precious princess has not been well.  About the time of the last post, she grew two bottom teeth in the front of her mouth.  Since then we've been dealing with general fussiness, a runny nose, and a low grade fever, symptoms to be expected with a teething infant.  In the last two weeks, however, the symptoms began to escalate.  First it was a cough, which mommy felt was worsening.  This prompted a visit to the pediatrician, even though we had just visited the pediatrician two weeks prior and been given a clean bill of health.  As expected--as I expected--we were given the standard advice for infants: as long as she's eating and having dirty diapers at least every twelve hours, just watch for fever spikes above 101.  That'll be $15.

The following week the fever continued.  Usually it spiked at least once a day, but it stayed below 102.  Then it hit 103, which meant back to the pediatrician.  No signs of infection this time either, but they inserted a catheter to test her urine just to be sure.  Kaitlyn was pissed, pardon the pun, mommy was traumatized.  The doctor suspected roseola and told us to expect a rash any day. As long as she's eating and having dirty diapers at least every twelve hours, just watch for fever spikes above 101.  That'll be $15.

Three days later the fever was still with us and the rash was nowhere to be found.  This marked about twelve consecutive days with a fever 101 or above.  When the doctor called to follow up, she ordered Miss K to the ER.  Three hours and thousands of insurance dollars of poking, prodding, extracting, picture taking, and yes, another catheter and mommy was a basket case. 

The toughest part of all of this has not been parenting, it's been husbanding.  A cool bath and a dose of children's Tylenol will make my daughter feel better.  Nothing makes my wife feel better.  Tuesday night I spent at least fifteen minutes searching the house for every one of our three thermometers because the readings differed by a few decimals each time.   Thankfully she did not insist on a rectal reading, although I'm sure it's in my future.

All of this drama is punctuated by some long awaited visits, which are made bittersweet by the circumstances.  My former college roommate Ryan visited on the 5th, followed later that week by fellow Road Scholar Chris.  This weekend my mom is here with her dad, giving us some unique four generation photo opportunities, not to mention an opportunity for Miss K to bond with her paternal grandparents.  Capitalizing on that opportunity, we toured downtown San Antonio yesterday, visiting the Alamo and the Riverwalk where we all took a river boat tour.  As I lifted up the stroller to carry it on to the riverboat, I heard something drop.  I set the stroller down and turned to see Jen and the boat driver staring at me.  "What dropped?" I asked.

Jen answered first, "your cell phone".

"I tried to grab it," said the boat driver, "but the boat moved and it fell in".

I took my seat without saying a word.  The guy sitting across from me made a wise crack about needing a scuba diver.  I said "are you volunteering?" and then picked him up by the collar and threw him overboard.  If you think I'm exaggerating, call my cell phone and you can ask him yourself.

Sometimes A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words

What's So Funny?

I Love My Backyardigans!

My First Finger Foods

What's That Smell?

Today was my first day back to work after two weeks of "vacation" in Ireland. It really was more of a "trip" than a "vacation", which is why I spent the day correcting people when they asked how my "vacation" went. I came home today excited about all the things I want to write about from the trip. You'll be able to read all about it on the main TRS blog, but the events of the last couple hours have preempted my writing frenzy; just as my wife's predicament preempted my packing two weeks ago.

I'm sure there's no need to pontificate about my day. You've all taken vacations before and had to return to work. Sometimes a break can be good--especially when it's a vacation and not a trip--and you come back to your career refreshed, replenished, and renewed. You're ready to face the world again until you get burned out from working so hard at doing what you love and you need another vacation. Other times a break can be not so good; in the absence of that pesky job thing you're reminded how good life can be--and how crappy work makes it. You return with dread and self loathing and your "vacation" (or trip) lingers in your mind, taunting your fruitless though financially gainful efforts. You know what I mean.

It happens to be raining today and a bit cooler than it was say, Saturday, when I had to mow my four foot lawn in 147 degree heat and 6000% humidity. Nothing inspires you more coming home from a "trip" than four foot weeds that have overtaken your yard. This is especially disconcerting to me because I'm one of those control type personalities that tends to get a bit obsessive-compulsive when it comes to things in life I can control. Usually, for me, the yard is one of those things; but between weeds, crabgrass, and a really big gecko, I'm either about to save a load of money on my car insurance or I'm one conversation short of being checked into Arkham Asylum.

Today is also the first day Kaitlyn spent with her new child care provider, who happens to be the mother of Dr. Feel Good (the one that fixed Jen's foot before I left for Ireland). School starts next week and Jen has been blessed with a long-term substitute job for the first two months of school. That means she gets to spend this week setting up the classroom, attending meetings, and meeting the parents--with pay! As I drove home just a few hours ago, each swish swash of the windshield wipers seemed to bring a new thought:

How did Kaitlyn's first day go? Swish-Swash
How did Jen's meetings go? Swish-Swash
What should I write about first from Ireland? Swish-Swash
Do I have to go back to work tomorrow? Swish-Swash
Dammit I'm out of vacation time. Swish-Swash
Is this a martini day or a Jameson day? Swish-Swash

I was only home for about thirty minutes before the answers started to come to me. I'm now on my second martini. I plan to keep drinking until I can't smell anymore.

For you younger readers, or those of you sensitive to certain four letter "colorful metaphors" in the English language, please stop reading now; I don't want to offend you. Unfortunately, the language is necessary. It was that bad.

I said hello to the wife and daughter, gave Hallie, our dog, some love, and got myself a quick snack before heading upstairs to the bar to make my Monday martini. I grabbed some ice out of the freezer and walked up the stairs. When I got to the top I froze. In the middle of the hallway, not ten feet from where I was standing, was a brownish heap. A foot away from that, a smaller heap. Six inches from that, brown heap droplets covering about two square feet. Fuck me.

Actually that last bit was out loud. Jen heard me and called up from downstairs "what's the matter?!"

Surveying the scene for another moment, I responded with the only words that I could muster: "Oh...Fuck Me!"

Growing more concerned, she asked again: "WHAT'S WRONG?!"

"Either the dog shit or puked. I'm not sure which."

I set down my ice and tip-toed a few inches closer, as if standing on the tips of my toes would protect me from the evil now embedded in my carpet. The texture and color were such that I still couldn't tell exactly what this substance was or where it came from. I looked around, praying for a hidden camera. Please let me be on TV. Please let me get punk'd. Please someone tell me this is not real. That bastard Ashton Kutcher was nowhere to be found.

I went downstairs to get a plastic bag and some paper towels. I again approached the pile cautiously. I tore off enough paper towels to wipe an elephant's ass and, turning my head, I took a deep breath and held it. I've taken CPR and First Aid. I was a Red Cross certified lifeguard. In Switzerland I dealt with a ten year old who shit his pants. I plucked splinters out of hands and feet. For the past five months I've changed diapers full of carrots and potato casserole and God knows what else. I once had to clean up Hallie's vomit that literally came out as a chunky pile of expanded dog food (that was disgusting, I nearly vomited myself). Hell, I watched my daughter fly out of my wife's hoo-ha. I can handle gross...to a point. As I reached out to grab the dried brown mound on my carpet (just outside my precious media room I might add), the pile soaked up into the towel and nearly wet my fingers. Fuck me. It was shit. Lots of it. A heap...dry enough to be stuck to the carpet, wet enough to be used in a Brawny commercial. I gagged.

At this point I was seriously ready to:

a) vomit profusely
b) kill the dog
c) replace the carpet
d) in the entire zip code

I suddenly remembered that Dr. Feel Good a few months ago got one of those lean green clean machines designed to clean up upholstery and carpet. It was either that or the hose, so I ran across the street to get the green clean machine. It was a thoroughly disgusting experience which included watching the dirty water from the carpet being sucked into a container on the machine that turned a very gross shade of doggy diarrhea brown. But it worked, and when I was done I still had half a tank of cleaning juice in the machine...so we decided to try it out on our once white sofa in the family room. With a newborn in the house I haven't been able to bring myself to spend money on getting our admittedly filthy couches cleaned. Having said that, I was not above doing it myself, and I now found myself with the means. I brought the little machine downstairs and tested a spot.

By now I felt I was wearing doggy diarrhea cologne. It seemed like the smell was following me everywhere I went. I assumed it was the container of "dirty water" from the green machine. As I continued to work on a small section of the couch, Jen turned to walk into the kitchen and I saw her stop abruptly, throw her arms in the air and moan incoherently. She wasn't saving any money on her car insurance. While I had been cleaning up shit off the carpet and dirt off the couch, the dog had created three new piles on the carpet behind the Lazy Boy...only inches from the easy cleanup of a tile floor. Fuck me.

Up to this point I really wasn't mad at the dog, this is not like her at all and I knew it wasn't her fault. But after cleaning up one mess and finding out that the entire time she was making another, I got just a little upset. The door opened and the dog--head down, eyes sad, legs shaking--went outside.

I cleaned up the second mess while the dog watched me from the back porch. I'm still not mad at her. I'm actually praying she starts feeling better so I can avoid what will undoubtedly be a costly vet bill. In the meantime I still smell shit everywhere I go, which means this will now become a Jameson night as well. After my "trip", at least I'm well prepared. More on that in the Irish blog...after I get rid of this smell.

Hyperbole and the Best Damn Sweet Potato Casserole Recipe Ever

It has been brought to my attention that there are some TRS readers out there that have taken offense to some content in the Speed Bump Chronicles. They feel I have painted Jen as a bad mother and, maybe because of what I’ve written, some of them actually think that she is a bad mother. So let me set the record straight: these people are dumb.

For starters, Jen is a wonderful mother. Check out the really cool scrapbook she made of Kaitlyn with Smilebox:

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

She also reviews the weekly updates and could at any time ask that I not post something. She usually finds that I’ve captured our mundane suburban lives in my usual satirical way. For those of you that actually think Jen keeps a freaking blender in the diaper bag, maybe I need to clarify my usual satirical way.

/ˈsæt^ər/ Pronunciation Key[sat-ahy^uhr] –noun the use of irony, sarcasm, ridicule, or the like, in exposing, denouncing, or deriding vice, folly, etc.

In the “or the like” category, I would include hyperbole, which is a literary device that uses extreme exaggeration. For example, I don’t really think my wife is a “traitorous bitch” any more than I think Barack Obama really has a picture of Osama Bin Laden hanging above his fireplace. Both are overstating the case just a bit. So let's move on.

I remember walking to my car one day after work several months ago and telling a buddy of mine whom I hadn’t seen in a few months that Jen and I were expecting. He's talked to me in the past about some of the “friction” he and his wife have had with his daughter who is now in college. Despite this, he made a point of telling me “I fell in love with my little girl the moment she was born”. This certainly makes him a lover, which meant a lot more knowing some of the challenges he recently faced raising his girl. I remember thinking that he was surely overstating the case. I’ve since been proven wrong on that as I too have fallen in love with my precious little oracle, even when she spits out her rice cereal at me.

Two weeks ago Kaitlyn had her four month checkup with the pediatrician. She gave us the green light to get started with baby food. Jen was tickled pink. For some reason she’s been counting down the days until feeding the baby required more effort than just watching TV in the lazy boy and holding a bottle. There I go again with the hyperbole; Kaitlyn has been holding her own bottle lately. Just like everything else though, I was behind the curve on this one. She was right, I was wrong. Baby food is pretty cool stuff when it's not rice cereal.

Who can really blame someone for not wanting to eat rice cereal? There’s no sugary goodness, no snap crackle pop, no fun pictures or stories on the back of the box. It's just...rice masquerading as "cereal", and it turns out that, despite the fact that our child puts everything in her mouth and has been living on breast milk and formula her entire life, she is not fooled one bit. But let me tell you what she can do with sweet potatoes and carrots.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but in this case I think I’ll stick with the thousand words. Watching this child eat sweet potatoes and carrots is like watching a drug addict looking for her next score. As soon as that spoon hits her lips her eyes get big and she does this little wiggle dance in her chair like you just fed her a spoonful of pure joy. You have about two and a half seconds to get that next spoonful in her mouth or the detox process begins. You don’t want the detox process to begin. The little lip starts to quiver, the eyes get angry, and she starts to wail. While entertaining, that is nowhere near the best part yet. It gets better.

Within about an hour, the Fuzzy Headed Oracle of the Poopy Pants earns her full title. On formula alone this child was pooping about five times a day. The doctor told us that the baby food should slow things down a bit. She didn’t tell us it would also get us on Leno. This morning, not even an hour after being fed, Kaitlyn shit a carrot. Pureed baby food went in, a perfectly shaped conical orange log came out. If you took a picture of a carrot with the best camera on the market, emailed it to that fancy photo printer down at Target, and picked up an 8X10 glossy an hour later, it wouldn't look as good as the carrot that came out of my child's ass. And I'll be damned if it doesn't take longer too. This morning I thought it was a fluke, a one time deal. Then, this afternoon I gave Kaitlyn a serving of sweet potatoes. Within an hour, a casserole dish of the best looking yams you'll ever see. This takes Oracle to a whole new level.

Of course, I might be overstating the case just a bit.

Technologically Challenged

When Jennifer and I decided to move to Texas, we were also deciding to move 1200 miles away from our families. This of course has some inherent advantages and disadvantages, many of which should become apparent by the time you finish reading this. From the family’s point of view, one of the disadvantages now that Kaitlyn is here is of course a lack of access to their grandchild/niece. I think this has hit the grandmothers hardest of all.

A few weeks ago my wife was talking to her mother. She was waxing on about a friend of hers who also recently became a grandmother and who is also geographically challenged when it comes to seeing the little one. But every morning this friend has breakfast with her daughter and grandchild through the miracle of the Internet. “Oh by the way our new laptop has a built-in camera”…hint hint. This got me thinking, and last week I went up to the media room, dug through a box of miscellaneous technology I have sitting in the closet, and found…tada!...my webcam I bought seven years ago in college.

I’ve been out of the videoconferencing circuit for awhile, so attaching the web cam to the computer left me with a bit of a conundrum: what software should I use? Surely there have been some advances in videoconferencing technology in the past seven years. I think the last time I used the web cam I was using Microsoft Netmeeting. The video was choppy at best and it was usually easier to call the person you were conferencing with rather than deal with the shoddy audio of a video conference. To my disappointment, my usual go-to source for software solutions does not appear to have anything in the way of video conferencing, not even in the Google Labs. So I did an old fashioned Google search and decided to try Skype.

For those of you who’ve used Skype before, you know how easy it is download, install, and set up a free account. It’s very similar to downloading GoToMyPC or AOL Instant Messenger in that you follow a setup wizard to create an account, install a small piece of software, and you’re off and running. I told my wife to call her parents and tell them to install Skype. My father-in-law was taking a nap when Jen called their house. He is the designated technologist in the household, and grandma was quite adamant about not waking the sleeping giant. We got tired of waiting and went to bed.

Sometime the next day we got a phone call. Grandpa was ready for his close-up. We brought the Fuzzy Headed Oracle to the office and with amazing ease, dialed up the grandparents. A lot has changed in seven years. The video quality streaming in from California was about as real-time as it gets; none of that hokey every fifth frame stuff we saw during the first Gulf War when correspondents would report using a videophone. And the audio—it was just like being on the phone. For an hour we broadcast Kaitlyn in all her glory, scooting across a blanket on the floor and sitting in her Command Center.

On most Sunday evenings you’ll find my grandfather, a.k.a The Silver Fox, at my parent’s house for dinner in Orange County. Having had success web casting with one set of grandparents I knew it was only a matter of time before I got the disgruntled phone call or the snappy email from my parents—specifically my mom—saying “how come we don’t get to see Kaitlyn on the computer?” I decided to head this one of at the pass and maybe even kill two birds with one stone. While Jen was at work Sunday afternoon, I called my house.

As predicted, the Silver Fox was there for dinner, but my dad was still working. I asked my mom, a.k.a. Miss Daisy, if she wanted to see Kaitlyn scoot. Normally she wants nothing to do with computers once she’s left work, but the thought of seeing her granddaughter LIVE ON THE BIG SCREEN must have appealed to her. She and the Silver Fox eagerly marched up to the room formerly known as mine.

Over the next thirty minutes or so we somehow managed to get Skype installed on my parent's computer, a process that ended with this conversation:

Sean: “Is it done?”

Mom: “Yes. It wants my Skype name.”

Sean: “You need to set up an account.”

Mom: “How do I do that?”

Sean: “There should be a link that says set up new account or I don’t have an account or something to that effect.”

Mom: “No, it just wants my Skype name.”

Sean: “See where it says ‘Skype Name’?

Mom: “Yes.”

Sean: “Just below that, it doesn’t say ‘Don’t have a Skype name?’?”

Mom: “Oh yeah, there it is.”

Sean: “Kaitlyn, when you learn to read make sure you learn how to read ALL THE WORDS”.

Mom: “Don’t talk to your mother like that.”

Once we finally got the web cast up and running, I set the Fuzzy Headed Oracle in her Command Center and she pushed some buttons which caused a series of LED’s to start flashing with some sound effects.

Mom: “Kids these days can’t just sit and be, they have to have constant stimulation.”

For the love of Pete. My mother is turning into one of those people that would have me surrender the color pixels in our television because she didn’t watch color TV in 1955. Along those lines I asked her, speaking of constant stimulation, to remind me how big her brand new 47” LCD COLOR television is with flashing lights and sound effects??

Mom: “That’s different.”

Of course it is. I know, I know, don’t talk to your mother that way. I’ll probably get voted off the family island now.

As if this all weren’t excitement enough, my dad, a.k.a. The Cozy Bear, came home. Grandpa Cozy is ultimately responsible for the Fuzzy Headed Oracle’s morning Star Trek habit. It didn’t faze him one bit seeing baby Kaitlyn sitting in her Command Center, pushing buttons that open trap doors underneath grandma. His first comment was critical, but not of the technology his granddaughter was enjoying (after all, in 1966 his favorite program was aired in color). His comment was critical of the technology we were using: “Can’t you clear up that picture?”

And not to be outdone, grandma weighed in as well: “yeah, it looks like you’re broadcasting from Iraq.”

I’m so glad Kaitlyn and I took this opportunity to chat with Frank and Marie. Clearly these people have no appreciation for how far videoconferencing has come in the past seven years. Star Trek has spoiled them! I pointed out that my camera was not exactly representative of the most up to date technology.

Mom: “Well can’t you get a new one?”

Sean: “Maybe the grandparents will buy us one so they can see their granddaughter better!”

To make an excruciatingly long story a little bit shorter, they did. I must admit, the new camera is much better. And the best part: it has a built-in flashy LED light. Kaitlyn loves it.

The Fuzzy Headed Oracle

About three weeks ago, I took this photo of Kaitlyn sitting up by herself on the couch. I set it as my desktop wallpaper on my laptop and when one of my coworkers saw it, she said she looks like a little Fuzzy Headed Oracle.

Since then, the FHO has practically taken over our daily work tasks. When we get pointless assignments, hear about absurd management decisions, or just get to a lull in the day we consult the FHO. I thought about having some bumper stickers made that say WWTFHOD?

At home I used to call Kaitlyn "Princess Poopy Pants"--for obvious reasons. Now I call her the Fuzzy Headed Oracle of the Poopy Pants, which I think is a promotion.

It's Your Turn

My wife is an elementary school teacher by trade. She earned her Bachelors degree in Liberal Studies from Cal Poly and has valid teaching credentials in both California and Texas. If you were to add up all the days she’s actually worked in the past year, I don’t think you’d need more than two hands to do the math. It’s not her fault. The plan was for her to resume life as a substitute teacher here in Texas upon our return home from England last fall. Unfortunately nine months of nausea meant a different plan. By the time she had the baby and was ready to resume school, there were only about two weeks left until summer break. Again, not her fault. But it turns out all this unscheduled unemployment has taken its toll on our bank account, so I sent my wife back to work.

One of my favorite things so far about fatherhood is the hand off. It’s most apparent on weekday afternoons between four-thirty and five O’clock. That’s when I usually come home from earning the money to pay for the diapers and the formula and the dog food (crap, we’re almost out of dog food) and the electricity and the water…you get the idea. As I push the button to open the garage door I utter a sigh of relief, “ah, home sweet home”. I pull into the garage, pondering what stuffed animal my dog will bring me as a welcome home gift today. I get out of the car and walk to the door. In one hand are my keys and the mail, in the other, my empty lunch bag. Closing the garage door behind me, I stop in the laundry room to put away my sunglasses, badge, keys, and blue tooth. Look at that, I now have a partially free hand. Hallie greets me with one of her toys. I don’t dare acknowledge her yet, she’s too excited and would pee on the carpet. I walk into the family room, anxious to be kissed by my wife and greeted by my little princess. Pay close attention, here comes the hand off. With eyes on my partially freed hand, my wife, sitting with the child in the lazy boy, holds her high in the air. “Here’s your princess, she has a poopy diaper. It’s your turn!”

What the hell happened to “give her to me”?

It seems being a stay at home mom was taking it’s toll on my wife, so I sent her back to work.

Having mommy work nights and weekends has hastened the daily hand off, but it’s improved household morale. For example, Kaitlyn and I are celebrating diaper bag liberation. For some reason my wife packs enough accoutrements in that thing to cross the Sahara. When we’re out together I always end up on the wrong end of a hand off, after all, it’s my turn. I remember one especially frustrating experience in the family restroom of Target. Kaitlyn had what we affectionately refer to as a “blow out”. That means there was shit everywhere, literally.

I took her into the bathroom and flipped down the changing table. I carefully placed our changing pad on top and then put the disposable changing cloth on top of that, just like mommy taught me. I extracted the child from the stroller and placed her on the changing pad with a robotic lift and twist maneuver that kept her literally out at arms reach. This was for her protection and mine. I tried carefully peeling off her clothing so as not to smear crap all over both of us. I failed. By the time the outfit came off she had shit on her head.

It's a funny thing about family restrooms; they give you your own room with a handy dandy changing table, but that’s it. If you need to set anything besides a baby down in there, you’re shit out of luck, so to speak. I needed to put the soiled outfit in the sink, but the sink was covered by the diaper bag. I knew there were plastic bags in the diaper bag, but it was across the room and if I let go of Kaitlyn I knew she’d make more of a mess. I decided to start with the mess. I took off her diaper and started the cleanup effort. Once satisfied that she would not be able to smear crap on anything else, I decided to look for a bag.

It's a shame I was alone in there with just Kailtyn. What followed would have been a great magic act. I felt like Bullwinkle trying to pull a rabbit out of my hat. I pulled out clothing for a blizzard, clothing for a day at the pool, a formal outfit in case a spontaneous wedding took place at the cash register, a rubber duck, a bath tub, a flashlight, freeze dried ice cream, and a blender, because you never know when you’ll want a margarita. There was not one single plastic bag, at least not that I could find.

Meanwhile back at the changing table, Princess Poopy Pants decided to pee, soiling herself (again) and all of the accessories I was using to change her. So now I have a soiled child, a soiled changing table, and no place but the toilet or the sink to put her while I clean things up. To top it off, I still had a poopy outfit and no place to put it. I was up shit creek without any plastic bags. In a balancing act worthy of the big top, I managed to get the child—and myself—cleaned up. But I learned my lesson.

Daddy and Kaitlyn had a lunch appointment yesterday afternoon with some neighbors. Since mommy had to work, it was finally my turn to decide what was worthy of the magic diaper bag. I took out the spare tire, the encyclopedias, and the army meal rations and packed only what was necessary for the two hour outing to a restaurant. Not only could I find everything, the bag actually fits in the car now.

This is the first weekend mommy has worked both Saturday and Sunday, which made daddy’s weekend chores a little more of a chore to complete, especially with a lunch date. The top priority this weekend was the yard: the back yard needed some fill dirt, the side yard had a broken sprinkler pipe, and the front yard needed to be mowed and trimmed lest we get a nastygram from the HOA Nazis. By the time mommy left for work Sunday afternoon, daddy was way behind schedule. The dirt was done and most of the beer was gone but that was all. To make matters worse, Kaitlyn did not get her morning or afternoon nap. Add that to the 95 degrees plus the 45% humidity and the afternoon was heading downhill fast. After a quick trip to Home Depot, Kaitlyn hung in there for the sprinkler repair, but then she started getting fussy. Half of my garage was out on the driveway, dirt needed to be swept up, and Kaitlyn was sitting in her stroller in the garage wailing like an air raid siren. Neighbors were coming outside and, upon hearing the commotion staring at me as if I was unaware of the squealing noise leaking out into the cul-de-sac. I did my best to get everything cleaned up and put away so I could bring the poor abused child inside to scream and be miserable. I finally got her down for an afternoon nap and the rest of the evening went quite well.

About twenty minutes ago mommy came home. I heard the garage door open and saw Hallie scramble to find a present. Then the phone rang. It was my wife.

“Would you like me to leave your car outside tonight? There’s a stroller in your parking spot.”

Dammit. In all the chaos of fixing the sprinklers, sweeping the dirt, putting away the tools, absorbing nasty stares from the neighbors, and bringing the screaming child back in the house, I forgot to move the stroller out from the middle of the garage. Touché

But she was still on the phone.

“Do I need to come out there and move it?” I asked.

“Are you busy?” she replied.

No, now that I think about it, I think it’s my turn anyway.

Mommy Doesn't Know Everything

Yesterday, Kaitlyn celebrated her sixteenth week of life and she’s already following in her father’s footsteps. Here’s a summary of her travels and experiences so far:

• Two minor league baseball games
• Lyndon B. Johnson Lake
• Southern California
• Austin and a tour of the Texas Capitol
• San Antonio Riverwalk
• The Alamo
• Fredericksburg, Texas
• First airplane ride
• First emergency room visit
• First ear infection
• First laceration

That’s not even including the time she spent in Europe while in the womb. We’ve had our share of good times so far, and a small dose of trauma.

We traveled in late May to California to have Kaitlyn baptized. We returned with an ear infection that earned us a trip to the emergency room with a fever of 104. If you want to see a new mom freak out, show her a thermometer that reads 104. Another way to make a new mom freak out: show her blood. This afternoon Jen was trimming Kaitlyn’s fingernails and accidentally missed one and hit the finger instead. All ten are still accounted for, but there was enough blood drawn to cause a stream of tears and a moment of hysteria. Kaitlyn cried a little too. If nothing else, these little incidents serve to remind mommy that she’s not alone, and she doesn’t know everything.

When we first brought Kaitlyn home from the hospital, she barely weighed five pounds. My wife was literally afraid to touch her. I’ll admit, it was hard to get a handle on something that small, especially since it liked to squirm. One of the nurses referred to Kaitlyn on her birthday as a "little jelly bean". For at least the first two weeks of Kaitlyn’s life, I was the go-to guy for just about everything. I even tried breastfeeding once. It turns out mommy does know a thing or two about that one.

I changed Kaitlyn’s first diaper. I bathed her for the first time. After she ate, my wife would hand her off to me to burp her. At bedtime I was the one that swaddled her. When Kaitlyn was fussy and nothing else seemed to work, daddy came to the rescue because daddy watched The Happiest Baby on the Block about four times, once in slow motion. I was useful. I knew things. Then over the last four months, something happened: my wife became an expert…on everything.

Now if I sit with the child, mind my own business, and she starts to cry, my wife can’t hold back her expertise: turn her on her side, pat her bottom, she needs to burp, she needs to crap, sit her up, lay her down. It always ends the same way: GIVE HER TO ME, which is like the triple dog dare of parenting. It’s not just the words, it’s the tone. It’s the same tone she uses at the end of an argument when she says “fine”. “Fine” at the end of an argument does not mean everything is fine. It means, “fine, you're sleeping in the tub". That’s the tone I’m talking about.

To compensate, I like to think I go the extra mile with the little things I do still know. For example, I always seem to be qualified to change a poopy diaper, especially if I've been hiding at work all day. No problem, I embrace it. I treat changing poopy diapers like an Olympic event. Mommy sometimes takes five or ten minutes to change one. She must be buffing the child's ass because I can get it done in about 60 seconds. Of course, according to mommy, I put the diaper on wrong most of the time.

A few weeks ago my wife asked me to change Kaitlyn's clothes. She already picked out a dress for her to wear and laid it out on the bed. I was honored. The outfit my wife picked out was a little dress with all snaps. I set Kaitlyn on top of it (after changing her poopy diaper of course), put her arms through, and snapped it up the front. I carefully double-checked her diaper to make sure I’d met all of mommy’s requirements, then triple checked that I had all the snaps lined up properly--apparently that’s a big deal too. After a thorough inspection, everything looked good. Kaitlyn even had a smile on her face. I proudly marched to the living room. My wife took one look at us both, shook her head, and told me the dress was on backwards. No gold medal for that event.

I’ve thus come to cherish the little traumas, when I hear "do something" instead of "give her to me". When the fever hit 104 it was daddy that drove to the hospital and daddy that carried the little girl into the ER while mommy parked the car. Today, when mommy cut off the child’s finger, it was daddy that calmed her down; then I calmed the child and put the band aid on.

By the way, daddy still does most of the bathing. Mommy hasn't mastered THAT yet!

Kaitlyn's Birth

e arrived at the hospital sometime around 7AM. We were already dilated to 3cm and the contractions were showing up on the fetal monitor about two minutes apart. Suddenly all the fear and anxiety and nauseous misery of the last nine months boiled down to one question Jen kept asking over and over: “what happened to ten minutes!!? How could we be at two, they were never at ten!” It didn’t really matter, two minute contractions meant we earned our ticket into a delivery room--and there would be no gun range for me today. They admitted us almost immediately. The sequence of events that followed nearly made up for the nine months of pure hell that got us here.

Once again, I refer to the haters, who painted lovely images of 28 hour labor and hospitals too busy to administer epidurals, just the things a first time mother wants to be thinking about on her way to the hospital. Our story couldn’t be more different. By 11AM we were watching episodes of Friends in our private birthing suite, we had seen the doctor, and my wife had her drugs. Just over five hours and three pushes later our little diva (as the nurse came to call her) was born.

I don’t want to oversimplify the process. There were a few challenging moments during those five hours. For example, every forty-five minutes or so the anesthesiologist popped his head in to see if we needed to be “topped off”. He reminded me of Leslie Nielsen in the movie “Airplane”, popping his head into the cockpit repeatedly to say “I just want to tell you both good luck. We're all counting on you.” I appreciated his diligence right up to the point where I could see the baby’s head, and since he wasn’t about to top me off I had no further use for the guy so I politely bid him adieu.

Let’s talk for a minute about heads. A few times during the pregnancy I had people ask me if I was going to videotape the birth. I’ve never understood these people. I mean, really?

REALLY?

Let’s for a moment just set aside how many ways of wrong I could list here and focus on this: In our five years together Jen and I have collected probably about ten hours of home video footage. We have family visits to Texas, the wedding, the honeymoon, 80^th birthday parties--and I can count on one hand the number of times we’ve watched any of it. So practically speaking, when we do get around to sitting down and deciding what memory of our lives together should we relive in 5.1 surround sound, where on the list do you think childbirth would be?

I’m not alone here. If there was one thing I took away from our childbirth 101 classes it was this: daddy’s head stays right next to mommy’s head. It seemed like very prudent advice to me, advice I fully intended to follow religiously. Yet as the big moment approached our nurse kept saying “I can see your baby’s head! Dad, take a look, do you want to see your baby’s head?” The first time she asked me I think I turned around to look for my dad. He was nowhere to be found. Damn deadbeat dads, never there when you really need them. Next I eloquently blurted out the prolific phrase “uhhhhh”. What I was hearing was:

“DADDY’S HEAD STAYS NEXT TO MOMMY’S HEAD! DADDY’S HEAD STAYS NEXT TO MOMMY’S HEAD!”

But all I got out was “uhhhhh”.

The peer pressure was killing me, it was time to bring in reinforcements. I knew from tireless conversations during the pregnancy that Jen and I were of one mind on this one. Under no circumstances was daddy’s head to deviate from the general region of mommy’s head. If there was anybody in that room that could explain this in no uncertain terms it was my wife, the woman who not eight hours prior took the Lord’s name in vein for the first time since I’ve known her. I looked at Jen to pound this one home, firmly grasping her hand in a way that said "I'm here to support you my wife, my love."

She responded, rather nonchalantly, “You can look if you want to”.

WHAT!? You traitorous bitch. Don't touch me. Before not looking made me sensitive; now not looking made me a pussy, sorry for the pun. Now I had to look.

The nurse said it was my baby’s head and I nodded that I could see it…but I couldn’t see it. To this day I don’t really know what I saw. About five minutes later I did see my baby girl jettison head first out of the general region where my wife was laying, so it stands to reason I was probably staring at her head in that brief moment of betrayal.

In the end it didn’t really matter, as soon as that slimy little creature appeared I forgot about the lovers, I forgot about the haters, I even forgot about the camera I had in my back pocket for the post-partum photos. I was mesmerized as I instantly fell in love with my little girl. The doctor snapped me out of it when he said “if you have a camera now is a good time for a picture”. That was about the only thing the doctor did, by the way. He swooped in as Kaitlyn’s head was literally poking out (even I could see it at that point), sat on his little rolling stool for about ten minutes, made a complete mess of our beautiful birthing suite, and then, after telling me to take a picture, disappeared like a phantom.

So that’s the story of Kaitlyn’s birth, which I suppose is the long way to answering the question, are we getting any sleep? The short answer is, it depends, on whether you are a lover or a hater.

For the Lovers:

I know you’re truly curious and maybe a little concerned. Your tone is one of sincerity so with sincerity I tell you that Kaitlyn routinely sleeps from 10PM until 5AM when I get up for work. After I get dressed I wake her up if she isn’t already awake. I change her diaper and then feed her while we watch an episode of Star Trek on TV Land. Don’t be surprised if I reveal in a few months that her first words were “beam me up”.

For the Haters:

Your tone is vindictive and laced with sarcasm. You ask the question squeezed out between chuckles. You do a disservice to pregnancy and to parenthood and it is with great disgust that I tell you we’ll move back to California when we’re damned well good and ready.