Ten on Tuesday #37

10 Things That I Am Thankful For This Year

1. Peeper - Her mere existence
2. Peeper is here
3. Peeper is, for the most part, healthy
4. Peeper is just amazing
5. Shrike
6. Our families
7. DoulaK
8. My birth experience was almost 100% what I had hoped for (see #5, #7)
9. We've decided that I will be staying home with Peeper
10. And since it seems I should be thankful for something non-Peeper-related: President-Elect Obama

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Ten on Tuesday #36

10 Bands / Artist That Remind Me of High School

1. Bruce Springsteen 
   
   
2. The Police / Sting 
   
   
3. U2


4. Joan Jett


5. Lionel Richie


6. Madonna


7. Prince
   
   
8. Whitney Houston


9. Billy Joel
    
10. George Michael

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Ten on Tuesday #35

10 Things that Scare Me / Freak Me Out
Yesterday, on our way home from the perinatologist, I told Shrike about today's topic and said, "That should be easy. I can come up with at least ten things, just about Peeper!" 

She replied, "Maybe you ought to expand your repetoire, so people don't lose interest," so I'll try to throw in a few non-pregnancy/parenting related fears and freak-outs. 

1. Regardless of what I said above, my absolute #1 freak-out topic these days is "Oh my God, I'm having a baby in two months!" 
   
   
2. Heights. I don't even like watching someone else in a high place. It makes my knees tingle.
   
   
3. There's a human moving around inside me. (Freeek-eee!)
   
   
4. Bugs. In particular, cockroaches. (Ugh, I have to shudder a little bit, just typing it.)
   


5. Is Peeper okay? (Which is slowly being replaced with "Is she going to stay put til she's done baking?")


6. I'm forty years old. When / how the fuck did that happen?!?


7. Childbirth


8. Injuries to finger/toe nails. Creepy, creepy, creepy.


9. Parenting. Pretty much the whole thing. 


10. Did I mention that I'm having a baby in two months?!?

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Ten on Tuesday #34

10 Great Things That Happened This Summer
(For the purposes of this list, I'll consider "summer" to be June/July/August.)

1. I'm pregnant! This summer covered more or less the second trimester.
2. I felt Peeper move for the first time.
3. We found out that Peeper is a girl.
4. After scaring the hell out of us for a week, Peeper turned out to be just fine.
5. Our trip to DC to see Melissa Etheridge (and the pandas). 
6. Shrike felt Peeper move for the first time. 
7. Lots of our imaginary friends (and several real-life ones) got pregnant and had babies.
8. We made the decision that I'll be a "work-at-home-mom" after Peeper is born.
9. We got lots of cheap and free stuff for Peeper. 
10. Our pre-birth order to both be on Peeper's birth certificate was approved. 

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Ten on Tuesday #33

10 Favorite Time-Wasters

1. Blogging


2. Reading other people's blogs
   
3. Reading email
   
4. Reading pregnancy-related websites
   
5. Miscellaneous web surfing
   
6. Watching my "baby shows" on TiVo (A Baby Story, Bringing Home Baby, etc)
   
7. Watching political shows on TiVO (The Daily Show, The Colbert Report)
   
8. Watching whatever else TiVO has found for me
   
9. Hitting the snooze alarm
   
10. My commute - it can't be avoided, and it's not something I do on purpose, but it wastes about 90 minutes of every day, which I really don't have to spare (see above - I've already pissed away all my other free time!)

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Ten on Tuesday #32

10 Things I'm Really Good At

1. Procrastinating


2. Rationalizing
   
3. Teaching people things
   
4. Planning and organizing events
   
5. Organizing people and getting them to do things
   
6. Fundraising (sort of)
   
7. Bullshitting
   
8. Learning stuff
   
9. Researching and planning and obsessing about my latest "thing"
   
10. Looking like a doofus

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Ten on Tuesday #31

10 Places I'd Love to Travel To (That I Haven’t Gone to Yet)

1. Amsterdam


2. Australia
   
3. New Zealand
   
4. The Pacific Northwest
   
5. Hawaii
   
6. Italy
   
7. Vancouver (make note, Katr & Roro)
   
8. California
   
9. Those new Disney parks besides the Magic Kingdom and Epcot (been to those)
   
10. Provincetown, Mass. when it's not the dead of winter (been there, done that)

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Ten on Tuesday #30

Ten Superstitions, Traditions, and/or Personality Quirks of Mine

1. I count things. Things that don't need to be counted. Preferably in multiples of four. Always in even numbers.


2. I don't like stepping on cracks (no, it's not about Anonymama's back) and if there are changes in the flooring/ground/surface that I'm walking on, I'd much prefer to do an even number of steps on each type of surface. Even if it's just two different colors of identical carpeting or tile, I swear I can feel the difference with my feet.
   
3. Speaking of colors and evenness and such: When I eat M&Ms, sometimes I just shovel them in, but more often, I sort them by color, and eat them in order from lightest to darkest, two at a time, chewing one on each side of my mouth.


4. For some reason, I'm hanging on to the empty medication vials from not only my estrogen and progesterone, but both of our stim meds, from the IVF and from my IUI cycles. I've also got about six sharps boxes full of needles/syringes. I guess I'm waiting until I'm all done with the meds to get rid of all the sharps at once, and I'm hesitant to get rid of the unopened vials, for fear that if I don't have them, something will go wrong, and I'll need them again. But what's up with empty progesterone vials? Maybe I'd just saving it all to take one big photos off all the detritus when I'm done with the injections in a few weeks? Yeah, that's the ticket.


5. There are a lot of traditions that I try to follow, nothing really wierd enough to be worth mentioning here. The most important ones to me are family holiday traditions, and all sorts of traditions from my summer camp.


6. Oh, here's one, that sort of comes from camp. In Camp Fire, candles (and fire, as you can imagine) are a big deal, and it's sort of a "thing" that you snuff out ceremonial candles, rather than blowing them out, so that you don't "blow away the good spirits." I tend to follow that with candles in "regular" life too, if they are lit in any sort of ceremonial type way. (Except for birthday candles, which of course, must be blown. But, see below about the wishes.)


7. When I eat an apple, I twist the stem and say the alphabet, and make sure that the stem comes off right on Shrike's actual first initial (not "S"). She does the same thing. As those of you who actually know me can imagine, she has to yank on that stem a lot harder than I do, to make it work!
   
8. Any time I "make a wish" I must go on and on and on and include all the details and, as Shrike puts it, "get the monkey-paws out."
   
9. When my necklace gets turned around, I kiss the clasp, make a wish, and turn it back. Because I'm twelve years old.


10. This happens pretty often, and I was spending alot of time reciting several years worth of "wish" so I finally just declared that I had made a "wish macro" defining the default wish for the necklace, so now I just kiss it and say (silently) "wish" and go about my business.

Wow. I am a fucking freak.

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Ten on Tuesday #29

Lately the "Ten on Tuesday" questions have been things like "your favorite actors/actresses" and other such stuff about which I really have no opinion, so I've been opting out. This one, I can sink my teeth into, though.

Ten Things I Love About My Life

1. Shrike. I can't say this enough. Maybe it's the hormones making me all sappy, but she is the best thing in my life.
2. Peeper. S/he is the best thing that is about to be in my life. (And, currently, the best thing in my uterus.)
3. The rest of our families.
4. Our pets (on most days).
5. Our friends, old and new.
6. We're both in good health.
7. Although it would be great to win the lottery and never have to work again, we are both lucky enough to have jobs that are fulfilling and pay well. (Or, at least, one of each.)
8. So, while we may not have anywhere near everything we want, we do (mostly) have everything we need.
9. Despite the fact that there are a lot of things that could use some work (see my my most recent Ten on Tuesday entry) I really like our house, and I'm glad that it's ours.
10. This isn't exactly about my life, specifically, but it's springtime here in BlueState, and the flowers and flowering trees are distractingly beautiful, as you drive down the road.

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Ten on Tuesday #28

Ten Things We'd Fix in Our Home
(If we had the time and money)

1. Plumbing. Every God-damned toilet and sink in this house runs.
2. More plumbing. There's only cold water going to the washing machine, and we figure we should probably get some hot water in there before we have shitty baby clothes to wash.
3. The nursery. Well, we will be doing this one - time and money be damned!
4. Replace the carpet in the living room, which BigGaloot has eaten.
5. Replace or get rid of or somehow do something with the folding closet doors.
6. Fill the holes and bare patches in the backyard - and stop the dogs from re-digging them.
7. Decorate the sunroom, with a beachy / nauticalish kind of theme.
8. Buy new sheets / comforter for our bed. We'd like something that looks very similar to what we've got now, but without the holes.
9. Add shelves, somewhere in the kitchen, for my cobalt collection.
10. Build a deck in the backyard.

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Ten on Tuesday #27

Ten Things to Do Before You Get Married

1. Graduate from college.
2. Live on your own.
3. Go on a great vacation with friends.
4. Figure out your sexual orientation.
5. Grow up.
6. Date someone who is completely wrong for you, so you can really appreciate Ms. or Mr. Right.
7. Have a job that involves a lot of travel, because you won't want to do that once you have someone to come home to later.
8. Spend money on stupid frivolous things, because there's nobody to hurt but yourself.
9. Fall in love.
10. Meet your intended's family, and become a part of it.

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Ten on Tuesday #26

Ten Places I'd Take a Tourist to See in My Hometown(s)
The first five are places in or near my current hometown, the second five are in or near my hometown.

1. One of the most famous Civil War battlefields.
   
2. Where the most delicious things in the world are made.
   
3. Where people in funny clothes and their horses live.


4. A great place to hike or camp.


5. A bit of a drive will get us to a zillion museums, monuments and more.
   
6. The beach.


7. The Intracoastal Canal.


8. A very large statue of the Virgin Mary, especially if it's Christmas time and the light display is up.
   
9. Anonymama & Anonydaddy's house!
   
10. Again, if we drive a bit, we can see, well, just about anything.

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Ten on Tuesday #26

Ten Things I'm Looking Forward To This Spring

1. Being pregnant (11 days til beta - hang in there, Peeps!)
   
2. Announcing that I'm pregnant (about 2 seconds after I find out I am)
   
3. Our family Easter party (2 weeks late this year)


4. Warm weather


5. Forsythia and crocus - the first flowers that we see each year Daffodils and Tulips - seeing how the bulbs that Shrike planted last fall come up
   
6. Azaleas - we have several bushes in a variety of colors and they are beautiful when they are all blooming


7. Oddly enough, my 40th birthday


8. Knowing who the Democratic presidential nominee will be


9. Hopefully, some local visits from the candidate(s)
   
10. Meeting said candidate(s)

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Ten on Tuesday #25

Ten Drinks that I Love
Hmm, it seems that all my favorites fall into either the fruity-with-rum "boat drinks" category, or the chocolate-and-booze, how can you go wrong with that combination, category.

Oh, I suppose one could include non-alcoholic drinks on this list but, really, what's the point?

1. Mudslide
2. Kahlua and coffee
3. Hot chocolate with butterscotch Schnapps
4. Colorado Bulldog
5. Chocolate Martini
6. Espresso Martinin
7. Sangria
8. Mai Tai
9. Strawberry Daquiri
10. Bahama Mama

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Ten on Tuesday Friday #24

Ten Movies That I've Intended to Watch, But Haven’t
I rarely watch movies, so I though this would be fairly easy for me, but then I realized that I don't watch them, because I don't get particularly interested in watching them, so, a little more difficult. But I'll give it a shot. Some aren't necessarily ones that I've "been intending to watch" for a while, but I'm clicking around Netflix and Amazon and they look like I might want to watch them someday.

1. The Star Wars Prequil Trilogy


2. Brokeback Mountain


3. Sicko


4. March of the Penguins


5. Happy Feet


6. Moulin Rouge


7. Harry Potter (but I should read the books first)


8. Elizabeth: The Golden Age (Shrike talked me into watching the first and I liked it)


9. The Princess Bride (loved the book!)


10. I don't know! You tell me what I should see!

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Ten on Tuesday #23

Ten Things I Love

1. Shrike
2. Our families
3. Our critters
4. Spending time with friends
5. Planning events and pulling them off
6. Teaching people things
7. Feeling like I'm making a difference
8. My summer camp
9. Cheese
10. Chocolate

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Ten on Tuesday #22

Ten Things I Hate About Politics
Hmm, this one is rather ironic for me, since I'm very involved in politics!

1. Republicans. (Sorry, I couldn't resist.)


2. "Swiftboat" style attacks.


3. People who don't vote, but then think they still have a right to bitch about the government


4. Mainstream media's "horserace" coverage, in leiu of discussing the issues.


5. People who just want to say negative things about the other guy, and never tell you anything good about their candidate.


6. As a liberal/progressive/Democrat, being incredibly out-numbered here in Red County.


7. The demonization of "liberals."


8. The willingness of some politicians to sacrifice the needs / interests of one constituency in other to avoid alienating another constituency.


9. That money speaks louder than people.


10. George W. Bush. (Oh, did I kind of say that already? Well, I really, really, really hate him.)

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Ten on Tuesday #21

Ten Things I Can Do Instead of Watching TV
You would think this would be fairly easy for me, because I really don't watch a lot of TV these days. I do, however, spend a ton of time in front of the computer, some of it contructive, some not so much. So how about five things that I actually do, and then five things I should do:

1. Blog


2. Read blogs


3. Read / send emails


4. Work on my latest political project


5. Fuck around with the checkbook / Quicken / online banking


6. Spend time with Shrike (when she's home)


7. Clean the litter box


8. Wash dishes


9. Cook for a damn change


10. Burn a calorie or two

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Ten on Tuesday #20

Ten Things I'd Buy If I Had a Million Dollars
(and had to spend it on myself)

1. Pay off the house.
2. Pay off my car.
3. Pay off the baby debt.
4. Pay back my parents for the baby money they gave us.
5. Hire a maid.
6. Hire a cook.
7. Hire a grocery shopper.
8. Buy every panda-related baby decor item ever made.
9. Buy whatever Shrike wants (if she's happy, I'm happy).
10. Invest the rest, and pay ourselves an annual salary, so we don't have to work for a while.

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Ten on Tuesday #19

At risk of lapsing onto my own personal episode of I Love The 70s/80s . . .

Ten Things That Were Better "Way Back When"

1. Music. Ok, so maybe 80s Pop wasn't good music but, dammit, it was my music.
   
2. My summer camp. When it was owned/run by the founding organization, and was girls-only.
   
3. TV. Remember scripts?
   
4. Video games. If I wanted to bowl or hit a baseball or - what the fuck? - play guitar, I would do it in real life. Give me some good ol' fashioned Ms. Pacman or Centipede any day.
   
5. Saturday Night Live. I enjoy the retrospectives, except that they make me sad, because all the funnies cast members are dead now.
   
6. Saturday Morning Cartoons. Two words: Scooby-fucking-Doo. (Oops, that's three words.)
   
7. Kid's toys. Tinker Toys, Fisher Price People, Hippity-Hop. No licensed characters, no batteries required, and no fucking lead.
   
8. Family car trips. No personal DVD players, no five-point-harnesses, no GPS. Just bouncing around in the back-back, listening to Anonydaddy's Tom T. Hall and Kris Kristofferson 8-tracks, playing "the initial game" and arguing with BabyBro about who's straying onto who's "side." (Yes, it is a wonder that we survived!)
   
9. Star Wars. Ok, I confess, I've never actually seen the "prequel" trilogy, but I don't have to see them to know that they can't possibly compare to the original three movies.
   
10. Summer Vacation. You know, because there was a vacation.

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