Her Ladyship

Notes from the gutter.

Thursday, January 24, 2013

The summer wind

Ah, remember back when it wasn't below freezing for days on end? Me neither. You know, a lot of people like to shit on living in LA, but one good thing about it is that it has a Mediterranean climate.  It actually snowed here last night and stuck. Silver lining: we were able to justify renting a Zipcar to go visit the baby in the NICU later on today.  Thus far, when it's cold but dry, we've been taking our scooters. Riding a scooter in 20-degree temperature is not fun. 

At least it wasn't this cold on Monday.  We originally had not planned on heading into the craziness of the Inauguration festivities, but I ended up getting invited to the Canadian embassy to watch the parade from there (it's down on 5th and Penn, so the parade goes right past it) and we figured that free food and booze plus readily available bathrooms would make this worth checking out. 

I had done an embarrassing amount of research to figure out the best way down there. I was worried that the metro would be crazy so I had several different bus options at the ready, plus a plan C that involved dropping our scooters off at my office and walking a dozen or so blocks to the embassy. Totally didn't need any of it. We got on the 70, took it through an empty downtown to 6th and NY Ave (end of the line on Monday), and walked what Google said was a mile but had to be less than it in about 10 minutes.  Easy-peasy.

We got to the embassy and as soon as we walked through the security check were handed a pair of red and white mittens with maple leaves in the palms. This forced us - and every other non-Canadian there, apparently- to take multiple pictures of us waving at the camera and showing off the maple leaf.  They had food and, more importantly, drink ready, as well as a few Jumbotrons showing the inauguration.  I will say that maple-flavored Crown Royal is an acquired taste, but I appreciate the ice luge that they served it on.  And without any question, the longest line of the day was for Beaver Tails (essentially flat donuts. DELICIOUS). 

We watched a little of the ceremonies but spent most of our time chatting. My favorite thing was that they had the embassy fenced off but some wily person - a smoker no doubt - had put the fencing about five feet outside the embassy property. This meant that smokers could step over the planter that denoted the end of the Canadian embassy and smoke without having to go through security; it also hewed to the letter of the law, which says that Canadian federal buildings cannot allow smoking on their property. 

We got there around 11am and made it until 3pm. The parade hadn't actually started by that point but I'd made a tactical error and tried out one of their punches featuring vodka, lemon juice, sugar...and maple syrup maybe?  It's kind of hazy.  I had held off until late in the day because I had been told by several people how lethal it was but I eventually cracked and had a few glasses. That plus four hours of standing on cold pavement killed any interest I had in waiting around for the parade. We walked up to Gallery Place, hopped on the metro (again, no problem), and were home in half an hour. At which point I crawled into bed to recuperate. Hooray peaceful transition of democracy!

Saturday, January 19, 2013

Happy date of birth

So Baby Ladyship (La Principessa? Still working out her nom de blog) was originally due today.  Instead, she came nearly two months early.  I look at her - 20 inches long, over 7.5 pounds - and I think, my god, all that was supposed to be in here? How do people manage that???  Of course, some women also go through childbirth without any pain meds, which hahahaha NO FRIGGIN' WAY.  (When the hospital decided that my contractions were getting serious enough to start making plans, they called down the anesthesiologist to talk to me. He got halfway through, "Will you want" and I stopped him right there. EVERYTHING YOU GOT BUDDY, is what I told him.)

She's doing really well - still at the NICU though, as she has not taken to the bottle anywhere near as much as her parents have.  But she should be home soon.

In the meantime, her birth has already brought to the forefront some fundamental differences between the Texan and myself.  The most prevalent one is one that is rarely discussed ahead of time, yet is going to be a crucial part of her being and identity as a person.  I mean, of course, whether she will be a cat or a dog person.  I have noticed that in many of the books we've been given, there is a pro-dog, anti-cat agenda that simply cannot stand.  It is somewhat counterbalanced by the cute kitties on a lot of the clothes that she has but still is a bit alarming.  She can be whatever she wants to be, but by god, she *will* be a crazy cat lady just like her mom!

Sunday, January 06, 2013

Christmas is over

As if looking at a calendar wouldn't tell you that already. But we have finally taken down our holiday decorations and denuded the tree, so we're done celebrating here. I still have a few xmas cards to mail out but I'm dubbing them New Year's cards so I'm golden.

This has been a weird Christmas.  Good, but weird.  As mentioned, oh, a half dozen times in the previous post, I gave birth to a little girl right before Thanksgiving. We were delighted to see her but a bit surprised, as she came two months early.  Eventually, I left the hospital but she stayed so she could continue baking to full-term.  Her official due date is in just under two weeks, and they've told us that preemies typically stay in the NICU until roughly around their due dates, plus or minus a few weeks. So we have spent the past nearly seven weeks going back and forth from the hospital visiting her. Never have I so fervently wished for warm weather, or at least, non-snowy, non-rainy weather, as we have been using our scooters for transport. And it cut into how much festivity we were able to put up with in the meantime. 

She's doing really well and, knock wood, is filling in nicely. She now has chubby baby legs!  And we are trying to look for silver linings: we can ask all the questions we want from the nurses about how to deal with a baby, she has very experienced (and expensive!) caregivers taking care of her, and all we have to do when we visit her is hold her.  We change diapers and all that too, but we don't have to if we don't want to.  I am sure that some day, the Texan and I will laugh about how there was a point where we were begging her to eat but that day hasn't come yet. The sooner she can take her milk regularly via bottle, the sooner she can come home.  Here's hoping that's sooner rather than later!
 
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