Outrageous Lies and Utter Fabrication

Truth lies in the no-man's land between what's written and what's lived.

[hellounreliablenarrator]

And Baby Changes It All

I dream of learning Swedish and moving to Sweden's southern end, just me and the Baltic Sea. Before I became pregnant, it was a plan. I'd get my degree, I'd get relevant job experience, I'd learn Swedish and when my youngest was safely ensconced at college, I'd move. Get a job and live a quiet life of reflection. Now it's just a dream. Sometimes I think about going through with it anyway, except with a small interloper attached. But a child shouldn't needlessly be separated from either parent if it can be helped… so I have to shelve my plans. Hope I'm not too tired, too old, by the time I can follow through. There's nothing wrong with my life as-is. Sometimes I dream of solitude, among people who aren't likely to ask too much from me. And the weather there is nearly perfect year-round.

[hellounreliablenarrator]

Evil Sausages & Clueless Manufacturers

Today I was eating sausage and it occurred to me that pregnant ladies should not be eating said sausage so I threw the (supremely expensive fundraiser) sausage away. It was not my most rational moment but I have yet to feel a twinge of guilt. I should. I ate only a little and there are others here who could eat it without hearing the voice of doom sound an alarm, plus, seriously, next time both faster and less nerve-wracking simply to toss actual cash into the garbage. But I am relieved: my niece got money for her band and I got rid of the evil sausage In The Name of The Baby. Who has not made his (yes) presence known lately so I am going just a little bit crazy. I finally broke down and ordered a fetal monitor like I should've done months ago so soon my worries will either be slightly appeased or even more magnified. My next doctor appointment is three weeks away and that's three weeks too long. I really need to hear the woosh-woosh of his little heart. I spend a lot of time cataloging my sins as a pregnant lady. I may have mentioned it (every single post). This is my most anxiety-ridden pregnancy ever. I cannot seem to remember ever being so worried before. So convinced that my failures as a mother are being made manifest. And a note to maternity pants makers. I don't want or like my rear pockets to be located on my back. That weird looseness on the ass is also distressing. My pants are literally acres of unflattering fabric. There is room for two of me in there. None of these things qualify as "a good look". Did you actually have a pregnant woman model for you or did you simply say, "pregnant women are enormous, Jesus, so just made everything twice as big as they are normally"? I know that I will be the living incarnation of Violet Beauregarde by the time this is all done (assuming all goes well) but that does not mean my dignity has gone the way of Veruca Salt.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

National Geographic sold to Rupert Murdoch

The $750m deal places the legendary nonprofit under 21st Century Fox’s control.

Read the rest

[wilwheaton]

Well, fuck.

[hellounreliablenarrator]

Apparently integrity has a very specific price point.

[hellounreliablenarrator]

Today I found some pictures from when I was giving birth to my oldest child, and remembered how annoyed I was with my sister for taking them. "One day you'll be glad you have these!" she said, chirping. 14 years later: nope. Still not glad. Pictures before: eh. Pictures after: ok. Pictures during: HELLZ TO THE NOES. I am still pregnant. Mostly I am pretty sure of that. Sometimes I have doubt, yes, even despite the puking and the baby's heartbeat and an increasing inability to wear my clothes. I get anxious, worried, that something has gone wrong. The idea of a baby sometimes fills me with terror. I'm not wishing it away. I'd be devastated if something did happen. But I'm not ready. I'm just not prepared. I'm no longer a spritely twenty-something. I'm older, I'm wiser, I'm a lot sadder. Because that is life, and it's what happens when you live. Making babies really is for the young, when you're still kinda too dumb to know what you're really getting yourself into.

[hellounreliablenarrator]

Six Days, or Just About

Because my period was late --

Because it felt like three weeks of PMS, oh my god -- 

Because my sister said, “maybe...?” --

And because I just wanted proof that I was perimenopausal, because I am an old lady, because my eggs started popping out with regularity 28 years ago --

I took a pregnancy test. What am I now? Some sort of walking cliche. I haven’t really decided which one. About 10 years ago, I came across this guy, this online blowhard, who said that women my age shouldn’t be “allowed” to give birth. “Allowed”! Who owns my body? I think I do. 

--unrelated tangent: Recently Amanda Palmer posted a picture of herself, her husband, and the baby bump, and someone said, “I feel betrayed.” What betrayal? What right do we have to Amanda Palmer’s body? Has anyone said to her husband, “I feel betrayed because you’ve (re-)entered the daddy-verse”? Probably not, because he is a man and therefore granted the right to live and work as his own self, and not as a mirror of our own insecurities. Amanda’s autonomy means that we don’t get a say what she does with her body or her life. The public ownership of women’s bodies and the decisions they make is one of those things that make me very angry (and now I am soaked through in HCG and all my emotions boil beneath the surface). Furthermore, motherhood (regardless of the route you take, the anti-mommy-verse, the full mommy-verse embrace, some uncharted path in-between) is not an erasure of self, of values and beliefs, of some sort of mythical divide between the procreated and the non. 

I was using birth control, of a type that is supposed to be 99.99% effective. Really, only abstinence is more effective and I was never interested in abstinence. Friday was an exhausting day of blood work, emergency doctor’s visit, horrific drive to ultrasound center (brand-new and enormous medical center HAS NO ULTRASOUND, which is utterly confounding). The ultrasound tech was nice, but the radiologist was a total jerk, who asked if I had imagined being pregnant (never glancing at my charts) (yes, it’s totally faked! I was hoping to get a spin on the transvaginal ultrasound amusement park ride, whaaaat the actual fuck, lady), who couldn’t see the gestational sac pointed out by the tech, who went on in considerable detail about the GS could be completely empty because the yolk sac wasn’t visible (the yolk sac in a gestational sac she couldn’t actually spot on the screen, by the way). The tech measured the GS at 4mm -- pregnant or not, empty or full of rapidly-dividing life -- that’s too small to see anything. But that’s been nice. Many hours of nice. Of wondering if I am actually pregnant or (as I suspect my husband secretly hopes) hysterically pregnant. 

I have been feeling All The Things. ALL THE THINGS. At once. It’s uncomfortable. I’ve had at least three sobbing sessions in less than a week and while I would never lay claim to being some sort of stoic never-crier, sobbing is quite beyond the pale. I can’t even decipher what I really think. I think I am happy and excited. But I am also terrified. There are times when I feel so alone and scared and sad. I finally had to declare a facebook fast because I cannot bear to see another post about suffering children. I’ve been going to school, about halfway done. Has all of my hard work and effort been derailed? Do I need new goals? What am I going to do? 

What if I lose this baby? This unexpected miracle, this unforeseen boon? This shocking, earth-shattering mystery? I keep worrying that I feel underwhelmingly pregnant. It’s irrational but a feeling I cannot shake. What do I want? I don’t really know. But I think -- I think I want this maybe-baby, my improbable point-zero-one-percent possibility.

[hellounreliablenarrator]

New York crane's load falls in Manhattan injuring 10 - BBC News

Ten people are injured after a piece of mechanical equipment being lifted by a crane breaks free and plunges 28 stories in central Manhattan.

“Things that work in context”

[hellounreliablenarrator]

Craning

As a child, I was fascinated by cranes -- construction cranes. Their height, their spareness, their raison d’etre. 

As an adult, I am morbidly fascinated by cranes. I always hope they are sufficiently secured against high winds and oversized loads. I imagine them crumpling and wonder if the tiny, fragile humans on the ground below would have time to safely scatter.

There is a crane swinging around at the construction site across the street. High above the Earth it towers, higher than any building in town. 

--------------------

I am starting a new blog and stating right up front that you probably shouldn’t believe everything that you read. The truth is that I am sarcastic and impatient and prone to telling the truth -- but it’s the truth as I see it, and we are all unreliable narrators of Truth. Or, as my postmod professor might say, there is no Truth. There is only the ever-changable Text.