It's everyone's good friend Avram's birthday today. Last year's birthday was kind of a disaster, as Brian and I were 1) totally clueless and 2) fans of the worst sushi place in Chico — well, the worst place to go if you ever actually want to eat food, which we did. Dear Avram, I hope you are in So. Cal right now with some ocean salt and sand between your toesies. Your gift is arriving via W.A.S.T.E. post, aka Drivler. I treasure your friendship and wish you the BEST YEAR EVER.

Speaking of good people who deserve good things, I have a new addiction: TLC network. Especially all of those “renovate your house” shows. Avram believes it's “pre-nesting.” He's probably right. All I know is I'm getting two bureaus (not news bureaus) from my downstairs neighbor, and I've filled three photo albums with pictures that span the past decade, and I cringe every time I look at my desk. It's a start.

Brian and Drivler and I watched a 1 1/2 year old, Cole, this week. The best part was watching Brian with the baby. Too adorable. The night before I'd had a dream that we had the ultrasound and the baby was a boy (with HUGE testicles). In my dream, I was disappointed. Cole helped to assuage the disappointment. Anne and Julie have both had boys in the past six months; I think I just want to be different. In any case, we find out for real on June 8th.

My Darling Husband and the aforementioned Drivler are road-trippin' this week. They're ghost hunting by day, and singing karaoke by night. Their destination is beautiful downtown Archer City, Texas, home of Larry McMurtry's four-building bookstore, Booked Up. I hope they can find me a hardcover copy of Power's “Three Farmers on their way to a Dance.” We'll see.

I changed the look/feel of the site because I think this one is easier to read. Avram?

So I alluded to the fact that work is hell lately, and the past three days I've worked 31 hours, which is particularly impressive once you know that on the second day, I only worked six.

And early Saturday I was coming home from a 14-hour day at 1:00 in the morning, blaring the Dead Kennedys and cursing the fact I had to be up at 7 that morning to take a bunch of the kids from the Noho store to a crew rally, when I felt the baby move.

Not only that, but I also realized that the “gastrointestinal distress” I'd felt while in the car with Brian the day before was actually the baby moving.

I talked to Katie about this whole baby-moving thing earlier this week.

“Have you felt the baby move yet?” she asked.

“Maybe, but I think it's just gas,” I told her.

“Could be. Every time I have a gas pain I think it's a baby kicking,” she said.

(Katie's youngest baby graduates high school next week.)

I'd been pretty ambivalent about feeling this new life thing moving inside of me. I mean, I'm a pretty autonomous person. But Julie's right; it's pretty cool.

At least for now, while I can feel it while still breathing and without needing to pee.

Not much to say on the front. I'm nearly at the point where I look pregnant (as opposed to schlumpy), and I'm disliking pregnancy much less than before. Hence the radio silence; I would have felt crappy posting how unhappy I was, day after day. But now I'm at 15 weeks, my energy is coming back (only to be sucked out again by my intensely insane job, but that's another story), and I never really had any morning sickness (except for that week of stomach flu), so I think I'm mostly done with complaining right now. Finally. 🙂

Here We Go is the first part, so read it first. There you go!

Brian saw me before I saw him, as I rode the escalator down to Bradley Int'l's baggage claim. He smiled and waved, and I grinned wide enough to split my face, afraid I'd be giving away the big news before I even disembarked from the escalator.

He pulled me into a big hug and we stayed wrapped around each other for long seconds, pulled away to look at each other, and then embraced again.

“Hi,” he said.

“Hi, honey,” I replied. “Maybe we should get out of the escalator traffic.”

We stepped over to the baggage claim area and hugged again.

“What's my gift?” he asked.

“Give me your hand.”

He extended his left palm. I placed it low and flat across my belly and looked into his eyes, which shone.

“Really?” he asked.

I nodded.

“I'm going to be a daddy?”

I nodded again.

“Oh my God.

“I know,” I replied.

It is interesting to note that, although he took the news of impending fatherhood very calmly and happily, the mention of the fact that he must now quit smoking sent him into a near panic attack.

I'm somewhere over Lake Erie, an hour away from Hartford, 75 minutes from telling Brian that he's going to be a daddy. Whew.

I think if I had to learn of my pregnancy anywhere outside of Northampton, it's good that I was at Anne's, for many reasons. One, she had Duncan three months ago today, so whe's a vast wealth of information. Two, she loaned me her pregnancy books. Three, she gifted me with new, bigger, clothes. I told Brian about that on the phone last night.

“Anne bought me new clothes!”

“Tell her she shouldn't do that,” he said. “She has a new baby.”

“True dat, but she told me it made her happy, and by God, if buying me new clothes makes Anne happy, I'm not going to stand in her way.”

Plus, with the amount I've been eating, by next Monday I'll have outgrown everything in my closet. Food cravings so far have included pineapple, avocados, and Mexican food — though the last probably stems from the fact that in Massachusetts there is no Mexican food, so I'm getting it while it's hot (and spicy, as it were).

Oh God, please help the pilot land safely so I can share the big news with My Darling Husband. Our one-year wedding anniversary is next week; too bad the gift designation is paper, and not pee stick or dead rabbit.

Anne wasn't feeling well this morning so Marc woke me at 7 am to see if I'd be on “Duncan Duty.” I watched him from that point until 2 in the afternoon, at which point I realized that if I didn't get out of the house, I would go severely Yellow Wallpaper on our asses. It was a joy to get out to Starbucks, where Anne was meeting her Mommy group. I took Duncan with me and went out for a Mexican food lunch. He started to fuss, so I picked him up and we toured around the restaurant. There was a fake firepit on the bar — a big mortar base with a light and fan in it, which blew the yellow and red cellophane in the air. We both stared at it, quietly fascinated. When I finished my meal, the server brought me a dessert for which she did not charge me. There's a bit of racket in this motherhood thing, I'm learning.

My phone conversations with Brian keep getting shorter, and I'm maintaining strict radio silence with everyone else. I figure it's only fair for my husband to be the first to know. Well, first to know after myself, Anne, Duncan, and Marc.

Speaking of too heavy to lift, I'm tremendously sore in the boobage area. Anne and I went bra shopping today and it turns out, it's no freaking wonder — my cup size is now a mere half step from being off the musical scale. The trainee salesgirl looked at me and I heard her think to herself, “I am NEVER having children.”

One of the ladies at our Seascape weekend retreat wore a waterbra. I'm thinking of buying one myself — so I can freeze it before strapping it on.

The plan was, I'd go to Seascape to surprise the Summer Home Park ladies during their winter retreat, then fly to Oregon to visit Anne and Marc and help with their nearly 3-month-old, Duncan. I bought my airline tickets three weeks prior and assured Monstro that I'd miss him.

“At least I'll be on my period the week I'm away, so it's not like we'd be having sex anyway,” I offered as a consolation. We kissed goodbye at Bradley Int'l Airport and I flew to San Jose, rented a car, and drove to the Cats, my home-away-from-home BBQ/bar/roadhouse/former bordello at the base of the Santa Cruz mountains. My MFA friends were all late, so I followed Julie and John to their house once they arrived and got settled in their guest room, soon to be the baby's room. Their baby is due in 20 days and Julie looks amazing — all of her weight was baby.

“I started charting my temperature a couple of days ago,” I told them. Julie assured me it was a powerful weapon, which made me smile.

I spent the night there and drove to Seascape, a resort on the Pacific coast between Santa Cruz and Monterey, the next morning. Only the organizers knew I was coming, and when Mom saw me she dropped her fork, stood, said, “You little brat,” and gave me a hug. What a great surprise!

I had a few drinks that night, especially after Yvonne announced that “any newlyweds not drinking will be assumed to be pregnant.”

No period yet.

The other two newlyweds tied one on to the point that J. was sick all the next morning, and H, upon awakening, was still drunk. I went for a walk with the ladies, had a Mexican food (oh, Mexican food, how I miss the lack of you in Massachusetts) lunch with Mom, headed out for a couple of drinks at the bar with Auntie Mignon and a now-sober H, but had no drinks that night and got into bed around midnight after a late-nite dip in the hot tub and some ladies' Texas hold-'em.

No period yet.

Packed up the next morning (Sunday), scrounged the leftover food to take to Sherry Ann's, played Taboo until 1:00, kissed Mom goodbye and drove to Capitola. Sherry's place has an amazing view of the ocean, and we smoked Camel Lights and watched the Oscar red-carpet specials, swtiching between Star Jones and Joan&Melissa. Talked her friend Joanie off the balcony after we determined that Sherry's dish didn't get network TV, called Dish Network to subscribe to the Oscars, and got ABC right as Chris Rock was finishing his opening monologue.

“Sherry Ann,” I asked, “what if I'm pregnant?”

“Do you have any symptoms?”

“When do those start?”

“The minute after you find out you're pregnant.”

“Do you think it would be OK to drink a beer?”

“Oh sure,” she said. “One beer at the 14-day mark is good for the baby.” So I did. And I slept on couch cushions on the floor, and when I woke up I thought I smelled dog barf. It was too dark to see my temperature on the digital thermometer, but I took it anyway.

Still no period.

“Still no period,” I told Sherry Ann when she came out for a cigarette.

“How late are you?”

“Three days.”

“How do you feel?” she asked.

“I feel the overwhelming desire to pee on a stick,” I replied.