In the past 10 years, I have moved five times, have changed jobs five times (not counting temp and substitute teaching positions), have had four cats, and 14 different haircolors. The only thing that has remained constant throughout the turmoil has been my e-mail address.

But no more!

I have dropped my maiden initial from my original address. But don't worry: I've created an alias so my LynnB reconciles to just Lynn at my domain dot com. So if you send me e-mail, for now I'll still get it. I'm thinking in a couple of months I'll drop the alias — after 10 years of staying the same, every spam artist across the globe knows how to get ahold of me. So, if you have me in your address book, please update me.

Because I've been married for more than a year, and it's time.

I'm in week 17 according to the midwife, week 18 according to my Target Date software. Baby weighs half a pound now! After working 11 hours today (though I did duck out for 30 minutes to attend church; I walked in right at the point in the sermon where the pastor started talking about “vulnerability”), I'm afraid it's maybe lost a quarter of an ounce from mommy's exertion. Oh, and boss-man still hasn't acknowledged the medical report or mileage report I sent to him 36 hours ago, which isn't affecting my stress level at all, no sir, not this girl.

Right.

And, on another note, I think that it's pretty funny that while my husband is on a ghosthunting/karaoke road trip, Peter Griffin and his Family Guy buddies not only turned the Drunken Clam into a karaoke bar, but brought the house down with “Don't Stop Believing” by Journey, whose CD I have in my car right now and for which I have received no end of shit from my passengers.

It's hard to be so cool.

Subject line pretty much says it all. Darling Husband called from Nawoleans this afternoon. “We'll be fine,” he said. “Of course we will; we have no choice,” I replied. He'd forgotten about the raise I got BEFORE being offered the promotion, so we're not in straits as dire as believed.

Boss called me at work, all “concerned” (my quotes, not his) about what he heard was my hospital stay yesterday. Wanted to discuss it over the phone. I nixed that idea — there was a new employee in the store with me, and I was just finishing up my medical incident report to send to him. I'll admit I cribbed it from my last blog entry.

I worked my crew to the nub today, cleaning the store and tending the customers. So that felt good, even if I didn't. I went home with cramps (normal, nothing serious, sez the midwife) at 3:00, ate delivery Japanese food and watched TLC all afternoon.

Oh! And I almost forgot the “best” (read: “worst”) part. Boss-man didn't tell the store manager about what's going on, so she was utterly surprised when I mentioned it to her at the beginning of her shift on the phone this evening. Grrreat.

It's 2 a.m. on Sunday and sleep still feels a looooong way off.

So today, my boss demoted me…
over the phone…
while I was driving…
to one of the stores to fix the fuck-up made by the manager he's replacing me with…
and then in Costco, while running an errand for the other store…
I nearly blacked out…
and two free-sample ladies had to help me…
and then I had a not-so-mini meltdown…
and drove to my midwife…
who said that, due to my low blood pressure, I'm more susceptible to stress and vulnerability…
and it was pretty much downhill from there.

I have consumed only water, jellybeans, and two forms of chocolate (Turtle-form and Hostess cupcake form) since 3:00.

I have not answered my phone.

I have turned off my cell phone.

And felt like a jackass for doing four hours of work at home this week after already working my nine-plus hour days.

And life, pretty much, fucking sucks.

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.