Shokufeh is... home

Excitement is building

A week from today, we'll be on the mainland! Yay! More importantly, we'll be seeing family and friends. It's been more than 1.5 years since we've visited Chicago, our home before here, or New Orleans, my home for the majority of my life. In the interim, we've seen family members - my Mom and Anis in China last spring, Meisa in San Francisco last Labor Day weekend, Sam's family in Orlando last December, my parents and Anis in Israel in March* - but this trip will have the added benefit of being visits to "home."

And my parents get to see their grandchild, or rather the belly that is housing him or her. We all traveled together on pilgrimage, but none of us knew Bean was present at the time. All we knew was that I was burping a lot and kept asking my mom for Lemon Altoid Sours.

And I get to see my Ameh**, who is making a trip to Chicago to see her only child, and to see my belly. I have never gone this long in my life without seeing my Ameh - she was with my parents in the hospital when I was born and after she moved away from Louisiana, I visited her at least once a year.

Now if I could only see Naysan. That hasn't happened since December 2003. That's just crazy in the Family Mojgani.

*I seem to be into the asterisks these days. Listing these out makes me feel like we travel a lot, and that I live a charmed life being able to travel to such places. I guess that's one of the advantages of having a far-flung family.

**Note to you new readers: "Ameh" is the title for paternal aunt in Persian. I have only one Ameh, Meisa's mother. She is very proud of being my only Ameh. And when my brothers have children and I become an Ameh, my Ameh will become the only Ameh of an only Ameh.

Need new shoes?

Here's a coupon for 30% off today through Saturday:
http://content.retailperiod.com/footlocker/?0COrgy-XBMj.dxV3GjQursMjlg0

Yum yum

Things my mouth really enjoys these days:

Bean is not opposed to either, and seems to really like the former. Sure, it could just be the sugar rush s/he is experiencing, but I like to think that my child has discriminating tastes. (Watch that sentence come back to haunt me, with Bean ending up like that annoying little girl in the Ensure commercial: "I don't think I like waffles.")

*Do you like how the link I used has the word "nutrition" in its url, but the page is blank except for the picture?

You left one out, Alanis

Does anyone else think it's ironic that Americans obsess over whether there is MSG in our Chinese food (to the point that Chinese restaurants post signs of "No MSG" as a badge of honor), yet we stuff our faces with snacks (like chips) of various kinds with MSG as an ingredient?

Tell me the bad news later

This morning, my monthly prenatal visit included the glucose screening. After reading and hearing from so many women how nasty the drink is, it wasn't as bad as I expected - it was like an extra sweet Sunkist. I got kind of sleepy, and felt a bit nauseated toward the end of the hour, but the overall experience was pleasant compared to what I'd anticipated.

So now I have to wait for the results of the blood test. I don't think I have gestational diabetes, but I guess I have no way of knowing without the test results. (Many of the symptoms of diabetes - frequent urination, fatigue, hunger, thirstiness - are a normal part of pregnancy.) Selfish as it may seem, if I do have it, I'd like for the doctor's office to forget to call me: I'm leaving for the mainland next week and I've got an eating agenda, which includes beignets.

Observations while shopping and lessons learned

This weekend, while shopping in various places, I witnessed a few things that I thought I’d share. But this is not idle sharing – I felt each of these had an associated lesson.

Observation: Crazy pregnant woman having a meltdown in Border’s. Through her tears, she could be heard asking her husband if they could go home now.
Lessons:
1) I am a crazy pregnant woman. (Gold star to those of you who recognized that the observation was of myself.) I’ve been under the impression that my emotions were relatively stable, despite all the physical changes I’m going through. I was wrong.
2) I am no longer allowed out of the house past 10:00 at night, and really should be in bed and asleep by then.
3) I am no longer allowed to stand up for more than 1.5 hours at a time. The line between my knees and feet feeling okay and feeling like they would appreciate amputation is too abrupt and should best be avoided.

Observation: Woman sitting on a toilet. (This was not me.)
Lesson:
When in a bathroom with brushed metal partitions, beware the stall next to the handicapped stall. In this particular bathroom, the handicapped stall juts out just enough to provide a surface that reflects the adjoining stall. Which means that people washing their hands inadvertently catch sight of whoever is sitting on the toilet in that stall.

Observation: Woman’s exposed derriere. (Also not me.)
Lessons:
1) Do not wear thong underwear when wearing a skirt that just covers one’s bottom.
2) If one is wearing a skirt that just covers one’s bottom, ask companion to carry backpack, so that the backpack does not scrunch up one’s skirt, exposing one’s bottom to all passersby, while one stands there unaware.
3) While I am capable of telling a stranger that their zipper is open, I am lacking in the skill of telling a stranger that her bottom is showing.

Observation: Woman, probably in her 30s, trying on white shoes, while telling her companions that she hasn’t bought white shoes since high school. (Do I really need to clarify that this was not me?)
Lesson:
That woman did not read my entry of week before last. Or, she did, and just doesn't value my opinion.

Still no names

As might be expected, given that our names are Sam and Shokufeh, my husband and I are having some trouble agreeing on a name for our child. He leans toward simple, I lean toward unique. He leans toward English, I lean toward Persian.

About a month ago, I suddenly awoke in the night, with a name for Bean in my head. “Oh, that’s a great name! I should wake Sam up and tell him.... No, he probably wants to keep sleeping. I should write it down.... No, it’s so good that I’ll remember it when I wake up in the morning, and I'm too tired to get up and find a pen.... I’m so glad that Bean told me the name she* wants.”

The next day, hours pass without this rapid exchange with myself cming to mind. Midmorning, I remember my thoughts of the night before, except that I can’t remember the name, the name I was so sure I’d remember. But I eventually brought it to the surface of my memory and called Sam. “What do you think of the name Navea?”

“Where’d you get it?”

“It came to me in the middle of the night. I think it’s a message from Bean.”

“Mmm-hmm. What’s it mean?”

“I don’t know.”

“How do you spell it?”

“I don’t know. I guess N-A-V-E-A.”

“I’ll look it up.”

A little later, he calls me back. It means cloud in Alphistian.”

“What’s Alphistian?”

“I’m not sure. I’m looking it up…. Um, it’s a made up language, created by a nine-year old.”

“That’s it?”

“… Well, if you spell it a little differently, N-E-V-A-E-H, it’s heaven, backwards.”

“Never mind. Here I was all excited that maybe Bean was sending a message, but I’m not using a name from a made-up language, or naming her heaven, backwards. What kind of message does that send? You’re the opposite of heaven?”

Despite the sad results of googling the name, it floated around in my head for a few more weeks. I kept thinking that I could put it fully to rest, if I could just remember where I’d heard it before. Since there’s no way Bean would send a made-up name, I’d misinterpreted its coming to me in the middle of the night. Did I get it from something I’d seen on TV? A movie?

Last week it finally came to me. I immediately called Sam to let him know that we will not be naming our child Navea or Nevaeh, or any variation thereof. (No offense intended to any of you out there who may have or love this name.) “Remember that show we saw last year? About the brothel in New Orleans? With several generations all working together? You know, the grandmother was the madam, the granddaughter was a prostitute?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s where I heard the name Nevaeh. That was the granddaughter’s daughter’s name. Remember? There is no way I want to use that name.”

“Yeah, I remember. Child services took her away. But maybe she represents the family’s last hope.”

“That’s nice and all for them. But I don’t want to use it. Yeah, we named you after a hooker’s daughter.”

So, we’re back to the drawing board. I liked the uniqueness. Sam was attracted to the made-up-language and the spells-another-word-backward aspects. But we’ve got our standards. And naming our child after a baby on an expose about a brothel in my hometown doesn’t fit into them.

*For no real reason, Sam and I often think that Bean is a girl. Maybe it’s that we assume we’ll follow the pattern – we have four nieces and no nephews. Getting a name in my head that was a girl’s just added fuel to the fire. I put a lot of credence in dreams.

Fingerblot test

I've discovered a potential new use for my big brown belly: Rorschach tests. With all the extra blood I have circulating, when I press on my belly with my finger tips, I get white blots. I think it would be fun to press patterns in a routine and ask people what they see.

But when it comes down to it, I think I'm a little too modest for such shenanigans.

Rrell confused

Sometimes I get actors a little mixed up. So, all day, as I saw the headlines about Colin Farrell and his sex tape, instead of picturing the bad boy himself, I though the actor involved was Will Ferrell. Talk about confusion - I can't picture Bullseye and Buddy the Elf at the same party, much less played by the same person.

A product of both parents

Belly: Week 24

Bean is not what you would call an active child. Not even out of the womb, and already following in my footsteps. My very slow footsteps. The slow footsteps that would result in my PE teacher telling me I didn't have to finish the mile, because he was tired of standing there waiting for me to finsh. While other pregnant women complain about the jabs and kicks their children are inflicting on their innards, I welcome Bean's activity. But it tends to be very irregular - a jab here, a kick there, rarely in succession.

However, this morning it was driven home to me that Bean has indeed inherited Sam's love for food. Yeah, great combo, I know - my inactivity, Sam's love for food.... I have got to make sure Bean befriends every jock on the block.

Anyway, the inheritance from Sam.... It was manifested in more than the MegaGrab bag of chips I just ate (that's 4 servings, if any of you are counting). I was responding to an email my mother had sent me - an article about a woman who was asked to leave a *$ because the manager thought her breastfeeding would make the other customers uncomfortable. As I typed that I will feed Bean whenever and wherever he or she gets hungry, Bean indicated being on board with that philosophy - there was movement like none I've experienced to date. I'd think it was over, and it would start up again - like a party in the pants. Mmm, you tell 'em, Mom, just keep the milk coming.

Hmmm, maybe the way to make sure Bean is not the inactive slug I was and am is to talk about food all the time.

Again with the feet

Today, I realized I'd left something off of last week's list of foot-related annoyances:
When people's toes hang off the front of their sandals.
The person has nice shoes. The person has nice feet. But then the feet are hanging off the front of the shoes, with an inch of exposed shoe where their heel should be. It's just wrong. Not every shoe suits every foot, and if the shoe fits you in a way that your foot slides forward, don't. buy. it.

Noticing...

My clavicles have disappeared.

You know what the best thing in the world is?

My brother Anis has this thing he does (or did?):
You know what the best thing in the world is?
Free donuts.
You know what the second best thing in the world is?
Free donut.

Even though donuts are not involved, I think Anis would still be pretty pleased with visiting me today, because today is free ice cream day in my building. Once a year, the building treats us to yummy ice cream from one of the local ice cream shops. Lunch will be a little delayed today.

Later...
Mmm, that was gooood. We had several choices, and, keeping in line with my recent relaxation of the self-imposed no caffeine rule (I haven't resumed the regular drinking of coffee, or even black tea, but I'll have green tea some days), I had the bowl with the Chocolate Mac Nut and the Royal Kona Coffee. I went decadent and topped it with granola, crumbled oreos, and whip cream. The result was thoroughly enjoyable and had the side benefit of taking me back in time. One of our favorite special desserts, and often a request for our birthdays, was the ice cream pie my mom would make, with Breyer's coffee ice cream and an oreo crust.

It's all about feet

I know it's between Memorial Day and Labor Day, but I don't understand why women insist on wearing white shoes. Buff? Good. Cream? Good. Natural? Good. White? Unless they're designed for exercise of the okay-to-do-in-public sort, they look like.... Well, they look like hooker shoes.

And since we're on the topics of white and feet... I am also not in favor of the ever-popular french pedicure. I feel like it's calling attention to the need to trim one's toenails.

And speaking of long toenails, why, oh why, did someone decide that it was fashionable to have such? I walk around seeing toes, nicely painted, some with pretty flowers and gems. But a lot of them, I want to whip out my ten-foot-long nail clippers. Before sitting down with the nail polish, why didn't they spend just a few minutes with the nail clippers? Stuff gets under there, you know? It's like putting perfume on a dirty body.

Okay, enough negative comments related to feet. I like feet. Really, I do.

Monster in confinement

Several hours have passed, and I've managed to go without the cookies. I owe this to two things:

1) I haven't left the floor - you know if I'd stepped into the elevator, my feet would have carried me right to the store and the cookie aisle

2) my short attention span - I've occupied my mind and my stomach with other things, maybe for only 15 minutes at a time, but the unintentional result is that I forgot about the cookies.

Until now.

Cookie Monster

I could really go for some cookies right now. Some = a lot. I would like to just sit and stuff my face with a whole batch of quality (in taste, not nutrition)carbs . But I can't bring myself to do it - even though I have a reason for the largeness that is my belly, I can't bear the thought of sitting at the office cramming cookies into my mouth while people walk by thinking, "that's why she looks like she's carrrying twins."

I guess these are the cravings that arise when one goes a weekend without baking. Weekend before last, I made a rhubarb cobbler/ dumpling/ yumminess - should I be embarassed to report that Sam and I ate the whole thing in one day? (I guess that's better than eating it in one sitting.) And the weekend before that, I baked oatmeal cookies with pecans and dried cranberries. We managed to stretch those out for several days. But this past weekend, nothing. And now I suffer.

I may break down and buy some Pepperidge Farms. For how else will I make it through the day?

Jane Doe, Licensed Bookseller

Just like with the last book, someone didn't pay attention, and sold copies of the new Harry Potter before this weekend's release. Reading this makes me think that there should be some sort of licensing to run a bookstore. Most independent booksellers are in the business because they love books, and I can't see one of them selling the book early, because they share a respect for the anticipation of the next book. And they admire the love of reading this series has awakened in many.

I know that I'm biased, having been raised not only in a house with an abundance of books, but in a children's bookshop for eight years of my childhood. I can't imagine my mom, or any other member of my "bookshop family" making the mistake of selling such an item ahead of time. It makes me think of that scene in You've Got Mail, where Meg Ryan visits the children's section of Fox Books. A customer comes through looking for the "shoes" books. The Fox employee doesn't know what the customer is referring to, but Meg Ryan immediately knows that it's the books by Noel Streatfield - she loves books, they're not just a job.

I doubt that these books were sold by a large chain bookstore, because they tend to be too structured for such a major mistake to happen. I suspect that they were sold by an independent bookseller, but one who does not have a love of books. And I can't help but think that if that criteria - a love of books - was required of every bookseller, the Harry Potter books wouldn't have been sold early.

For lunch today

Two hearty servings of pizza: one for me, one for Bean.

And I wonder why I'm ahead of my targeted weight gain.... The child has just reached a pound. The rest of the weight gain is mine, all mine.

Tasty tidbits

One of our favorite restaurants here has an extensive menu, including several pages of what they call tasty tidbits. Mmm, boy, are they tasty. But I won't tell you the name of the restaurant. Because what I'm about to tell you isn't tasty. Far from, in fact. It's just a tidbit:

When you become pregnant, one of the first messages your hormones may broadcast is, "Hold on! To everything!" Your digestive tract slows down to an excrutiatingly slow (with the emphasis on excrutiating) pace, so that the baby can pull as many nutrients as possible from your food. The outcome? Nothing. And I mean that.

In the early days of my pregnancy we were traveling. It was so early, that I had no clue that I could possibly be pregnant. Sure, I know that I could theoretically be pregnant, but had no expectations of getting pregnant on the first try. That's no try, only do.

Most of my time in Israel, I produced a marble a day, despite my intake of roughage, my extensive walking (oh, the stairs...), and my previous history of my output keeping pace with my input. But I still chalked it up to travel. Silly me, silly conclusion, given that the only other time in my life I've been constipated was when I was living in the Gambia and, for a while, had a horrible diet relying heavily on white bread. But I had no idea that pregnancy could result in constipation.

Sure I was regaled, along with the rest of you, with Heather's stories of consitipation during pregnancy, but she has a history of that. Me? Smooth sailing up until four months ago. No one had ever told me that constipation might be an early indication of pregnancy. So I'm providing you this tidbit as a public service.

Take home message: When there's a "do" there's no doo-doo. (Ha ha, I crack myself up. Which is good, since I know as soon as you realized what this post was about, you stopped reading.)

That's a lot of sugar

Some months ago, Hawaii implemented a deposit/redemption program for beverage containers. We're charged a 5 cent deposit on the container, and can then turn it in for the 5 cents back.

Today, a press release went out that included the information that more than 77 million drink containers were turned in for recycling last month. 77 million! For a state with a population of 1.26 million! That's an average of 2 containers per day for every citizen. And that doesn't include the containers that were bought but not redeemed. (Like ours - we buy so few bottled beverages that we just throw them in regular recycling, rather than standing in line to get 5 cents back on each one.) And when you consider that I am likely not alone in not partaking of bottled beverages (pregnant or not), that means some people are drinking at least four containers of soda or beer every day. It blows my mind. And presumably their waistlines.

Swift world intercommunication*

I suppose I shouldn't be, but I continue to be amazed by this world in which we live. There is the craziness of instability and violence. But there is also a universal coming together, helped by the efficiency of technology. Check out Wikipedia's entry for G8, specifically this part. Talk about quick updates.

*a reference to the last part of the World Order of Baha'u'llah

Golf = good

Like most people, I'm not a big fan of pop-ups. But the exception is those that belong to Orbitz. I'm always happy to get one of their pop-ups, since they're games. My favorite is the golf one.

Just sharing. (If this were a real conversation, this is the point at which you would stare at me like you're expecting more. And when you realize there's nothing else, your eyes glaze over.)

Killing me softly

Yesterday, I had an About a Boy moment. You know that part when Marcus is explaining to Will why he doesn't fit in at school? And he brings up singing - how sometimes the songs in his head make it to his mouth, and he finds himself sitting in class singing out loud with his classmates laughing at him? I was Marcus.

I had just started my walk home, so was still in the more congested area of downtown, waiting to cross the street. And I realized I was singing out loud (Madonna's Like a Prayer, if you must know), and a woman was staring at me. I decided lack of eye contact, and shutting my mouth, was the best route. I didn't want to find out if she was someone I know. I want to believe that I still fit in on the streets of downtown. (Not the corners, just the streets.)

Countdowns

Ten days until the release of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Two weeks until our wedding anniversary
One month until Lacey and Myk's wedding
Four months until Bean's due date

Waddler

This week, two different people, in completely different settings, commented on my waddle. So, I guess it must be true - I have entered the waddling stage.

Lord help me, that sounds so unflattering. But what's a girl to do when she's:

And it's easier on the clothes than the next stage - the rolling one, when Sam, or any kind stranger, will have to give me a push in the appropriate direction.