Emmy Math

I take no credit for this. The Good Doctor and Emmy just emerged from the car one day and she could add. Then they came out of the bathroom and she could subtract. I think it's pretty decent for a 2.75 year old, but what do I know? I got rejected from Stanford.

But as a friend recently told me (not about herself) "As for child prodigies, I think most people don't realize that the extremely gifted are just another flavor of "special needs," so I wouldn't really wish that onto a kid as they tend to be outcasts." I trust her. She was accepted into Stanford and graduated too.

P.S. Math makes me want to poo too.

Husband Hall of Fame

Inducted this weekend: The Good Doctor.

Awarded for: Above and Beyond Husbandly Duties

Special Merit Earned for: Accomplishing major feat while keeping pregnant wife completely in the dark

Dude planned a SURPRISE baby shower by hijacking my phone in the early morning hours and emailing my friend and colleague Liza 7 times for additional contacts. That's what happens when the cell phone charger is on your husband's side of the bed.

He'd been telling me for a week we were going to Maggiano's for a lunch date with some of his friends. I wasn't super jazzed because for some reason I loved Maggiano's the first 2 times I went there, then I had a mediocre pasta and decided I never wanted to go back. Ever. Plus, some of his friends are really boring. So it was going to be a wifely duty to hang out and make small talk and hope that the calamari and seafood linguini put me in a good carbo coma for the afternoon. 37 week pregnant women have small wishes. 

I urged him to ask his friends to meet at Yard House instead. We recently had an NBC Investigative Unit team dinner there and it was a really good experience. The team investigated at least 12 of their 120 beers on tap. I am the type of person who will eat toasted crumpets with ricotta cheese every day for breakfast for 2 years so when I find something I like, I exhaust it. I went to the Yard House after my team dinner for lunch with a friend and I thought we should introduce The Good Doctor's friends to it since it was basically next door to Maggiano's and I would at least enjoy the food if not the conversation. I'm kidding. I love his friends. They are all so...nice. Again, not kidding.  I know, I'm not getting a Wife Hall of Fame ceremony any time soon.

Anyway, he's telling me he thinks they already made reservations and it's kid friendly and they really like that place, so I sigh and say, "Fine. But I hate that place. I'm never going there again." Totally overdramatic and actually, it's really not a bad place. I just wasn't feeling it.

So Saturday comes, we're on the way there, and he says, "Hey, I changed it, we're going to Yard House."

By then I'd actually mentally prepared for the pasta so I was like, "Oh. OK. I was planning to just get the seafood pasta. I'm not in the mood for Yard House." 

He was like, Can you be any more annoying, WOMAN? "Oh, well, that's where we are meeting because I thought you'd like it better." You crazy pregnant lady.

Hey, getting into the Husband Hall of Fame requires a lot of sacrifice. Not many men have this kind of dedication, patience, and wherewithal. Or raw sexual charisma.

So we get there, and right before I walk in, I get a VIP phone call pertaining to a nightmare ID theft situation we are going through. I want to just head in and finish the conversation but he wants to wait outside until I'm off the phone. We get inside a few minutes later, park the stroller, and walk toward a table. 

The first thing I see: his Aunt Tina's curly brown hair. I'm like, "Hey, your aunt Tina is here!" Then I see his his grandma and I'm like, "Wow--they're in the South Bay today!" Not totally unusual because Tina has a house down here. Then I see some of my friends and finally all my synapses fire together and I realize...they're here for a party! For me! And it's because of my husband!

I look at him like, "Are you serious right now?" in a tone totally from Shit Girls Say and I start tearing up like a crybaby. 

It was just so unexpected, so not discussed or authorized, and a complete, utter surprise. He pulled it off and I had zero idea. Even with the two random times I picked up his phone when my mom was calling and she sounded all flustered and weird mumbling about how she needed Brian to help her with her "um uh phone but nevermind, I'll call back later."

It really meant so much to me to have my girlfriends and family come out for a lunch to celebrate our impending arrival. And I didn't even have to play a single baby shower game or have people guess the circumference of my belly.

The fact The Good Doctor put this party together in a week and a day makes me think procrastination is preferable when it comes to things like this. Just BAM--we're having a shindig, can you come?

Take note husbands: works pretty well and can earn you a spot in the Husband Hall of Fame. And it's forever. Like when you've been elected president. They can never take that away from you.

Christmas Cards 2011: Production

Clearly this is not the final product. We knew it would be impossible to top last year's production, but we gave it a college try because it's not in our nature to underachieve. Yes, we are those people.

Photog and good friend Kiet Do sent me this blog post for inspiration. This dad/photog takes the most amazing photos of his girls. Photoshop is his friend.

So Kiet invested in a fatty green screen, and we put our cumulative Bay Area educated brains together to come up with this year's concept. Here's a snapshot similar to one I shared on my Facebook during the shoot. 

That's Tofu, hanging from a coat hanger, with her shearling collar popped. Will post the finished product and outtakes next. 

Placenta Eater

In researching a potential story on home birth, a colleague of mine who worked in New York told me about this piece on women who eat their placentas. Whether it's ground up and then put into a capsule, or stewed in a pot, or dried into placenta JERKY, there are so many ways to enjoy a placenta these days.

And while I'm sure the initial reaction from most people is hell no, placenta must go, I actually think there's something about this that makes sense. If it cuts down on post partum depresssion, or helps with the hormone swings after pregnancy, or if it ups your milk production, why not? Apparently almost all land mammals do it. I mean, it might be because they don't want lions to smell the blood of their young, which is not something I'm exactly concerned about, but there might be something to it. 

So I was talking to The Good Doctor about it, wondering if our hospital would allow us to take home our placenta, and I was like, "I might consider eating my placenta. I actually don't think it's the grossest idea in the world. Would you have some of my placenta?"

Him: "No. Definitely not."

Me: "Not even a little, tiny bit? Just a taste."

Him: "NO."

Me: "Dude, why not? I mean, it's MY placenta."

Him: "Exactly. You should have the whole thing."

He's nothing if not generous.

The Good Doctor Dances

Christmas came early.

Somehow my husband, along with two of his colleagues, was recruited into a DANCE ROUTINE for his holiday party this year. Yes. DANCE ROUTINE. I have no idea how or why this happened, but I'm delighted and mortified at the same time. Delightified. Delighted because I love to see all 6'6" of white boy shaking what his mama gave him. Mortified because I was his plus one and not only did I bear witness to this performance, I captured it on video so that when Emmy and Babius grow up, they will know their dad was Justin Timberlake in scrubs.

Picture three anesthesiologists of varying sizes, accompanied by three nurses, performing a 5 minute dance number. A "Dancing with the Doctors" if you will. I mean, when he first told me about this, I thought it'd be a little 2 minute do-si-do.

I was wrong. The music was a medley of 5 or 6 songs with transitions, ending in a Rockettes kickline! 

They rehearsed twice. But I guess when you're busy saving lives every day, two rehearsals is about all you can fit into your schedule.

The performance was this weekend. I, of course, filmed it. As of now, and probably forever, it is on Youtube, but only as a private link that I'm verboten to share with anyone who does not share our bloodlines. And even then, you need $50 and the secret password.

I can say it was pretty decent and the audience gave them a very warm reception. As one lady said after the performance, "I love juvenile immature stuff like that." I'm pretty sure she meant that as a compliment.