the world is your acorn

Ok, here it is. The Little Red Haired Girl is preggers. It’s been 2 months since we’ve been public about it, and I still find myself having to announce it in various places. Someone congratulated me yesterday and I had no idea what he was talking about, and he had to explain to me that we haven’t seen each other since he found out. A couple weeks ago someone else (who I see multiple times a week) asked me sort of embarrassedly whether or not The Little Red Haired Girl is pregnant, because he’d figured it out indirectly from somewhere. Oops. I find it hard to keep track of who’s been told what, and really I’m not interested in making announcements in the first place. Not because I’m a total bitch (which I might be), but it’s just such a rigamarole and I hate social rituals. I kind of just want to hand out a FAQ and be done with it:

1. Yes, we are excited.
2. No, it was not an accident. (That’s my favorite joke, and I make it every chance I get. Sorry.)
3. We’ve been trying since last spring, and we feel incredibly fortunate that she got pregnant so quickly.
4. Yes, that time I had to leave the softball game early was because we were inseminating. (and yes, I am a queer stereotype).
5. She’s due in mid July
6. The Little Red Haired Girl is feeling great now, the first trimester was not too bad for her, we’re hoping to be as lucky for the third.
7. The father is Chinese, we don’t know him, and mostly we picked him because his donor profile was one of the few that matched (willing to be known, Chinese, and something about cmv).
8. It’s a girl, but please don’t buy us weird gender normative pink shit. Baby Doc Martens and little cargo pants of all styles will be accepted.
9. No, we don’t have a name picked out yet, but if we did we probably wouldn’t be telling at this point anyway.
10. Yes, we’ll have a shower, and yes, you can be invited if you want. Unless you’re planning on showing up with weird gender normative pink shit.
11. Yes, we would love to use your hand-me-down _______________ since your kids are grown and you don’t need it anymore. Unless it’s weird gender normative pink shit.
12. Thank you for caring enough to ask, and sorry I’m too bitchy to walk you through it personally. If there’s anything else you’d like to know, come buy me a few beers at Yazoo sometime and then I won’t be able to stop talking about it. I’ll probably even show you her girl parts (the baby’s, not The Little Red Haired Girl’s).

For the first time in many years we are not doing anything for Chinese new year. Usually we make lots of food and invite friends overs. This year, because we’re trying to get the house ready to put on the market, we’re not doing it. Half our cooking implements are in storage, and the house is too clean for massive cooking and partying. I guess one thing that we did do this year that we’ve never done before is do a crazy cleaning and purging of house and stuff. It wasn’t expressly in preparation for the new year, but the timing was right. So in a way, I can tell myself that we did something for new year’s.

I’ve also made 3 resolutions for myself. American tradition, but I’m going to attach it to the Chinese new year. One is to enjoy myself, and don’t do stuff that makes me unhappy. Mostly, I don’t think that this has to change my behavior much, just my outlook. I don’t do that much stuff that I don’t want in the first place, which is probably why a lot of the things I’m unhappy about exist for me. Which leads me to the second, which is to make myself do more things that I don’t want to do. This might seem contradictory to the first resolution, but I don’t think it has to be. If I don’t think of the things that I don’t want to do as things I don’t want to do, then they’re not so bad. And usually they don’t take that long or that much energy. I’m starting off with small things every day, like putting things where they belong. The third thing is to keep my mouth shut, and to have a good reason for opening it. Baby steps on that one too, but I think that even small strides for these three things will go a long way in the pretend happiness project that I’ve launched.

The other day The Little Red Haired Girl and I were in line for a cashier, chatting it up while we waited. Suddenly we noticed that the cashier was ready for us, and The Little Red Haired Girl apologized to the cashier for not paying attention. The cashier then said, “That’s ok, I talk to myself sometimes too.”

Umm, hello?

I felt like I should check in, but I don’t have much to contribute. I mean, things have happened lately, for sure. For example, I’m no longer on a road trip across country. In fact, I haven’t been for weeks now. In the time since the last post I’ve caught up with an old friend in LA, gotten to SD, flown back, driven to Durham, then to Charleston, participated in a bachelorette party, come home, driven to Michigan for a wedding, then watched Mrs. Superhero become even more super as she defended her dissertation.
I’ve also cooked and eaten all kinds of things, including summer faves like beer can chicken and flat iron steak, and delicious luxurious things like pate sandwiches and beet tartare, and weird shit like the penis shaped banana dessert that was served to the bride-to-be during bachelorette weekend.
It’s been a busy month. But somehow I haven’t felt like posting anything. Just one of those phases, I guess.

* the ncaa women’s tournament is actually interesting this year, with lots of major upsets in the 1st and 2nd rounds
    * as a subindicator of the above, TN, Duke, and UNC are all out already.
* this morning i accidentally performed my shower routine out of order
* i saw a blip in the matrix
* i’m still motivated to work after an intense couple of weeks of overtime paper writing and whatnot
* we were ready to leave the house 10 minutes early this morning
* we had gulf oysters last night, and they were delicious
* we managed to save some money this month
* talked to mom on the phone last night, and she did not mention my retirement fund. the disturbance is not SO great, however; she did tell me that i should be working harder on my dissertation.

The night before the wedding The Little Red Haired Girl and I decided we wanted to have a rehearsal dinner, we wanted it to be a Chinese banquet, and we wanted invite everyone. Never people to disappoint ourselves, we did what we wanted. Back in June, The Little Red Haired Girl, Lady Ebony, and I went on a tour of Chinese banquet facilities in the Boston area, trying one menu item at each restaurant. Even though we thought something in Chinatown would be fun, the obvious choice ended up being Royal East in Cambridge, right between Central and Kendall. The manager, Otto, was really nice, and the soft shell crab app that we tried was amazing.

So, after some deliberation about the menu, here’s what we ended up with:

1. Cold Platter

2. Seafood with yellow chive soup

3. Double lobsters (in the picture there’s also a tofu dish that was for non-seafood eating folks)

4. Crispy double squabs (note the look on our faces)

5. Steamed whole fish

6. Hong Kong steak

7. Sauteed pea tendrils w/ crabmeat sauce
8. Longevity noodles
Plus fresh fruit for dessert.

Somehow no one (that I know of) managed to get pictures of the last 3. Too full and lazy by then, I guess. All the food was fantastic, and exactly what I had imagined and been telling The Little Red Haired Girl about for years. Otto and his crew at Royal East also did a great job. We didn’t have to ask for much, they handled vegetarians and fish allergies easily, and service was efficient and professional. We were so impressed and grateful, if we lived there we’d be regulars at that restaurant. So freaking good.

I’m married now.