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I thought I was doing really well with mood swings, til Dave came home for his dinner break tonight.

I saw the dishes in the sink and was so paralyzed with feelings of overwhelming stress at the stack of dirty dishes that instead of rationally washing them, I turned the light off and ran away.

So when Dave got home, he got me on the couch, angry for no good reason other than I had eaten today, and that had created dirty dishes, and couldn't he SEE what was WRONG with that?? It doesn't stop. It NEVER stops. As soon as you have the sink clean, you get hungry. I will be 98 and still angry about this.

He trepidly asked what I wanted for dinner. Easy. I've been craving ravioli and homemade garlic toast. Easy enough. Only we don't have garlic salt.

We went through our timid dance of I-don't-know-what-do-you-feel-like-eating began, and we settled on cream of mushroom with soy crumbles and instant mashed potatoes.

Only he didn't tell me we didn't have cream of mushroom. But! But! Erin! We have cream of chicken! Tastes the same! Only, no, it doesn't. Because you don't put chicken and beef in one pot, so you shouldn't put cream of chicken in something that's supposed to resemble beef. And there weren't enough mashed potatoes for us both. And the sympathy soy chick'n nuggets were overcooked and couldn't be chewed through.

So I did what anyone would do. I grabbed my napkin, held it to my face and bawled. Uncontrollably. Because nothing's going right! And it's almost Thanksgiving and I want to see my mom! And the pile of dishes is bigger! And I have to go to work tomorrow! And none of my pants fit! And the mashed potatoes are getting cold! And I can't taste them because I'm crying too hard! And Dave wasn't helping!

Probably because he was scared to death. Hi, his wife just fell apart over her chick'n nuggets. He'd touch my shoulder if he weren't afraid I'd bite his hand off. He'd hug me if I hadn't put the kibosh on that for reasons you probably can only appreciate if you've been pregnant.

Poor Dave. He did an awkward side shoulder hug and a "shhh, shhh" thing, probably praying for the phone to ring or for a meteor to hit the house. It didn't, but I calmed down and ate and he grabbed his scarf and coat and kissed me goodbye sweetly, and then it was over.

I think he'll come back ... I hope so, anyhow. Cuz I'm not doing those dishes.

Written Nov. 17

Yay, Dave

Morning sickness is a weird occurrence, because I get it when I'm hungry, tired or otherwise standing still. In the morning, I find it hard to get out of bed -- remember that time you were so tired you thought you'd lay down and never, ever get back up? It's that feeling, plus vomiting.

Now picture yourself at 6:45 a.m., leaning over feeling like that, wondering if you already asked Dave to get you toast or if you were just hoping you did.

He doesn't move. You assume you just thought you did.

"Dave?"

"I'm going," he says, eyes closed, mouth barely moving.

Though you didn't ask, he knows what to do. Why? Because he's Dave, the poor sucker stuck lying next to you night after night, waking up to your "I'm thirsty"s and "Could you get me some toast?"s. And he's the kind-hearted guy who goes and gets them without much complaining.

Everyone should have a Dave.

Written Oct. 29

I can't think about anything else

Right after I got engaged, I thought family, friends and random strangers would come up to me just to punch me in the mouth to get me to STOP talking about my STUPID wedding already, God! No one CARES.

But you guys. This is a BABY. As I write this, I'm 7 1/2-weeks pregnant, and my baby looks like a little half-inch alien. He/she has a heartbeat. A brain. A liver. This is serious stuff. And I'm responsible for this. When I post this, he/she will be three months not-born-yet-but-old.

He/she's not even here and already I'm having a complex about my ability to help this child not-die, and maybe even succeed. It's scary.

So it's no wonder that I've got that one thing on my mind right now, and only that. And I don't think anyone would blame me for only talking about my little cashew.

Plus, it's like the "don't think about puppies" thing. I say "don't blog about the baby" and all I can blog about is my baby. I'm laying out pages at work and thinking about he/she. I'm reading copy and going over names I might like in the story. I'm reading pregnancy books where I used to read Joyce Carol Oates or Jodi Picoult. I'm giggling. Over nothing. Everytime someone says excitedly "You're going to have a baby!" I just giggle and say "I KNOW!"

What's happening to me?

Written Nov. 1

I don't really know myself

I don't like pickles, nor do I ever crave ice cream. But meat. Now, I can't stop. Scary, bad-for-you meat, red meat, a damn hamburger, spaghetti sauce so thick with meat chunks that it's not quite sauce. Pepperoni, even. Beef sandwiches, with ketchup.

I don't even know myself.

I was a chicken woman. Nuggets, legs, sandwiches, patties. Chicken. Healthier, lighter. Soy, even. Yum.

Now, unless it's covered in hot sauce, I don't want it.

Mmm, that or just plain green olives. I eat them like I used to eat M & Ms, and olives are unfortunately not much healthier.

Somewhere, my doctor is crying and my sodium levels are soaring. I promise. I'm also drinking my milk and eating fruit and the occasional veggie. I promise.

Written Oct. 22

Telling my mom

"Mom, we have a bunch of gifts for you," we said on our vacation last month.

"Ooh!"

"Here, your jelly container back."

"All right."

"And here -- magazines."

"Sweet."

"Aaaaand, Dave got you this for early Christmas -- a 7-foot crossword puzzle."

"Oh, man."

"Aaaaaand, Dave framed this photo of you and Bernie. Isn't it cool?"

"Oh, baby!"

"Oh, speaking of babies -- I'm pregnant."

Silence.

"AH! YES!"

Written Oct. 20

In my head, I made a lot more sense than I did aloud

"Ugh, I'm so tired. My back hurts."

"YOUR back hurts? You're tired? I carried around a fetus all day!"

"Wha?"

"Yeah! YOU try being pregnant!"

And I'm not even really "showing." Dave's probably got an escape plan for months seven to nine. Sucks to be Dave. I'll track him down. He won't get far.

Written Oct. 29

Good luck, suckers!

"Dad? Erin's pregnant."

Pause.

"No foolin'? Well, wow, good luck!"

Pause.

"I mean, uh, good job!"

Written Oct. 21

Baby Cashew

I was five weeks pregnant, skinnier than I'll ever be again and aware of it for the first time, and buying baby name and pregnancy fact books at Meijer (it's like Wal-Mart, with a conscience, and Wisconsin desperately needs one here).

That night, sitting on my mom's couch, Dave and I picked out girls' names we liked, narrowing it down to about five. Olivia. Emma. Isabelle. Tegan. Abigail.

It was all perfect. People said "awww," and gave their opinions on each. But a few weeks later, I checked the oh-so-addicting Social Security Administration Web site's baby name page and found all but Tegan were in the top 10 or 15.

Then I found a name somewhere in the top-hundreds. Lucy. I asked Dave and he said "I've never thought about that name ... Now I can't get it out of my head." Lucy Wasinger. Lucy, Lucy. I thought we'd found it. We could stop calling the baby our little cashew -- she could have a name!

But the next morning, while brushing my teeth, I stopped mid-brush and stared at myself in the mirror. Lucy. No. I can't. WHY didn't I think of this? I thought. Calmly finishing and sitting at the table moments later, I said "It can't be Lucy."

"Why?"

"Carly's dog. Her name is Lucy."

"I thought it was Lou-Lou."

"I think that's the nickname. Call your brother."

But his brother confirmed his girlfriend's dog's name was, indeed, Lucy.

"So ... Joe. If you could, you know ... 'off' that dog, you know ... I'm just saying."

Great. Now we have attempted murder on our hands. Lucy's out. The dog lives.

And yes, we have a boy's name. But that's secret for now. I'm hormonal, and likely to get angry when strangers scrunch their noses up and say "Ewww, you want THAT name? What are you naming, a goldfish?"

Written Oct. 19

Why I had to tell you now

I wrote about 12 blog posts and saved them, carefully selecting "Return to list of posts" instead of "Publish post," afraid I'd tell you all and then jinx the whole thing. That I'd go to the doctor and they'd do the blood tests and say "Well, the good news is, you're not anemic. The bad thing is, you're not pregnant."

But no.

I am. And it's still early. The good news is, I'm pregnant, I'm not anemic, I don't have hepatitis, HIV, Rubella or anything else they took four vials of blood for at my nurse's visit in mid-October, two days after our one-year wedding anniversary.

I won't feel OK about being pregnant until Dec. 4 when I enter the second trimester of my pregnancy. My pregnancy. It sounds weird to say it, and I walk around all day thinking "I'm pregnant, and you don't know. She doesn't know. She doesn't know, either. I'm having a baby. I'll have a baby this time next year. This is my last October as a woman without a child."

But I'm not going to lie. Dooce had a missed miscarriage right after Dave and I told our immediate families and I told my bosses, and I thought I didn't have the nerve to share it yet beyond that because I didn't know if I would be strong enough to, like Dooce, blog about it, should anything -- God forbid -- happen with my pregnancy.

Of course, I went through how many weeks of not having anything to blog about because I wasn't doing anything but being pregnant, and I realized I missed being able to talk about real life.

But what can you do? I kept my mouth shut. And DANG it was hard.

Written Nov. 9

So hot

Old wives are rarely right in all their tale-telling, but sometimes, they can be right on.

I guess morning sickness is one of those things they got head-on.

Of course it was named by an insensitive man who never had it, because if he were able to experience it, he would've insisted it be called all-day kill-me-my-mouth-is-watering-oh-God-I-think-I'm-going-to-puke-oh-wait-false-alarm. (Now, Nov. 27, it's pretty much gone. But dang, it was a long month.)

And I'm not sure there is a sexier feeling than being not-quite-showing-but-still-bloated, nauseaus and tired like you've never, ever experienced. Ever. And I know tired. Then you add on top of that the heightened sense of smell -- of which I come with a sensitive sense, anyhow -- and you've got yourself some burpy being with your pants unbuttoned and held together by a hair tie looped through your button hole. Hot. Hooootttt.

I think it's nature's way of making you not sleep around. Cuz, man, did I have a problem with that before! Whoooo. (Just kidding, Ma.)

Written Oct. 18

Also, the first time you blame a mood swing on being pregnant, you get a punch in the face

"Let's lay some ground rules."

"Ohhh-K."

"First, there is no fruit in my womb. I hate that."

"OK."

"Second, WE are not pregnant."

"What?"

"I am pregnant. WE are not."

"Oh."

"We are having a baby. We are starting a family. We have one on the way. But WE are not pregnant."

Written Oct. 17

What I've been up to and hinting at for about two months now

The two lines sprung up within seconds. First the variable, then the control. The clock ticked as the blue lines grew darker, the variable slightly lighter than the control line. It was 7:16 a.m. on a Thursday in early October. By 7:18, my heart beat once in my throat where three beats should have been in my chest and I hesitantly called for Dave. "Daaaave?"

Holding the paper with the idiot-proof directions and the wand out in front of me, I just looked at him and watched as he looked at the key. "Two lines ... positive ... One line .... nega--"

Pause. He looked at me and smiled, slowly, rubbing his bed-head.

"We're having a baby?"

"I think so?"

I mean, yes.

And later that day, I took two more home pregnancy tests. Positive. Took one more - a different brand, just to make sure - the next day. Positive.

I guess I should clear my calendar for early June.

Written Oct. 16 - It should be noted the blue lines I'm talking about are from the first test. This picture was the third test. Can you say paranoid?

Noooooo, don't make me goooooo

I'm all about home improvement (the act, not the show), and I'll admit that nothing quite brightens my day like the smell of paint drying. Paint that I didn't put there. Paint I wanted there, and ordered Dave to put there. See, I'm very specific about the scent of my drying paint.

Since Lowe's opened in Oshkosh last week, a mere five minutes from our house, Dave's been a madman.

"Let's go tomorrow after you get done with work."

"Wow, I call that incentive."

"To get done earlier?"

"No, to get lost on the way home."

"Come on! It'll be great."

"I'll bet!"

He's decided that tomorrow, just because!, we're going to pick out molding for the kitchen, new toilet paper holders for both bathrooms (because the ones we have are jiggly beyond repair, and he wants fewer moveable parts), a towel holder for the downstairs bathroom, and the mower we'll be getting next spring.

Wooooooooeeeeeeeeeehhhhhhh! A new mower! All right! Let's go now! Let's go tonight! Let's talk about weed control! Let's talk about blades! Let's talk about oh-my-God-I'm-so-bored.

I had a penchant for home improvement-type stores right after we bought our house, but since, oh, October of last year, that kind of returned itself to the "boring" pile of my life. He's going to ask me to pick out the siding we'll get when we're rich, or the type of windows we'll get in our next house, I just know it. God, wake me up. I must be having a nightmare.

No, she doesn't have the mullet anymore. I still have that crazy hair, though.

All weddings are fun, but weddings that are held around home with your family, with Putnam County wedding food, with wine, with a bride you used to stay up late playing Barbies with at Grandma's by the closet light until you started giggling so loud that you got yelled at for not trying to sleep ... those weddings are the best. The weddings with the bride you used to spend hours on the phone after school with dissecting what The Boy said to you that day in school -- does he still like me? I think that's him! On call waiting! Oh my God! What do I say??

And I'm gonna be in one those weddings in September.

My cousin Kristen called me last Friday around 11 p.m. to tell me she got engaged! Finally! Yay, Paul! And Thanksgiving night, she asked me if I'd be in her wedding. Heck. Yes.

She's got what I understand to be 286 days to throw together the wedding she's always wanted. Less than a year. Actually, to tell you the truth, I'm glad it's less than a year, because I'm so excited for it, and for her. But I'm not exactly jealous to have to do all that planning in nine months. But I guess she won't feel those five-months-out, I-swear-to-all-that-is-holy-I'll-never-make-it-to-my-wedding-day, this-is-taking-forever moments.

Siiiiiigh, fun.

Thank you, thank you, tip your waitresses

"There wasn't a lot of dark meat on this turkey."

"No, there wasn't," I say.

"But I guess that's more on the drumsticks. This turkey didn't come with drumsticks; it's more of a guitar player."

I laugh.

"Whoa, I thought you'd think that was stupid."

"It was. That was awesome."

They're crooks, the whole lot of them

If ever there was anything someone could have mentioned to me somewhere along the line about being an adult that would've made me stop and re-evaluate this whole living thing, it'd be insurance.

I'm not going to sit in my recliner with the doilies on the arm rests while I spew hatred on the entire health care system, saying it's full of people with scabies for brains. Nah. I'm much too bored for all of that. Sure, it's a scam. Yeah, someone's getting rich off my measly $1,200 a year. But, well, what can I do. Write my congressman?

Anyhow.

I spent about an hour last night comparing options, checking doctors and facilities between here and my mom's house (just in case!), choosing out-of-pocket expenses vs. out-of-paycheck stabs in the heart.

I hated every minute of it. I ended up doing a cost analysis, something I thought I'd never do after I passed (the second time around!) math for liberal arts majors in college. I was wrong. Kind of. I mean, I didn't have to do it long hand. There was pretty much a calculator right there, waiting for me. And I really just had to look at some factors, then pick the one with the lowest number. But it's numbers. It's luck. It's logic.

It's Dave on the couch going "You did what?" when I tell him which I chose, and then me sitting on the recliner going "But I can't go in and change it! What did I doooo? It was a mistake! Oh nooooooo!"

I'll live. Just, you know, with less control over where I go should I get the shakes and chills and feel impending death coming on. Until next fall, I'll convince myself I made the wrong choice, and should I get in an accident, I'm going to need someone to tell the kind man giving me CPR that if he could kindly drive me to Aurora Medical Center, that I'd be most grateful. No, I do not care that I was hit by a bus in Mercy Medical Center's parking lot. They're blacked out. Sorry.

I'm going to go straighten up my doilies on my TV stand now. Maybe dust off the plastic on the davenport. Watch some "Price is Right."

You can't help yourself at all

"What should I write about this week in my column?"

"My backache."

"No."

"The broken water heater?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"It's boring."

"The possibility of 40 gallons of water gushing into your basement isn't boring. We're LIVIN' ON THE EDGE, BABY!"

"Oh my God."

Holiday mish-mash

We dropped in Limelite Studios before the big tree-lighting ceremony Friday in the triangle that is Opera House Square. The studio had the white tree up, snowflakes were being cut out of white paper by a normal, adult male. A couple others hung sparkly flakes in the storefront windows, and it was at least 80 degrees inside there. I sweat in my winter coat, hat and gloves, and a few seconds later I was shivering outside by the tree.

Those gathered around the tree before it was lit were singing "O Christmas Tree," and when the anticlimactic lighting of the dull white lights on the tree glowed, they pretty much stopped and faded away as the crowd dispersed.

We dined, we had some friends over, we listened to Christmas music on our iTunes, bragging about the 9.2 hours of Christmas music (not all good, admittedly) we have. The trees were all lit in my house.

It's pretty much Christmas, all over.

And yet Dave and I don't know what we're doing for Thanksgiving. I keep forgetting that stupidly placed holiday is still about a week away (who plans a holiday on a THURSDAY? Seriously). I forget that before we get too enthralled with the Peanuts Christmas soundtrack I got, we should probably talk about that whole turkey thing.

Ah, but that doesn't happen. As I checked out Christmas CDs from the library today, the librarian told me she's trying to live in the moment and enjoy the seasons and holidays in their correct order; she's right, ya know. I'm the reason people cringe the day after Halloween. I'm the reason early shopping days were invented. And maybe that's a bad thing. Probably.

But I don't want to live in this moment. I'm not so thankful for this exact moment. Christmas? I can pretend it's Christmas. I can see family. I can leave this city, for which the honeymoon's over and now we're just ... comfortable. So maybe if I have Harry Connick Jr. singing about Rudolph, it'll make Christmas come faster and we can be done with this whole boring waiting game.

Or maybe it just drags out. I dunno.

I also hated how "Who Let the Dogs Out" was played at every pep rally. We get it. We're the Bulldogs. ENOUGH ALREADY.

I was that annoying girl in your senior class who thought everything was stupid.

I hated having three study halls and not being able to leave the building. How stupid. I hated having classes with freshmen. I hated being forced to go to pep rallies. Stupid. I couldn't wait til I was 18! I was so out of this stupid town! I was going places! I hated everything and everyone! Insert slamming the locker door shut and stomping to government.

But now I'm missing a few things. Just a few, though. Let's not get too excited.

Like the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, when the cafeteria would serve two globs of boxed mashed potatoes with shredded turkey on top, and Nickel's Bakery rolls with butter, and a little heap of peach crisp? Sigh. We stood in line for 20 minutes for that stuff. I've never spent a better $1.50.

Then there were the movie days; I guess it was pointless to try to teach us stuff right before the holiday, so here! Let's watch a movie. Yer teacher needs a smoke, so sit down and shut up and watch the movie.

And the days off ... Not that there was much to do in a town of 2,000-some people, but still. It FELT like freedom. No school, man! No one's here to hold me down! Except my mom, she's making me sweep and dust. GOSH, no one UNDERSTANDS me.

Still don't miss the other things. But I'd sell my dog for a tray of that turkey-mashed potato stuff and a few freebie days off. OK, maybe not my dog.

I think she can thank my brother

"So I clicked on your Facebook page tonight," I said.

"What's a Facebook page?" Mom asked.

Guess that answers that question.

I know I'm lucky he cooks. That's not the issue here.

Our marriage is a good one; we laugh, we share secrets, we stay up late painting each others' nails. Dave promised me I wouldn't tell you that (oops!) -- I'm always doing that, ha, putting my perfectly manicured foot into my mouth.

But I've mentioned before that if he asks me what I want to eat for dinner one more time, I'll chop up his body and put it in the wall, and then calmly call to order pizza. (That's a lie for three reasons -- one, I only commit murder never, so that's out; two, I only order pizza online because I hate talking to them on the phone; and three, we have plaster walls. Messy to work with.)

The other night, we came to a point in the conversation where our fighting over what we were going to eat for dinner escalated to almost-death. I don't KNOW what I want, DEAR, and you standing there with the freezer door open doesn't HELP. And the fact that he gets an hour to eat leaves us with quick! Hurry! Make up your mind! options. This is why we eat macaroni so often.

"I'll just make something myself," I said after 10 minutes of "No ... No ... What do YOU feel like eating?"

"No, come on. What do you want?"

"I DON'T KNOW."

"Chicken?"

"No time."

"Tuna pasta?"

"I don't LIKE tuna pasta."

"Well I don't know ..."

"I SAID I'd feed myself!"

Growl, divorce lawyers on the phone, cereal bowls hitting the countertop with see-I-mean-it force ... Oh, yes. Even I felt uncomfortable with all the loud noises.

Luckily, Dave has the good foresight to see we can't live like that. So sometimes, like tonight, he grabs something he knows I hate (pork in this case), and says "I think I might just eat this ... is that OK?" Asking nicely so as not to tick off the crazy lady! She's batty! Crazy lady!

And the suddenly, without fighting, I get choices. So many. I get waffles. For dinner. And no one had to die.

I'm serious. A Monday can be made or broken on our 10-minute supper conversations. This is why God invented second shift for Dave, Crock Pots and toaster waffles. Because I love Dave ... Just not while I'm in the kitchen, too much.

But see, then we eat and the fight's gone and my belly's full of waffles and life's good again. Funny that.

(Your Mom) has added you as a friend! Would you like to confirm?

Facebook is the last bastion of my college years. No, there's nothing scandalous on there; just some old fashioned photos, a list of books I like, that sort of mundane thing that all my exes probably are dying to know. I mean, that's why people have those pages, right? Just kidding.

So, as I said, no scantily clad Erin, beer cup in hand standing over a keg, has made it to my Facebook; I don't put anything on there that I wouldn't want my mom to see.

Which is good, now that my mom joined Facebook.

I'm not really sure where the idea came from or why she thought she wanted a page, but I'm guessing my college-aged brother talked her into it. Or, went behind her back and did it himself. Either way.

My mom's cooler than your mom. She's on Facebook.

She's so out of my top friends list the second she puts up embarrassing photos of herself, though. I draw the line there.

Seems like less fun, more work this year for some reason

A city that welcomes the man in red down Main Street before we've even carved our Thanksgiving turkey can't judge me for what I'm about to say.

Our Christmas trees are up. Dave's valiantly come through in setting them up, I've been diligent in my lighting and decorating ... And voila, you have Christmas all over the place. We've finally amassed enough ornaments to fill all our trees (and then some ... some didn't make the cut this year) -- a "pre-Dave" tree, a "pre-Erin" tree, a blue-and-silver tree, a Santa/red tree and "our" tree.

Feel free to go get a tissue now.

But see, then you leave the house and no one else knows it's Christmas! fabulous Christmas! in your living room! in your dining room!

Instead, it's just November something and that woman in front of me in the grocery store's countering the cashier's pleasantries with her diatribe about how she hates the holidays, and the cashier nods and smiles and scans her savings card and suddenly, life's just mundane again.

Woman, she just asked how you were ... she didn't mean it! I think to myself. Take your raincloud and be a hater somewhere else. I'm trying to have CHRISTMAS over here.

Not my proudest moment

I was putting up certain festive items that shall remain nameless but may or may not include tiny lights, bulbs and tree skirts. From the living room, I could hear Big get off the couch and start sniffing around one of the less stable festive items; decorative lights tinkled against each other and I saw the lights from the corner of my eye, swaying back and forth.

Big? In the festive artifact?

No.

My dear. My son, my apparent manly, dominant son with four legs but no manly parts of his own, was showing Frosty who was boss under the festive artifact, and looking up at me as if to say, Mom could you KNOCK before you came in, because I wasn't done?

And Frosty, the foot-tall stuffed festive decoration that he was, lay with his plastered-on smile, screaming "help, help" in his jolly, booming voice.

How do you tell a dog that straddling a stuffed object is no way to treat a holiday artifact, no matter how threatening you find his demeanor?

I'm so ashamed. I think I'll start carrying around a water gun so I can just shoot him to get him to stop, and not have to make eye contact with him while he defiles such cheery objects. I can't take it.

It wouldn't be so dismal if we got the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving special on TV

We've not been alone together for Thanksgiving ... ever. Yet.

It's like that one last frontier; that last "first" day we've got to share together. Or maybe it's not that dramatic.

For the sake of blogging, let's say it is that dramatic. Because it's a holiday -- pre-Christmas, if you want to get Erin-Technical -- filled with mashed potatoes, gravy, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, a little turkey, mashed potatoes and cranberries. Oh, and family. It's supposed to have that, too. And we'll be sharing it here, in our quiet house, probably eating take-out or ordering pizza from some lonely pizza place that has a skeleton shift on for all the losers like us who order out instead of waiting four or five hours to cook some bird.

I'd say I was excited about it if it weren't so anticlimactic. Nothing feels like a holiday when you don't get to go anywhere for it. The good news is, I like Dave, so I guess that part won't be so bad. I guess. Gooooosh. Bring on the Trivial Pursuit and KFC mashed potatoes. Yum.

The light at the end of the tunnel just disappeared

I've been calling my mom for stupid, meaningless reasons lately, in increasing amounts.

It used to be our Saturday or Sunday night thing; now it's our Monday afternoon, Wednesday night, Saturday morning, Sunday evening thing ... And I am so homesick it's not even funny.

I realize outside circumstances might have led to this neediness to talk to someone about something like their personal preference for window sill types, their thoughts on my Saturday afternoon plans, what they're having for dinner, what I'm having for dinner, what I'm doing at that exact moment ... But who cares.

I overheard someone at work talk about the time they spent with their mom over the weekend and instead of my calm, so-what attitude I usually have on from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., this was total jealousy. Ugly, smoke-coming-out-of-my-ears jealousy. Kind of makes ya want to quit your job and move back to your parent's basement, doesn't it?

Only then I remember we'd be broke, we're just now getting those new windows, she eats meatloaf for dinner a lot and I have Dave to cook for me; and she has cricket and spider problems in her house ... And I see the wise response is just to hate her boss for making her work the day after Thanksgiving, hate The Man for making me work at all, hate the man (for surely it was a man) who made weekends just two days to a five-day workweek, and to loathe all 500 or so of those miles between us. Especially the Indiana portion of them.

Ugh. Sorry. Back to be reasonable now.

New storm door gets the best of Oshkosh man

He's intelligent, but he was surprised -- as in called me to tell me, was bothered by it all night -- when he put a new door in the frame while he backed away ... and it fell.

Who is surprised by this? Who? Let's see ... it's not secured. It's not being held up by magical fairies.

It fell. It wasn't fastened ... Just putting that out there.

I should find more instructional books

While antique shopping, we found this great book for $1; "Better Homes & Gardens Baby Book," from 1951. Of course we got it. It was $1, and much like "Teen Guide to Married Life," these books can't be passed up, child in the house now or no.

I've heard your unasked concerns, and I've found answers you didn't know you needed. Yes, I'm here to share with you the realities of child-rearing and pregnancy, circa 1950. You can thank me later.

Concern No. 1: How will I know I'm pregnant?
Answer: Well, funny you should ask, because "it's not at all uncommon for a bride, thought she isn't pregnant, to skip a period ... because the possibility of pregnancy is in her thoughts." If you're pretty sure -- like, three months into missed period-land -- there's the rabbit test which is about 95 percent accurate. (But only if she's a bride. If she's single, Jesus in 1951 wouldn't let that happen. It's probably just gas.)


Concern No. 2: I'll never be skinny again.
Answer: "You'll be sylphlike again." It says that -- "sylphlike." I don't know what it means, but it sounds refreshing. "Many of the lovely figures you see going up and down the street belong to women who have had one or more babies. Follow instructions about not getting heavier than necessary and don't worry!" Easy enough. Put down the cupcakes, fatty.

Concern No. 3: You won't be able to do anything when you're pregnant.
Answer: "If you're a working woman: If your appearance is important in your work, you'll want to quit." This is especially important if you're, say, a Victoria's Secret model or a waitress at a restaurant that gets its name from jokes you heard over a beer pong table.

Also, note you shouldn't climb stairs "more than is absolutely necessary" and you shouldn't become chilled. Because, you know, it's uncomfortable and goosebumps on pregnant ladies accentuates those extra pounds, right? You also shouldn't swim, but if you are accustomed to driving, you can probably do so in moderation. To like, the store to make your husband a meatloaf -- but that's it.

Don't you feel better already? I'd share more but I don't want to give away the ending.

Made my heart skip a beat for a minute

It's November now.

You know what that means ... Because I'm a sick, twisted person, I will have a Christmas tree up in 14 days.

Fourteen. I just gotta get Dave to check all the boxes for mice and rats and bats and other creatures that ruin my yuletide glee. Because that's what this all is. Yuletide glee. Has nothing to do with being ca-razy.

I'd go back. I just don't want to be the one driving

I made it!

OK, I got lost, I may have shed a tear as I turned onto yet another one-way street away from my destination, away from the haven of a parking garage and the sterile serenity of a hotel room, onto another street where people walked in the middle of the street and looked at me like, what woman? What? You expect me to walk on the sidewalk? You must not be from here.

But then Dave answered his phone and he saved me from eternal circle-making, and I actually saw Milwaukee, the part you're supposed to see and not the part that's so out-of-the-way that you think the only way out will be to stop, hold a tree and whistle for help like they taught you in elementary school.

Milwaukee's cool. You win. Actually, it made Toledo look quite junky. (And you know what else is junky?)

And of course the best part was the hotel room, the king-sized bed, the cable, the throwing-wet-towels-on-the-floor-because-I-can't-do-it-at-home. Yessss.