Cold Spaghetti

I have a long standing “thing” for geeks. I’ve generally felt that I was a least a little on the geeky side, my dating history is (almost?) exclusively with geeks, and I definitely married one.

Last night, the subject of “geeks” came up during our weekly post-unicycle/juggling club potluck. So we took the Geek Test.

Let’s just say Paul scored really, really, high. I came out at just under 29% geek (“Total Geek”). Anyone else up for a score?

One wonderful thing about my marriage is that we have been through some incredible stresses and strains. Lay-offs, serious and chronic illness, cross-country moves, ownership of 3 homes, renovations, family dramas, a child, 5 international jobs, a bunch of degrees, and the nation’s most major natural disaster. All in under 6 years. We figure that with our history of working through these things, the current questions we face are no match for our ability to work together. Still, we are pretty stressed out.

Balls we have in the air:
– We have a very long and detailed punch-list of things to do to fix up the house for market.
– We have no current daycare for Will.
– I need to be in NOLA to work on my prospectus (the writing and research of which cannot happen without the daycare situation worked out).
– As of the first week of April, I have weekly appointments with our midwife in Pensacola (3-4 hours drive from New Orleans).
– We are putting our house on the market sometime between April 1st and May 1st.
– We have a friend living with us until classes end in late April.
– Paul needs to continue to work 40 hours a week, each week, while juggling appointments, the no daycare situation, and home repairs.
– Valerie, my committee member based on Lima, will be in-country in mid-May, so this is the perfect time to present the prospectus… which means I have a ticking timeline that I cannot even start to address until we figure out a daycare arrangement.
– The baby is due May 5th.
– We have no firm plans on where we are going after selling the house, what we are doing with our stuff, or generally what we are going to do. (We are leaning towards a maintainence-free condo in a planned community somewhere, but would need to find somewhere very, very affordable since we need to save our pennies for rent in Lima.)

Just writing all of these things down is giving me indigestion. We know we will be okay and start to figure things out and certainly we’re working on it (I’ve got some daycare leads and have been working on house stuff each day) but there are still so many unanswered questions!

Anyone have a really good magic 8 ball???

We’ve arrived in Mobile for a short trip. Tomorrow we have a full day of prenatal visits: a morning appointment with our midwife and an afternoon consultation with the doctor who has to sign off on my medical chart for me to deliver at the Birth Center. Part of the consultation is the “scare session” where he’ll go through all of the terrible things that can happen in a VBAC and in birth in general. We’ve heard he’s a pretty nice guy and totally into midwifery care, so I’m kind of interested in hearing the schpeal. I’m also glad I know the science and the studies and have the knowledge to stift through it in a responsible fashion.

The big part of the day is the second ultrasound. Turns out my placenta is on the front and low — possibly on my scar. This is a Big Deal and needs to be investigated for the birth plan to proceed. We feel pretty good about it not being a problem, but it will be nice once we get the go-ahead.