Elsewhere
On diskant: a lengthy ramble about digital distribution disguised as a record review, and proof that I don't unconditionally love everything that Fat-Cat put out.
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Monday, June 16, 2008
Almost-Father's Day
Neither of us have gotten much sleep this past week. The latter stages of pregnancy are often less than fun for the mother, with the baby pushing on the stomach causing acid reflux. During the day she's mostly been able to keep it under control with heroic doses of Gaviscon, but she was only able to lie down for a couple of hours before it flared up again. One site I discovered suggested raising the top of the bed by about ten centimeters, which is how I found myself measuring out two piles of paperbacks at 3am on Saturday morning.
Thankfully, it seems to have worked, and we now sleep with Lewis Carroll under one leg, and Hunter S. Thompson under the other. The dreams are a bit disturbing, but at least we're sleeping.
Four weeks to go, then, until the estimated due date, and the likelihood of his arrival increases with each passing day. We've been trying to keep the flat relatively clutter-free in case we have viewers, (Though after three weeks on the market we've had a grand total of one viewer. What recession?) so most of the baby's things are in my parent's loft for the time being. Since his birth is drawing near, we're feeling the need to be more prepared than we are, so this afternoon we went over there and picked up the car seat. The cot and things can come home while R is in the hospital, if necessary, but the car seat is something I'll need practice with, and don't want to be dicking around with for two hours in a hospital car park. It can live in the boot of the car until then.
On the way back, and I'm slightly ashamed to admit this, we went to XScape at Braehead. For dinner. And kinda enjoyed it.
Chain restaurants, neon, teenagers, I should have hated it. I'm going to get kicked of the curmudgeon's union for this, but it was actually surprisingly fun. We watched some skiers on the real slope inside, ate some ribs, wandered around the world's most depressingly sane crazy-golf course, and were gratified by the fact that, even though most amusement arcades are populated either by ranks of fruit machines or the same ubiquitous racing/shooting coin-ops, the unique clatter of an air-hockey table is still never far away.
Friday, June 06, 2008
Steamy Knees
Some time ago I wrote about a certain den of vice, iniquity and hand-jobs that stood at the end of the street I used to work on.
Four years on, and the most hits I get on this blog are from searches on the name of that very same establishment.
On an entirely unrelated note, tonight we're going to visit my mum in hospital. She's just had one of her knees replaced with an artificial one. Whether it will enable her to sprint at super-speeds and leap thirty feet into the air remains to be seen.
Labels: blog, diary, glasgow, site
link | 2 comment(s) | links to this postThursday, June 05, 2008
MySpeccy
Apart from vague memories of early coin-ops and a "Pong" clone that we owned in the late 70's, it's the humble ZX Spectrum that first piqued my interest in computers and, for better or worse, made me the geeky programmer and gamer that I am today. I know longer own a Speccy, but thanks to the joys of emulation I still like to indulge in some colour-clash-saturated nostalgia from time to time. Hence, I think that this is, as I believe the young people say nowadays, "the shizzle". It's a Spectrum emulator that you can play in your web browser. Ok, nothing new there, but this one adds high-score saving and online leaderboards a-la XBox Live to your virtual rubber-keyed pal. How awesome is that? 3D Deathchase, anyone?
Labels: games
link | 0 comment(s) | links to this postWednesday, June 04, 2008
Doom
So there's approximately five weeks to go until we have this baby. Here are some of the things that some of our nearest and dearest have said in response to R's ongoing pregnancy ...
- "Look forward to never getting any sleep then."
- "I hope he pisses in your face."
- "So you'll be stuck at home for the rest of your days, a slave to a mewling infant who will howl for attention every minute, penniless, never having a moment to yourself, completely and utterly friendless, OH MY GOD WHAT HAVE YOU DONE YOU HAVE RUINED YOUR LIFE!!
... and these are just from my mother, who has gone on continuously about us having children since the day we got married, but only, apparently, out of revenge for the nightmare that was giving birth to and raising her only son. Every time we go over to visit, she delights in recounting horror stories from 32-and-a-half years ago.
We do have a few friends who have been positive and excited for us, however, and this means a lot. On top of which, we've been going to weekly antenatal classes. Up until tonight, these have been led by a midwife called Susan. Susan is very good at her job. She is approachable, friendly, honest about the child-bearing experience, but positive without sugar-coating anything. She tells it like it is, not sparing gory or unpleasant details, but you still come away feeling like this is something that you can deal with. Something that is worth doing.
Tonight, however, Susan couldn't make it. Susan's replacement had, I suspect, been talking to my mum immediately before the class. She was pregnant herself, with child number three apparently, though hearing her talk about the experience of becoming a new parent one wonders why she would go through that more than once. Like all the doom-mongers of the last eight months rolled into one, she told us about how we'll be tired, about how the baby's nappy will need changing constantly, about how there's a good chance of post-natal depression. On and on with barely a chink of light to be had while the rest of us in the class gave each other worried looks that said "is it too late to back out?"
I know that having a baby isn't easy. I know there will be late night crying, nappies that smell like they came from the arse of satan himself, trying times, sleepless nights and stress. Everyone in that room knew it. None of us in that class is a teenager knocked up by her ned boyfriend. We're all about the same age, we're all grown-ups, and we've all been living with the knowledge that we're going to have a baby for some months now. We don't need told how much it's going to suck because we're all worrying about it already. What we need is a reminder that there will be good things, that we haven't made a huge fucking mistake. I don't care if you believe it or not. Even if you think we're hastening the starvation of the world by selfishly reproducing, it's a bit late for us to change our minds now. If you see us in the next five weeks, do us a favour and don't go on about how shit it is to have kids. R might be getting big, but she can still cause severe testicular injury when provoked. link | 2 comment(s) | links to this post
Sunday, June 01, 2008
Salesman
So our first viewer did turn up today, though he was an hour and a half late. I won't curse him too vehemently, however, since he did seem really keen on the flat. We've always had an image of the sort of person who would be keen to buy our flat: someone fairly young who would be keen on living close to the pubs and restaurants of Shawlands, and who would be looking to rent out one of the rooms to a flatmate. The guy that came round today fitted that template perfectly. The fact that we've got a bathroom and a wee shower room makes it ideal for a pair of flatmates, and it's a great location. I realise the chances of selling to the first person to walk in through the door after only a few fays of it being on the market are pretty slim, especially with the housing market being what it is, but you never know.
R had her baby shower today. She was pretty despondant at the thought of not having one, and we were both so chuffed when Victoria from the choir offered to put it on. She seemed to have a grand time, and we got a good haul of cute baby items. Thanks so much to all involved for pressies, but, most of all, for being there for Becca.
While she was out, and after our visitor was gone, I got to have a rare Sunday afternoon on my own. Got to put my feet up, play some of Mario Galaxy, and do a spot of writing, something I haven't done for far too long.
Labels: diary
link | 1 comment(s) | links to this postScrubber
So other than the usual sleeping, eating and working, and getting Poster 0.2 out of the door, most of my time lately has been spent cleaning, tidying and moving furniture around, in an attempt to get our flat into the sort of condition that might entice someone else to buy it. With expert timing we have, of course, put it on a market that is the slowest it has been in a decade. It is nice to have it tidy and clutter-free at last, so at least we have a nicer place to live even if it takes us a while to sell, and we aren't in too great a hurry.
Today we had our first visitor. Well, we were supposed to. Although it's in a pretty decent state, you can't really keep your grubby fingerprints off of the place you live, and we spent all morning in cleaning mode, only for the guy to fail to turn up. Apparently he forgot and is coming tomorrow. Well, that's today now. These light summer nights make the evenings just disappear, fooling you into thinking that it's earlier than it is. It was a glorious, sunny day, of which we were glad, since I think our flat looks its best with plenty of light coming in, but never mind.
Only six weeks until the baby's due date. R is uncomfortable and wishes it was over with, but other than the inevitable hearburn and back-ache is basically fine. Fortunately the estate agent will let us take the flat off the market for a couple of weeks when the baby arrives if it hasn't sold. I don't think we'll be in any state to clean and show visitors around for a while.
Labels: diary
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