Saturday, June 28, 2014

A Random Assortment

~ "When Suits Become a Stumbling Block."

~ Oh my goodness: this can't be real (also--an unfortunate title): "School drops Cougars as team name because it might offend women."

~ "Email me offline" (from a listserve email): stupidest phrase ever. How does that even work?

~ Charming tidbits from PAL on Carey McWilliams:
Carey was not your usual Jersey Boy.  He was, in fact, an Orangeman and so somewhat anti-Catholic.  He once told me that if we were in Ireland, he’d have to kill me (probably joking).  He was once the discussant on a panel at which I gave a paper on Flannery O’Connor. His comment was he was sure it was good, but he wasn’t about to read O’Connor and find out for sure. ...
After the talk, we had a party in an upstairs bar in downtown Rome, GA.  I think the statute of limitations is up, and so I can admit it got out of control and many people–including Berry students–came who were not invited.  I’m not saying any Berry students actually drank alcoholic beverages.  In fact, I don’t think they did.  But they did line up with the gift of whiskey to get to talk to Carey.  He told them all kinds of wonderful stories and flattered them shamelessly and made them promises (all of which he would have kept had they insisted) for hours.  The liquor bill was astonishing, and I had no fund to pay for it.  Fortunately, the bar was about to go out of business, and the bar tender told me not to worry about it.
~ "The Brave New World of Three-Parent I.V.F."
In Britain, national law prohibits altering the germ line, but Parliament is very likely to vote later this year on whether to allow mitochondrial replacement to move forward. Likewise, this February, the F.D.A. held a meeting to examine the possibility of allowing clinical trials. If either gives the go-ahead, it will be the first time a government body expressly approves a medical procedure that combines genetic material of three people in a heritable way. 

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Twitter

I guess I never noticed it until Francisco expressed surprise, but my editing process is very physical, by "cut and paste" I mean with scissors and tape. And I take frequent trips to the actual garbage can to throw away pieces that I don't need.

Monday, June 23, 2014

The View from My Balcony


This is the view from one of our balconies (the other isn't nearly as nice).

Diana: turns out you can catch a little bit of the sunset from the balcony (although it isn't nearly as nice as Cayman sunsets).


Our poor planter: on the upside, it was super cheap from our favorite cheap produce market; on the downside, the end of June doesn't seem to be prime time for planter purchasing. 

Sunday, June 22, 2014

A Random Assortment

~ I enjoyed Season 1 of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, although Francisco made so much fun of me for watching them, that it became my secret guilty pleasure. Well, the Fug Girls liked it, too:


It is very refreshing to watch a show where the glamorous, feisty heroine basically does whatever she wants, and what she wants is to solve mysteries and wear amazing hats and make out with hot dudes and generally be awesome. ... I believe the appropriate word for the entire endeavor is “fizzy.” Like champagne.

I feel totally legitimized in my television watching choices.

~ Images of Mary nursing (via Miriel on twitter). Hilarious that everyone is worried about covering up Mary's hair in images. I'm intrigued that some of these even capture the hand position while getting ready for Jesus to latch on (which I'm just reading about now in The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding). But I must admit, the last picture is a bit much for modern sensibilities.

~ One person's experience with Obamacare.

~ Architecture designed to push homeless people away. (I really don't care about the part about architecture designed to discourage skateboarding...)

Saturday, June 21, 2014

A Diary of Pregnancy.12

~ Pregnancy reading: The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding: My grandmother was a devoted La Leche League group founder and leader for decades. I assumed that that meant that she breast-fed her children, but it turns out, she was so devoted to the movement precisely because she received almost no support or instruction in breastfeeding and breast-fed only half of her children, and then only for a couple of weeks or a month. She lent me the book that the La Leche League women gave her and signed for her upon her "retirement."

Which is to say, it's very dated, but also delightful--the 70s really permeate the book, from the photography, to the hippy dippy writing (things like, "if you normally don't wear a bra, you probably won't need to wear one while you're breastfeeding" and "exposing them to the sun can help prepare your nipples for breastfeeding").

Also, you can't get more anti-scheduling the baby than this book: it claims that you should feed the baby, especially at the beginning, anytime he wants to be fed. (The ideological nature of all of these systems for bearing and raising children is continually amazing to me. I mean, even this seemingly anti-ideological, do-what-seems-right-to-you approach really preaches feeding the baby at every moment and holding him whenever he fusses.)

28 weeks:

~ The baby flipped and went head down. And then started kicking my ribs. I guess, at this point, he still may flip some more, but it's reassuring to know that he can flip, for when it's time. I think I'm noticing some hiccups, too.

~ Francisco texted me, after I told him that I was on a ferry: "So the boy went on his first boat ride!" He also told me that one of the things he misses most since we're apart this week is feeling the baby kick.

29 weeks:

~ Becoming parents together is incredible. I swear Francisco likes me better than ever now that I'm having his baby (he claims that it's me who has changed--that I let him treat me better than I used to). There's loads of anxiety, but there's also a gradual coming to love someone we haven't even really met. I feel sort of bad that, when Francisco and I are apart, I still get to have the baby with me. Tonight Francisco told me to "tell Baby Leopard that his dad loves him too."

~ I think I've said it before, and I'll probably say it again: the birth center where I go for prenatal care and where I hope to give birth is very affirming. They make you feel like the healthiest, most on-track pregnant person ever.

~ Just realized that I'd been absent-mindedly taking a men's multivitamin with my fish oil instead of a prenatal vitamin for the last week or so. Oops. Francisco: "Good thing we're having a boy."

~ I've never panicked from the electricity going out before last night: it was very hot and humid and I was wondering how I was going to make it without our air conditioner. Thankfully, our electricity came back on after about twenty minutes. The bad news: This is the second outage since we moved in just over two weeks ago. It seems like it might be a recurring problem in this area.

~ My favorite part of pregnancy is all the ice cream.

~ Earlier in the pregnancy, I thought about it as "we're expecting," which described what I was feeling pretty well. Now it seems inadequate. We're not expecting some vague, unknown entity. We're preparing to welcome Baby Leopard--we know his sex, his name (more or less), and we even have a picture of his profile on our fridge (I say hello to it every time I walk by). It makes it easier, too, to think about going through the pain of labor--the fact that you're doing this for someone you're already getting to know and love, not for a perfect stranger.

Friday, June 20, 2014

Simone Weil on the Iliad


Weil reads the Iliad as being all about force and suffering. Force turns people into things; when force is held back, there is the possibility that human traits like justice, reasoning, and prudence may intervene in the gap. She connects the Iliad to the suffering of the Gospels, maintaining that both texts understand the way in which suffering changes and marks the one who suffers.


I think her analysis is insightful in the sense that it captures the way in which war affects everyone negatively: violence, when engaged in, is ubiquitous; no one is saved from it. And honor seems to be empty at the end of the day. War is the great equalizer--at the best, someone is temporarily the conqueror; he, too, eventually falls. (And women and slaves, too, are at the mercy of force.)


On the other hand, she doesn't really analyze honor, and it’s striking to read an interpretation of the Iliad that neglects this central element. She gives us no basis, for instance, on which to evaluate as better or worse different uses of force. All are equally problematic. Perhaps she’s right. 

While emphasizing the continuities between the Iliad and the Bible, she doesn’t attend to the disjunction: what has changed in the eras between the two (and then from the time of Christ until now)? We certainly don’t value honor in the same way that Achilles did. Are our uses of force just as problematic as those in the Iliad? In fact, is all politics a use of force, as Weil sometimes seems to imply? Or can we have a politics that involve and yet transcend force? Perhaps politics is inextricably connected to violence, at least for those who violate the law.

Perhaps what she’s implying is that the foundation of such a politics must be a recognition of the common humanity of the ruler and the ruled.

Thursday, June 19, 2014

Seattle--Pike Place


I love markets and Pike Place is a very nice one.


My favorite part is the flowers--often different from what you'd find in an East Coast market.


For instance, there were lots of sweet pea blossoms for sale, which I've never seen before as flowers. And some flower stands sold the sweet peas, too.




And there are tons of flower arrangements for sale, often with a cool mix of formal and wild flowers.


And there's this great sitting area with a view.

Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Seattle--Ferry



We took a ferry to Seattle for a day.


You can just see Mount Rainier ever so faintly in the left side of the picture above. (Why is it so hard to photograph mountains?) We could see it clearly and it looked surreal--so beautiful and heavenly, floating on the clouds. (I think we saw it, too, as we were flying into Seattle: it was unbelievable--a mountain that felt like it was at the height of the airplane.)


My favorite part of ferries is the commuters in the women's bathroom: it's the seriously most social part of any public transportation I've ever seen--women curling their hair, putting on their make-up, and chatting as they get ready for the day.

Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Washington, The Flowers


The flowers are almost all different from East-Coast flowers.






I love the tiny, delicate alpine flowers.




Monday, June 16, 2014

Twitter

Oh my goodness: dreamed about political theory and Hannah Arendt last night. Also there was an action movie component to the dream that I can't quite remember.

Washington, The Woods


The woods are lovely to walk around in.


The trees are tall and there is lots of hanging moss.







Sunday, June 15, 2014

Washington State


I had a little working trip to Washington State. We stayed in a pretty and remote area along the water. It was cool (weather-wise), which was delightful (I think it's the first time in my life I've said that). Although it was also cloudy on many of the days--and when there are clouds, you don't have a good view of the mountains.


I can never get distant mountains to show up in photographs anyways.


Where we stayed was very remote, which is to say, was across from three or four stores perched between the highway and the water: a general store and restaurant, a pizza place, a massage parlor/gift shop and this itsy bisty espresso shack.


Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Quote

"I understand the physiology of it, but it's still remarkable."

--someone at my table at lunch, about how much I ate

Sunday, June 8, 2014

Traveling


Thursday, June 5, 2014

Happy

I found a $12 rocking chair in the wood style I prefer at a thrift store in my new neighborhood. (There are three thrift stores within two or three blocks of our apartment.)

Also, I won the auction on a green maternity bathing suit on ebay so Francisco and I can enjoy the shore this summer.

And yesterday we bought a reasonably priced craigslist Ergo baby carrier, the kind I hear you. must. have.

So, besides the yet-unpacked boxes that line our apartment from wall-to-wall (seriously, I'm dying to do some yoga, and I don't think there's enough room anywhere here to do it), I'm feeling very good about the baby preparations.

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

On Parenting and Working Hard Together

This baby has been living and growing in my body for more than 6 months now. He's caused endless fatigue, occasional heartburn and hemorrhoids, decreased mobility, and the threat of many other ailments (not to mention the impending pains of the actual birth). I already feel like this little guy belongs to me and should wait on me hand and foot once he's born; he should never disagree with me, nor disobey me.

.....

My parents came to help us pack and move this weekend. My parents, and especially my mother, are the hardest working people I know, and they work very well together. I still remember the afternoon that they replaced the alternator on my old Chevy Cavalier many years ago. They were both leaning over the car together, patiently adjusting and adjusting, until they got it right. Francisco and I, on the other hand, are, let's just say, not always perfectly in sync when we're working together. (I'm not too worried--we have thirty years of working together to catch up on.)

They work far more unflaggingly than Francisco and I, and their presence spurred us to work harder and longer than they would have otherwise. My mother would clean the house far into the evening, after the rest of us could just manage to put our feet up (and she cleaned more rigorously than our house has ever been cleaned). And in the midst of our work, she would cook us lunch and dinner. And then, after carrying boxes all day, my father would wake up early to go for a run, while Francisco and I could barely get out of bed. Francisco and I have perfected the art of relaxing, not working (or maybe, to put our working habits in the best light, physical work is just really different from the work we do at our laptops).

.....

Since I've been expecting, my mother is always happy to rub my belly; this time she had some quality time with her grandson: she talked baby talk to him, gave him a kiss, and even felt him move a little bit. It's very nice to know that our son already has people who love him this much, even before he's born. (Of course, my mother, and all the women in her family, love all the babies. But I suspect she loves this one better than others.) It makes me confident that if anything ever happened to Francisco and me, Baby Leopard would be well taken care of.

.....

All this to say, I hope that one day I'll grow up and be as good and self-sacrificing a parent as my parents are to me. The scope of their sacrifice is only just now becoming apparent to me as I experience the very beginning of it. I can't imagine giving to your children all their lives, and then continuing to give to them as they grow up and go their own way, never asking for anything in return.

Tuesday, June 3, 2014

A Random Assortment

~ Libertarians want start-up countries.

~ Print huge pictures for relatively cheap.

~ A pretty smart critique of trigger warnings by professors.

~ "Who Gets to Graduate?"--UT's innovative (and sometimes small) reforms that helps at-risk students succeed at college.

~ "No Matter How Much I Prepare, I Am Terrified to Give Birth." This made me laugh so hard I was crying. This could easily be about me: As the baby (and my belly) gets bigger, the reality that I'm going to have to push this thing out gets more pressing. I wish that giving birth were like a test and if you just studied enough, you'd be okay.

~ "Female-named hurricanes kill more than male hurricanes because people don't respect them, study finds." Unbelievable.

Monday, June 2, 2014

Twitter

I never even mind when something goes wrong with my Nordstrom order because their customer service is so freaking nice. And yes, it is probably the reason I come back to that store.

Although, I will say I am super confused about in what sense these are maternity shorts.

Sunday, June 1, 2014

A Diary of Pregnancy.11

25 weeks:

~ The baby's kicking just strong enough for Francisco to feel it regularly now. The other night the baby was in rare form and we spent an hour feeling his kicks together. It's even better than feeling them alone. Then we watched some fun youtube videos of babies and then a National Geographic video about how babies develop. (Babies in the womb can open and close their eyes! And do weird stuff like lick the inside of the uterus. And even, it seems, silently cry when they're unhappy. Can you imagine if you could hear them??) Fascinating--I want to know everything he's doing in there, and this helped a bit. Our favorites:



This one is soooo bad that it's hilarious (I also love the chosen background music--this doctor appears to be quite a character):



I've probably shared this one here before, but it still makes us laugh so hard:



What I really want to know and haven't been able to figure out is how much is he moving in there? Like, is he doing backflips all the time, or does he mostly just stay in one place and kick his feet and wave his arms?

26 weeks:

~ I feel profoundly grateful to anyone who, whether meaning it or not, tells me that I look so good for how far along I am. (Must remember to tell every pregnant woman that I meet that.)

I find the whole aspect of gaining weight while pregnant to be surprisingly tricky. I don't think that I have that many body issues compared to a typical American: I've never been particularly thin; I accept my big-bone-ed-ness, and am proud of my strength. I try to dress in ways that don't accentuate my not-flat stomach.

But pregnancy is complicated: You hear horror stories about how much weight women gain and how hard it is/impossible to get rid of all the weight again after the baby is born. Things that particularly concern me, like varicose veins and many other things that are too delicate to mention here, worsen the more weight you gain. Plus, for me, the very thing I've been working to avoid for years and years--my stomach expanding--is happening to me. And you look different in every outfit--huge in some, barely showing in others. It's a bit of an adjustment and a struggle to be okay with these changes to my body.

And obviously it's really important to gain enough weight during the pregnancy so that the baby is big enough--low birth weight is bad. So I eat basically constantly (I haven't been hungry for a second since I've been pregnant; I eat even when I'm not particularly hungry). I haven't gained as much weight as the internet says I should have, but the midwives haven't fussed at me at all, so I figure it's alright. Plus, I think I had plenty of body fat to start with.

Anyway, worrying about it doesn't help anything at all. And I'm sure the most important point is to eat the right things--like plenty of protein--which I'm striving, and I'm sure failing, to do. This is all an exercise in trying to make good decisions and then trusting my body. Which is hard for a control-freak to do.

~ Mini-rant: When I was fussing about the fact that I wanted a girl and I was having a boy, someone said to me, "I never cared whether it was a boy or a girl, just as long as it was healthy." I know it's just a saying, but it bothers me. Of course I want my son to be healthy; I want him to never have to suffer. But the truth of the world is, in different ways for everyone, we all suffer--this world is a valley of tears, as the prayer goes. When we welcome a baby into the world, we welcome him in full knowledge that he will suffer, but that there is also a meaning to the suffering.

Twitter

We're still mid-move, which is to say exhausted, but on the up-side one of our new neighbors is an avid gardener and a retired anthropology professor.