the waiting game

Still pregnant. The new end date is Thursday, meaning I'll be heading to the hospital for an induction if Oprah doesn't make her apparence before then. Maybe she's waiting for someone to announce her the way her namesake was announced at the beginning of each show? I never watched Oprah so can anyone fill me in on how that part of the show went so I can properly set it up? Was it something fun like Ellen's dancing? Does she need the promise of a few of her favorite things in the delivery room? Where is Gayle, is she busy, can she come cut the cord?

Unrelated to my being pregnant, doesn't this toy pig have some massive balls?

I mean, it's obscene! And of course this is one of Truman's favorite toys.

I carried a watermelon

I'm 38 weeks now and according to one website Little Oprah is the size of a watermelon and according to another she is the size of a leek. To me those are vastly different and I can tell you which one I would rather have ripping its way out of me. (hint: it's not the watermelon)




Go ahead and judge me for those shorts if you want. We've had 29 days of 100+ degree weather here in Austin so you're all lucky I'm wearing anything at this point. Speaking of those shorts, I just went to the bathroom and noticed they are splitting at the seam that runs right down the middle of my ass. Thank god I've been wearing them out and about all damn day. Also, my ass needs to stop growing.

Stupidly I was awake for most of last night (no really, I only slept for two hours) because I thought I was in labor. Trust me, I wasn't but thanks to some late night Google searching I was certain my water was going to break at any moment. So I laid, uncomfortably, in bed just waiting for the downpour that never came. You would think based on this behavior I've never birthed a baby before.

Little Oprah Parks

So, about the name. (again. Yes, I know I need to find a new topic.) I really appreciate all your comments and emails about the name that is not Oprah but is kind of like that. What I wasn't expecting was that so many people would say they need to know the name before they could give an honest opinion. I should have seen that coming because it totally makes sense that you would need to know the name/celebrity before you could decide if I'm crazy or not, but still color me surprised.

I've taken a week to think about it and I was certain we weren't going to use the name. I could spill the name beans and we could all openly laugh at me but then jparks announced that he's not ready to let go of Oprah. He has quickly changed from Team "You're Kidding About That Name, Right?" to Team "That's The Only Name In The History Of Names That I Like." I'm still on the fence, leaning more towards the no camp, but the thing is if I tell y'all and you say I'm crazy, Little Oprah is fucked for life, and then we use the name anyway, well, I'll have to leave the internet forever.

I'm not trying to be overly dramatic (it just comes naturally when you're this pregnant) but I just know that I wouldn't be able to look anyone in the eye if you say how awful the name is and then we can't find a suitable replacement. So for now I'm keeping the name under wraps. After the baby is here either we'll use that name or I'll finally tell y'all. Either way, after all this navel gazing I'm sure you won't care anymore.

the trouble with names

We're now a month out from my due date and it seems jparks and I are no closer to picking a name for this kid than we were nine months ago. Technically we are right on track with our naming history as Truman was two days old before he had a name but this time we really wanted to do better. Sadly, we are failing at this endeavor.

Here's the thing: there's a name I really love but I'm torn about using it because it has become very visible and is now associated with a celebrity. And so I'm asking y'all for advice.

Let's pretend the name I love is Bella. (It's not) Would y'all think I'm some nutty Twilight fan (which I suppose I am as I've read all the books and went to a screening of all the movies back to back but that's beside the point) or would you think that I just really like the name Bella? I mean Bella was a legitimate name option for parents before Twilight ever came into existence. It wasn't just an emotionless Kristen Steward fawning over an inappropriately old sparkly vampire; it was a cute name for little girls.

What if we took it a step farther and I said the name I love is Oprah (again, I swear it is not). There is definitely an attachment of the name Oprah to the media proprietor Oprah Winfrey. Like I even needed to say that. Hell, her name didn't exist until she came around because her parents created it by reversing Harpo. But what if I really loved it? What if I could remove the tv personality from the name and see Oprah as the perfect name for my kid? Again, would you think I'm some nutjob that secretly has Oprah's face tattooed on her back?

So what say you dear internet friends? Am I dooming a kid if I use a name that is currently associated with a celebrity? Will everyone think jparks and I spend our spare time stalking said celebrity? Or can people remove the celebrity from the name and accept that we're not crazy? Is it really back to the drawing board for us? Not that we really ever left the drawing board in the first place.

(For the record, even if you say you can all remove the celebrity from the name, it's not certain we'll go with that name. Jparks doesn't love it yet which is how he feels about almost all the names I like.)

but I won't do that

I sort of hate all of y'all for not shaking me really hard when I mentioned I was going to have renovations done on the house while continuing to try to live in it. And while parenting a toddler. And creating another child with my own body. Friends, it is your job to talk me out of stupid decisions. Like if I announced I was going to name New Baby "Strawberry Pie Parks" because that's been what I most want to eat, I fully expect you to say "What the hell lady? Try again!" (Please note, this is not what I expect if I say we've already filled out her birth certificate using the name Strawberry Pie Parks. In that case make fun of me all you want but only silently or behind my back.)

Anyway, here we are 5 days into the estimated 5 week remodel and I'm about to lose my damn mind. Let me take you on a tour so you can also feel my pain.

Here's the master bathroom:

I like to think of the walls as a giant game of Tetris now. Also, you know what's fun? Playing "Shit, I forgot to move my toothbrush off the counter this morning, where did the painters hide it?"


Who doesn't love having a shop vac covered in drywall dust just hanging out in their living room all the time?


or random disassembled ceiling fans hanging out in a corner


Truman views the paper on the floor not as something we need to keep down for protection, but as something to shred and rip apart and sometimes draw on. The dog views it as a convenient place to pee.


While all of this work is enough to send me directly into a mental ward, there have been some nice moments about it. Like the other day when I needed a jar opened and couldn't get it on my own; I had a house full of men to assist me. I did not have to do without my jelly sandwich.

Or today when the whole painting crew broke out into song. What song? My Heart Will Go On by Celine Dion. It was truly an awesome moment. They've been really great about asking before they turn on music and I always tell them to go ahead. They spend their day painting to the Spanish radio station and today was no different. I usually zone the music out so I thought for sure I was wrong with I heard that opening flute part, but after a few seconds I knew not only was the station playing Celine but the whole crew was singing along with her. I was in my room really trying hard not to laugh at them. Some of the guys on the crew barely speak English but they knew all the words to the Titanic theme. How is that even possible? Why would the Spanish station play her? Why were the guys so proudly singing along with it? Next week can I expect a rendition of Meat Loaf's "I Would Do Anything For Love" because that might just make all the dust worth it.