One Year Ago Today

One year ago today, I was heavily pregnant, and very whiny. (And puking, but that was pretty much the default setting during the whole pregnancy.)
And I was knitting this for Jen:

(Yes, it is what you think it is.)
But now we can all celebrate Kendyl's safe arrival with Jen and Troy!

My stethoscope's so pretty!

I lost my stethoscope at work the other night. When I told my co-workers this, they all wanted to know what it looked like.
"Uh, it's a black Littmann stethoscope with a green light attached to the bell."
"Does it have your name on it anywhere?"
"No..."
"Do you know how many people have black stethoscopes?"
Thankfully, Laura from housekeeping (who has far surpassed "Custodian" and is quite possibly a "Cleaning Goddess") found it and returned it to me. But the whole experience caused me to realize that my stethoscope looks just like everyone else's, and I need to do something to make it distinctively mine.
The next night, I had a dream. The dream told me (apparently the Yarn Pixies are branching out) to take the beads I had left over from trying to spin beaded yarn (a complete and utter cluster^%&$ that made me repent of ever wanting to use, let alone make, beaded yarn) and make myself something beaded for the stethoscope.
So I took beads and needle in hand, with no plan of what to do next beyond making a beaded gewgaw to identify my stethoscope. This is what it evolved into:


Lots of people have black stethoscopes. But how many people have a black stethoscope with a pink beaded three-dimensional Cinderella dress on the tubing?

Overheard at work

As I've said before, there's far fewer male nurses than female nurses employed by my hospital. Occasionally, this leads to some unintentional conflict in the break room. During lunch on my most recent shift, I overheard this conversation:
Female nurse #1: "I loved breastfeeding! Especially all the skin-to-skin bonding with the baby..." (sighs dreamily.)
Female nurse #2: "I know! But after my youngest got teeth at five months and nearly bit through my nipple, I had to wean her sooner than I wanted to."
Male nurse #1 to male nurse #2, very loudly: "SO I'VE GOT THIS PATIENT ON AN INSULIN DRIP..."

We love socks!

I did a very special dye-job for the roving for these socks. Then, I split the roving in half and spun two (hopefully) identical skeins of yarn. Starting from the toe, I knit until I ran out of yarn on one sock, completed the other sock to the same level, and then knit alternating rounds on each sock until I ran out of yarn.

Specifically, until I discovered that I was five feet short during the bind off. @$&!!!! So now I have to rootle through my stash and find a bit of red/purple/blue that's similar and spin five or ten feet and re-do the bind off.

Still, I think they're stunning.

Shirley has expanded her sock obsession from the security sock to all socks. Mine, Brian's, and hers. As long as it's a sock, she's not picky.

Who wants to fight about politics?

My brother and I are different people. I know this point seems very obvious to many people, especially as he needs to shave far more regularly than I do.
But this is most obvious when we start talking about politics. Specifically, what should be done to fix the seething cauldron of issues, insecurities, and occasional bursts of outright paranoia that is the United States' relationship with most middle eastern countries. (From their end of things, I imagine that it's a bit like asking a woman's (Let's call her "Iraq.") entourage of female friends what they think of her on-again, off-again obnoxious boyfriend. Some of them think he'd be fine if he'd just stop drinking (or invading other countries) and some of them would love to see him dead. It all depends on which gal (country) you talk to.)
And after a recent discussion on Israel, Gaza, Hamas, and ways in which Israel's situation as a Jewish state in an Islamic region compares to "being the little guy in a prison cell," I had a sudden flash of insight as to the core difference in our world views:
We both believe that diplomacy requires both a carrot and a stick. The main point of disagreement between us is what exactly those should be. Objectively, I know that only time and history will tell whether military might or economic incentives are the better strategy. But in defense of my own position, I must point out that while you can only blow something up once, you can wreak havoc on a country's economy forever.

Waste not, want not?

There's quite a few random allergies in our family. My body "doesn't do dairy." It's probably technically a form of lactose intolerance, but as Lactaid tablets don't help my problems (nausea, bloating, migraines, and the occasional episode of spectacular vomiting and diarrhea) when I overindulge in dairy products (By "overinduldge" I mean "eat more than one half serving of cheese daily".) that seems to be the best description. One of the nicest things about being pregnant was that God, in God's infinite wisdom and kindness (as well as possibly recognition of the fact that I wasn't keeping down many other foods, so ice cream might be the only shot at getting enough calories in me to support new life) chose to repeal the "dairy issues" for nine months. But I digress.

My mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and husband are all allergic to onions. It's not as dramatic as a peanut allergy, but does complicate cooking. There is a very short list of nice restaurants (by "nice" I mean "has wait-staff and cloth napkins" at which Brian and I can both eat food off of the menu.

When we were in college, we were singularly blessed when a local restaurant, the Dutch Inn, was taken over by a Chinese restaurant chain. The resulting hybrid, the Dutch Inn-Quick Wok served both food off their American menu, as well as classic Chinese American food. Brian would order off the American menu (where onions do occur in cooking, but in predictable dishes) and I would order from the Chinese one (wherein dairy products do not typically occur.)

We weren't sure if Shirley would develop this trait. You can imagine my panic when I realized one day that I'd just fed her a jar of something that listed onion powder fourth on the list. (To be fair, the first three ingredients were "chicken, rice, tomato paste." Gerber makes very simple baby food.) I drove to the grocery store and bought a bottle of Children's Benadryl.

She had absolutely no problems with the food. Just as well, as you're not supposed to use Benadryl on children under two without a doctor's supervision.

Which leaves me with a bottle of Children's Benadryl that I can't return and will expire long before Shirley is old enough to use it. Fortunately, one teaspoon of the nauseatingly sweet syrup is enough to make me sleepy, and two will cause me to sleep for at least six hours. (For those of you who are curious, Benadryl is the "PM" in "Tylenol PM.") It's not a complete solution to my insomnia, but it definitely helps!