Friday - Spag bog

From Birth

For those of you joining us for the first time, welcome.

Today Barbara cracked open the laptop and began working for the first time in almost a week. Judging by the expression of horror on her face, the inbox was more than a little full. She wanted to make sure everyone got a link to this blog so that you can follow the adventure if you want.

I have written this at breakneck speed so far, with no attention on spelling or grammar. I figured you would rather have something bad now than something perfect two weeks from now.

Many of you have sent flowers. They are all over our house, and everywhere she goes she is reminded that a very special event has ocured... I have to cook and do house work for a while now it seems. Barbara has made a special request that if you have the desire to send any more flowers, they should be timed to arrive on Feb 14, and the card should read "To barbara, Love Mike"

Since we started living together, Barbara has refused to allow me to cook. If start insisting, she gets that Italian "kick your ass" look and tells me to leave the kitchen.

For years now, every time she does this, i threaten to cook my amazing Spag Bog for her one day. This is a dish I learned to cook in college.

When I threaten to serve this at a dinner party for her friends, her reaction could not be worse if i told her all her friends just died. Despite its abreviated name, its really only Spaghetti Bolognese.

This week, amongst the 100 other things going on at the hospitakl, I prepared this dish and last night i had it ready to go just at the moment when her body started demanding food again. By the look on her face when I announced the news, I suspect she was expecting something the flavor of Marmite, but the aroma did its magic and she was so hungry she agreed to try it.

I wanted to serve it on Spaghetti of course but she was so hungry she could not wait, so I offered her the high speed version; Bog on Toast. For Brits this is no surprise. Any nation that puts cheese on toast and has the audacity to call it Welsh rabbit, would have no problem with Bog on toast. Needless to say, she said it was delicious and early this morning she microwaved some more.

Barbara is having a very hard time taking it easy. She is walking around most of the day and if I suggest she take it easy and let me do everything, she asks me to stop telling her what to do. The doctor said that she should walk, but her ankles are swollen and she has a bad pain in her back which she thinks is a trapped nerve. It just doesn't seem like standing for hours would be such a good idea, but I know better than to insist on this one.

We went to the "mommys club" at the hospital today for a check up, breast feeding and weighing. There machine is so accurate that is detected .6 of a gram change in weight. Her breast milk is beginning slowly because it was required five weeks ahead of schedule. She has little patience for this logic and is frustrated with her body and breatfeeding in general.

Her local friends Kiara and Jean Luca have lent us their breast pump (amongst many other items) which she is using to jump start lactation. She is not convinced that this is going to happen despite the assurances of a stream of lactation consultants in the hospital.

The hospital was filled with sick kids couging everywhere. We had to run a gauntlet of them to get to the "mommy's club". While I get the idea, it just seems like this should held in venue where the healthy people go, not the sick ones in the middle of flu season.

In the first two weeks, the bambini have to fill many diapers. This process allows the billi-rubin to be excreted until their livers start working. If they get a cold and stop eating, the jaundice will escalate requiring re-admission to the hospital and being take away from us. Having read a good deal more than I ever wanted to about this over the last few days, 60% of re-admissions are due to this reason alone.

On the way out I was approached by a hospital volunteer and the guilt of my wicked intentions with her lovingly made pink and green woolly hat overcame me. As we had our conversation (in slow motion), I began making a list of relatives in my head, that i could give this to next xmas, thereby relieving me of any and all guilt.

We valet parked the car. When I offered the valet guy five bucks because he ran (literally) to get the car and smiled constantly, he told me they cant take tips.

Moving up here has been such a welcome change from Los Angeles where even going to dinner is a stressful experience filled with traffic, parking waiting and attitude issues. If you don't tip 20% or more there, you don't even get a thank you.

The people here are much nicer to each other in general and driving on the 280 freeway is always moving well. It was so refreshing to have a nice valet guy that I finally forced the tip into his had so that no one could see.

I will try to upload a couple more shots in the nursery taken tonite. It is coming together slowly. Almost everything is done, but I have failed miserably on a couple of items. We had the nanny come by so we could see how she interacted with the bambini, and Barbara was happy.

Last night Barbara made it through until about 4am when the pain medication wore off and she came to get the mild pain medication she has. The main pain medication is Norco which takes the edge of nicely, but she did not allow me to pick those up yesterday. She is determined not to be "handicapped" by the state of her body and I suspect a good dose of old fashioned Italian Catholic guilt.

I have the night shift right now, and i can usually make it until 6am. She then takes over and sleeps on the sofa bed in the nursery. She really wanted some "me" time today and settled on a pampering and "blah blah blah" session at the hairdresser. She loves this. I got up early to make sure she could go before we had to leave for the hospital, but we still ran late.

The idea was to pick her up on the way.

Finally today, just to add to the fun, I managed to upset one of Barbara's hypersensitive aunties. She doesn't speak English and I don't speak Italian so we settled on bad Spanish which I know a little of. When I told her that Barbara was at the hairdresser she thought I was making up excuses not to put her on the phone because she was about to die. It really went down hill from there.

The last time we called her was back when she had just had the operation and she sounded like mental patient due to the drugs. Now I was telling her she was at the hairdresser. it was just too much. I explained that in times like these, the small details of like like her cell phone charger was forgotten and calls don't get made.

I think the low point was when I suggested she go to an internet cafe (to read this blog) like all of our friends. She reminded me that she was family, not "friends" and she could not wait in the internet cafe for us to call. Yes, in retrospect that was probably a bad idea. Finally she made sure I understood that she was not happy.

It's just hard to explain how impossible "touch base" phone calls are at a time like this unless you have been through it. We appreciate you patience and will call each one of you in the coming days.