And You Though Band Nerds Were Geeks...

Tony has requested I share with you all the story I deemed important enough to share with him at the dinner table the other night...

Yesterday at work, I was busily shelving the non-fiction books, making sure they were in order as I went. I got to the 599’s – mammals – and had to stop in confusion. The 597’s – reptiles, fish, and amphibians – are shelved according to how the animals are related to each other within their class in the animal kingdom. So are the 598’s – Birds – and the 595’s – Insects. Surely all the animal books should be ordered according to the same rule. Right? I mean, surely Dewey wouldn’t change mid-stream – he was anal! He had to have been drunk.

But here, in the mammals, it was confusing. I had heard they were shelved according to continent of origin, and yes, look, there – in 599.64 was buffola, raccoon, lots of North American animals. But look, here – in 599.63 was a whale shelved right next to a hippo, next to a giraffe, next to a llama??? What on earth? Obviously they must be misplaced. No, they are in order. Maybe they are labeled wrong? No, that’s the correct label.

Ok, so they obviously can’t be shelved according to continent. I mean, gracious, whales don’t even have a continent, giraffe’s are from Africa, and llamas (I think) are from Asia ! Hmm. What is going on here? Are they randomly placed on the shelf? I must get to the bottom of this problem and save libraries the world over from the confusion of a drunk Melville Dewey. I went over to Mrs. Hunt (the librarian I work with) and posed my question. She replied, “Well, I think they are shelved by continent of origin, but that wouldn’t make sense because the other animal books are shelved by relationship within the animal kingdom.”

So, we then proceed to spend the next forty minutes discussing and researching the animal kingdom online to see how they could possible be shelved. And we discovered? Dewey wasn’t drunk. Who would have guessed a whale was a hippo’s closest relation?! Who would have guessed whales, hippos, giraffes, and yes, even llamas, are all in the same Order. They are class – mammal. And lo and behold, they are order – Artiodactyla. Shocking.

And that is how I spent forty-five minutes saving libraries world-wide from vast confusion. I thought it was rather important information, but Tony thought I was just plain geeky.

Our Ornery Daughter

We’ve come to the conclusion that our daughter is a teenager. She kicks and squirms and wiggles all the time – until Tony puts his hand on my stomach. Then she goes completely still. She won’t even twitch. Tony is beginning to believe she doesn’t like him already. You should see his interpretation of what she’s doing in there. He crosses his arms, pokes out his lower lip, and pouts about “Daddy, you’re embarrassing me.” “Daddy, quit touching me.” And last night, Godwill added one – “Daddy, get out of my womb (pronounced with a lisp so it almost sounds like room).” I keep telling him one of these days he’ll get to feel her moving around, and maybe even watch her kick and squirm, but he acts truly despondent. He does understand, and he’s very patient, but this little girl better watch it, or she’s going to be in trouble before she ever comes out!

Smelly Incidences

The last week has not been kind to the noses in our household. On Wednesday, I got home from the grocery store to find the milk jug had leaked all over the truck. In spite of my best efforts to scrub it clean and let it air out, it smells, you guessed it, like rotten milk. Tony won’t even get in it – I would like to not get in it, but I have to drive to work. Any suggestions?

Today, I walked into the nursery/Tony’s closet room, and there, on the floor, was a roach. I hate roaches. Without looking any closer, I rushed to the bathroom and got the ant and roach spray. I then proceeded to drench the poor bug. I was trying not to look to close, but I noticed the stupid thing wasn’t dying, so I looked – and low and behold, it wasn’t a roach at all, but some poor lame cricket who was missing a couple legs. I hope it dies anyways. Now of course, the whole house smells like roach killer, so I get to open all the windows and turn on the fans before I leave for work. Oh well, at least the house will get aired out.

Guess what?

It's a girl!

This is a head shot - she was upside down :)

Here are her legs, you can see her right foot pretty clear, with toes and all.

Here are her legs and tummy pooching out (thats an umbilical cord, not boy parts :)).

This was the telling shot - her bottom.

This was just the heartbeat one.

Well, enjoy the pictures - we're very excited. We went shopping for girl stuff, looked at all the pink stuff.

Kickin' and Rollin'

Well, it's official. Our baby is (quite predictably) the most hyperactive child in the universe. I'm serious! He/She/It never stops moving and kicking and jabbing me. It's actually quite exciting and reassuring, but I love harassing Tony about how hyper he/she/it is.

Tomorrow we get to have our ultrasound, and we are definitely planning on finding out if it is a boy or a girl. (Finally! No more he/she/it business :))

After I posted on Saturday about how I'm finally showing, we went to a church potluck, and I had like four people tell me how tiny I was, and how they couldn't even tell I was pregnant and they couldn't believe I was 5 months already. The same thing happened at school yesterday. I guess pregnant belly is in the eye of the beholder!

Well, hope everyone has a wonderful evening, I will try to post ultrasound pictures tomorrow afternoon.

Josh's Wedding

Josh and Desiree got married September 27th. They had the wedding at Mommy's house, and it was very pretty. The weather was just right for standing around outside all day. I thought I would post some pictures for all the out-of-town relatives.

Mommy and Josh got the yard and flowerbeds looking really great for the ceremony - and the dog decided she really didn't want to be left out. She killed... something... and planted it right in the middle of the flower beds Saturday morning.

Little Josh is so cute, and getting so big. He's hyper like the rest of us, and likes to run all over the place. Here is he is still in his PJ's.

Here is Alex in all his wedding finery (with his hair combed even!)

Josh and Little Josh right before the ceremony.

Desiree watching Josh and L. Josh get their picture taken.

The aisle runner provided hours of entertainment after the ceremony. Alex and Echo stretched it from the tree to the fence and played all sorts of games with it. They used it as an obstacle course (jump over, bend under it, then crawl up it into the tree) and when they were tired, it became a hammock. All in all, it was a fun, beautiful day.

"Man is an Endangered Species"

Well, it's finally happening. I have a definate pregnant belly. There is one outfit I wore last week that totally hid it, but for the most part you can see it no matter what. We are now at 20 weeks (halfway - yay! ack!) and we get to find out what gender our baby is on Wednesday. Of course, knowing us, we'll have a child that is uncooperative from the beginning, and will have it's legs in the way or something. I'm actually starting to get excited about the idea that it could be a girl, so either way, I'll be happy. Here's some pictures starting when we very first found out I was pregnant.

This is at four weeks, the day we found out.

This is at fourteen weeks, when I finally started to regain a tiny bit of the weight I lost from morning sickness. Before this point, my stomach had actually shrunk instead of getting bigger.

These last two were taken today, at 20 weeks. I soon won't be able to wear the same outfit to take pictures in :(

Oh well :)

Time has seemed to fly by the last month or so. School is 1/4 of the way over already, Josh got married last month, Alex is doing great in school, and I'm starting to get excited about Christmas.


Uncle David was in town this week, and we got to visit with him for several hours on Wednesday. That was very nice, we hadn't seen him since last April.


About the random title of this post - That's the first line of a great science fiction book called "Battlefield Earth". It was one of only two books Papa actually assigned as required reading as high school (the rest he trusted me to choose through research and recommendations). He wouldn't even tell me what class I was reading it for. He just said "About half-way through the book the plot turns, and you'll know what class it's for." I was like, great. It turned out to be for economics of all things, and come to find out, it had inspired him to do all his research on banking, stocks, and market manipulation. Anyways, it's a good read, and also happens to be the cleanest science fiction book I've ever read. (If you saw the movie, please read the book instead - everyone I've talked to said it was the worst movie ever made from a book.)

Well, I think I've bored everyone enough for one post, so I will write again later ;) Ta-ta for now!

Car Show

See? It hasn't even been a whole entire month since my last post ;)

A couple weeks ago we went to the Mustang Car Show in Mustang, OK. It was pretty fun - I’m not a huge car person like Tony, but since we didn’t stay all day long it was cool. They had a parade (the only part we payed attention to was the flag presentation and the National Anthem), carnival rides (which I couldn’t ride because I’m pregnant, and Tony won’t ride because he pukes – roller coaster are fine, swings, etc., all those are great, but the whirly twirly ones not so much). It also looked like they had craft fair style booths and concession stands, but we were there (apparently) for the cars.

I took all of about three pictures before my battery announced it was exhausted and my camera shut off. I felt very prepared (not). Then, when we were almost finished looking around, we found a car that is pretty much exactly like one of Dad’s cars he’s wanting to restore. We managed to coax the camera back to life long enough to get a few pictures.

The car below is exactly like Dad's, except his hasn't been restored yet, and I don't think he'll be painting his red. I don't remember what color he said though.