Ten things I have learned since last Monday

1. Babies do smell nice, and not, as I have maintained for years, of melon.

2. I can type with my left hand.

3. When people say, 'you'll forget all the pain as soon as you see your beautiful baby', they are either lying or freaks.

4. Poo is not cute when it belongs to your own baby. It's still gross.

5. We have never really given the cat enough props for her self-cleaning abilities.

6. It is better if, when you are told you require emergency surgery, not to have that statement followed up with 'but you'll have to wait a short while, because someone else is in there having it right now, and she's having a haemorrhage'.

7. Babies are 100% feeling, 0% reason.

8. Major abdominal surgery, care of a newborn, and visiting hours which require your support network to disappear for 12 hour stretches, are not a happy combination.

9. Sleep is not overrated. As Joni once said, you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone...

10. My baby really IS the most beautiful and intelligent one that ever there was.

Gretel Rose

no news is no news

Well, here we are at the weekend and still nothing to report. Baby-wise that is. Thea's show was fantastic - the highlight for me being 'blue christmas', as the vocal was just stunning. The whole show was really great though. And Alan had a spare guest list place, so Alice got in for free at the last minute too. Was really nice to have so many people - James, Alice, Riccardo, Kerena and Alan all there for (probably) the last pre-baby gig. Though Amy Wadge is playing the Half Moon in Putney on the 9th, if there is no news by then...

Watched 'Sweeney Todd' with Alice yesterday. It was pretty good, given that it was essentially one long murder-fest with singing. But Johnny Depp can really do no wrong.

Turns out Salon picked up on my research as well as Jezebel after the Guardian piece came out. All good news for me. Alice has been helping (read: entirely doing) with my new website, where all my professional/academic stuff will live. www.deborahfinding.com Hurrah!

Now going to have a shower and probably head off to Oxford for Zoe and William's tea party for Nahum. I'm hoping an inconvenient distance from the hospital will prompt labour to start...

A tale of two Christmas albums

Well, not a tale exactly - more an observation that Thea Gilmore's 'Strange Communion' kicks Tori Amos' 'Midwinter Graces' out of the room, house, street and town. The difference between them is really quite something. As such, tonight's Tori Amos show at the Jazz Cafe, showcasing the album, will be the first time in about 6 years that she's done a London show that I have not attended. But tomorrow night, my last pre-baby gig will be Thea Gilmore's show at Bush Hall, and I cannot wait. I know there are a few surprises in store, and I'm sure it will be fabulous.

No news here on the baby front. I had a massage today which was very nice, but made me wish I had had one much earlier. Dear God, how everything hurts. Movies this week a little thin on the ground so far:

Harry Brown (really very good indeed. Bleak though- like 'Gran Torino' with no funny)

No Reservations

So, Harry Brown is possibly my last cinema trip pre-baby, depending on when she arrives. Thea will be my last gig, unless I'm still sans-baby on 9th Dec, in which case I might make it over the the Half Moon in Putney to see Amy Wadge. Last art exhibition was Pop Life at the Tate Modern (lots of Andy Warhol and Tracey Emin, but actually the coolest thing to see was Damien Hirst's 'Golden Calf' which was strangely sad and affecting).

Three out of six NCT-ers have now had their babies (two queue-jumpers...I was supposed to be second!). Everyone's been early so far. Apart from me. Baby now officially 'late', but this is clearly ridiculous, given that 'term' is anything from 37 to 42 weeks of pregnancy. Yet when you go to make your 41 week appointment, the receptionist says 'oh dear' and looks at you pityingly... clearly there is only one 24 hour period in which it is acceptable to have the baby. Having said that, if this baby was 100% my DNA, she would have arrived on time, as I'm a bit of a stickler for time-keeping. Sadly those MacKenzie genes probably mean she'll start off a bit late, get half way out, then realise she's forgotten something and have to go back :)

movies, waiting, reading, waiting, eating, waiting

Movies seen now include:

Law Abiding Citizen

P.S. I Love You

Saving Sarah Cain

Enchanted

Books I am currently reading:

The Suspicions Of Mr Whicher - Kate Summerscale

Starting Over - Tony Parsons

A Swamp Full Of Dollars - Michael Peel

I blame late pregnancy for my sudden inability to concentrate on one book - reading three concurrently is very unlike me (and something I abhor in others!). I feel most ashamed not to have finished Michael's book yet, as he's a good friend, and the book has been shortlisted for the Guardian first book award. Awards happen on 2nd December, and while everyone suggests 'it's a fiction year', he's done amazingly well to be the only non-fiction entry to even make the shortlist. And what I have read so far is truly excellent.

Despite me giving up 'Heat' once I discovered we were having a girl, James has kindly stockpiled some copies to keep me going during labour and any hospital waiting around that happens. After that, it's back to cold turkey.

Speaking of turkey, we're still planning to have Christmas dinner at our house, crazy as it might seem with a newborn. Yesterday, we bought an enormous (8 kilo) ham, and James is in the kitchen right now pouring all sorts of exciting goodness into a bucket to marinate/cure/brine it until it finally gets cooked in a few weeks. Including salt peter, which we got under the counter from a source who made us promise not to mix it with the thing that turns it into gunpowder (or the baby might come early after all). I can't wait for Christmas. I know we're going to be tired, but it will be our first family Christmas, and I have embarrassing santa outfits for both the baby and the cat - watch this space for a Christmas Day photo. I reckon we'll have about 5 minutes to take it in before mutiny sets in (from the cat) or vomiting occurs (baby).

Baby is technically due tomorrow, but I am extremely doubtful that she'll turn up then. Or even in the next week. In fact, I'm sort of at the stage where I'm not sure there will even BE a baby. It's like I've been pregnant for so long that I've accepted it as my lot in life... I'm not sure I really believe in a non-pregnant existence with an actual baby :)

So, this week I have plans to have coffee with the NCT-ers, go to the Thea Gilmore show on Thursday, and then maybe to Zoe and William's tea party for Nahum in Oxford on Saturday. We'll see how it all pans out... If things get really late, I comfort myself that there is an Orla Kiely sample sale on in Brick Lane on the 10th December. If baby is not here by then, I will go and buy a bag to cheer myself up. I hope she's not too long after that! I always thought it sucked for people who had their birthdays in the school holidays, and of course the closer it gets to Christmas, the more you have the 'one present for both' scenario to contend with :( My Granny's birthday is December 11th, and I guess it would be cool if they shared a birthday. After that, I'm all out of fun, and will just sit and home drinking raspberry tea and eating curry.

the cat mirrors my mood

More movies, more waiting

Clearly the last stage of pregnancy is characterised by being enormous...and sitting around. I'm too big and uncomfortable to do anything, but too not-catatonic to do nothing. So I end up doing things that either make me very tired through having to leave the house and walking, or things that only involve sitting on the sofa. Sigh. Apart from going to the pool and jacuzzi, which is a lifesaver, especially with the hell that is SPD.

Anyway, movies I have seen now include:

A Mighty Heart

2012

The Bucket List

hmm...I feel sure there are more

Marcus Brigstocke was very funny, and Dar Williams was as good and as lovely as always. Today and tomorrow I'm going to the O2 to see the tennis. Today, Nadal v Soderling and Djokovic v Davydenko, and tomorrow Del Potro v Verdasco and Murray v Federer. There's doubles as well, but I'll have to see how I am coping - if I'm too uncomfortable the plan is for me to go and lie down in the car for a bit with pillows and duvet. Sad, isn't it?

On Wednesday, the remainder (apart from a few tiny bits) of my Christmas shopping should be delivered, and I will be wrapping things in a fiendishly organised manner. Then there is nothing in the diary (apart from coffee and cake with my fellow suffering NCTers) until 30th November, which is the day the baby is supposed to arrive. HAHAHA. I highly doubt we will be seeing any baby action on that day, as only 5% of babies arrive on their due date, and 75% come later. But I am so damn uncomfortable, I will be trying everything I can to hurry things along by then. So far, I have heard that the following things help bring on labour:

Curry

Sex

Pineapple

Red Raspberry Leaf Tea

Champagne

Walking

Anyone know any more? I will be trying them all in various combinations (apart from the walking too much, as that is too painful). I'm already on the raspberry tea, as it's supposed to help anyway.