An unsettling discovery

My Seahawks have made it to the Superbowl and I couldn’t be happier, but only two teams make it to the Superbowl, leaving 30 NFL teams looking for something to blame their failed season on. Some teams fire the coach, some hope to sign a first round draft pick. But whatever the remedy, its obvious that there’s something wrong with the system.

Well, lately there’s been something wrong with my digestive system, and I’m looking for something… anything to blame it on. I think I may be lactose intolerant. I just get such bad gas and it HAS to be linked to SOMETHING. Last week I avoided any dairy all week. The closest I came to it was the one day I forgot and put margarine on my toast, but I didn’t really feel any adverse affects—is margarine even a dairy product?

This weekend I had a pizza party with friends. I popped a few lactaid pills just to be safe, but at about 4 am this morning it hit me. The eruptions came in droves and didn't let up until about an hour after I got in to work... and even though it has let up a little, I'm puckering one in at this very moment.

It hit at 4 am, but I didn’t get up (out of bed) until 6… and by that time the smell in my bed was so rancid and so heavy that I had to strip my bed covers off and drape them over furniture so they could air out. I sprayed air freshener all over the apartment and even onto the sheets hoping at if they absorbed some air freshener it might at best neutralize the rank.

And the stink is only half of it... my stomach has been jostling around like the washing machine on the permanent press cycle. I have a small bottle of both lactaid and gas-suppressant pills and I was popping dose after dose of them this morning. I'd swallow one kind of pill and if that didn't work I'd try the other, etc. I felt like a pool cleaner who keeps adding chlorine then water then clorine then water until he gets just the right pH balance in the pool.

I'm planning on eating the left over pizza for lunch today. It's probably a foolish thing to do, but I'm going to try taking three pills before my first bite (just as the bottle recommends) and see if that doesn't pacify my abdominal warfare.

Even if it doesn't, I feel like I need to experiement as much NOW as it takes to conquer this demon now, regardless of however much backfireing (pun intended) might result from each trial. After all, I'm only staying in Utah for another three weeks, so what’s the difference if everyone here hates me when I leave. Better to best this now and leave my enemies behind than to drag this problem home with me and cultivate a whole new crop of enemies there.

The ultimate sacrifice

“Don't have sex, because you will get pregnant and die!”

I don’t like to think about how it happened, but two of my sisters are pregnant. They’re both due this spring and one’s having twins. Getting pregnant won’t kill you but it can make life tough on everybody.

My sisters have to put up with doubling in size. Their husbands have to fake like they care what position the baby is in TODAY. I have to listen to or over-hear them talk about their cervixes or uteruses (or is it uteri?) as if talking about those things were just every-day conversation and/or inoffensive to anyone but their doctor.

“I'm sorry, I'm just a little pregnant here.”

But despite all the disturbing anatomy lessons, un-negotiable mood swings, and endless activity-distrupting trips to the bathroom, the truth is I’m totally excited to finally be an uncle and to have some little tykes in the family.

And even though I like to joke about how different my sisters are when their pregnant, they’re really both handling it very well. But from what I’ve heard, having twins can be a little risky.

I don’t really understand much about these things, so what I’m about to say will either sound helpfully informative to those who are dumber than I and profoundly ignorant to anyone else who’s ever had kids or who’s even been remotely interested in the miracle of birth enough to have ever paid attention in health class: oh, and I’m going to try to keep it as anatomically vague as possible because I really don’t want to have to think about my sisters’ anatomy.

So let’s assume that what prompts a lady to go into labor is when the baby gains so much weight that gravity’s pull on the baby is stronger than the woman’s body’s strength to keep the baby inside.

If that sounds like total rubbish, then consider the fact that my closest experiences to this sort of thing are those moments when I’ve really have to take a number 2, but for one reason or another I had to wait an hour before I could go… at about the 45 minute mark, when I need to start a dance to keep it from coming early… that’s about what I expect the last minutes before labor are like. Its in moments like that the strictest laws of physics concerning mass and gravity are in effect.

So, anyway, my sisters twins are getting so heavy that (weight wise) they’re ready to drop, but they need a few more months of development before they can survive on their own. So, in an attempt to fool gravity, my sister will spend the remainder of her pregnancy in the horizontal position.

They call it “bed rest”. I call it “two days of much needed vacation followed by 90 days of the worst case of a one-room groundhogs day jinx imaginable.”

Heading into day one, Siri was confident that she could survive with her sanity in tact. Assuming she knew what she was talking about I proceeded to offer my support in a way I knew she wouldn’t take me up on. I sort of have a talent for that kind of thing. My mom says that every time I so generously offer to help with the dishes just happens to be the same time she finishes cleaning the last one.

I offered to ship my xbox up to Siri to keep her company. Most girls don’t care much for Halo or Ghost Recon, but my xbox can play one or two old-school Nintendo games (Dr. Mario is a family favorite). Well, she rejected the offer, saying that she’d just spend her time reading or watching TV or something. But after 48 hours she left a voicemail asking for me to send it up ASAP.

“Greater love hath no man than this:
that he lay down his [xbox] for his [pregnant sister].”

To understand the gravity of the situation, you must understand the despair of my situation. Most of my friends live too many miles away to see every day. I have no roommates, and I’m sort of a homebody. So my xbox is my life. But I offered to send it and I wasn’t going back on the offer.

I padded and packaged my little electronic friend with the delicacy and care of a mother swaddling her newborn baby. I used so much foam padding that I could have sent home four dozen eggs and not one of them would arrive with as much as a crack in it.

The package arrived yesterday and Siri called with praise and gratitude for my having sent it. I hope it will help her pass the time. Meanwhile, I’m trying to pass some time of my own. I’m planning on moving home to Seattle in the middle of February and until then I kind of feel like I’m on “utah rest” and I’m in need of something to pass the time too. Fortunately, I’ve got medical clearance to stand upright, so at least I can spend parts of my day at the gym, wandering around sporting goods stores and other normal activities. During the down time, instead of dominating the NFL or conquering the galaxy (a few of my favorite xbox activites) I busy myself with movies and music I borrow from the library.

Those twins had better be the cutest nephews this world has ever known, because if all this sacrifice brings me are a couple of snot nosed brats for nephews I’ll be FURIOUS! :)