I'm bored.

Jeremy is snoring on the couch along with Bootsy. I'm actually bored of the internet. Blah. I heard on the radio this morning that Brad Wall is going to be asking Saskatchewan what we should be spending the overflowing coffers on. I shouted at my radio, SOCIAL PROGRAMS YOU IDIOT. I don't think he heard me.

BRAD WALL, SPEND SOME MONEY ON SOCIAL PROGRAMS!

Better yet, HIRE SOME MORE NURSES!

I seen an interesting comment about nurses: what would we rather have - a salary increase or better working conditions. Easy answer: BOTH. Some other comments... why should nurses get more money, we aren't the hub of the health care system... go to the ER tonight and TELL A NURSE THAT. Why should nurses get such a pay increase, they already make more money than the dietary staff (I laughed at this comment). I'm not saying dietary isn't important, but I also have a $60 K tuition bill from my four years of school (I only have to pay back half, because I was a single parent at the time). I doubt safe food handling costs THAT much to take.

No word on being induced. Blood pressure was fine today. So now I'm just waiting. It's funny how being in pain seems favorable in my world! Every little cramp and I think.... could this be it...

Baby has the hiccups right now. Apparently it's a good step in lung development, means baby is trying to take breaths but only getting amniotic fluid. It's cute! If you think your abdomen moving and jumping and twitching is cute...

The old men on the TD bank commercial amuse me. Especially when his cell phone rings.

Trevis Smith lost his appeal today. This doesn't surprise me.

I put some henna on Tai tonight. She wanted a butterfly on her tummy. Henna is kinda fun, but it smells bad. Hopefully Jeremy can humor me and do some on my tummy...

Adventures at the clinic today...

So I reluctantly drove myself down to the clinic this morning. I have my reasons for absolutely HATING going to see a doctor. It all started when I was a wee lad, and had to be subjected to going with my mom and my brother at LEAST once a month for some health issue... I've always hated waiting rooms. The only thing that used to keep me content as a child was the biblical stories. I think a majority of my knowledge of Christianity came from those bible stories read in the waiting room.

ANYWAY. I registered to see my doctor at 9:00 this morning. Keep in mind, his hours start at 9:00 and usually he takes his first patient somewhere in that first half hour. Today he had at least 10-20 people ahead of me ALREADY registered. It was obvious that people had shown up at 8:00 with the intention of seeing the doctor at 9:00. Fine, whatever... I know how bonkers it's going to be, I've only been doing this doctoring thing with my doctor for the past year and a bit.

So I take my fat lard pregnant butt and walked a lap around the Goldenmile. I figured that perhaps I might see a good sale at Liquidation World or get lost in some sort of store. Of course, nothing was open until 9:30. I decided to go for a car ride and get some McD's for breakfast - thinking it would kill some time.

Go back to the clinic. There's a huge sign saying "if you left the clinic, make sure to tell the desk you've returned or you won't be called." So I tell the receptionist my name and that I have returned. She puts her hands on her hips and says "you didn't even tell us you were leaving." Then sort of walks away. I KNOW I told them I was leaving, hence registering and asking how long it would be...

I sat down. Several people get up and ask "how long", "how many ahead of me", and various other questions. One guy gets up and says "I've been watching you call people and you MISSED my chart." He didn't realize there was more than one doctor at the clinic, but figured it was all "in turn." Again, the rude receptionist tells him to SIT DOWN and wait his turn. A clearly inpatient young couple stand up, huff, make hand gestures every time someone else is called and they aren't. Finally one of the receptionists says "there are still five people ahead of you, I can't guarantee when you'll see a doctor."

Eventually, the flow started to get moving at around 11:00. This is the doctor who was supposed to start seeing patients at 9:00.

I didn't complain. I had no idea if they had moved my file into the "returned from leaving the clinic" but I figured that if it was after lunch and I STILL hadn't been seen then there was a problem.

It was after noon before I seen anybody. So a three hour wait just to see a competent doctor! There was one very rude receptionist in particular who would just burn people at random. One older man got up when he thought he heard his name. Clearly he had a hearing problem... I thought she was going to start beating him with his chair just for standing up. Poor guy.

You know, walk in clinics are a good thing. There should be nothing wrong with accessing quick health care for minor issues or just regular health maintenance. It really does take the pressure off of the ER, and if more people would use the system the way it should be used I'm sure it would be even busier then it was today. Three hours sucks... but it SURE beats the NINE hour wait I had just to get some IV fluids and be sent home half hour later. BUT I think there's something to be said for efficiency, too. There's no reason why the staff couldn't start asking people to come back at certain times in the day if they could manage it. If the receptionist would have told me that 2:00 is better I could have come back. But they don't seem to do that, and I guess it would be negligent if someone "needed" the first possible appointment.

Also, they had two nurses on staff who could have taken my blood pressure, weighed and measured me, and sent me to the lab. I don't know WHY they don't utilize the nurses on their staff more to do those kinds of things.

Just my beef... I didn't get home until 2:00 this afternoon. All in all, five hours of my life gone.

End result: I see the Ob/Gyn tomorrow because my blood pressure was high (tee hee, three hours WAITING must have had something to do with that) and I'm swelling. I also have proteins spilling in trace amounts and my WCB's are elevated. There is a small possibility that if it's worse tomorrow, I might be a candidate for an induction of labor! This is all speculation mind you... I have NO idea if the Ob/Gyn will regard this as needing induction. Just seems to be the way to go this late in pregnancy when things get elevated.

Beautiful Mothers Day

It's been a good day! My daughter and husband planted me a beautiful garden in my front planter (I've been staring at it with admiration since we moved in...). They also made me supper, and Jeremy has been hard at work catching up on our laundry mountain! It makes me feel very loved and appreciated. Not to mention spoiled.

Thanks!

The Business of Being Born

We're so hippy-dippy

We may have lost one set of dread locks, but we're still doing it the way of the hippy.

I really didn't want our birth to turn into a consumer-dream. Babies are expensive these days. Moms want the "best". Their friends want to spoil them with gifts. If you've walked through a Toys R Us lately, a crib costs around $400! That doesn't even include the mattress! The high-end baby stores have $1000 strollers. Really, there is no difference between a high-end stroller and any old thing from Zellers. Baby shoes are $40/pair! YIPES.

We did spend good money on our pack n play (bassinet/play pen). We have been gifted some BEAUTIFUL things, my favorite gift is a quilt that Jeremy's grandma Forer made for us. We even had a sort-of baby shower. I told people to come over and eat something and visit, I really wasn't concerned about getting gifts since we've been acquiring so many things on our own. This baby already has tons of second-hand clothes coming her way. The only thing we haven't really stock piled is toys...

Also, we're going to cloth diaper at some point. Obviously, it will be between the ages of a few months - age 1, when baby goes into child care. I'm hoping (ideally) to save us at least $1000 in diaper costs by cloth diapering.

I'm also going on a mission to find a second-hand crib. Wish me luck... the market is flooded with REALLY OLD stuff, the newer cribs go really fast!

Jeremy and I are going to have our own little hippy ways... we're going to light some candles when we go into labor and say a blessing to the baby. We have done a belly cast. We're also going to do some henna on my belly...

Three weeks until we're due... I'm spending my days pre-occupying myself with the entire process. Being off work sort of facilitates extreme boring times for me. I can't do much physically because of my back/hips being in rough shape. Also throwing up still... but just for the morning at least.

THANKS again for the baby gifts from everyone at our little get together this weekend. It was really nice to see people one last time.

My Snoopy...

Has been driving me bonkers.

I can think of a few reasons why our beagle stresses me out. The first few times she's run away have hurt Jeremy. I see how painful it is and hard on him it becomes. Even though we've been SUPER LUCKY to get her back, it just stings a little. I know it's the nature of the beast.

She's also super sneaky. The past two days she's been raiding the compost bucket for Tai's peanut butter sandwich crusts. I've tried putting the bucket up, but she still manages to stick her nose into it and grab a crust at random times. Today she dug a HUGE hole in the back yard and got under the neighbors fence. Sure, it's a dog thing to dig... but then she came into the house and jumped right onto the couch and tracked in a bunch of mud. So I threw her into the tub and scrubbed her dirty underside and legs. Trust me, a very pregnant woman bathing a dog is SUPER FUN to watch. Even funner was my expression when she shook herself out all over me before I could get the towel on her.

My dog is NO BETTER some days. He poops at random in the house too, pees on my purse and anything left on the floor that belongs to me (including my stereo). He cries when he wants out of his kennel. Just as annoying.

I do love both of the dogs. Bootsy has been especially annoying. Jeremy thinks I'm jealous. Maybe I am, kind of. I've also been home so much that I've spent a LOT of time with her and Shadow. Bootsy has unfortunately just been the bigger shit head most days. Having two neurotic bitches in one house is maybe a little much.

BABY ONLY A MONTH AWAY!!

Oh Married to the Sea...