infantesimal

well, it took me about a week to recover from the world cup final. i'm not even going to talk about it here, really. if you want to read about it, you can go to just about any internet site you like, and you will find something. i will just say that the worst part is that people who, on july 8th, had never even heard of zinedine zidane, now know him as "the head-butt guy" and that makes me terribly sad.

and it seems that bastille day came and went without even the hanging of the tricolore around here. maybe because it was 175 degrees and nobody could be bothered to do much of anything at all. or maybe because the press ruined that too by using the holiday to sound off further in the zidane symposium. in any case, le quatorze juillet did make its appearance, in spite of the fear that it might be called off, in deference to la débâcle. oh, and thank you to john for being the first and only to offer his bastille day wishes. thank you. i did find it heartening too, that after france lost (and after they won those thrilling games leading up to the final) a handful of friends called my house to offer their condolences (and to congratulate me on the victories) as though i were the trainer. it reminded me of the time, nearly 26 years ago, when friends and neighbors called our house to make sure i was ok after john lennon had been killed. (my sister's birthday celebration was also killed that night, poor dear.) i was that much of a beatle fan at the time that people felt the need to check in on me. it did put me into a terrible spin for quite a while, and i kept my own vigil by the fm radio for weeks on end. i even wore a black ribbon for 40 days, an act that really only served to confuse my fellow 8th graders and disturb by grandfather beyond measure. anyway, i'm not sure what it says about me that i receive condolence calls when john lennon dies and the french national team loses the world cup. perhaps i could devote myself to loftier causes. but we knew that already. i told you all about it in the siege of budapest episode.

now that we've gotten all of that out of the way, i can tell you about the dream i had this morning. i was outside, in the street, in front of the house i grew up in, and i was going into premature labor. however, i still managed to stay out there, running up and down the street for about an hour. a famous tennis star (i don't know who it was, because i don't follow tennis) was repeatedly serving up ping-pong balls to me and i repeatedly failed in my attempts to return the volley. i tried and tried, but the ping-pong balls were getting swept sideways by the breeze, or i simply couldn't reach them. the tennis star never lost her patience though, and kept up the service. it wasn't until we both noticed an erector set type of military aircraft hovering overhead that we put an end to the game. we could see this craft circling around, and we could see a few people peering out of the open red baron-ish cockpit. they didn't communicate with us, or shoot at us or anything, but they certainly were menacing. it was at this point that i decided to return home, because i was, after all, going into labor about 6 weeks early, and i figured i should do something about it. or at least get out of the line of fire. it was then that the granule woke me up, needing her breakfast and her insulin. thank goodness for the granule.

i am sure that i am probably the 10 billionth pregnant woman to have that dream. (not the part about the tennis star, or the enemy aircraft, but the part about going into labor early.) the dream has been recurring for about a week now. it either has to do with the fact that the prawn now weighs about 73 pounds, or that we aren't really ready. i don't worry about being ready for parenthood, i mean ready, in terms of having all of the stuff. i would certainly still be having these dreams even if we had painted the nursery (office) robin's egg blue and had a big fluffy rug and the diaper sorter and all the stuffed animals expectantly waiting along the periphery of the crib, but as we don't have any of those things, i keep looking around the house and thinking: a baby's going to live here?

oh sure, we do have a lovely crib from my soeur of all certainties and the greatest glider of all time (a gift from ma mère of all windermeres) should be arriving any day now, but to look at our house, you wouldn't know a baby is coming. to look at me and my beetle existence, you would have no doubt, but the house is another story. i bought a container of organic wipes from the healthfood store, so that's a start. and as for names, we still don't know. yesterday, we had the brilliant idea that his name should be janus, until this morning when i realized that it will forever sound during roll call at school (do they still do that?) or on the phone with the insurance company like his name is janis. which is neat for joplin, but not for the poor prawn. so we are back to the drawing board.

two more things:

1. we had very great red curry last night.
2. today is our first anniversary, and my dear of all deer is the greatest of all times.