FRICK.

Hey, remember that awful woman I work with? She's the one with the problem of accidentally asking her co-workers to physically harm her with her non-verbal cues? Let's be real subtle and give her the pseudonym Histrionic Personality Disorder, just for confidentiality's sake. Well, old HPD recently revived her attentions towards me, and I fear I have only myself to blame.

{Anna Nicole and HPD share similar value systems and fashion-senses}

Two days a week, I work at 6:30 in the morning, as does HPD. Yesterday I managed to forget my office keys, so I had to actually summons HPD from her desk to let me into the office. This of course, opened the gates for conversation (con-ver-sa-tion, n: 1. oral exchange of HPD's sentiments, observations, opinions or ideas 2. instance of such exchange wherein only HPD may speak). I had actually experienced a lovely HPD-free streak of good fortune for going on about six months there, but yesterday's dumbass keyless situation just threw that era right out the window. An obnoxious, but surprisingly short by HPD standards conversation ensued, and then we went to our separate corners to work.

So OF COURSE, this morning when I attempted to get to my seat and begin my work day unmolested, I was unsuccessful. HPD was at my desk in under five minutes. I hadn't even logged on to my computer yet. She had some fake reason for needing to stop by, like asking my opinion of something without actually attempting to solve the problem on her own before contacting me. I answered her question quickly - which of course annoyed her - and that's when she began making up reasons to stick around.

She told me about her car and her horses and her boyfriend's dad's pituitary gland tumor, and some other stuff I probably don't care about, but I wasn't really paying attention. This is the part that amazes me about HPD; I can literally turn my body away from her and start working on my computer, and she just... keeps talking.

Anyway, it is at this point that my dumbassery really comes to bite me in the ass. HPD spies the calendar that hangs behind my head, the calendar upon which I write personal appointments (i.e. non-work-related appointments, not like personal, personal appointments), and she sees the "20 week ultrasound" note scheduled for May 23rd. Please let me note at this point that I am one day away from being 19 weeks pregnant. I OBVIOUSLY look pregnant, and I have for a few weeks now. I'm not trying to hide anything here, and though I never made a grand announcement of pregnancy to the office, it's clear to everyone that I am pregnant and the knowledge is widely accepted.

Well, ol' HPD takes one look at that note and starts squealing. Like, peel the paint from the walls, jumpy-clappy dance, squealing. She begins this weird loop of questions in an attempt to get me to engage with her: "Are you EXCITED?!?! How far along are you? I bet you want a boy! I bet KYLE wants a boy! ARE YOU EXCITED????" Ahem: Yes. 'Bout halfway. Don't care. He doesn't care either. Yes.

Let's just say that HPD is... interested in pregnancy. She wants to be pregnant. I'm not sure if she actually wants a baby so much as she wants the attention that you get when you have a baby, you know? She is obsessed with all things pregnancy and to a certain extent, baby-related.

A co-worker of ours (lovely woman, too nice for her own good, very sweet lady) had a baby about a year ago. HPD got this woman's phone number from the internet (wtf?? can you do that???) and texted/called her while she was in labor 20+ times before lovely co-worker woman shattered her phone on the hospital wall as a result of all of the HPD attempts at contact. After a day or so of labor, lovely co-worker was rushed to emergency c-section. Two hours post-op, HPD shows up in her hospital room. Lovely co-worker and HPD are not friends. Lovely co-worker did not tell anyone in the office a) the name of the hospital at which she planned to deliver, and she certainly did not share b) her actual room number (or PHONE NUMBER, OMG). She did not invite visitors, and HPD was clearly unwelcome.

As hospital staff were escorting HPD out of the hospital room, she attempted to goad Lovely co-worker in to allowing her to visit them at home, once discharged, so that they could visit uninterrupted. Um, she said no.

I'm afraid this does not bode well for my future. Actually, I'm just afraid. Human Resources is aware of the situation, and I am to notify them immediately if anything even remotely close to the level of stalking that Lovely co-worker endured happens to me. I consider that level of attention to be normal for someone who does not know the difference between right and wrong. This is someone who might not necessarily understand what is wrong with trying to walk out of the hospital with someone else's baby.

Looks like the game is afoot. You want to mess with my hormones right now? You want to mess with MY CHILDREN? REALLY?? Bring it, nut-job.

Future blackmail fodder

I'm afraid things aren't going to be too updatey around here for awhile. I am heading off to the great District of Columbia (not to be confused with the fine shops located in The District IN Columbia; entirely different locations, I assure you). I'll be gone from Wednesday evening till Sunday afternoon. I will likely miss Iris Music Thursday! this week, and frankly have no intention of thinking of anything even remotely associated with adult responsibilities while traveling. So you're not likely to hear from me till after my return. Fortunately for my lovely readers, 87% of you are the people I'm going to visit, so not too many people will be vastly disappointed with my bloggy absence, as you will be reveling in the awesomosity that is spending time with dear ol' me in the flesh. You're welcome.

I have compiled this delicious selection of photo/video offerings for your viewing pleasure, and to hopefully tide you over till regularly scheduled programming recommences.

Iris' current favorite outfit. We had to hide the shoes - it was just getting out of hand and they are so small they cut her feet now. Also? The no pants thing: better learn to love it because it's her preferred state now.

ROCK from Megan Kelley on Vimeo.

Iris and I happened to be playing in the yard the last time band practice happened. I'm serious, she stood next to the garage and rocked out this way for like 20 minutes. It. Was. Awesome.

Future Colin Burgess from Megan Kelley on Vimeo.



And this is what we've done many Saturday mornings in a row now, till we had to prepare the house for sale and the snare drum *mysteriously* found itself relocated to the garage one night while Iris was asleep.

P.S. Do you like the new blog design? Books are neat, right? The new layout makes me absurdly happy, so if you don't love it, for God's sake, lie to me.

Iris Music Thursday: PB&J

Peter Bjorn & John, of course. Iris really has a lot of things to say about this song. "Dey dancin' Mom? Dey singin songs. Da Mommy an da Daddy say 'WHOOOO WHOOO WHOOO' an dey whistle. Da Daddy pay uh-tar." Yep. They do that, kiddo. All adult men and women are Moms and Dads in Iris' opinion, and this video does nothing but reinforce that all Daddys play guitar (uh-tar).

Someday I'll get a video of her listening to these songs. She actually has slightly different dances for each one. The dance for this song is a subtle bob of the head with some general bouncing all over thrown in. It's a rather serious "hipster at a show" move if I do say so.



P.S. I was a little unclear in that last post. No idea what flavor FBK is. Child would not wake up and so the only thing we could see was the face/elbow. All sorts of crotch-shots will happen next month, I'm sure.

Shelby Pat Kelley cannot be moved

Today was the 'big' morphology/ID sex of baby ultrasound. I asked my doctor to schedule it sometime before the weekend of May 5th if he could, mostly so that I could participate in gender-specific shopping on my trip to DC with the fam. It's admittedly a silly reason to bump up the scan, but the doctor seemed fine with the idea and scheduled it for this week. We (I) thought I was 17 weeks pregnant, and that this ultrasound was just slightly too early (usually morphology scans aren't scheduled for any earlier than 18 weeks). Turns out I am not. My due date was moved four days later about ten weeks ago, and nobody told me. So my actual due date is October 6th, 2011. You would think that this information would have influenced Dr. G's scheduling here just a little bit.


While it is wonderful that I have four more days to cook this kid before all the c-section harpies come at me with scalpels, it is not so wonderful in the land of insurance-covered ultrasounds. There were two sonographers in the room: a super nice and presumably experienced one, and a second, mildly snippy student-sonographer who was really extra annoyed that I wasn't far enough along to get all the proper readings. I kept telling her that I think ultrasounds are really super fun (I do!) and that I'll gladly come back, but she wouldn't be cheered. What is it with us and cranky sonographers? I mean, the one today was not nearly as gruff or curt as the last one, but still - cranky mofos.


Anyway, we got some shots of the baby's face and elbow. Apparently the placenta is a lovely place to nap, and FBK could not be inspired to do more than flap an annoyed hand in our direction when we attempted to wake him (her?). I can't help but wonder if we would have had more success had the cheerful, experienced lady attempted the same maneuver. We will know in four weeks, when the next attempt is scheduled. May 23rd, 1pm central time. It's totally going to work this time.

Blue Cheese

Easter 2011 - This picture was taken five minutes after we noticed Iris' 101.2 temperature, so her cheeriness her is extra impressive. Cute, no? Motrin is my friend.

Iris Music Thursday: The Beginning

Also Known As: Hey! Hey! Hey!

Are you sensing a pattern here? Iris likes repetitive sounds. I think it might be a baby thing, or perhaps a human thing, because I don't know a lot of folks who are opposed to repetitive sounds in the form of a good beat (except for myself when we're talking about minute eleven of some awful jam band's solo). Ahem. Let us recall the relative flexibility of the term "good."

Anyway, this song is Iris' first musical love. This song is the first song she ever sang along to, and this is the song which inspired her very first word ever: "Hey!" This is the song that we used to calm Iris down in moments of parental terror (so she's been crying for 40 minutes/is about to lose her sh*t in public/looks like she's about to cut someone - PLAY THE SONG). It was a lifesaver.

Please to enjoy Vampire Weekend's "A-Punk."

Smells Like Irrational Crying In Here

How about a State of the State address, if "state" (the latter) is like, the life of the Columbia Kelleys or something similarly vague? I knew you'd be down with that! Thanks for being so supportive of my generalities, oh bloggy buddies of mine.

Iris is on the potty train. She has shining moments of totally GETTING it, then slips back into rejecting the notion altogether, just hours later. I think in those moments she throws such a fit because the idea was likely recommended by one of her totally square and lame-oozing parents. We apparently do not ever have good ideas, and the appropriate response to any suggestion of ours is to throw an enormous fit. Like, enormous. Big old ugly tears and lying prostrate with woe, eventually winding down to a little wimpering and the declaration, "I crying, Daddy. I so sad." Juuuust in case you missed that giant floor show, let me tell ya, I'm sad.

Kyle is gleefully counting down the days remaining till summer break begins (24 with actual kids present - no idea how many total, but the kidless ones don't really count). Over the last four years he's mastered the Grimace and Ignore It face, so it will be nice to see him unclench a bit and just enjoy life. He's always so happy in the summertime. This will come in handy for him this particular summer as I get bigger and less pleasant to be around.

Speaking of being unpleasant (yay)! I have been gloating these last months about how much better I'm handling pregnancy this time around, how the hormones don't seem to be affecting me as much, and how generally awesome I feel. (obvious foreshadowing is obvious!)

Then last Friday someone at work was kind of a jerk to me, and then Saturday one of my "friends" was a mega huge cruel a-hole, then a gaggle of electric guitars woke up my kid from nap, then I couldn't seem to keep my eyes open for longer than 30 minutes at a time. Was this narcolepsy a result of the string of dumb encounters, or was it its very own entity, sent to push me over the edge? Don't know, don't really care I guess, but I did end up in the bathroom for about a half hour "pooping" (where pooping = crying into the hand towel), and I did briefly consider finding Iris to tell her that I had been crying, and that I was so sad. Okay, no I didn't. It probably would have scared her senseless and made her cry too, and that's just not nice.

FBK is the size of an avocado and as far as I know, is not crying. I mean he (he?) could be, but I'd like to think it's rather warm and comfy in there. He's busy growing toenails and contemplaing his cool squishy jumprope. He's likely also not very irrational. I'd like to think he lives a very frank and sensical existence.

So, two-thirds of the non-fetal members of the Columbia, MO faction of the Kelley family are currently prone to irrational crying jags. Do not be alarmed. I'm pretty sure that both are in phases which, while likely to get worse before anything else really happens, are temporary nonetheless.