Now we play telephone

My firstborn now has a phone. She's had a whole bunch of firsts lately and the phone is mostly for my paranoia's sake to make sure she can stay safe in all her activities. Let's see, what new things is she up to or will be soon?

• She got her first Young Person's Travelcard. Which means she can now take all the busses she wants to. Alone. She has to pay for the tube so at least I know she'll not be going off to random places. Intentionally. She's not a got a good sense of direction and I worry she'll end up in Morden on her way to some afterschool club.
• She's starting secondary school next week. It's a bit of an awkward trek. I'm pretty sure she can manage it without a phone. Which is good because the school does 't allow phones at all in the building at all. Whatsoever. A Policy I find quite antediluvian. but then again, they have a dress code, which I find mad as well. but that's a post for another time.
• She's got after school activities she'll be going to on her own. I've been going with her to some for years, and still she can't recall which bus we take and which stop to get off at.
• she's been going over to friends houses a bunch. Not that I don't trust her to walk a well known route that's like 10 minutes by foot. It's more we want to be able to remind her to pick up stuff on the way home, or her to have a way to get in touch when she somehow turns the 10 min walk into 40 min by getting on the wrong bus or something.
• We did make a set of house keys for her, but we didn't them to her yet. Mostly because she's never home when we are not, so the only point would be if we're too lazy to walk to the door to let her in. but I also worry about her losing the keys, as changing locks is such a huge pain.

So I got her a S30 Nokia. It's almost completely unchanged from the 90s. The only difference is it's in colour and the speaker can make more sounds. But otherwise it's the exact same terrible UI which made the iPhone such a success. It takes a "mini" size SIM (you know, the biggest possible SIM you can find) which I didn't think anyone used anymore. But it is a lovely shade of blue, which I like.

It doesn't even have internet – something I feel kind of guilty about. Partly because I'm paying for a few GB of data, which she'll not be able to use. And partly because she's missing out on things like bus schedules and maps. I feel zero guilt about no whatsapp, though.

I also feel guilty about making her have to use T9 to write text messages. I hated that back in the day, and switched to stylus/touchscreen/mini-qwerty phones as soon as I possibly could. But this thing doesn't even have Bluetooth. So she's now learning how to associate letters with the number buttons. Like she's a millennial or something.

In the end, this phone is an experiment. It's to see if she can keep it without losing or breaking it. I mean, it's a Nokia, so breaking it will be a challenge. Losing, I really don't know. I do know her track record of keeping pairs of gloves as a pair is bad enough we stopped buying her gloves. I have told her that if she does manage to not lose it and keep it one piece for long enough we can upgrade to something more 21^st century.

Now we are commuting

Recently we found ourselves in a predicament. It was half term and L had a morning meeting ending at 930. I had to be in at work for 930. A small but awkward conflict. R had to be somewhere, and school, being out, was not an option. Leaving her at home alone for an hour or so – well, that's frowned upon in the 21^st century, so we couldn't do that either.

The solution was actually quite simple. L's meeting was a 3 minute walk from my office. So R would go into work with me and wait there til L was done, and then go home with her. It was a plan.

I got up R extra early (earlier than she normally does for school) and she was dressed, fed and ready in less time than it normally takes her and in a much more chipper mood. I don't know if it's the single early day during half term that did it, or the walking up to Björk videos, but she was in a good mood, and that always helps.

We went through my morning commute together. Walking to the train, picking the best carriage that is the least walk when we get off but still has enough empty seats so we can be comfortable. We sat together on the train and chatted the whole time. We discussed the commute, what it's like to take the train every day, and so on. It was the nicest commute in I'd had, and for some reason it was much nicer than most normal travel with R. It was nice to have the company and nice to just be in the pleasant mood.

When we got to the office, I introduced her around, then showed her to the sofa where she got comfortable and got out her iPad and started playing on it.

Not everyone was in when we'd arrived. Just about every person to come in after that, once they noticed her sitting there, made the joke Oh, it that the new starter?

Not very original, but in their defence, a person did just start that morning.

L showed up shortly after her meetings, did the hellos around the office, then went off with R to play in the nearby piazza for a few hours. All sorted.

As an aside, I take R into school once a week. It's a short walk but I often take the bus in, rather than the scooter or her bike. The bus stops right outside the school and saves a bit of walking. It takes actually just as long as walking does, so it doesn't really save time. L always thought I was odd for even bothering. The word "lazy" has been used once or twice.

In reality it's not that. It occurred to me when we last did our microcommute to school that it's actually more fun to take the bus. When walking to work, R and I are different levels, it's always about nudging her past distractions and just keeping us moving down the street. It's all about herding.

On the bus, we sit next to each other and talk. Talk about what we see. Who we see. What's going to happen today. It's nice. It's like the commute on the train in miniature. I like it.

Now we are paying attention

It was an unusual morning in that it's the first time in ages we've all sat down and had breakfast together. I was looking at stuff on my phone and L asked What are you reading?

Just reading the news.

Anything interesting?

You mean you've not heard? Oh, ok. The American health care bill passed. I went on to explain just how much worse it makes things, and how it's sexist, classist, ableist, and just much more expensive.

R, clearly remembering that we are planning to visit the US in June, asked, Will be be safe when we go to the US?

Yes. Because we have travel insurance. That will take care of us in case we get sick or have an accident.

And we have light skin?

We both just pause and consider the implications of what R just said. Turns out, she's been paying more attention to what's going on in America than I thought. At this point L tries to explain White Privilege, though it's clear R already understands that it exists. L mainly focused on White Privilege when going through passport control. And then went on to explain how it's never really safe for anyone. Just never make any jokes. Or say anything, unless they ask you your name. They'll probably only ask you your name. Tell them, but don't be chatty.

I hate the way we now have to train the daughter to walk on eggshells when dealing with public officials. And I have how it's so obvious to her that things are so messed up when it comes to race.

Now we are two

We decided to try an experiment. We went to visit the family in the US. And then we left the girl with her grandparents. She's been there almost two weeks and she comes back tomorrow.

A bit of background. Life's gotten quite busy here. A planned visit to the States was to end with us coming back at the start of half-term. A magical period where not only schools are out, but so is nursery (because why would you need extra childcare then?). So zero free time has turned into negative free time.

When we mentioned this to L's mother she asked Why don't you just leave her with us for a while? You can change her flight home and I'll come back with her. Which we though Ha ha ha. That's silly — Wait.... why not?   Hey, what do you think about staying in the States with you grandparents for a week?

Yeah!

And that was that. Actually not quite. We were quite hesitant. But with her excited about it, we could at least take it seriously. I know we'd always expected for her to spend a summer or other break with her cousins or grandparents, but at 3½... we'd not expected to get the chance so soon. So to make sure we were doing the right thing, we did a number of tests.

Test One: The Sleepover.

The girl had never spent the night away from us. She'd recently gotten to sleep for a sitter, so we knew it was possible. But we'd never tried. So, with her assent, she spent a night a friends house. It worked. She had dinner and went to bed and eventually got to sleep and woke up without freaking out. Score.

Test Two: The Flight.

After staying with the grandparents she has to get back home. Which means a 7 hour flight. Her grandmother was going to fly alone with her, and the girl had to be trusted to behave for the duration. In other words, not run up and down the aisle into first class like last time.

Not an issue, if her flight over is any basis. she spent the entire time engrossed in the entertainment system. Hours of Doctor McStuffins and various other children's shows. She had to be bribed to leave the seat and go to the loo. So this would not likely be a problem.

Test Three: The day with the grandparents

She's a lovely lass, but can be a handful if you're not expecting it. So we had to be sure the grandparents knew what they were getting into. On the first full day we were in the States, we got up early and left the girl with her grandparents while we spent the entire day shopping and seeing friends, with the plan of returning after she was asleep in bed. We had a lovely time. She had a lovely time. She was actually asleep when we got home.

With all those tests passed, we still had one final challenge

Test Four: The airline tickets

We had to change the girl's ticket to a new flight, and get her grandmother on the same flight, and get them linked so they could fly together. And agree on a day with the grandparents. Not trivial but also not a big deal. Except to save like £100 per person we went through one of those cheap ticket resellers. Over email, resellers told me they can make the change. Good. But then they say on the phone only the airline can do it since it involves the grandparent's ticket. The airline, on the other hand, says only the resellers can do it since we bought the ticket through them. Back and forth few times til we learned the grandparent had to buy the ticket less than 24 hours before the child ticket was changed. During the back and forth we had to cancel the grandmother's ticket just so we'd have another 24 hours to resolve it. Finally, after a bit of escalation, a manager at the resellers says Look, only the airline can do it. If you don't believe me, call them. Then call me back on a three-way-call and I'll talk to them with you and we'll sort it out together.

So I gave the airline another call. After being on hold for 30 min. I got through and they, as chipper as can be, said, Of course we can help you with that... huh, there's a funny grinding noise on the line. Is that teeth?

I do understand why they initially denied it. Even with things going smoothly it took another 45 minutes of changing flights, changing times, moving seats, breaking up bookings, regrouping bookings, and so on and so forth. Until finally, everything was in order. The seats were booked and all was set in stone for the girl to stay.

As we stayed there we all became more and more comfortable with her staying without us. At one point when she was sleeping in another room, she got up in the middle of the night and walked to the room sister-in-law was sleeping in, and crawled into bed in between her and her infant daughter, and went back to sleep. In the morning when we spoke to the girl she said I thought you went back to London. Given how blasé she was about it, we figured she'd be just fine.

Our flight back by ourselves is where it started to hit us. First time in ages going through security without the child and her accoutrements. It was pretty easy. And on the plane L and I had a row of 3 by ourselves. It was too uncomfortable to sleep, but I had the luxury to find out, which was nice in itself. And when we landed we could go through the e-passport queues, so that took no time at all getting out, getting baggage and getting home.

It's been weird not having her around the house. Part of it is reverting to how life was before, when L & I were just a couple. So weird in that it's completely not weird at all. Though I do like being able to make the food I like to eat without worrying about spices or avoiding certain foods. La la la, let's just put a quarter cup of chilli peppers in here. Oh crushed chillies, I missed you. Let's be friends again. For a little while.

Another part of of the weird is recovering from the exhaustion of the past 3.5 years. So far I've twice slept in 12 hour chunks. I once went to bed at 7am and still got some sleep afterwards.

And there's the part where we can finally do the things that we've been putting off, like moving heavy furniture. I've been able to clean and hoover the house, and use caustic chemicals without putting them away immediately. I've done two years worth of shredding. We've 5 full recycling bags with just shredded paper and boxes we no longer need.

L on the other hand is taking the opportunity to let her attention drift. I suppose not having a child around lets you just sit and vegetate. That plus a phone with games and internet means you're not there when you're there. I found earlier that in order to keep her attention for the full duration of a conversation, I had to phone her despite being in the next room.

We've been getting reports from the grandparents about how she's doing. The first week seemed fine, though it looks like she's starting to wear down and tire of all the uncertainty and how different everything is. We've been doing Skype calls every 2 or 3 days, It's been lovely seeing her. Especially when say says I miss you dad. She's so much more rational on the calls than when she's with us talking to her grandparents.

Anyways, she's back tomorrow. We'll just have to see how she comes with this change and all the rest that's in store in the next month.

Train of why

Last Friday L and I managed to get our first series of Why? questions from the little girl. We were taking a train and L was explaining where we were going and what we would do when we got there. The girl innocuously asked why? I don't think this is the first time she's asked why, but she certainly hasn't done it much. Without giving it much thought, L responded with a simple answer. So the girl asked why? again. And again, and again, I think 4 times total before L and I realised we hit a new milestone! So, we just stopped answering her and got on with transferring trains.

She's not really done this since then – possibly since we caught on to her. I've noticed her asking Why? once since then, but without the trailing refinement queries. But I do expect more and more of this as she get more comfortable with language.

Back again

I spent a fortnight without the family last month. L took the girl off to the States to help L's sister give birth. I stayed at home putting in exceptionally long days trying to get work done. All the while I learned a number of things.

• Wow. Sleep is nice. But when you're alone in bed, it's really quite slow to warm up. I took to sitting on the duvet an hour before bedtime so that I'd not have to sleep with a jumper on.
• Without anyone else here, I never spend any time in the kitchen/dining room beyond actually making food. With the family here, I spend good chunks of my day here (where I'm writing this now), eating meals, playing with the girl, etc, etc. Then maybe I didn't spend as much time here because L took the laptop with her.
• Cooking for myself is easy. I can use as much spice and salt as I want. Though I have lots of trouble judging what a portion size for one is. I think I overate alot.
• I gravitate to later hours. By the time the family came back, I was keeping EDT time rather than BST. Dinner at 11pm, bed by 5am. Which meant we were all jet lagged when they returned.
  We'd Skype once or twice a day, which is what led me switch time zones. Chatting with L after she ate dinner was usually around 3am or so my time. And chatting in the morning so I could see the girl was around 7am or so her time (on a good day when the girl didn't wake her at 6am when the sun came up in their curtainless room).

While they were away I was able to make the flat slightly more liveable. I replaced another 3 bulbs (we have lots of those GU10 halogen bulbs, most of which have blown out. We're slowly replacing them all with much more expensive LED ones. It seems that the only place I can find with decent bulbs is ordering then online on Amazon, but 1 in 5 are dodgy and have to be sent back. Sigh. So we're just lacking now on the dimmable bulbs, which are really expensive and often have a rather dodgy definition of what "dimmable" means) – I bought 4, but one was bad. But we've now got one more room which use tens of Watts instead of hundreds of Watts.

I tried to do some DIY, but I just did not have it in me to drill holes in our nice walls and counters. So I left that for L and just settled on cleaning the stuffs with all those noxious chemicals I don't like to use when the girl is around. That said, I didn't manage to clean and seal all the floors since, 1) no one likes a neighbour who hoovers at 10pm, and 2) to really clean all the floors, I'd have to move an awful a lot of very heavy furniture.

I even got to work on my physio – something I just can't seem to do with the girl around. My right arm has been some degree of dodgy for several months now. At least now it's not debilitating, but it's clear I've lot lost a lot of flexibility and buggered my posture a bit (I bend down a lot). At least my extensors pollicis longus have had a chance to heal. They take the brunt of the weight when I lift up the girl, and have been getting ouchier and ouchier over time.

When L and the girl came back, they flew into Heathrow. I took the tube down to meet them. Their plane was delayed a bit, and it took what felt like ages for them to get their luggage and come out. It was a surprisingly teary reunion. Well... on my part. The girl was just a bit confused and clung to her mum, and didn't really pay much attention to me. Not as exciting as I'd hoped, but I was far more choked up by the whole thing than I expected to be.

Since then the girl has been really clingy to her mum. It's harder to settle her, and I can barely put her to sleep at all. We've not had a single night where she's slept by herself the whole time. I think she's still getting over all the chaos of the past month, with all the new things she's been doing and places she's been staying. Well, we have a month at home before going anywhere else. Hopefully she'll get used to hanging out with me again. We've already had a few pleasant days out, and I've planned a few more. So, even if things are not the same, it'll still be fun.

By the way, their trip to the US was successful and I have a new niece (that I've only seen over Skype).

Holding hands

We spent a long weekend away on holiday, doing a good deal of travel by car. For the first time, the girl has been comfortable holding my hand. I don't mean sort of holding like grabbing onto a finger, or guiding while walking down a street, but actual hand holding – the idle sort you do when you're just being comfortable with someone's presence.

When in the car, I usually sat next to her in the back seat, with her in the car seat. Not always, but often enough the girl would sit quietly and hold my hand. It was the first time she'd done that. It was really sweet.

It was also the first time in ages I'd had time to just sit down and watch TV with L. We were staying with L's cousin. A few times after we'd put the girl to bed we'd plop down in the comfy chairs and watch something. The weird thing was holding L's hand. I didn't recognise it. It still fit, fingers interwoven, like it has for ages. It just somehow it didn't feel familiar. I mean, we must have held hands at some point since the girl was born. I'm fairly sure, at least. Maybe her hand has changed... I know mine are much drier these days – all the extra handwashing has taken a bit of a toll. Maybe that's what feels unusual. It's hard to tell. But regardless, it was nice to have those moments to just sit together.

L has taken the lass with her to visit the family in the States. I'm back here in London getting, what I hope will be, a lot of work done. And, with luck, give the house a decent tidy – the first real opportunity to clean it without the girl being around. Time to break out the noxiously fumed floor cleaners.

Green eyed monster

On saturday the girl met her first first cousin. He's my brother's tiny little 10-week-old son. She rarely sees children younger than herself and I don't think she's been around infants since she was one. So she didn't really know what to make of him.

We're currently visiting my parents, and my brother and family were also up for a couple of days. When we showed up we got to meet my nephew for the first time. The girl didn't quite know what to make of him. There was clearly a bit of jealousy when the wife or I held him. She did a bit of acting up and making disappointed ooooo noises with a scrunched up face. She's normally got a good disposition and has never been bothered by us holding other children before. So this was a bit unusual.

The girl tried being gentle to her cousin, but didn't seem to be entirely sure how. The poking in the eye and squeezing the head was not meant maliciously – as far as we could tell. I mean, she was about as gentle with him as she is with me when she tries to stroke the side of my face – i.e. not very. It usually ends up as slapping or scratching. Fortunately with a bit of supervision, she wasn't able to do any damage to her cousin.

She did kind of get used to him after a while. But she kept acting a bit strange the entire time – something that mostly stopped after they left.

Of course some of this could be attributed to being the 4^th time she had to change house during the trip, and the chaos was starting to get to her. I can imagine her thinking Wait… do we live here now? Do I have to live with him? Is this my brother? Is that how it happens? Can I still drink milk? What's going on?

We did try to explain everything to her, and we know she can understand much of what we tell her, but there's no way to know how much of the abstract We're going to visit my parents and your cousin will be there she can possibly understand. At least she's not freaking out when we leave her alone with people for a few hours. I suppose we've done this travel thing enough that she gets that we're not sizing her up for adoption, but just showing her off to new people.

My fantasy nappy bag

Nappy bags are troublesome. Off the shelf nappy bags always have some major failing and other bags always have something which makes them not quite right for the job. Part of the problem is we have unusual requirements which few manufacturers cater to. And even when we find something which is great, the girl gets older and requires something new to be carried around with us.

Most nappy bags look like a standard woman's over-the-sholder handbag. At this point I have so much RSI from parenting I'm not willing to carry anything of any decent weight on one shoulder for any length of time. So that style is right out.

There's a number of lines of nappy-bags-for-men, all of which look like courier bags. These take some weight off the shoulder, but distributes it right across the child – since she's sling-carried. So that's not an option either.

That pretty much leaves backpacks.

Fine, there's plenty of backpacks out there. Surely someone must make something that fits my needs? Well… so far it appears not.

So, what do I need?

• A compartment for food. Enough for 2 meals - just in case we're away for longer than expected, or she decides she's ravenous. Ideally this would be insulated so it'll stay cold/warm, but that just just a wild dream.
• An outside pocket for her water bottle. Or at least somewhere to store it where it won't leak on anything else.
• An outside pocket for an umbrella. We live in London. The only way to ensure it won't rain is to take an umbrella with us wherever we go.
• A compartment with enough room for a change of clothes in case of accidents. Plus some extra space for a jumper or coat and a few small toys or books. Even better would be enough room for a jumper for me, so I don't risk getting cold.
• We're ECing her, so we need a place for the portable toilet seat we have to carry about. And it's got to be in a separate compartment from the clothes and food. The compartment has to have enough room for her nappies.At his point we carry around 1 or 2 cloth nappies with covers, plus a couple of emergency disposable nappies, just in case. I can live with these being in the clothing section, but the "toilet" section needs enough room for them once they're used.
  For those unfamiliar with reusable nappies, used ones go into a wet bag, aka The Bag of Yuck, until I can get home and trasnfer them into the laundry pail. The "toilet" section has to have enough room for the wet bag filled with 2 nappies and an entire change of soiled clothes. However, as long as the change-of-clothes compartment gets smaller as the toilet compartment gets bigger, I'll be happy.
• It's got to have enough room for stuff I need with me. All I really need is enough space for some pills, lip-balm/moisturiser, a couple of cloth grocery bags¹ and, as I said before, a spare jumper. L probably would like a bit more space for her stuff since she doesn't usually have as many pockets as I do. This could go in the clothes section, but I'd rather not have to dig through baby socks and suchlike to find my ibuprofen.
• I don't need a changing mat. I can't remember the last time she had a miss outside the house that we needed to put her on a mat to resolve.

When she was an infant, we got by rather nicely with a Petunia Pickle Bottom bag. It could be a backpack or a shoulder bag. Plus it was tasteful – not too girly or too manly, and never looked awkward with what either of us were wearing. When all we had to worry about was changes of nappies and clothes it was great. But its one big section doesn't play nicely if you have toilet seat and clothes and nappies all together, leaving no room for food. We still use it when travelling since we only have disposable nappies then, which take up less room.

We've been mainly using an old laptop backpack for the past several months. It's got 3 sections, one of which is tiny. So we often end up putting the portable seat in the big compartment along with the food inside a thermos bag. Which takes up far more room than it should. It's passingly acceptable, but ends up packed to the gills almost all the time. And it'll only get worse as she'll need more food (and fewer changes of clothes, I hope) over the coming months.

Sooooo… that's a backpack with a minimum of 3 big compartments and 2 outside pockets. Plus, ideally another smaller compartment. Every time I go to a baby shop, I have a look at what bags are available. Some have some really great ideas, but so far nothing has worked. I've even toyed with the idea of getting her a small backpack to carry her food or clothes, and I carry the rest in my backpack. After all, her back does face out in the sling. But I can't see that working. So I'm still at a bit of a loss and kind of exploding around the edges.

¹ At this point it rarely occurs to me I can still go to a shop if I haven't brought my own bags. I usually just skip grocery shopping on the way home if I don't have a bag I can put them into.

Travel fever

I don't understand why the girl gets sick, usually with a fever, every single time we go on holiday. Except for that one trip we made when she was ten weeks old, she's come down with something every time we travel. It does not matter if we go by car or plane, stay in a house or a hotel. She always gets sick.

We live in London, so she's not wanting for constant exposure to strange germs. Could travelling have such an impact on her that it weakens her immune system?
I'd potentially blame it on travelling in winter and her dealing with the unexpected chill, but the same thing happened when we went to the beach in August. She eats mostly the same things on holiday. The only notable difference is that we put her in disposable nappies when travelling (rather than reusable cloth). That can't possibly make a difference, can it?

We're going to be in the States for 3 weeks at the end of the month. I'm dreading what sort of cold she'll come up with this time. Must stock up on baby ibuprofen.

Now we are flying again

We're now on the wee lass's second intercontinental trip. At 10 months she's far far more active than she was at 3 months. Which makes travel much harder. No downtime at all for us. I got maybe 10 min of sleep on the flight – all of which was on the runway.

The first experiment was taking the tube to Heathrow. We've been hiring cars to the airport so far. But that was getting expensive. At some point we had to try it, so we did. We took the bus to the Piccadilly line, and sat and sat and sat. Part of the experiment was travelling with no pram or car seat. I carried the girl in the Baby Bjorn, and L did the bulk of the heavy lifting of the two bags.

I have to say, OMG, that was a success. Everything was easier. Getting to the airport, walking around the airport, going through security, not checking the pram at the gate. Everything. Everything was easier. If I can get away with it, we're not air travelling with a pram again.

Rush hour was over when we got on, but the car was still pretty full. I headed toward an empty seat, but L forced a man sitting in the "give this up" seat to get up. My husband needs this seat. Perfectly in character for her, considering she did that when she was pregnant. But not truly necessary since there was an empty seat.

The car emptied out just past central London, and we had a long but uneventful trip. I listened to podcasts, while the baby slept and L played games on her phone. That was the last relaxing moment we had for a while.

Our plan was to go to Boston. L's family wanted to see us. We did the maths and it turns out to be cheaper to fly to DC and back for a few days, than the equivalent in hotel fees for everyone. So a month after getting the tickets to Boston we bought an internal flight from Boston to DC. We got the last flight of the day we could, with 2 1/2 hours for getting through passport control, customs, check in and so on.

Checking into a flight with a baby is hassle because you can't check in in advance. So we take our chances that we'll even sit next to each other (I bought my ticket separately), let alone get a "sky cot" for the lass. In between checking in and bag drop, I take the girl to the loo. The baby changing rooms at Heathrow do not work so well with EC. No toilet, just a changing mat, sink and very very full rubbish bins. Fortunately we brought the portable seat which acts as a loo in a pinch. Which, for the first time for me, she used. So with that success behind me, I head back to L, still in the queue, next to someone with an identical nappy bag – which was a bit of a surprise since ours was gift from my mum, bought in the US.

Airport security was soooo much easier without the pram. I just walked through with the baby still attached. Everything went off without a hitch, including lunch, boarding and so on. We even had the middle row of four seats to ourselves. The pilot came on to say we may be able to take off early too. But instead, we sat on the runway for an hour and a half while some engineering issue was being resolved. Eventually they told us to get off the plane, and get on a new one which would be ready in two hours. Our Boston to DC transfer was 2 1/2 hours. At this point we knew we'd be at least 3 1/2 hours late. Bugger.

I was very wary of taking Virgin again after they broke our pram on the last flight we took with them. We spoke to Virgin at the desk, who said Not our problem, you bought the other tickets separately. We spoke to US Air who said Sure, we'll change your flight to tomorrow, but it's up to Virgin to pay for your hotel. We spoke to Virgin on the phone, and they said It's up to the people at the desk, but they should give you a hotel voucher. We spoke to the travel insurance emergency line and they said It's after 5 (it was 5:07), call back on Monday. Can you at least tell me what, if anything, is covered? Nope. Call back Monday. Good luck. Back to the Virgin desk for us, No hotel for you, really. Full Stop. they tell us.

On, the bright side, on the way back to the desk there was a big queue, but it was moving at a moderate pace. So I took out the lass and walked her through the queue. It was going just fast enough for her to keep us. Her first queue!

So, we qet on the new plane in bit of a cranky mood. Adding to the annoyance was the fact that there were people sitting in the row next to us now. However, it wasn't such a bad thing – they were there for the other sky cot. They were travelling with an 11 month old girl. We did the usual introduction of the children, and giving their ages. This time after half a minute I remembered to add Oh, and I'm Bob and this is L.

I'm trying to hard to remember this part of introductions. Almost always I meet other parents and come away knowing their child's name, but almost never do we exchange adult names.

At one point the two little girls sat next to each other and tried holding hands (the best they could do is hold wrists) which was really cute. Another cute point was when L was holding our child on my left, and the other girl was on my right. I announced I'm surrounded by baby toes! to the amusement of the rest of the row.

Our girl just would not sleep in the sky cot. Every attempt L made to put her in would wake her up crying. So she eventually just held the sleeping girl in her arms. After a few hours I tried my luck. Success. Except ten minutes later when the other girl started crying which woke ours, crying.

In the end, L and I got maybe 20 minutes of sleep between us. The girl got about 4 hours. The toilets were just small enough that she couldn't wriggle too far, but large enough I could put her on the loo without raising the changing table. she loved the air jet. It distracted her and she played with it.

Passport control and customs were fast and easy to get through. We were out by 9:30 or so. We could have made the 2nd flight if we'd arrived a couple hours earlier. I was hoping the 2nd flight was delayed enough we'd make it, but no. It left on time.

We went up to the Virgin making-connections person just past customs, explained the situation, and he said, Ok, we'll get you a hotel, but you'll have to go to the US Air desk at Terminal B to sort out a replacement flight in the morning. Just sit here for a few minutes while I do the paperwork. Okaaaay. Why they couldn't do that in the first place is beyond me. But I'm not complaining. Literally. This saved me the effort of a huge scathing letter I was going to write to them about their drop in quality of customer service.

We went out to catch the shuttle to terminal B. No shuttle in sight. The sign said it was 0.3 miles, so we decided that since we still had the trolley for the luggage, and the girl was safely in the Baby Bjorn, we'd just walk it.

Bit of a mistake there. The airport is a big U shape. And the route through from E to B, walking inside the airport is not direct. Two notable things. First, there's the rocking chairs in terminal C. The other is the really nice baby changing facilities in terminal D. Enough room for both adults and the luggage. A huge bin which was easy to get waste into, and wasn't full (like in Heathrow), a good size changing table and a toilet, so we could EC the lass. Which was good, since she was ready to go by that point.

We finally got to terminal B, which was itself a big U shape – we had to trek through the car park to bypass the bulk of the walk. I was terrified that they'd be closed, but at the far end of the US Air area was one open desk with a live person. We wearily marched up to him and explained ourselves. He told us that when they built this airport, they must have done huge amounts of research on airport design so they could build the worst possible layout that could fit in the area. We certainly agreed. He also told us that the only reason he was still there is that there was a delayed flight to Buffalo still to come, and if it were on time, the desk would have been closed. Scary bit of luck for us.

He cheerfully and immediately put us on the next flight at 6am (ick) and were done. He told us how to get to the hotel and we were on our way. Via terminal A – so we'd walked through the entire airport by the time we were done.

The hotel is attached to the airport. We found ourselves suddenly in the conference centre in the hotel still pushing the luggage trolley we got when we picked up our bags. This did not work at all well on the carpet. So we cheekily abandoned it and went off in search of the lobby. On check-in we found we also had $100 of food vouchers. Which was good, since we were starving, and room service in the US is hideously over-priced. We got to our room at 10:57. L found the room service menu which said it ended at 11. A mad selection of food and a panicked attempt to figure out the room phone followed, but we got the order in on time.

They gave us a travel cot for the lass, but she did not take to it at all. We had to be up at 3:40, so cosleeping was the far better option than trying to convince the child to use the cot. We collapsed on the bed and were up again far too soon.

This time we took the shuttle to the airport. A quick check in and baggage check and we were off to the security queue. They saw the girl and sent us through the business-class queue, which was nice. I had to take off my shoes, but the baby could stay attached. They took me aside for a hand check, at which I joked, Whose hands? We have four of them before I panicked and realised you do not joke with airport security. But the woman laughed and passed me on to someone who brushed over my hands with a magical chemical-sensing wand. Whatever it checked for, I did not have, so all was well. I still wonder if that's standard with people carrying babies, or it was random? Were they checking for baby poop and sudocrem?

There were no baby changing rooms in terminal B, so we had to make do with L changing her in the ladies'.

The puddlejumper we got on to DC was small, but at least we sat next to each other. No sky cot. Not even a baby seatbelt. We just held on to the kid during takeoff and landing. We took turns walking the lass up and down the aisle during the flight, so she'd not get restless and maybe use up some of her energy. I passed person after person head down and asleep on their tray. One of the stewardesses was friendly and chatty, which helped keep me awake enough to survive the flight.

At the end, we landed early, breezed out of the airport and spent 1/2 an hour trying to get the car seat fitted in L's sister's car. The baby cried the whole car ride, and would only be settled by being sung French lullabies by L and her sister. She finally fell asleep two minutes from the house.

Turning into my father

Somehow I've managed to find myself on a plane, for work, 3 of the past 4 weeks. I had in mind, when the child came, I would work from home a day or so a week. Rarely travel. How did I find myself working from Europe far more often than I was expecting to work from home?

I'm travelling more often than I was 10 years ago, when I thought I was travelling loads – once week out of every 8 on average. And back then L was fully self-suffcient. And by that I mean I have made commitments by being a parent that she now has to pick up the shortfall for. Back then the only comittments were household chores and pleasant company – something that she could safely do on her own or live without.

My father spent a fair chunk of my very early years working from another city. I just remember him leaving for the week and coming back... on weekends maybe – it's hard to remember. I don't resent him for it, and I didn't resent him for it. I just did not want that for myself.

These things just sneak up on you.

It irks me that somehow I ended up on a path I did not want.

I came home last night after a 3 day trip and the wee one smiled and slowly crawled to me across the floor.

She wasn't doing that when I left.

Teeth and guilt

The nightmare in Germany of the incoming top teeth fever seems to be the worst of it. She's up to 5 teeth now, with a 6^th coming in any moment. These don't seem to be causing as much pain – she's clearly using them to chomp on fingers, and the occasional nipple. There's not as much fever, though she has been warm, and is the snotliest I've seen her. She's getting used to having her nose wiped without crying, though I have to say the snotsucker tube makes me sick just thinking about it. I've yet to come close to trying it. Or even watching while L uses it. I know I'm being a big baby and just need to get over it. But there's just this big squick factor I can't get over.

Speaking of big baby things... I had another business trip last week. Three days away this time, with a flight out at 7am monday morning.

I'm still sick from my trip last month (the one where the wee one got the fever). I felt utterly awful at 430 when I got up. I very nearly cancelled, but I went because I knew my only chance to get enough rest to beat the cold was being alone in a hotel. I still feel really guilty for leaving the wife alone to care for the child for 3 days alone. The 11 hours sleep I got Monday night alleviated the guilt a little, but I still feel wrong. Even worse is the fact that now that I'm back, the cold which was getting better is now getting worse. I can't blame the family. I mean, it's work's fault I have this bloody thing in the first place. And their new accidental policy of no working from home is certainly not helping (oops, we broke the VPN. We'll have it working for you again in at probably a fortnight). But, to be honest, I don't want to blame anyone. I just want to be able to walk up a flight of stairs without needing to cough out my lungs.

The business trip

Work has asked me to spend more time at our office in Germany. This is clearly not easily compatible with spending time with the wee one. So I hatched a plan I'll, go, but the family comes with me. They agreed. I decided that we'd just try it for a single week, to make sure this was remotely feasible.

To cut a long story short – I won't be doing this again.

The trip over was filled with annoyances, which I won't go into since none were related to the child. She only started being problematic when she started bawling in the rental car from just outside the airport for the next half hour on the autobahn. That and the car's transmission was buggered and try to rev out of control every ten minutes or so.

We escaped that death trap and arrived at the hotel to find that the room work booked for me was not actually a double. Why have someone do bookings for you if they screw it up? I'm competent enough to make my own mistakes – I don't need help getting a booking wrong.

The good part about cosleeping is that you don't need to worry about travel cots or anything of that nature. What you do need to worry about is the destination having a bed big enough for even two people. This hotel does not have the concept of beds bigger than a single. So we had to try our luck with the bed legs bound together to try to keep them from eating the child.

The first day worked out well. I went into the office and got useful stuff done. L stayed at the hotel with the child, away from household distractions and got things done herself. In theory, if things kept on like this the trip would have been fine.

That evening the wee one started feeling poorly. Dinner was awkward with her being quite fussy. We suspected a fever, but, due to a I thought it was already packed error, we had no way to check it. We ended up getting the hotel to call us a doctor.

Note to other new parents in the UK: Get yourself an EHIC card now. It takes 3 minutes to fill in the forms on the web site (or six if you have to fill it in from scratch after mistakenly filling in the child's details first) and will save you trouble in the end.

Doctors comes shortly after and tells us 3 things.

1. She's a very well-behaved baby (always good to have you baby professionally assessed as wonderful)
2. She does have a fever – alternate baby paracetemol and baby ibuprofen to keep it in check.
3. it's not meningitis or encephalitis or anything worrisome. It's all teething related. No need to be concerned unless she stops eating.

Good to know.

So we get very little sleep that night with a fussy pained baby. And we fill the prescription first thing the next morning.

She does not eat all day.

Well, not more than a few sips here and there. But she's clearly getting more and more dehydrated. Stuff comes out, but nothing really goes in. At 4 in the morning L and I finally start discussing the logistics of taking her to hospital.

She latches on for a full feed half an hour later.

She starts getting better and is fine by the next day. My ability to deal with humans continues to degrade. Work ends up with several heated conversations by the end of the week. I decide that while the comfort of having family makes the trip much more comfortable, the strain of having family makes the work much harder.

So no more bringing family with with on trips. Or at least not until the baby can promise to stay healthy the whole time.

Now we fly

Just over a month ago, we took the child on her first intercontinental plane trip. We went to see her grandparents, aunts and uncle in the US. Planning this journey was a lot of work. I've travelled a lot, so at this point I've got it down to an art. At least if it's just me, or just me and L. No need to plan how to get to the airport, or anything. Just set out on autopilot and don't think till we hit the destination.

This time we had to actually plan. In great detail. How do we feed and change her on the flight? How many changes of clothes do we need to bring? How many just for travelling. How do we get her and the pram to the airport with our luggage? Do we need the pram? How does security work? How do we carry her around the airport? How will she deal with the air pressure changes on takeoff and landing? What do we do if she fusses? How do we get from the airport at our destination? Our birth plan wasn't this complicated.

Or expensive. We ended up using minicabs for the London-side travel, and a rental car in the US.

The minicab picking us up at home arrived 45 minutes early since they wanted to fit in an extra fare that morning (or, as they said, traffic). We weren't done packing so all we could do was have them wait. We barely squeezed our luggage plus the folded pram in the car. So now we know how much we can take with us an fit in a reasonable sized minicab.

Rather than detailing the whole adventure, I'll just recount the interesting bits.

The wee one had about as much luggage for just herself as we did for both L and I combined. Or more for her, if you include the pram.

All the airport and airplane staff cooed over the child. Even UK immigration said awww. Only Dulles security were heartless and mean. More on that later.

We flew Virgin Atlantic, which had good parts and bad parts. The seating on the plane over was lovely. It was one of their newer planes. The "sky cot" was easy to get the kid into and out of. She even slept in it a little. We were sat next to the double-sized loo which had a good sized changing table. We had row of 5 to ourselves.

The real down side was Virgin breaking our pram. Two of the wheels just snapped off. They said they'd pay us back for the repairs, but I'm still following that up with them. Not at all impressed. Especially with their customer service: Here's all your paperwork, phone the number at the end to make the arrangements. When we got to our destination, only then did we notice there was no number in the paperwork. Or on the web site. Or anywhere. Not impressed.

They also appear to have a policy of taking 3 weeks to respond to any communication. This is not sarcasm. This is their actual policy.

Anyways, once we arrived, we got to spend some quality family time plus occasional visits to friends in the area. The little one behaved quite well through most of our social events. In fact, we benefited from her jet lag since she was not able to get to sleep at a reasonable time, instead of after midnight.

My first time alone together with the wife after the child was born was when we left her, with the mother-in-law and a bottle of breastmilk, while we went off to renew the wife's drivers license. Then shopping at Target.

Sounds romantic, doesn't it?

The worst trouble we had was car rides. The babe would sometimes just hate them. That was yet another thing which was the opposite of what we were led to believe. About 1/3 of all drives had her needing consolation at some point. Either I had to reach to the back seat and try to calm her down, or, I would just sit next to her for the duration of the drive.

We ended up not using the pram much at all – even after we got the replacement parts. It was car seat for the drive, then the sling at the other end. I did end up getting a number of amused my god, there's a baby in there when people noticed that the bump on my chest was a cute little tiny person rather than too many pies.

Flying back the UK was less pleasant than leaving the UK. Dulles has dropped in my opinion to a strip mall with airplanes. There are no changing tables at the airport. None. The family restrooms are just large restrooms with a single toilet and a sink. I had to change her on the floor. I still cannot believe it's that bad.

Security made things worse. They were nice and cooed over the babe up until the metal detectors. At that point they made us dismantle the pram, on top of all the various take off shoes, take out laptops, etc etc they usually make people do. Then when madly putting the pram and luggage back together, with just one shoe on between us, all while trying to keep the child calm, then they told us to vacate the secure area. Really. That actually happened.

I swear, if I didn't have to return to DC, that would be enough to convince me to just give up and never go there again. It's not that nice a place to warrant that sort of trouble. (Then again, arrival wasn't so bad, maybe next time I'll try leaving from another city)

The plane ride back to the UK was innocuous. The plane itself was not as new, so the facilities were less nice, but certainly passable. The cot did look like it was slept in more times than I care to imagine. This time Virgin didn't break any of our stuff, which was a bonus. Passport control was a breeze. There was sizeable queue, but they herded us to a new queue with no one ahead of us. We were stamped in by a officer in training, who clearly had not gone through her cynic training yet. She cooed the most of any public official yet over the child. That made for a nice welcome home.

I'm stopping the story here so I end on a high note

Now we have tooth

The little one's first tooth has started to peek through the gums today. This comes as rather a bit of a shock being that she's not even 4 months old and we're not supped to be getting those till 6 months.

She's been showing the classic signs of teething for almost a month now. Chewing on things. Especially my fingers. And. So. Much. Drooool. We thought this would last for a while, creeping up in intensity till teeth popped out. But no.

I worry most for L's breasts. I'm hoping the wee one shows some restraint and does not start chomping. I've heard too many stories of women giving up breast feeding after the first teeth came in. It's too soon to stop now, and there are downsides to having to bottlefeed her (like having to have bottles of milk at hand whenever you leave the house – breasts are so much easier to carry around with you).

L and the baby met me for lunch today. I've been offsite away from home for 2 days, so to make up for lost time, they came to see me in the office. To my surprise, L dressed her in an outfit I wore when I was about 5 months old. It fits her perfectly. Too perfectly – was I a small baby at 5 months? or is she large at 4?

It was all rather sweet. After work, when I got home I took out the camera and started taking pictures of her in poses I'd been photographed in as a baby. Cheesy, but I had to do it. I don't mind dressing her in the intense 70s fashions of my or L's clothes. After all, my hindbrain associates childhood and new parentness with 70s fashions. I have to actively try to seek out sane styles and colours for her to wear.

After all that, Life on Mars came up on the playlist. I joked with L about feeling like DCI Sam Tyler meeting his baby self in 1973. All the while, I swayed with the little girl in time to the music till she slowly dropped off to sleep by the end of the song.

Lovely.

First time away

Work has picked up in intensity. This does not play well with spending time with the wee one. L is home all day with her while I work, and I tend to only see her nights and weekends.

So I'm on my first work trip since the child was born. I told them I would not travel until September. So they asked if I could travel on September first. I, of course considered this taking the piss. I ended up convincing people to come to London.

A few weeks later and I can no longer avoid it. So off to scandanavia for 3 (well, 2.5) nights away. I'm away for as short a time as I could get (they wanted another 2 days).I prepared by making an absolutely huge curry. It barely fit into the pot. I hoped it would feed L for at least a couple of dinners (she went out for din with friends one night).

That's all I could do to provide any help at all for L while I was gone. It just felt mean leaving her alone to care for the child. I'm not sure if there's anything I could do beyond finding a nanny to come in – and I doubt L would want that.

I've gotten used to being without L while on trips. Between SMS, email, VOIP and skype video being away is about as painless as it can be. But that doesn't work with the baby. I can't cuddle or change her remotely. The best I can do is watch her over skype (we set up an account for her). It helps, but, of course the hotel was having internet problems. So I got a few minutes of watching her (nice)before it just got a bit awkard.

I'm back home tonight. L has come down with something. So the annoyance of taking care of a baby alone is now the annoyance of taking care of a baby while under the weather. We have her immunisations tomorrow. So I'm going to try to take her myself so L can get a bit of rest. Which means doing early morning conference calls beforehand, then heading into work in the afternoon.

Sometimes I feel I have to take care of one baby during the day, and another (more cuddly one) at night.

Birth story, part 2

Saturday, 30 July, noonish. We arrive back home after the being checked out at UCLH. We decide to take things easy and just sit at home watching movies all day.

After a bit of hemming and hawing we decide to bail on the 1:30 meeting of the NCT group. It was at a nearby pub, so we could easily get there – and it would be better than sitting an waiting for the other baby shoe to drop. But quiet and at home won out – mostly due to the fact that all but one couple had emailed saying they couldn't make it. We found out later that one couple had just given birth a few hours previously, just didn't have time to send apologies in advance. Which made me quite glad we decided to stay at home.

The wife was starting to feel unidentified twinges. She had no idea if they were contractions or not. She just kind of guessed they must be since what other uterine twinges are you likely to get the day your water breaks? To be safe, we attached the TENS machine. It's supposed to not work if you start too late, so starting early felt like the best way to go. We put on My Big Fat Greek Wedding and had a light lunch. It's not a great film. But it's a fun film, and a mindless film. We tend to watch it when we need an amusing distraction from the world.

The wife started contractions around 1:30 pm. 5 minutes apart, no pain at all. At the time it wasn't clear if that means the TENS works or the contractions weren't real yet. At this point we were pretty sure that these were not fake Braxton-Hicks but that the baby was coming that day.

When the movie was over we debated if we had time to watch another full length movie, or stick to something shorter in case we're interrupted. We decide on something shorter. She has her first real contraction at 3. At that point it occurs to me then that this is real and we can actually handle this.

The wife phones UCH again. They say to sit tight. At home.

So we sit down to watch the episode of V with the birth of the alien baby hybrid. It nicely set the mood. Over the course of the show, the contractions got stronger, but not too bad and not regular. By the time the show is over we're both having a hard time focussing on it – her with the pain, and me with the concern. When it ends, around 4:30, we give up watching things and just concentrate on the contractions. They're irregularly every 3 minutes or so, but skip every now and again, and are strong enough the wife tells me to note that they're strong. The wife phones UCH and tells them this. They focus on the skip every now and again instead of the every 3 minutes which we found to be the important part. They say to not come in yet.

It's getting awkward calling her "the wife" all the time. I'll switch to "L" from here on out.

Eventually I remember we have music for this. We made a Labour playlist. I start to get out the iPod to play it, but L just says we're going to hospital. Now.

So at 5:00 I start calling UCH to tell them we're coming in. No answer. Over and over again. For 15 minutes (FFS). I can't call both a taxi and the hospital at the same time. Ok, technically I can since we have more than one phone, but I can't focus enough to do it. So I keep trying to call the hospital – especially to let them know to get the birthing pool ready. And while it's ringing I use L's phone SMS some nearby friends and ask if they could give us a lift.

They're just about to head out to a party, so they're happy to stop and get us on the way. At 5:30 we're in the car and on our way. L is in the front seat still timing contractions and making smalltalk. I keep saying potentially unhelpful things like don't go anywhere near Arsenal. Around now contractions are coming every 2-3 minutes and lasting about a minute. Still, L keeps up polite conversation, and stops bothering counting contractions. I am impressed. Later she tells me what is wrong with the contraction timer app she was using and what a good one needs to do. If anyone wants a collaborator for writing one, I can put you in touch.

We get to UCH just before 6, pile out of the car with our 3 bags, and say very brief thanks and goodbyes. We head up to the birthing centre on the 3rd floor. Fortunately we've been there before and can easily find it. Unusually, the lift is there, so there's no where's the sodding lift panic.

Since I was never able to get through to them, the midwives are not ready for us. L sits in reception having contractions while I give them the pregnancy notes and our birth plan. They say thanks though I clearly see that they don't actually read out birth plan – they just file it in with the notes. They start cleaning a room for us, and take L to another room to wait.

To be continued...

The birth story. Part 1

Saturday, 30 July, 5:30 in the morning. I woke up to go to the loo. I came back to find the wife was awake. Both of us could not sleep. The baby was wriggling a bit. The wife played games on her PDA while I tried to get back to sleep. Eventually we both dozed off.

8:30 exactly. The wife taps me on the shoulder twice. Annoyed, I thought This better be important.

My waters just broke

Oh

And, to myself, I thought damn, I was enjoying that sleep, I guess I should get up. I mean, it's not like she was having contractions – water can break at any time, but we should probably do something about it.

So, after a bit more harsh wakeup, we get up. I check the heartbeat – it's just fine, and she's definitely still moving. Now that water is going the wife's belly is all solid. Which is an interesting change from its previous fullness. She asks me to check the colour of the water. To which, in my colourblindness, I respond I am not going to be able to differentiate a subtle green tint. Use your magic colour vision to tell.

After a bit more blather, we eventually call birth centre. There's a nice person on the other end who had a calming effect on us. She redirected us to the foetal assessment unit (MFAU). They are not nearly as friendly. They start out by asking if I'm calling from within the hospital. No, I'm at home. I was transferred on the phone to you (from someone who seemed to have more of a clue, to my annoyance). They don't want to speak to me, they'll only speak to the wife. I say fine, and in a great relief, hand her the phone, saying she'll only talk to you and walk off, relieved that I don't have to deal with that call.

I go off to put the dishes in the dishwasher. I don't want to come home after a week to moulding dishes. I finish as the wife gets off the phone. They say come in for a speculum exam. Leave the bags at home and just come in, she tells me. But without any contractions to go along with it, I figure we have 92 hours max, 48 most likely. So we will see the baby soon. There's no need to rush now. I wonder if we have time to make the NCT meet at the pub later.

Our roles seem to have reversed. The wife is panicking and worried about foetal distress. I'm calm and don't see anything untextbookish or worth worrying about. The heartbeat is solid. She's moving a bit less – but there's so little room for the wee one to move around in. I suppose the foetal assessment unit put some panic in the wife by implying she was out of the midwives' hands and now only fit for the labour ward. I figure it must be the clueless person on the other end of the line confusing the matter. Water breaking is hardly a birth complication.

So at 9:30 it's not-very-rushed breakfast of smoothies for everyone. I bathe, since this could be my last time for days. The wife doesn't since she thinks she's guaranteed to get messier from here on out.

We pack an ipod, camera and the pregnancy notes. Neither of us have any cash, so no taxi for us. So we take the bus which miraculously comes soon. We transfer to the tube at Finsbury Park. It looks like it'll be an Arsenal game later, so it could be very hard to get home afterwards. I push that to the back of my mind for later.

On the tube there are plenty of seats, but the wife makes a man move out of the priority seat anyway. I giggle. I'm guessing it'll be her last chance to do this and it gives her some sense of control. This, of course, was violated by london transport inspectors accosting her and demanding to see her card on the way out of the station. Bloody twats. She's clearly very pregnant and exiting the tube at a big maternity hospital. The these two London Transport idiots surround her, stopping her from going anywhere and don't let her say more than Do we have to do this now — before cutting her off and demanding ID. Really uncalled for and certainly did not help her mood.

After that unwarranted attack from London Transport, we make our way to the UCLH MFAU. When we arrive there just after 10am, there's no one there. A nice very pregnant woman sitting in the waiting room lets us in. People with appointments start showing up, and we let them in. Eventually some staff show up just as we started regretting not making pancakes for brekky.

We're finally seen at just before 11. The midwife is very friendly and bubbly. Thankfully – our mood had been slowly darkening since that fist phone call at 9. The midwife spent most of the time chuckling. Everything is fine. The waters are clear, her blood pressure is fine. She decided there was no point checking dilation or anything since it's just a question of waiting for contractions to start. We're now at 80% chance of a spontaneous labour in the next 7-10 days. She asked us to come back Sunday morning (the next day) after the morning shift change at 9ish. They'll check the state of the baby, and if there's no strong need to induce, they'll start the wife on antibiotics (since once the waters break the risk of infection goes up) – though the midwife was rather keen on inductions. After that morning I had not intention of putting any effort into making it there on time. I figured if we did need to go back, we'd have a proper leisurely breakfast first.

So out we go, and back home on the tube. We stop on the way to pick up some cash so we can get a cab next time.

Seeing the family

One more trip to go before the baby. Well – one more that I know about, these things can sneak up on you. After we hit 35 week I am staying by the wife's side until the kid is safely born and our lives are relatively stable. We're just coming up on week 34, which means she is considered fully at term and able to pop in as little as 3 weeks!

So this last trip was a cousin's wedding in Boston. It was neat to see all the relatives again. All the cousins of around my age and generation that were there had kids, barring the couple who just got married. So there was a mass of children about. It's been quite a while since I've been around so many children at the same time. Running, playing, melting down, etc etc. It's not as scary as it would have been if I weren't planning to breed. I think I can deal with it.

Some highlights: one young cousin I thought had a fair resemblance to my brother as a wee youngster. I showed the photo to my brother and he said the resemblance is closer to me. So I suppose my brother and I must have looked similar as kids. Also, I paid special attention to my two baby cousins that were 2½ years old. They were soooo different. One was a rambunctious tall blond lass who could not sit still. The other was small(er) dark and quiet. I’m guessing mine will be somewhere on the spectrum between the two.

I went to the wedding alone since the wife is too pregnant to be covered by insurance when flying. And with America being the most costly healthcare country in the world we decided to play it safe and stay home. Then work told me You have to go to Boston for a week. Can it be at the end of May? Sure, go ahead. How could I say no?

While in Boston I looked for toys to bring back for the soon-to-be baby. Small snuggly toys were my preference. I went into one shop and picked up a cuddly looking bear and read the tags to see what ages they recommend it for. It didn't say anything about ages, but it did say which web browsers it was compatible with. That was the moment I gave up and stopped looking for toys.

Note to child — If you're reading this in a few years and have no cuddly toys, now you know why.

Otherwise, the pregnancy is going well. The wee one has been squirming and moving in new and, to be honest, quite odd ways. Very quick and rhythmic – not the slow stretches and shifting I'm used to. Which reminds me, I should read to her some more, I don't want her to forget my voice.