What's saved on the DVR at the Beck household?

I know. It's sad. Very very sad.

The "man police" should kick my door down and smack me over the head with the remote.

I remember being so excited the day we got our first DVR a few years back. It was the perfect invention. Pausing live TV. Fast forwarding through commercials. Timeshifting. And, of course, never - ever - having to watch TLC's What Not To Wear again.

The DVR was one of those rare devices that profoundly impacted the way we lived our lives. And we found it hard to imagine how we ever lived without it. I loved my DVR. And it loved me.

How then, did the perfect man-gadget get reduced to the timeshifting equivalent of "What to expect when you're expecting?" (Guys, sorry, that's the 1,000 page book that takes you week by glorious week through the different stages of your wife's pregnancy. She will love this book. And she will want you to love it too. Love the book! Diet, medication, flu shots, cat ownership, false labor, vitamin supplements, cramps, poopy diapers, ultrasound, breastfeeding...it's all in there. And it's completely unavoidable.)

Anyway, over the years I had become an expert at monitoring "the list." I never let it fall below the 75% threshold of man-appropriate shows. Sure, every now and again a few episodes of “Grey’s Anatomy” (or "Grey's" as we sometimes call it) would start to stack up....but I would quickly recalibrate (delete) as necessary. And if Rhea ever asked, "What happened to last Thursday's episode of Grey's Anatomy?" I would simply look confused and say, "Honey, I'm pretty sure you watched that one the other night. You remember, the doctors were wearing scrubs..... and Dr. McDreamy looked cute.... and then he did some stuff that upset Meredith....and then she started to whine about her life.... Remember sweetie? You must have deleted it. "

The point is, that, by and large, there were significantly more shows about motorcycles, surviving in the wilderness, and sports than there were about weddings, makeovers, or babies. And it was good.

But somewhere along the way I took my eye off the ball. Maybe it was the purple haze of pending fatherhood bearing down on me. Or perhaps it was the Irish Car Bombs with the guys after work. I don't know. But before I knew it, our entire list was made up of shows about baby showers, birthing centers, and pre-natal yoga. And the worst part about it is that I didn't even know this was happening. And now I'm worried that my wife is spiraling out of control. She's addicted. She's binging on baby shows. And I'm not sure how to stop it...

A Public Body

Yesterday, I was at my desk in the middle of an important phone call with one of our company's long term consultants. I was hunkered down in front of my computer, with the work scowl (you know the one) plastered all over my face.

Our company accountant walked in and signaled that he needed to talk to me, so of course I put the caller on hold and gave him my attention. " You know," he said gravely, "you're not supposed to be eating canned tuna."

HUH?!

Last week, I visited one of my mom's work friends. As soon as I walked in the door, she began to unzip my winter coat and move aside my scarf. "What's going on?" I asked, confused and a tiny bit alarmed.

" I want to see your belly!" she demanded, not stopping the strange striptease.

I am assured that this behavior is only likely to get worse.

We live in a culture that worships the ideal of personal space. Scot and I, I must admit, are among its chief proponents. We observe the unspoken rules about distance between customers at the ATM. We'd rather stand than squeeze into the last seat on the train. We sit as close to the aisle as we can in movie theaters, never next to people if we can avoid it. We let restaurant patrons dine in peace rather than rubbing elbows at the last available, badly placed table. Most importantly, we are actively, fiercely disdainful of those who fail to observe the rules.

Ever since I became belly-icious, the rules don't apply anymore. It turns out that when a woman is pregnant, whatever her personal disposition, she should happily consent to be poked and prodded by those who don't know her well enough to know how much she hates it. She should smile as mere acquaintances rub her belly and touch her face while remarking at her "glow". They fail to see that in my case at least, this isn't glowing, it's glowering.

I do not belong to myself anymore. My very body now belongs in the public sphere. I am progenitor, rub me for luck. I can no longer be trusted to make good food choices, a 54 year old childless part time accountant must oversee what I eat.

Friends counsel patience. But I worry that I will snap.

After all, I think she can hear me and I don't want her to think that mommy is a loose cannon.

Except... it ain't all bad. Scot and I were at the Clinique counter the other day, and the saleswoman was, typically, very interested in my belly. I smiled till it hurt. Then, on the way out of the store, I opened my shopping bag and realized she had slipped me at least $50 worth of free stuff. Good stuff, including my favorite, expensive lipstick- full size tube at that. I showed off my bounty, pleased as punch.

"See", Scot laughed, "that's what you get for being nice."

Bump in 3D!

We had our second ultrasound a little over a week ago.

This one was the anatomy scan where they measure everything. Heart, kidneys, bladder, stomach, brain, spine, and sex organs.

Everything's looking really good.

They did a quick 3D scan for us. It's actually way too soon to get a real look at the bump....but you can see her little hands and some of the face. The doctor had a hard time getting a clear shot of the face because she was pretty active in there.

For those of you who have been keeping track of the trials and tribulations with our Doctor, Yoda, he's been fired. More to come on that in the next day or two.

Scot vs the Snoogle

Now, it's important to mention how much I adore my husband. Even though we'd been dating for more than five years before we tied the knot, I still think he's the bee's knees. When I see him dressed up, or down for that matter, I still say to myself- "Damn, girl"

This is a man who makes me dinner almost every night and all I have to do is set the table. Yes, ladies.

He fills his pockets with ginger candy because he knows how much I like them. Uh huh.

On the weekend, he says things like " Why don't you take a nap while I clean up?"

Let the church say Amen!

I would say more about what runs through my mind when I think about him, but my parents and my in-laws are going to be reading this, so I'll just make my point by saying how happy my husband makes me.

Scot is a good man.

Then, my tummy started growing. I woke up with sore muscles from my back being misaligned during sleep and I spent nights tossing, turning and waking up even more cranky than usual. I began making noises about getting a pregnancy pillow; he looked skpetical and darkly remarked that it would be like having a third person in the bed. (Again for the sake of the parents, I'll omit the obvious aside.)

In the end I was sad and because he is primordially programmed to fix any displeasure of mine, we found ourselves late one Friday night at the Babies R Us. We brought home a five pound ivory bundle of joy and I eagerly laid it out on the bed, under the covers. I got in and snoogled up against it, sighing with pleasure as it worked its magic on my neck, back, knees and ankles.
The next morning, cooing with delight, I suddenly realized Scot had been right.

The Snoogle was a bad idea.

Frankly, there's no way he can compete. The Snoogle is on demand bed-time cuddle. It never gets too hot in the middle of the night, or needs to change positions, or has to worry because it needs a drink of water and doesn't want to risk waking a tired pregnant woman by easing out of the cuddle. No! The Snoogle is all cuddle all the time. It is perfection, and that creates a powerful, insurgent thought- That there could be something, in some capacity, better than Scot; he is not infallible.

This was a mutinous thought, and I had to keep it at bay. But I couldn't help it. Every night I literally enfold myself around the Snoogle, pull the blankets over my chin, shiver with pleasure gasp!, turn my back to my husband. Very slippery slope, indeed. I felt powerless to stop it, torn between the two. How was I to choose? I couldn't imagine ever going back to the plain rectangular pillow, after the discovery of this treasure, and my wonderful soul mate had the inconvenient habit of occasionally needing to move during the night. Perhaps I could have them both.

Last week as I embarked on my night-time ritual with glee. Scot looked over at me, and said unblinkingly, with an eye to all at stake- " Just so you know, I'm throwing that thing out the window the day you have this baby." And with his own smile and sigh of pleasure closed his eyes and went to sleep.