Oh what a difference 20 weeks makes

20 weeks ago your Mom was 11 weeks pregnant. And my what a difference 20 weeks can make.

20 weeks ago it was mid August and very nice temperatures outside. Everyone was comfortable. Your Mom was hot. Today it is early January and we are in the middle of the coldest winter streak Dallas has had for a long time. The high today was 30 degrees. Everyone is freezing. Your Mom is finally comfortable. Temperature-wise.



20 weeks ago your Mom reported raging cravings. Now I can report of your Mom's raving rages! Well, they're not really rages, but due to hormones, she can't really seem to help being easily agitated and, therefore, snapping at anyone who annoys her. This is not good for me, as the "A" in "Aaron" (the second one) actually stands for "annoying." But, seriously, sometimes there is no logic to her snapping. For instance, while we were driving to the doctor for this morning's appointment at 9 am, I decided to chime in with Boston (playing on the radio) and hit the high note in "More than a Feeling." This was interpreted by your Mother as "yelling in the car," and I was told that it was far to early for such behavior. Talk about irrational hormonal anger!

20 weeks ago your Mom and I were shivering in our (metaphorical) boots. We were uninformed, mostly scared about how to care for a baby and what kind of parents we'd be. Today we're shivering in our (real) boots (or at least I am, your mother seems to think that 20 degrees is the new 50 (see above)), but we're only kinda scared now. In fact, we're mostly ready for you to come out and meet us!

20 weeks ago your Mom could see her feet. Today, well, you get the picture.
20 weeks ago your nursery was a dining room. Today the old dining room is almost a nursery, the old record stand between the windows is a dining room, the old unused space by the front door is now where the record player stays, the old coat closet is a bass closet, the old bass closet is a nursery closet and the old nook under the stairs is a coat closet. And we're not even closet cases yet.

And in less than 6 weeks, now, you could be born!

If you Can't Stand the Heat...

You know that old saying. Oh wait, you don't? Because people aren't born with knowledge of colloquialisms? Okay. Well, the old saying goes "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen."

Well, look who's still in the kitchen:

Look, winter is fast approaching, and I'm starting to get cold. Sometimes I need to turn the heat on in the house or the car, but your Mother protests.

Why does she protest? Because her hormones have thrown her entire body's thermometer out of whack and at any given moment, especially the given moments when I'm freezing cold, she feels like she is on the surface of the sun.

Now, it's not just my word against hers as far as the temperature is concerned. At work, when everyone is freezing, your Mom is, again, burning up.

One could get pretty comfortable calling your Mom the "Human Torch," and attributing this newofound warmth to some sort of pregnancy super power.

But, as luck would have it, when it's actually warm, your Mom is freezing- which just goes to show you that this whole pregnancy hormone thing makes absolutely no sense at all. Her body is a glitching. If it were a PC, I would hit CTRL+ALT+Del and reboot the system.

But no such luck. Instead of that, I get to endure such fun things as:

+ Waking up in the middle of the night burning up because SOMEONE has pushed all of their covers on top of me, so I'm, in effect, sleeping under two sheets and two comforters.

+ Turn off the heat in the house or car when my fingers are blue.

+ Walk around with my nose running because it must be kept at the temperature of a meat locker in our home.

Now, it's not all bad, though. One cold morning, driving to a Doctor's Appointment, I was really cold. So I did my norm, and cranked the heat all the way to the end of the dial.

About 3 minutes later, your Mom exclaimed: "What are you trying to do? Smoke me out?" And she turned the heat back down to a compromise level of tepid warmth.

But my hands were still cold.

So, we used her super powered heat hands and my mere mortal susceptability to the elements to solve our mutual problems. By clasping hands, her warm mits heated my frozen fingers. In return my frigid digits cooled her hot hands.

The only problem was that no one was holding the steering wheel. So maybe that wasn't a good idea.

This trick also works for cold hands giving soothing hot foot rubs and hot hands warming a cold headachy noggin. This trick does no favors in cold hands touching the belly though. I have to wear mittens or rub my hands together to warm them up before I can do that!

As winter comes and Dallas gets colder and colder, though, I know your Mom is going to be a hot commodity, literally. We can keep warm together; and maybe I'll be able to roast a few marshmallows over her head.

So even though your Mom can't stand the heat, and I can't stand the cold, we're both staying in the proverbial kitchen because, well, to continue the cooking metaphor, we've got a bun in the oven!