now with actual content!

usually, my weekends consist of one day which seems to last forever & one day which goes by far too fast, then i end up back at work on monday morning wondering just where the heck the weekend went. this was not one of those weekends. this weekend was chock full of all the awesomeness i could handle!
because i want to rant about something, i’ll conserve narrative keystrokes by just listing the awesomeness for now:
– my new couch (yeah, i know, but it deserves mention again. and again. and again.)
– meeting up with the boy after work friday night and wandering around downtown until i got a blister
– waking up early saturday and being able to drive all around the north shore running errands
– finding new throw cushions, curtains (for half price!) and a side table to match my tv stand (for cheap on craigslist!)
– seeing Hawksley Workman perform outside the VAG for free & dancing. in public!
– putting out all my xmas decorations & really feeling the spirit of the season
– seeing meghan, having her love her birthday presents & making plans for a big day out
– getting my adorable coat fixed and my awesome new pants shortened
pretty much everything about this weekend was fantastic. i’m crazy joyful today and i feel like i would run around hugging everyone if i don’t control myself. my humour is so good today, even my boss’ craptastic mood and forgetting my cell phone at home aren’t getting me down.
this wednesday, christopher is going to become an uncle for the ninth time (tenth, if you count his great-niece). how do we know the baby will be born on wednesday? well, his sister-in-law is going to have her labour induced. this seems to happen a lot these days. i know my friend rick’s wife was induced so that he and his first-born son would share a birthday. i understand it makes it very convenient to know exactly when and where your baby will be born, with none of that embarrassing “oops! my water broke” messiness while out shopping or visiting a friend for tea, but it seems to me that it kind of goes against nature’s design. you’re supposed to let the baby incubate for as long as it needs, not say “hey, i’m sick of being pregnant” or choosing a designer birthdate for your offspring for whatever reason seems necessary. babies should be born when they’re ready to, not at the whim of your particular lifestyle.
this also goes with women choosing to give birth via cezarian section when it’s not completely necessary for the survival of the mother or child. i know it may sound really callow, but i think there’s a reason women were built to squeeze out their babies: it’s a test of the infant’s hardiness. if they could survive that first, stressful experience, then they were more likely to survive life. personally, i’ve never thought that passing a bowling ball with shoulders through my vagina was an activity i wanted to particpate in, but i like to believe that sharing that particular kind of trauma with your baby bonds you in a very special way that having a surgeon opening and closing your abdomen like a ziploc bag can’t.
don’t get me wrong, i don’t begrudge inducements or c-sections in cases where either the mother or child’s health or life is at risk. i’d also be a hypocrite if i spoke against medical intervention during childbirth seeing that if it wasn’t for a quick-acting doctor either, or both, my mother and i might have died on that monday in july thirty-four years ago. i just think that it’s kind of odd to opt for the easy path when it comes to bringing your child into the world. it’s not easy to raise them and nurture them into being healthy, happy, productive adults, why would you start their life with a shortcut? it just seems like you’re starting them off on the wrong foot.
update: it’s been several hours since i wrote the above. my boss’s craptastic mood got to me. grr. i’m going to go put my earphones in and file. maybe that will make things better.