Two-ish weeks to go...or possibly two days, who knows??

I feel kinda ginormous these days.  Although apparently not everyone thinks so, since the same people who told me I was "finally looking pregnant" are now exclaiming "oh, there's NO WAY you're due in two weeks, you're not big enough!" - so basically I can't win on that front and I'm just doing a lot of smiling and changing the subject.

Obviously still not sleeping incredibly well, or I wouldn't be blogging in the 6 AM hour on a Sunday.  Yeeps.  We went to baby class yesterday (both infant CPR and "all about baby," where they teach you very basic things like how to keep your newborn alive when you bring him home from the hospital) and learned that newborn sleep patterns are apparently established by the 36 week mark of pregnancy.  So when I feel Holden doing baby jazzercise and throwing dance parties, that's what we should expect when he's here for reals...theoretically.  That's scary.

Physically...doing ok, just low on energy.  And low on space for meals - Holden's taking up some room in there.  Although maybe not quite enough room - the doc thinks he might be a little on the small side (which she guesses at just by squeezing around and feeling him - not quite an exact science), so we're doing a sonogram on Wednesday to check on his size and growth and general condition of things in his own little personal biodome.  And my hips are killing me - side sleeping? Body stretching out and doing weird things to prepare for this whole birth business?  Yeeps again.

Milkshakes are delicious.  And so are soapapillas at Chuy's.  I'm kinda liking just going for it here in the last couple weeks...

Oh, and happy Mother's Day to all the mommies out there!!  I'm secretly hoping Craig will do something sweet for me today...but am also managing expectations.  He's big into logic and technicalities, and since Holden is still hanging out in utero, in Craig's eyes I probably don't qualify as a real mom yet.  We'll see what happens...but for now I might try to go back to sleep as a present to myself.

Science rocks

A couple of weekends ago I met up with the gals (before heading into work, of course!) for a delicious brunch followed by a couple of educational hours at the new-ish Perot Museum of Nature and Science - free member tickets courtesy of Kami's work connections, what what!  I was more than happy to be one of her honored guests since I have a nerdy love for all things museum.  Seriously, Smithsonianity (which I never quite tackled, but that was still a LOT of museums).

oh, hello downtown!

We watched this really cool building go from the ground all the way up during our Pdub days, and the sloped lines and crazy escalator encased in glass stuck to the side of the building were really kinda fascinating.  So I've been looking forward to actually checking out the inside of this thing for a while now.  Some highlights for you!

Just a small reality check on where we are.  You know, perspective and all.

Giant sea turtle attack from above!!

Seriously?!?  When??  Do they crawl into our mouths at night?  GROSS.

Heart rhythms, yeeps!

Crazy veins, super yeeps!

Come on, kid, you really think you can outrun a cheetah?  No way.

It was such a cool museum!  There are so many interactive exhibits, and a lot of the displays in dino land were North Texas specific - crazy that this alllllll used to be underwater. Pretty awesome way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Crazy cool building filled with super awesome sciencey stuff

Shopping at its finest

I believe shopping can often best be done from the comfort of your own home in your pjs.  Which really wasn't a viable option all that long ago.  Can you remember a world where Amazon wouldn't bring your every last whim to your doorstep?  I mean, Amazon - it's kinda like Wal-Mart, only about a thousand times more awesome.  It has EVERYTHING.  I've also become addicted Etsy for things like adorable cards (I ♥ paper products!) and custom-made earrings and other cutesy things.  Clothes can still be a little iffy, but I love Shabby Apple and ModCloth and the usual suspects in the form of Old Navy/Gap/Banana Republic and Loft/Ann Taylor.

Online shopping also serves me well on those occasions when I'm shopping for someone else and might not ever actually visit the kind of physical store that sells things like King Ranch caps.  That one's for you, Dad.  And NOW they send me catalogues, of course.  When's the last time anyone actually ordered something from a catalogue??  I'm talking filling out the form and mailing it in kind of thing.  Does anyone do that now?

I kinda love having coffee delivered to my home.  And I don't allow myself to actually go in Sephora for fear of spending triple digit amounts on things I don't need that won't miraculously cure my skin of all that ails it.  And I found great shoes to walk around Spain in...but NOT in a store.  These didn't exist in any store in the D.C. metro area.  Trust me, I tried.

You know what I've purchased online in the last week?  Well, no, you don't.  But I'm going to share it anyway:

• Essential makeup supplies from Sephora, including a Clinique eyeliner I've recently fallen in love with.
• Custom holiday cards from Snapfish - I used one of my pictures from last year's Snowmaggedon adventures.  Pretty excited about them.
• Tickets via Groupon for my sissy and I to see Paula Deen at the Metropolitan Cooking and Entertaining Show this weekend.  Excited to see my sissy AND to hang out with the Queen of Butter.
• Replacement rubber foot for my laptop from Amazon.
• A gift to be delivered as my substitute for not actually being able to attend something since I live halfway across the country from the something. 

Power to the interwebs!  And yes, I have my credit card number...actually, two credit card numbers...memorized.  Maybe I do a little toooo much online shopping.

Time keeps on ticking away

Monday night.  Monday nights are not exceptionally exciting in any particular way.  It's time to recover from the shock that you, once again, must face the fact that another weekend is over and work must happen.  This time of year, there's not even Monday Night Football to soothe your pain.  Or even "Dancing with the Stars" or "How I Met Your Mother" (and just when is this mother going to show up?!?  I'm losing patience).  Yes, I often turn to mindless television at night.  It's a nice escape mechanism.

So what do you do in order to jazz up a Monday night?  Find a new TV show...or take a tour of the U.S. Naval Observatory.  Granted, this may not sound very exciting, but it's definitely a step above re-runs.  And besides...I have a fascination, some might even say an obsession, with organization and scheduling out my entire life day.  Mom even says my first word was "clock," which frightens me a little bit - hard consonants, really?  Probably scared her, too.  So, what better place for me to visit than where they keep official time?  Fascinating!!

This is one of those random "hey, you should do this in D.C.!" things I discovered, and about three months ago I submitted my name for a tour.  Three months.  There are apparently a lot of people out there just as fascinated with clocks as I am.  I mean, when you're promised "a presentation of the mission and history of the Naval Observatory, a view of USNO's timekeeping responsibilities with a presentation/explanation of the Master Clock System, and (weather permitting) viewing of celestial objects with the 12-inch Alvan Clark refractor with an astronomer," and they only happen on Monday nights, then I guess you get a backlog of nerds people really interested in this kind of thing.

Stephanie and I met up after work last week to embark on this DC adventure, and after being mildly admonished by security from walking straight up the driveway instead of through the scary pedestrian gate, we proceeded to make it through the rest of our security checkpoints without incident.  We then spent a little too much time in a room with thirty-five other people while our fearless leader proceeded to tell us pretty much everything you'd ever want to know about how time has been kept (remarkably precisely, I might add) over the years while waiting for the sun to set so we could see cool things through the super-old telescope (built in 1892!).

I could go into a fantastically long diatribe on time right now, but I'll refrain - the much cooler part of the night was looking through the telescope.  Just know that the USNO Master Clock (currently a system of dozens of independently operating cesium atomic clocks and a dozen hydrogen maser clocks) ensures that the USNO time scale's rate does not change by more than about 100 picoseconds (0.0000000001 seconds!!) per day.

Fortunately, the weather was cooperating (exceptionally well, actually - it was freakishly cool after about a few too many steamy days that felt like August AND the sky was clear!  woohoo!), so we made our way over to the crazy-old, super-cool telescope and saw Venus and Saturn.  Rings, moons, everything.  Sciencetastic!

Stephanie checking out Venus

Apparently I was on the "Al Observatory Tour" - nice work, thumb

It's the government - of course they take this tour business very seriously

After some quality telescope time, we shifted over to the other end of the building to check out another crazy-old telescope and pay a visit to the James Melville Gilliss Library, home to a smorgasbord of old and impressive stuff )other than just old and impressive books and journals), including a selection of clocks, engravings, globes, and an adorable fountain in the middle that helped serve as temperature/humidity control back in the days before good ol' central air.  We saw a copy of Newton's Arithmetica Universalis, flipped through the 2010 Nautical Almanac, and got a quick lesson in how to use a sextant (you know, in case any of us end up lost at sea but just happen to have this handy device around).

After a little bit of science overload, we thanked our guides for the evening and headed toward the gate...and were nearly attacked by a deer.  Ok, perhaps a little dramatic, but seeing as how the USNO is surrounded by forest and it was dark on the walk back, the smallish deer that made a brief scamper in the general direction of the path was enough to provoke a couple of girlish squeals and gasps.  Little touches o' nature, right here in the city.  With the telescopes.  And the time ball that drops at noon.  And oodles of atomic clocks, enabling us to use things like GPS.  Science is cool.