Hairbrained Schemes

This is a big week for us. Only 3 more days until our big ultrasound, which will give us lots of information about Peppermint, including whether Pepps is blue and white striped or pink and white striped. Honestly, I am a nervous wreck. I really just want to have a healthy baby-- I want the untarnished pleasure of seeing Peppermint dance around the screen with all his or her baby parts in place.

Latest developments include being asked my a virtual stranger if I am pregnant. I was stunned. I felt like saying, "How could you tell? Is it my lustrous hair or my radiant glow?" I am pretty sure it had something to do with my belly and my new style of wearing a super long maternity shirt and a matching long sweater. My new outfits scream MATERNITY, so it's not hard to pick up on it. Shopping for maternity clothes is like trying to shop in an alternate universe. Even at a place I have been shopping for decades, like the Gap. First of all, you have to go to a "flagship" store to find maternity clothes. Then, the maternity section is on the basement floor, back in a corner based the baby and toddler clothes. It's disorienting to shop in a section next to onsies that won't even fit on my feet. The clothes that they market to women are feminine, but somewhat infantile and frilly. There are lots of bows and sashes and feminine prints. I don't know what to make of it, exactly. It's not like I want to run around looking like some hot sex pot, but the bows...the soft feminine colors... the sheer dearth of choices. It's just disorienting, that's all I am saying.

Then, there is boutique shopping. That's just a whole other world itself. I saw a tank top at a boutique that said, "Due in July," and it was totally precious and cute and totally $68.00. I applaud my own restraint and decided I would buy some Hanes men's wifebeaters and get out the be-dazzler to make my own damn shirt. I'll use the money I save to get a prenatal massage.

Speaking of style, I am having a strong and possibly self-destructive urge to get a new hairstyle. I am not talking "take a few inches off the bottom to clean it up," I am taking new color, new length, new shape, new me. I suddenly am thinking that now is the perfect time to get a little pixie cut, which makes perfect sense: as my body expands, why not make my head look even more like a pea sitting on top of a rugged mountain. Last night I saw that Katie Couric has chopped her hair off, and I assume her higher ratings can be attributed to her new do. But, then again, remember what happened to Felicity when Kerri Russell cut her hair? There was a backlash that culminated in the show's cancellation. Before I swore off pregnancy books, I read that this desire to have a drastic hair transformation is actually common. From what I recall, the author of the book BEGGED women not to do anything drastic to their hair. I hate that my obsessions are so unoriginal. I may do it though. The good news is that Jeff just got a new camera-- a big fancy kind with a lens that weighs about 75 pounds-- so if I do something stupid we can document it thoroughly to remind me next time to stick with what I got.