It’s a GIRL!

The ultrasound technician froze the screen, put up an arrow pointing to what looked like a lot of nothing, and (sure enough!) typed out: G-I-R-L.

We were both totally flabbergasted for, like, two minutes. But before they had even wiped the ultrasound jelly off my (now decidedly bulbous) belly, we were both just beaming, and I already couldn’t possibly picture us with anything else. How on earth had we ever thought it might be a boy?

I am already in love with the word “daughter.”

In other exciting news, the fact that this baby is a girl definitely means I’m clairvoyant.

Like everyone else, I often have dreams about things I’ve never encountered. I remember the dreams, but I never think much of them. However, there have been many, many times in my life when I’ll be somewhere I’ve never been, or meeting a new person, or having a particular conversation, and it will all be exactly as it was in a dream I had, usually several weeks before.

Anyway, I have only had two dreams about this baby, but both were very vivid, and in both, the baby was a girl. I could see her face in perfect detail, and she had a name and everything. I kind of dismissed the dreams, because I always assumed we would have a boy first … but obviously, I shouldn’t have. I fully expect that, when I meet my daughter, she will look (and the situation will feel) exactly as it did in my dream.

Rob, of course, insists that my dreams are just that uncanny feeling of déjà vu, but I think this baby gender news clinches what I have always known to be true:

I have special powers.

After the ultrasound, Rob commented on how neat it was when the lady typed out the word “girl” for us. ”Wasn’t that crazy? G-R-I-L-E  …” he started, and then, looking confused and shaking his head, continued: ” … wait. Le grill? What the hell is that?!”

Click here to view the embedded video.

Other choice comments include the following:

Rob: “At least she didn’t type out ‘monster.’ If I was the vet tech, I would totally type out ‘monster’ every time.”

Rob: “I can’t believe its a girl!”
Amanda: “I know! What should we name her?”
Rob: “Well … I like the name Amanda.”
Amanda: “Yeah, but you don’t really name a girl after yourself.”
Rob: “We could be trendsetters! Amanda Junior. We’ll call her AJ.”
Amanda: “I don’t know.”
Rob: “How about Rhinocerous?”

Rob continues to say the most delightful (and absurd) things in anticipation of our baby’s arrival.

Rob: “So, after you have the baby, you’ll be, like, a cow, for awhile.”
Me: “Uhhhm. You mean fat?”
Rob: “No, like udders.”

Rob: “I wonder if my baby will be able to make lemonade.”
Me: “What?!?”
Rob: “I don’t know. It’s refreshing.”

Rob: “I’ve got a business idea: headphones that you put right on the woman’s belly, so the baby has the best possible listening experience.”
Amanda: “Um, OK.”
Rob: “Like a Walkman for your stomach. The Stalkman.”
Amanda: “How about Fetus Phones?”
Rob: “How about The Womba?”

Rob: “Is Yoda an acceptable name for humans these days?”

Rob: “Does the baby need a passport?”
Amanda: “Yes.”
Rob: “OK, but we are going to have to get one at the hospital. In case we have to flee.”

Rob: “What’s the baby’s address?”
Amanda: “Well, it would be here.”
Rob (stating, not asking, as if he has already answered his own question): “So, you wouldn’t have to specify ‘womb.’”

Rob: “Would you be surprised if the baby was born and I wasn’t the father?”
Me: “Yes, particularly because I didn’t have sex with anyone else.”
Rob: “What if you had God’s baby? Would you be surprised then?”
Amanda: “Yes. We had sex when I was ovulating.”
Rob: “OK. But if it comes out black, I’m going to assume it was God.”

Rob, in a rare moment of tenderness, while gently patting my belly and talking to the baby: “Hi baby. What are you doing in there? Are you sleeping? Everything is going to be okay. I love you baby. It’s going to be a wonderful world for you to live in.” Rob pauses, and just about as I am about to start crying, he adds: “You will never have to wait for the iPhone to come out.”

I am beyond excited for next Tuesday. Not only is it Election Day and the day Starbucks starts giving out their red cups of cheer (I know this for a fact; Rob asked his barista), but it is also the day we have our “big ultrasound” and can find out if Human Newman is a boy or a girl!

Turns out, Wyoming does agree with me. It was the best trip of our life. Better, even, than our honeymoon, we decided.

That may have had at least something to do with the fact that we know with certainty that our days of relaxing vacations and time for just the two of us are numbered. In fact, our days number 172 as of the time of this posting.

Now incubating Human Newman, expected March 21, 2011.

It was very difficult to blog over the summer, having found out on July 12 that I am pregnant but not being able to say anything about it until, oh, just recently.

I have a lot of stories built up. A LOT. Mostly centering on the absurd things Rob has been saying in anticipation of this baby, and mostly when we are in bed and I am about to fall asleep. Consequently, I’ve forgotten a lot of it, although some statements have been just too hilarious to forget. Lucky for you, I’ve started keeping a notebook by the side of my bed. Next to the Saltines and a copy of What To Expect When You’re Expecting.

A quick sampling, just to get us warmed up:

Amanda (poking still barely visible baby belly): “Look at my belly! I think its growing.”
Rob: “I know! You are a big fat whale!”
Amanda: “No. You aren’t supposed to say that.”
Rob (completely innocent): “Oh. I’m not?”

Rob: “How soon can babies walk? Two months?”
Amanda: “No, like a YEAR.”
Rob: “A year? No way. Our baby is going to have to learn how to walk before that. Get it together!”
Amanda: “Good luck with that.”
Rob: “How long before he can play touch football?”
Amanda: “Like, at least seven years, Rob.”
Rob: “I don’t know about this baby thing.”

Amanda: “Oooh, do I get a pushing present?”
Rob: “I guess so! What do you want? A purse? Something with diamonds? An iTunes gift card? A new car?”
Amanda: “What? How are those things remotely in the same category?”
Rob: “Oooh, I know what you need. A bayonet.”
Amanda (pauses): ” …. A bayonet?”
Rob (longer pause): ” … Wait. What’s a bassinet?”
Amanda: “Something you stick on the end of your rifle so you can skewer your baby.”
Rob: “I think what the baby really needs is a subwoofer in the living room.”

Rob: “I was picturing our baby today, and I accidentally pictured him as something that could fly.”

Coming soon: Lots more where that came from. Also, my thoughts on pregnancy, how we got into this mess in the first place, the end of life as we know it, and some absolutely classic reactions from family and friends.

I promise.

As I was tidying up the other day, I was horrified to discover that the cello Rob rented me for Christmas has actually, literally been collecting dust.

I learned to play the cello as a kid. Not Suzuki or anything serious — just orchestra class in school, and a few private lessons as I got older. I was something like fourth or fifth chair in the high school orchestra. Out of eight. I wanted to be better, of course, but it was never my top priority. I had a lot of other things going on.

I just liked playing the cello. I liked the deep, mellow tone. I liked putting rosin on my bow. I liked being part of an orchestra, playing beautiful, classical, important-seeming pieces I had never heard before.

Since I met Rob, I have spoken with great fondness about the cello, which I haven’t been able to play since high school, since I never actually owned an instrument. So, finally (and undoubtedly with designs on adding a little rock cello to the band), he rented one for me for Christmas.

It was one of the most thoughtful gifts I have ever gotten. And now, one of the most guilt-inducing.

I’ve had a whole arsenal of excuses: It’s my busy season for work. It’s too loud to play in the house without disrupting the entire building. I don’t have rosin. I need music. I need lessons.

The real problem: I tried playing it. And. I. Suck.

Sure, some of it came flying back to me. I was pleasantly surprised at my muscle memory, how easy it was to finger the right notes with my left hand. But something about the bowing is just horrendous. The sqwuaking! The moaning! It sounds like an elderly cow trying to pass a kidney stone right here in my living room.

Molly DOES NOT LIKE IT.

I don’t remember it ever sounding this bad. I don’t remember it ever being this hard.

So, most days, the cello just stares at me, reminding me that, like so many things in my life, I am willing to try for about fifteen minutes, and when I discover that I’m not the best at it, I flat out give up. Then, I plummet into an existential crisis about how horrible I am at everything. And then, even worse, once I have given up and sent the cello back, I sit around marveling that I ever gave it up in the first place, and wishing that I had tried harder  to be better or at least to have enjoyed it while I still had the opportunity.

This could literally be the great metaphor of my life. It occurs to me just how absurd that is. If I only had a month to live, would I spend it trying to re-learn the cello? And if I did, would I be so mad at myself for not being very good?

Before I cut off monthly rental payments, this cello deserves another chance. I deserve another chance. I am going to try again to play the cello, if for nothing more than the adventure of working on something that does not come very easily to me, and for the opportunity to try to laugh at how horrible I am at it.

And then, I’m going to assess whether or not trying to play the cello really brings me happiness, or if it’s just something I’m doing because I feel like I should be doing it, and, worse, if doing it not very well is just making me feel bad about myself.

And if, in the end, I give it up, I’m not going to be mad at myself for that, either. I’m going to be proud of myself for recognizing that there are many adventures in life, but you can’t have them all at once. And how lucky am I to be able to choose more than one? Or choose at all?

Or something like that. There’s a fine line between being a quitter and being good to yourself.

In the meantime, the least I can do is take some photos of the damn thing for posterity. Photography is another one of those hobbies of mine that I don’t put enough effort into, for fear of failure and for the sheer disappointment of not being good at it right off the bat.

Are other people that much more patient with new or difficult things than I am? Or do they just not have to work as hard to get great results? That is not meant as a rhetorical question. Sincerely, dear universe, I ask of you: Am I trying too hard, or not hard enough?

Nine years ago on this day, twelve college students in central Illinois crammed a week’s worth of luggage and themselves into two too-small minivans. Bound for the East Coast and armed with little more than a pitch pipe and our voices, we were a college a cappella group on spring break tour, at the ready to sing for our suppers and crash on dorm room floors.

Traditional spring break destinations be damned! Who needs sun and sex in Fort Lauderdale when you’ve got freezing New England rain and a sleeping bag? With tens of fans turning out for your shows? This was a cappella, baby! Our rendition of Billy Joel’s “For The Longest Time” never sounded so good.

We departed at sundown, immediately after midterm exams, and drove through the night, the sun rising on us somewhere in eastern Pennsylvania with hundreds more miles to go. Somewhere in between, as I listened to the mix tape he made for me, Rob reached over and took my hand for the very first time.

Then we made out a little in the back seat.

Like oh so many great romances that stand the test of time, ours got started super classy.

These first few warmer days in March will always remind me of what it first felt like to really fall in love, and to be loved in return. It made me a different person. I remember those days as the happiest time of my life, and yet, nine years later, every new day together is still better than the last.

Happy anniversary to the one who finds my particular flavor of crazy not just tolerable but actually (sometimes) (maybe?) endearing. You still make me feel like being a better person, even though I’m too lazy to actually do anything about it.

And yes, even though we’re married now, you still “get credit for all the dating years.” All nine of them!

This photo was taken the day after we got back from that spring break tour. We are such babies! Look how fresh and unlined our faces are! And check out my crunchy hair, super sexy going-out top, and chipmunk cheeks. It’s such a wonder that Rob was the only guy who was after me.

Oh yeah, that bathroom remodel.

It hasn’t been going well. Or going at all, that is.

Back in September, when work was slow and I was feeling all project-y, I decided more or less on a whim to paint the bathroom cabinets. The cabinets were fine, really — I just didn’t like the color of the stain on the oak. But apparently, my brain operates according to this adage: If it ain’t broke, break it.

The paint job didn’t turn out so hot. So I ended up taking down all the cabinet doors and drawer fronts and stripping and sanding them. This was a messy project, and because I was reluctant to use the stripping solvent anywhere near our newly installed hardwood floors, and because by now it was November and too cold to move the project outside, I ended up taking everything to my dad’s garage, where there is a floor nobody cares about, an installed furnace (not just a space heater — an actual furnace), an arsenal of tools and supplies, an utterly absurd collection of posters (seriously, that link is worth clicking!), and, most importantly, my dear old Dad himself, who I knew would take over the project in his usual, busybody, project-loving way.

As expected, Dad took to scraping and sanding and staining my cabinets with far more TLC than I would ever have been able to muster. I was there to take photos, which, you know, is just oh so helpful.

A conversation:

Dad: “Hey, do you want an iced coffee?”
Amanda: “Uhm, wha!?!?”
Dad: “An iced coffee.”
Amanda: “Are you seriously offering me an iced coffee? In your garage? Who are you?”
Dad: “Mom bought these Starbucks things at Costco. They’re in the fridge.”
Amanda: “You mean a frappuccino? Since when do you like frappuccinos?”
Dad: “Well, do you want one or not?”
Amanda: “Actually, yes. I’ll get them.”
Dad: “I’ll take mine in a glass with ice. With whiskey.”
Amanda: “OK, this is making a lot more sense now.”

Unfortunately, the project gods were not smiling on us that day. I had brought over the same sanding sealer and stain that I used to refinish my desk. Which, may I remind you, turned out fine. But the cabinets just didn’t want any part of it, and the sanding sealer, which is supposed to help the stain absorb evenly, ended up repelling the stain altogether, so that it didn’t soak in to the wood. At all.

We even double-checked the label to make sure we had used the sanding sealer as instructed. We double-checked it real good.

And yet. The stain rubbed right off.

So, I got frustrated and went home, leaving my Dad to have another go-round with the cabinets and the paint stripper. At least one of us was still in good spirits.

Then it was Christmas, and we had invited 50 people to cram into our tiny condo for our annual party. Which meant, inevitably, people would be trying to use our bathroom, where there were still no cabinet drawer fronts.

I suggested that this was a thoughtful gesture on our part as hosts: our guests could relieve themselves in peace, without grappling with the moral dilemma of respecting our privacy versus poking around in our medicine cabinets. It would all be right out there, for everyone to see.

Rob disagreed with this philosophy, so we ended up closing the door and posting a sign that said “OUT OF ORDER: Please use the other bathroom. Thanks!”

(But, people still used it. And they inevitably got an unobstructed eyeful of our collection of tampons and toilet paper and expired condoms and, wait, is that really a MacBook Pro? In fact, rumor has it that one couple went into the Forbidden Bathroom to make out, which is by far the most exciting thing to ever happen in that room, despite what the presence of outdated prophylactics and that computer might suggest. So don’t think I don’t know who you are!)

Suddenly, it’s February. The cabinets, still unwilling to absorb the stain because of that damn stain sealer, are essentially garbage. I’ve looked in to ordering new, unfinished cabinet doors, which would only cost about $200, but I don’t know that my dad or I have it in us to stain them, let alone deal with the frustration when inevitably the cabinets are not the right size and we have to start all over. Again.

I’ve got a guy who will order new cabinet fronts for us, stain them, and even create a new toe kick panel (which was also ruined, and I’m using the passive voice there for a reason!), for $700. That’s highway robbery, given that I know for a fact the doors themselves cost under $200.

But there’s that other adage: You get what you pay for. Which really is a better adage to live by than “If it ain’t broke, break it.”

I have learned the hard way that I do not have a Midas touch. On the contrary, everything I touch turns to crap. At least, as far as household projects are concerned. Have I mentioned the stain on my desk is rubbing off? Just rubbing right off.

(I assure you that, in person, it doesn’t look nice and/or rustic, as it does in this photo. That’s just the f/1.4 talking.)

I need to accept that I am really good at spending money, and not so hot at saving money by doing it myself (see also: Waffle FAIL). Bring on the self-loathing.

My sister gave Rob a waffle maker for Christmas, after hearing him gush about how he was once at a Courtyard Marriott and they made him a waffle at the complimentary breakfast buffet right before his very eyes and it was just the most amazing thing that had ever happened to him in his whole entire life.

I’ve never seen the guy so excited about an appliance, except maybe when he opened the Roomba we got for our wedding.

Rob had to go out of town on an intellectual property emergency over his birthday, but he was home for the weekend, a few days later. I decided to give him a birthday do-over on Saturday morning, so I woke up early to make him coffee, bacon, and, yes, a birthday waffle.

Sadly, trophy wives do not come programmed to use specialty kitchen appliances, so although the waffle iron itself came with several recipes for waffle batter, I thought nothing of instead using the fancy Williams-Sonoma pancake mix I had on hand (sitting in the cabinet for months while I instead went out to innumerable breakfasts).

However. Pancake mix is apparently incompatible with waffle makers. Do regular people really know these things without first encountering this disaster?

Rob woke up to the smell of bacon cooking in the microwave (where all the fat and other inherent values are absorbed into paper towels), took one look at this mess, and proclaimed:

“Good thing I had a birthday waffle at the hotel this weekend.”

Chicago, IL (October 31, 2009) — For the first time in more than ten years, the legendary band Recollection has reunited under a new name — Guy Incognito — to christen Amp Rock Lounge in what some are hailing as the band’s werewolf bar mitzvah.

“Get it? Werewolf bar mitzvah?” said Amanda Newman, band manager and wife of keyboard player Rob Newman. Newman also masterminded the Groucho Marx glasses as a Halloween costume for the band.

“Whatever,” she said, rolling her eyes. “I suggested ‘Kosher Delight,’ but they just had to be ‘Guy Incognito.’”

For more than two hours on Saturday night, Guy Incognito delighted a drunken audience of dozens with their awkward jubilee and self-aware swagger.

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, they’re so good,” said fan club president Ben Ferguson, whose wife, Abbie, wore a shirt with band members’ faces strategically situated atop her breasts. “I want to have their babies,” he added.

Once hailed for their electrifying live performances on the North Shore coffee house circuit and exclusive rehearsals in their drummer’s mom’s basement, Guy Incognito has spent the past decade cultivating their introspective pop sound. That is, they haven’t been doing much of anything for a long, long time.

[Caption: Drummer Scott Hinden's mom has a really sweet basement.]

Despite this hiatus — this period of “going incognito,” if you will — Guy Incognito continues to be one of the most influential bands in the lives of their little sisters, girlfriends, and would-be girlfriends, who know who they are.

Guy Incognito is the reunion of front man Barry Horwitz with his longtime collaborators and BFFs Rob Newman on keyboards and Scott Hinden on drums. The trio, then known as Recollection, first released an album in 1998 that featured photos of them at a suburban train station posing pensively while wearing denim jeans and sport coats and carrying single red roses. I mean, if that doesn’t make you swoon, then you’re just an animal.

In the past year, the band added bass player Matt Wechsler, primarily for his ability to grow his own ’stache.

“They hadn’t had much luck with keeping new bass players,” Amanda Newman said of Wecshler. “This time, they kept it in the Tribe. Sure enough, Matt stuck around, and next thing you know, the band was back and better than ever.”

“He’s hairy, just like us,” added Horwitz, whose own arm hair actually looked like crazy rocker tattoos that night. (See first photo, above.)

[Caption: Horwitz gets nice and sweaty, too -- just like Steven Tyler.]

Though not actually a member of the band, legendary rocker Steven Tyler of Aerosmith, pictured above, made a cameo. Unfortunately, due to technical difficulties, no one could really hear his voice very well.

“It’s too bad the balance was off,” said Kenny G, father of band manager Newman. ”I couldn’t hear Rob enough,” he added, placing his beer hand territorially on Newman’s keyboard. “I really, really love Rob. Have you seen that smile? It’s like the Kennedys!”

Kenny G later noted with some excitement that Newman wasn’t even wearing his wedding ring.

“I was afraid my ring would catch during a really intense glissando and I’d break a key,” Newman later explained. Newman’s signature is his athletic manner of playing the piano as if it were a drum set, including a lot of banging and foot stomping and often leading to cracked, bleeding fingernails. “Why, is Amanda pissed?” he asked.

Uncharacteristically, Newman’s wife did not fly into a jealous rage, although she was quick to indicate that, back in the day, the would-be girlfriends of the band then known as Recollection would routinely give her “the stink eye” when she showed up for gigs.

“They can have him,” she said. “He’s out of his mind. I mean, have you seen this guy? He’s dressed up as a Newsie, and not even for Halloween,” she said, referencing the 1992 cult classic film, Newsies.

Newman had no comment on her own ensemble, which was described by audience members as “showy” and “obnoxious,” though it remained unclear as to whether they were talking about the costume or Newman herself.

“I mean, she showed up with her parents in a white stretch limo,” said one audience member, who declined to give her name but was dressed up as what appeared to be a rose. “That’s a bit over the top.”

Newman, after claiming her parents ordered the limo without trying to be ironic, quickly added, “But, I mean, it went really great with my outfit, don’t you think?”

But no amount of sequins or Aquanet or electric blue tights could upstage the musicians of Guy Incognito that evening, who performed at their signature high intensity. Even the bartenders took note.

“I just wandered into this place after grabbing some pizza next door,” said some drunk guy dressed like Big Bird, “and the bartender is all, ‘Did you see Guy Incognito play? They totally rocked.’

“And I was all, ‘Guy Incognito’ — who’s that?’”

Indeed.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The above footage was selected for publication specifically because it is Kenny G’s favorite song, and because it best illustrates Newman’s “foot-stompin’” style that his grandpa (who numbers among the six or seven who actually read this blog) loves so very much. More videos, in larger format, here.

For a complete photo gallery of the evening’s events, look at the pictures on the right. Or, oh, OK, I’ll make a link.

My constant need for a home improvement project has officially gotten out of hand.

My inspiration (source: Restoration Hardware)

I swear I decided to do this almost on a whim. I mean, I ran it by Rob, but just barely. In fact, he kind of imploded about it last night when he came home, but fortunately for our marriage, it looks like its going to turn out OK.

Of course, this essentially necessitates painting the walls. Probably like the picture, though I’ve picked out a bit more of a greenish shade. And, while I’ve had a can of white semi-gloss open, I’ve been touching up the trim around the house. Because, I mean, why not.

Oh yeah, and this nightstand, too.

And then tomorrow, my neighbor and I are going to the mothership Home Depot to pick out some flower bulbs and shrubs to plant in the front yard. I got a quote from a landscaper, but of course we know that we can do it better ourselves, and for free. (She works from home, too.)

I definitely do not have time for this.

I definitely missed my calling as a manual laborer.

Even Molly thinks I’m nuts.

Last night at the park, another dog peed on Molly. I didn’t see it happening, but suddenly this guy was looking around nervously, tearing up grass and putting it on Molly’s leg. Next thing you know, he’s long gone and my dog’s trotting around with neon yellow splattered on her hind legs. Completely unfazed, of course.

I threw my back out earlier this week — bending down to turn off the fan that Rob and I cannot sleep without — which puts me out of commission for yoga for a good week. Bathing the dog — inevitably a leaning, heaving, sopping, sloshing endeavor — is out of the question.

Most people would go to their husband for this kind of thing — but that’s out of the question, too. I am, after all, a single dog mom.

So I was left with no alternative but to give her a sponge bath, to try to sanitize the, erm, pee spots. I used water and rubbing alcohol, so I wouldn’t have to worry about rinsing.

Molly was not a happy camper.

Click here to view the embedded video.