[Looking at our dinner as Burcu began to have stronger contractions] 

“So this is what I’ll be pooping on my doctor tonight.  Hope they like baked ziti.” 

[Trying to get Juniper to breastfeed] 

“It’s like trying to get a gay man interested in your boobs.” 

[Watching Juniper smile as she sleeps] 

B: “Look, I think she’s dreaming.”

A: “I wonder what babies even dream about.”

B: “Murder.”

What’s a Turkism? Find out here.

“If I were a lawyer, I’d sue the English language.” -Burcu

My wife has surpassed her 36th week of pregnancy, which pretty much means that should the Shrub choose to exit, she can.  But first, she’ll have to realize that the exit is not through the belly button, which the actions of the past couple months would suggest this is a fact she is unaware of.

Being fully immersed in preparation as part of the Official Countdown to Go-Time, we utilized the weekend to get all the little things in place – baby clothes washed, hospital bag packed, and batteries for the myriad (and sometimes diabolical) devices designed with the purpose of distracting and/or entertaining our child in the months to come.

While I’m a big sucker for anything that has multicolored flashing lights (Oh Sweet Heaven, the lights!  The glorious, glorious lights and their blinking!) and digital synthetic music (Muzak Mozart) or nature sounds (Chirp on, robo-cricket!), one item in particular may be my all-time favorite: a “music center” that attaches to the corner of our bassinet.  Why, you ask?  Simple.

Not only does this “music center” play tunes and sounds at an auditory-assaulting volume (it is kind enough to offer three sound levels: OFF, SHRIEKING BANSHEE, and PRISON-GRADE EAR SODOMY), it plays, of all things, what I am almost certain is the Saudi Arabian national anthem.  [Note: Upon further analysis into Middle Eastern national anthems, I believe the tune more closely resembles a jauntier interpretation of Yemen's national anthem.]  The song that follows it immediately conjures up images of mistreated bears on tricycles in shadowy tents with depressing, low-wattage lighting and vodka fumes on the wind.

And the “nature” sounds!  Oh, the idyllic return to Eden that these sounds capture!  Thanks to one of the options, I’m certain I have a fairly good idea of what it would sound like to drown.  Violently.  I also know now what it would feel like if I were stuck in a recurring Groundhog Day-like cycle.  Except the cycle lasts not a day, but a second and a half.  And I’m sitting next to a very obnoxious bird.  And the bird is being strangled.

The creme de la creme of the “music center’s” features, however, is easily the function that allows parents to record their own voices for playback, apparently to calm an upset child.  Reasonably good idea in theory, but in practice…it converts the nice, soothing, HUMAN tones of a loving parent into the lifeless, expressionless, mechanized inflections of a Death Bot 3000.  

I think the vast majority of parents can immediately recognize that the sounds emitted by the “music center” upon playback would cause permanent psychological damage to human children.  But me?  I’m filled with glee.  Thanks to a bit of exaggerated stiltedness in my speech, my baby girl is going to have the most terrifyingly robotic rendition of Rock-a-Bye Baby ever recorded.