As you all are no doubt already familiar, it was recently reported that Mel Gibson and his Russian mail-order bride musician lady-friend had a baby girl a couple days ago.  It may shock you to learn this, but I really don’t give a flying fuckabaloo about celebrities, their children, or their televised attempts at finally getting a real shot at love.  However, as I scanned the myriad headlines of what passes for “Top Stories” at Yahoo, I was suddenly overcome with an overwhelming sense of foreboding and terror.  So much so that I spilled a good portion of the water I was drinking right (where else?) on the fly of my pants.  Or, at least that’s the excuse I’m using until it dries.

 

So why the terror?  Why the foreboding?  Why the thinly masked incontinence?

 

Simple.  I don’t want my daughter to share the same name as any of the offspring of Mel Gibson.  Or any celebrity, for that matter.

 

The problem is, I have a dark and incontinence-producing premonition that one day it may.  And I just know it’s going to be a celebrity I despise.  Most likely, Brett Favre and Alexandra Guarnaschelli’s (the truly heartless and evil judge on that horrible Food Network show “Chopped” that my wife is always watching) love child.

 

The danger lies in the fact that my wife and I chose an “untraditional” name for our daughter.  It is a name we decided months ago and while it has definitely not received any standing ovations from those we’ve shared it with (most times, it is met with a very conspicuous silence, followed by an avoidance of all eye contact), we both love the lyrical nature of it and the associations we have to the word.

 

The name:

 

Moon Unit No. 2

 

Actually, the state of Arizona is outlawing our first choice, so we settled on…Juniper.

 

Yes, Juniper.  Like the tree.

 

Oh, quit rolling your eyes!  It’s not like we’re going to name her Apple, or Blanket, or Moon Unit No. 2 (thanks to the overbearingly paternalistic nature of the state government of Arizona).

 

So before you go accusing us of being those parents, or marvel at our over-the-top tree hugging ways (I’ll have you know that I do not hug trees, I only dry hump them), allow me to explain.  Not justify, but explain.

 

Why Juniper?

 

First of all, most “normal” names belong to people I’ve already met.  As a general rule, I hate people, so I couldn’t choose a name that carried with it all the negative connotations of all the horrible people I’ve already met with that name.  I mean, really!  Would you have me despise my first child because you so selfishly ruined the name for eternity with all your personality defects and poor life choices?  I think not.

 

Two, I love it because, to be honest, I’ve never been a big fan of living in the desert.  I look forward to the opportunities to escape to the high country, full of pines and mountains, and away from God’s attempt to melt us all with his magnifying glass like the rotten, scurrying little ants he must think we are.  One of the first tangible signs you’ve successfully fled the desert proper is the juniper trees that populate the landscape.  For me, it’s a great feeling.  One I also get when I say the word.

 

And three, I’ve always felt it had a kind of poetic lilt to it.  Plus, the diminutives it affords are off the charts!  June Bug, June Berry, The Shrub.  The possibilities are endless.  Or, perhaps, three in number.

 

So, this brings me back to my original point – the terror.  The problem with unique names is that they stand out that much more when someone revolting has the same name.  Don’t believe me.  One word: Paris.

 

Fortunately, Mel and his Comrade-Under-the-Covers, Oksana, named their child Lucia.

 

We dodged a bullet today.

 

Who knows what the future holds…

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.

I’ve come a long way, baby.  I entered a whole new world in my understanding of breasts.

 

As we arrive at the one month countdown till the Shrub (my nickname for our human, not plant, baby) arrives, Monday evening found us in a course offered at the hospital on breastfeeding.

 

First, some initial highlights of the course:

 

A pregnant woman and her husband had just entered the classroom before the course started when the instructor inquired, “Are you here for breastfeeding?”

 

The husband, without missing a beat, replied, “No, I ate before I came here.”

 

Truly not fair that some husbands get the perfect set-up to jokes, while others are left to quietly devise comical answers for a wide range of scenarios that go left unasked.

 

Also, thanks to the video in the course that had me biting the inside of my cheeks to keep from laughing (not due to the prevalence of nipples and the stuffing of said nipples and hearty helpings of boob into the gaping maws of ravenous infants), but from the outrageous Australian accent narrating the video (reminded me of Murray, the manager, from Flight of the Conchords, and what receiving “braystfeeding” advice from him would be like).  I still don’t know why we were watching an Australian video as opposed to an American one (particularly when it suggested seeking assistance from the Australian Board of Breastfeeding should we have difficulties), but I suppose that says something about the modesty, i.e. prudishness, of our country when it comes to breasts.

 

On the bright side…

 

I learned a great deal about breasts.  First off, I had always assumed babies simply sucked on the end of the nipple to feed.  Turns out they choke down a whole mouthful of boob to get the milk flowing. 

 

Very impressive, babies.  Very impressive.  I applaud your tenacity and go-get-em spirit.

 

Some of you may be laughing or mocking my lack of knowledge on this front, but I blame Western civilization.  If boobs were out all the time, all this knowledge would be readily apparent.  So, thanks a lot, Western civilization.  You made a boob out of me as far as boobs go.

 

The downside of this course…

 

I now am cursed with viewing breasts, pretty much the only evidence I’m willing to consider as proof that a God may exist and love us above all else, as not just beautiful, bouncy play things that bring joy and happiness to life, but as food sources.  Truly fucks with the wiring of the male brain.  So thanks.  Way to turn me back to atheism, Boobs, by providing an essential life function (other than pure joy) to the most joyous things on earth.

 

On the other hand, it also makes boobs just that much more awesome. 

 

They provide life. 

 

They provide joy. 

 

They simply make life joyous.

 

All hail the Almighty Breast!