Monstrous Pregnant.
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Pregnancy
By the calendar, I won't even hit the third trimester of pregnancy for another couple of weeks. No matter; yesterday I felt myself move into the final stage. I've done enough of this to know the signs.

Physiologically, it's perfectly understandable. The uterus, in its undisturbed state, is about the size of a plum and nestles safely behind the pubic bone. My uterus, as of this morning, topped out about three inches above my navel. I'm a short girl and short-waisted; there's not a lot of space between my ribs and my pelvis. What this means is that not only do I have a belly the size of a Volkswagen, but all my internal organs are being shoved about rather rudely.

The practical result of all that is chronic heartburn, shortness of breath and backache. My belly has developed corners; it seems to move independently of the rest of my torso. And the Braxton-Hicks are not so much contractions as a perpetuity. I spent enough fruitless time on the fetal monitor during my last two pregnancies to know that this is not a sign of premature labor, just my peculiar version of normal.

Does this sound like endless kvetching? It's not, really. There's a fair amount of discomfort, true, but mostly I find it fascinating to have my body taken over by another entity, its form and function changed so radically by someone who weighs, at this point, only a pound or two. She moves in me, and I try to guess from the sensations what she is up to in there. As I told Ben this morning, it's a lot like the movie Alien, only with luck my little Julia won't actually burst through my abdominal wall to make her appearance.

Morning Commute Soundtrack: Babylon And On (1987) by Squeeze. At this point, the band's lineup included Jools Holland but not (thankfully; my God, that guy is tiresome) Paul Carrack. I think this is Sam and Matt's favorite Squeeze album; listening, Sam remarked, "I like Squeeze. They're very good at singing."

The track Some Americans features not a guitar break but a sitar break by the adorable Glenn Tilbrook. The best-known single, Hourglass, spawned a cool, trippy music video; five years later, the movie Toys (1992) would feature an ersatz MTV video that echoes many of its visual elements (and also borrows heavily from the painter Rene Magritte). (Reader Challenge: If you can procure for me the Hourglass music video on DVD in Region 1 format, I will give you oral. I'm only about 65% kidding.)