LC Labours Long (and succeeds!)

Firstly, and most importantly, I have a daughter! Project Tadpole came to a successful end on Wednesday morning, and so she shall no longer be referred to as Tadpole - she has a real name, and also a blog name that I shall introduce later.

It was all a bit of a nervy time. LC had been due on the 9th of this month, but that came and went without incident. And when she went to see the midwife last week, it didn't go well - an attempted sweep was just too uncomfortable to complete.

So I had my last day of work on Monday, and then we were booked in for an induction on Tuesday morning. The first phase of which is the installation of some sort of hormonal pill, after which we went home.

Tuesday was a fairly uncomfortable day - LC was complaining about back pain all day, which seemed to get worse as the day went on. Which was pretty horrible. About 11 we went to bed, though it was unlikely we'd get more sleep. And that plan was to go to the hospital again the next morning for the second phase of induction, and a long wait in the hospital.

In the event, it was unnecessary - LC's waters broke just before midnight, we called the Labour ward, and off we went!

Five minutes later, we were at the hospital. We did make a mistake in going to the wrong ward initially, but were soon at the Labour ward, gained admission, and waiting for a room to be ready for us.

The theme of the next several hours was of waiting. LC did a lot of work - I tried to do what I could, but the reality is that that was very little. The midwife was great, but really it was LC who was magnificent. She didn't even use much pain relief - she took a paracetamol and some codeine early on, and then some gas and air for an hour from 1.30 (but then stopped because she was feeling nauseous), but that was all.

Things actually proceeded really fast, and just after 4 it was time to push. Alas, that was the end of the 'easy' bit. An hour later, and it was time for a doctor to be consulted.

The upshot was that our baby needed a bit of help to reach the world. There was also some concern that she might be facing the wrong way, which wasn't good - but the doctor couldn't be sure, as the examination was just too painful to perform. So the recommendation was for LC to have an anaesthetic, and then the examination would be possible. From there, a forceps delivery might hopefully be possible... if not, a C-Section might be needed.

Well... this was the point where I got really worried, because while I'm aware that these things are fairly routine these days and the risks are pretty minor, the fact is that the risks are non-zero. And even if the odds are 10,000-to-1, someone still has to be that one. And when you're talking about the two most important people in my life, that's a hell of a thing.

But, of course, saying any of that really isn't helpful. The key thing was that LC had done as much as she could possibly have done, and it was time to let them help her out. And then pray.

In the event, it all went as easily as could be hoped - as soon as the anaesthetic was applied, LC found she was no longer in pain (as you'd expect, really), which was a huge relief, it turned out that baby was the right way around, and so although forceps were needed a C-Section was not. And both came through okay.

Project Tadpole came to a successful end at 6.20am on Wednesday 21st Feb 2018. She weighed in at 9 pounds 15 ounces (and a bit).

As she was born, I had the great pleasure of informing LC of the sex of our child. That was quite a thing, because although we genuinely didn't know until that moment, we'd more or less convinced ourselves that we were having a girl. Not that it matters, of course - her first clothes (from us) were still an R2-D2 onesie, and she's still been watching Transformers with her Daddy. She's my little girl, but she's still my little geek. Until she rebels and grows up secretly normal.

The rest of the story is pretty straightforward - LC and baby were kept in for the rest of the day for observation, and then we came home on Thursday. We've since been having very little sleep, we've been enjoying a multitude of visitors, and have been very much imposing on Gran's willingness to do the ironing. And the nappies have been horrific.

Now, I said she now has a real name, which I'm not going to reveal here. However, she also now has a blog name, which is rather important. As you know (maybe), LC is short for Lady Chocolat. I therefore toyed with calling her Little Chocolat, since she is very much her mother's daughter, albeit much smaller in stature (for now). However, that would need to be abbreviated to lc, and that would just be confusing. Therefore, I shall name her after another form of little chocolate: Funsize (FS for short). Until someone in the comments points out that that's a really bad idea...

And now... sleepy. So very, very tired.

Oh yes, one more thing: we need to say a huge thank you to the staff at the hospital. You were fantastic from start to finish.

#8: "The Sorcerer's Daughter", by Terry Brooks

If Now Is Not The Time, This Is...

As a matter of principle, I take the view that the question of gun control in the US is a matter for citizens of the US. It's not really my business.

But...

Every time there is a mass shooting in the US (about three times a week), the response is on the one hand to send thoughts and prayers, and on the other hand to declare that this isn't the time to discuss gun control. And then the media cycle moves on, and somehow "the time" never quite seems to come around. And then it happens again, and all the same things get said... and the big discussion never quite happens.

Some of the survivors of the Florida shooting have now called for an end to this cycle. They've accepted that now isn't the time... but they've also set a date. Good for them.

Here's the video:

Survivors of the school shooting in Florida are calling for a march on Washington to demand action on gun control. "People are saying that it’s not time to talk about gun control, and we can respect that. Here’s a time: March 24, in every single city." https://t.co/ObmdZo67La pic.twitter.com/qaJfAZy99k

— ABC News (@ABC) 18 February 2018

Day 50: Update on... Stuff

Normally at this point in the year I would put together an update on my goals for the year. However, having only one goal fixed makes that somewhat pointless, so instead here's a more general update on various things:

Books: Normally, by day 50 I would be targetting just over 8.2 books read. As of last night, I have read 7 books exactly in 2018. It would be more, but "Against a Dark Background" really slowed me down. (Funnily enough, it was an Iain Banks novel that also nearly derailed me last year.)

Anyway, that's no big deal, since I didn't set that goal for this year. Instead, my target was to get through the remaining books on the British side of The List. And on that front I have read 2 of the entries, leaving a further 9 (or 8, given that "Hamlet" is a duplicate). So, in theory at least, I'm right on target. That said, the two I've read are probably the shortest two of the options, so it gets harder from here...

Band: It has been a bit weird going through the winter without practicing heavily for a competition season. That said, joining the new band has motivated me enough to keep practicing, which is good. And it has been going well, though it has been a little disconcerting that I've now twice found myself left in charge of the practices. Which wasn't quite what I'd intended...

Gaming: Just as I was taking part in my final Pathfinder game, a new game kicked off at work, which has been interesting. The format is quite limiting, with us only having one hour to play per week, but it's better than nothing.

Weight: As noted elsewhere, I have been attending the gym twice a week since starting back at work, which has been tough. I have also lost about half a stone, which normally would be great... except that that mostly puts me back where I was at the start of last year. And since getting back to that point it has stalled. Grr.

Blogging: I've been finding it rather difficult to find good topics for the blog, and as a consequence I haven't maintained the post rate I would prefer - the Imaginarium is not far from my target, but one has fallen quite short. Must do better!

And leaving the most important until last...

Project Tadpole: Still waiting. Otherwise, you would have heard about it by now!

And that's basically that. See you in seven weeks!

#7: "Lolita", by Vladimir Nabokov (a book from The List. Also, ick.)

Black Panther

LC and I went out to see the latest Marvel film last night. And it's good.

The recent Marvel films have tended to go one of two ways - either they take a very offbeat tack (Guardians 2, Thor 3), or they tell a fairly straightforward story in an unusual way (Dr Strange). "Black Panther" falls into the latter category - at its heart is a story of family drama, set in a fictional African kindgom where natural resources have given them super-tech.

And Wakanda is pretty cool, but where the film really shines is in the cast - Chadwick Boseman had a key part to play in the success of "Civil War" (providing the emotional heart of that film while Cap and Tony are busy tearing each other apart), and he's great here too. I would say he carries this film, but that would be unfair on the others.

Opposite Boseman, we have Michael B. Jordan playing another grieving son. He was great in "Creed" (itself far better than it has any right to be), and he's good here, filling the character with a great deal of menace and danger, and yet still not being entirely one-dimensional.

(Edit: When I wrote this post I hadn't yet realised that Ryan Coogler was the director of both "Creed" and "Black Panther", which explains a great deal. That's a name I'll have to look out for in future.)

And then there are the women: the bodyguard, the spy, and the scientist (Dania Gurira, Lupita Nyong'o, and Letitia Wright, respectively). Very varied roles, very varied characters, and all great. Plus Angela Bassett and Forest Whitaker in small but significant roles.

(Even Martin Freeman did well. I really didn't like his character in CW, but they did a good job of turning him around here. He's not a good guy, as such, and he's not a bad guy either. He's somewhere in the middle, which is cool.)

Looking past the cast, there's the set design which is new and unique (at least in the MCU), and the sound, which again isn't quite like anything else in Marvel films to date. Good stuff.

I do have two slight quibbles. The first is that, again, we have the big CGI battle to end the film - the trappings are different, but it's still just pretty cartoons going against one another. Unfortunately, I'm not really sure how you get around this - they did a pretty good job of setting up the competing agendas that led to the big fight (again, as in CW), but once you get there it's still a lot of sound and fury.

The other was that at times I found the fight scenes hard to follow - the camera seemed to do a twisty-zoomy motion that gave things a somewhat dreamlike feel, but also made it hard to keep track. It wasn't as bad as "Transformers", probably because nothing is, but it was still far from ideal... especially when there were a lot of characters wearing very similar uniforms running around.

But those are quibbles - the strengths of this film are very strong. Chalk up another winner for Marvel.

Waiting

There's not much going on in our world right now - we're mostly just waiting for Tadpole to make an appearance. We may or may not get a chance to see "Black Panther" before this happens. (I'd kind of hope not, but it's not up to me.)

It's funny how much harder it is to wait for things when you don't know how long you'll be waiting. After the fiasco with the sale of the flat, you'd think I'd be used to it by now. Oh well.

In the meantime, the latest books:

#5: "Pathfinder: Tower of the Drowned Dead", by Ron Lundeen
#6: "Against a Dark Background", by Iain M. Banks

Hmm, that's odd

I find myself lined up to pipe at a wedding in June of this year in the USA. As a consequence of this, I thought it would be quite nice to play something suitable American for the event, and while the "Star Spangled Banner" doesn't work terribly well on the pipes (due to the range of notes available), "America the Beautiful" should indeed work.

Or so I thought.

The thing is, while I've found sheet music for the tune easily enough, and although that music seems to match up with the way I'd expect the tune to be played, all the videos I've found of people playing the tune are at odds with this - there's a High-A being played where the sheet music shows a High-G. And as a consequence it all sounds really weird, and obviously wrong.

I suppose it's possible that Sinatra just sang it wrong, and that the tune should indeed have that High-A. But that really doesn't feel right, given how obviously wrong that High-A sounds in that context.

I dunno. It's just odd.

Anyway, the upshot is that I'm going to learn it the way that the music says, and if anyone questions it I'll just blame Frank.

Experimental Cookery 2018: Chicken Noodle Stir-fry

This one also comes from Jamie's "5 Ingredients" book, which I strongly suspect will be the more-used of the two cookbooks I got for Christmas, but which hasn't had quite the impact I thought it might. I had to replace the brocolli in the recipe with green pepper (as I can't eat brocolli), and I also added some spring onion as a garnish because I figured why not...

The meal was, as anticipated, very quick and easy to put together. I think it took about 20 minutes from end to end, which is pretty good for a week-night (the book claims 16, but I don't entirely trust the cooking time for the chicken, and I did include time for washing and chopping the veg before I applied heat to anything).

The result was mostly fine, but way too salty. I suspect that's a matter of having too much black bean sauce in the mix. However, I'm not particularly inspired to have this again too soon - it was fine, but I have a number of other chicken/noodle dishes in my repertoire already, and this doesn't do anything to displace them.

Still, a worthy effort for the second of the year.