Lately the Coming Soon to a House Near You! baby has been the biggest thing weighing on my mind.

Some days I think about him in the abstract.

Other days I suddenly realize we only have about 3 months left and we haven’t even finished setting up his room yet and I have a moment kind of like this:

And then I immediately start putting together mobiles and taking stuffed animals out of boxes and moving around the crib and hyperventilating. And Drea lets out a long sigh and gets up off the sofa and comes into the room to help me.

But aside from all the preparation I’ve often wondered to myself if I’m going to be able to step up to the challenge and take care of another little living thing when it absolutely needs me.

And then Christmas night, while taking the dogs on our usual before-bed walk, we came across a box turned over in the snow. And the box was meowing.

The dogs and I proceeded with caution until a little kitten popped out, no more than 7 weeks old. Murphy suddenly looked like he was going to lunge and I pulled back on his leash and gave him a look that said “You go after that cat, you die!”

The turned over box had some holes in the side, a tiny blanket and a handful of cat food. Our best guess is that this was a Christmas present that someone didn’t want. But in 20 degree Chicago weather this kitten probably wouldn’t have lasted the night. So I scooped him up, tried to wrap him in my scarf and headed back home.

The rest? Well, I think the rest can be told in photos:

For roaring fires, hot chocolate, giving and family.

And also for dog boots.

Like most dogs, our dogs hate dog boots. Hate them. Murphy usually looks at me like “Why would you DO this to me!? I thoughts we were FRIENDS!” And then he proceeds to walk around the house like he’s wearing swim flippers.

Tiberius hates the dog boots just as much but has a more passive approach.

Every time I wrestle the dog boots onto the dogs and they fight me in quiet anger I start to flash ahead to the hundreds, thousands, MILLIONS of things I will do to this on-the-way baby, all of which will be for his own good, that he will hate me for.

The times I’ll tell him he needs to finish his homework, he can’t go to a party, he needs to wear a coat, he can’t watch that scary movie, he shouldn’t play on the roof, und so weiter.

“Why do you hate me!?” I’m sure he’ll yell at some point in his life, no doubt followed by slamming his door. Of course, I won’t hate him, I’ll just know what’s best for him even if he doesn’t realize it at that moment (in the way that kids never can realize).

I guess all this wrangling of dogs paws and boots is just a warm up for what I will eventually end up doing to a small human. Not putting boots on him (though I no doubt will do that), but doing what I know will keep him safe and happy, even if he doesn’t realize it.

And of course I have to remember that he won’t stay mad at me forever.

Last week we got a new dremel to trim the dogs’ nails. Already you know this is going to be an exciting post.

First, let me say that I’ve learned a wonderful new trick for keeping the dogs occupied while trimming their nails: Peanut butter. On the side of the fridge. Over which they will happily go nuts while you grind their nails. And it keeps them standing up. Wonderful! Whoever came up with this should get a Nobel. Obviously not in one of the big categories (like Peace), but maybe in one of the smaller categories (like Making It Easier to Trim Your Dog’s Nails).

Second, there’s the box that the dremel came in:

I swear that I’m not making this box up. Does that not look like the saddest dog you’ve ever seen? Doesn’t that dog look like he just cannot go on another day? Doesn’t that dog look like “Oh. You’re going to cut my nails? Hmm. Well. Okay, I guess.”

All week I kept thinking about Sad Dog until I finally decided to do something about it:

Classic Sad Dog.

Lately a lot has been going on. My life has been divided into three distinct categories:

1. Work
2. Babybabybabybabybabybabybabybaby
3. Watching TV to relax and take my mind off the first two things

Work has been busier than ever and I’m trying to wrap my head around the fact that I’m going to be the stay-at-home parent and how I’m going to put the breaks on work. Foolishly I’m trying to do a HUGE amount of work now with the the thought that I’ll be able to do so much that I’ll be caught up for months once the baby gets here. Of course anyone with a job know that this is not how work works. No, all the work now will just equal different work later.

Babybabybabybabybabybabybabybaby stuff is in full swing. We are taking diaper classes. We are taking birthing classes. We are buying things and receiving things and there is no stopping this baby train. Someone has yelled “All aboard!” and we have gotten aboard. And this has happened to Drea:

There is no denying that the little (or, rather, GIANT) peanut is in there. And he’s gobbling up real estate by the day.

And as for TV? I’m afraid that my former love affair with our giant flatscreen is hurting because of Numbers 1 and 2. We still haven’t watched Top Chef: All-Stars from four days ago. We watched most of 30 Rock from the other night but not the last 10 minutes. I mean, who doesn’t watch the last 10 minutes of a 30 minute show? What kind of TV slacker am I turning into? I suppose the kind of slacker that cares more about Numbers 1 and 2 than about Tracy Jordan, but that’s sad in it’s own way, you know?

Lately Drea has been asking me to talk to the baby. I can’t put my finger on why, but I’m not completely comfortable with it. But she’ll insist and I’ll oblige and I’ll lean down ’til my face is at the underside of her belly.

“Baby,” I’ll say in a deep, paternal voice.

Occasionally Drea will act the part of the baby and say “Hi Daddy” in a high voice.

“I know you probably have no idea what’s going on in there right now…”

“It’s great in here! Life is good!” Drea will say, still as the baby.

“Yes, well, you’ll be out soon and things will start making more sense.”

“Eat more sugar! Mmmm! Sugar! Weee!”

“Hmm. Right. Well…Dad out!”

And then I’ll lean back and Drea will give me a look like I just wussed out. But what do I say to the unborn baby? MY unborn baby? MY unborn SON? Sheesh.

Do I talk about myself? That seems a little boring for him. Do I talk about current events? That just sounds like a bummer. Do I tell him about how we’re prepping for him all the time? How I’ve assembled a crib and a changing table and a glider and this baby is going to have a super great room? Or how BOTH of his grandmothers wanted to come along with us to Babies R Us for one long afternoon of gift registration where we picked out things I’ve never even heard of?

I could tell him about the time I got thanked in the acknowledgments of a book because the author confused me with someone else at the Ryerson who actually helped them. Or I could tell the story of how I sped too much when I was a teenager and had to go to a traffic school where we did nothing but watch tapes of America’s Scariest Police Chases on FOX for three hours.

I could share my wisdom about how to make great scrambled eggs, or how to best cut up a mango.

I could tell him all about technology he’ll probably never encounter, like cassette decks and typewriters and my first computer, an Apple LCII, which didn’t really do much beyond word processing, being a calculator and letting me play the occasional game of Where in the USA in Carmen Sandiego.

Deep down I know that it doesn’t really matter WHAT I talk about. I could read the phone book to the baby and it wouldn’t know the difference. But I just want to do exactly the right things, y’know?

I should probably try and let go of that thinking before it completely cripples me, shouldn’t I?

Yeah.

Dad out.

The “big” ultrasound was yesterday. The one where we got a bazillion pictures of the little peanut and found out that he’s a boy.

We also discovered the little guy has a striking resemblance to a Marvel superhero.

Today I’m working from home. As it is on days that I work from home, this morning Drea gave me a do-to list.

“One!” she began, getting ready for work, “Clean out the fridge. If you think there’s even the slightest chance that it’s no good – get rid of it!”

I nodded the affirmative.

“And two!” she said. “Blog.”

Blog, blog, blog.

Lately I haven’t been able to think of anything to say. I still can’t. So I dug through a few of my old notebooks. And I what I found were some scrap pages of a short story I had started writing back in 2003. So that what you get today.

—

Several years ago the card catalog in the Paxton Index had been replaced by computers, the large wooded drawers hauled out and shiny new turquoise iMacs installed. Hundreds of thousands of index cards became casualties. Most of them were in boxes in storage but plenty were in the reading room, acting as scrap paper. Cards detailing things like “The Danson Collection 759.2 T744d”, which were once essential to the library functioning, had become pieces of paper to write notes on; obsolete scrap.

Often, Aaron would return home and unload his pockets, several of the old index cards scribbled on and mixed in with change, receipts and wrappers. His roommate would pull her hair out when she saw this.

“Look at these!” she would say. “Some of these are more than 40 years old. And you’re scribbling phone numbers on them!” She would shake her head in disbelief. “Don’t you ever feel like you’re vandalizing history?”

“Tif,” he would reply, “they’re index cards.”

Again, Tiffany would shake her head.

By the time she was 11 Tiffany had earned the nickname Tiffany “I’ll Take That” Burgher. If there was a record you didn’t want, a chair you didn’t need or a random knickknack you just didn’t care enough about to hold on to anymore, Tiffany would take it off your hands. Her bedroom included a lamp she’d found on the side of the road, dozens of posters she’d taken from local movie theaters that were going to throw them out, a blanket she’d purloined during a drunken night house sitting and several milk crates full of old National Geographics.

“I don’t see you complaining when you need to write down a phone number and it’s the only paper handy.” Aaron said, crumpling up some of the cards and throwing them into the trash.

“I’d sooner write on my hand,” Tiffany said, huffing off with the put-on air of an aristocrat.

Last Saturday night Drea and I headed out to go to the soft opening of a new restaurant that’s a client of mine. The food (English gastropub fare) was great and their beer list was amazing. I’m excited to go there with my beer loving brother soon and watch him drool.

Unfortunately we were seated next to a woman who didn’t share any of our feelings about the place. And repeatedly voiced this to our server.

She didn’t like the mushrooms. Her cocktail was too bitter. The tasting size of the deviled egg wasn’t enough for her. Und so weiter.

At the end of our meal the owner brought Drea and I two tiny glasses, one with a rose infused liquor and one with a violet infused liquor. Both smelled like heaven and were smooth going down – better than any liquor I’ve ever tasting (which is saying a lot as a former bartender and, at one time, possibly a functioning alcoholic). Drea opted not to have any, and while I “mmmm!”ed in pleasure she excused herself to go to the bathroom for the 5th time that night. The woman next to us took this as her cue to say something.

“Congrats on the baby,” she said, her eyes going towards Drea as she walked away. I said thank you. “Y’know,” she began, “one of MY good friends is dating a doctor and HE says that it’s TOTALLY okay for pregnant women to have a drink once in a while.” She smiled a fake smile at me.

“We know,” I told her, “but she had a glass of champagne with brunch earlier and we don’t want to get the baby plastered today.”

“Oh,” she said, getting the hint to mind her own business and turning back towards her date.

And the worst part is I know it’s only going to get worse.

So it turns out I didn’t completely abandon the whole Dressing Nicely thing as quickly as I thought I would.

In fact, I actually wore a tie yesterday. For a dirtball like me (who sometimes will not shower and just throw on a tshirt and a hoodie) this is big news. You should all be very impressed.

As proof:

And you know what? I felt better too. I made better eye contact with people. I made myself sit up straighter in my seat. I was a better Josh. Which may sound stupid I realize, but it’s true.

So today, again, I decided to dress nice:

If I’m not careful I may stop being such a dirtball all together.

p.s. Sorry for the stone faces today – every smiling face I made just made me look like I was auditioning for the lead role in the remake of Ernest Goes to Camp.

*But not for me.

Yes, on an “actually-worth-it-in-November” note (unlike my “Dressin’ to the Nines in ’10″ campaign that lasted about 7 hours), my friend Dave over at Switching Over to A.M. is participating in Movember this year. For those of you who don’t remember, I participated in Movember two years ago. And for those of you who still have no idea what I’m talking about, Movember is a mustache growing charity event held during November each year that raises funds and awareness for men’s health (cancer in the nether regions). I know that anything you can give to Dave for this great cause would be much appreciated. You can visit Dave’s blog here, or click here to donate money for the cause at his Movember.com page.

And if it helps any, here are a few of my mustache shots from two years ago when I participated and…

A) Looked like your gay uncle Rob:

B) Discovered on day six of growing my mustache that it didn’t help me look like Tom Selleck or Orlando Bloom, but rather Daniel Stern in Rookie of the Year:

Frick.