ben's guts

ben informed me last night that his gut feeling tells him this baby is gonna come early.

"oh? how early?" i asked a little nervously. who knows, it could be nothing, or it could be God trying to prepare us? only time will tell, but his response was, "2 weeks, so you'd be 38 weeks."

"gotchya."

so if ben's guts are right, we'll have a baby girl (another gut feeling of his) in our arms on or around october 2nd. which gives us two weeks to settle in to the owatonna house (assuming it will in fact be ready by mid-september).

something to think about, that's for sure.

speaking of gut feelings on whether this baby is a girl or a boy, i suppose i should mention all the other "gut feelings" and predictors we've heard. (for the record, i put no stock in these whatsoever; we're either going to have a boy or a girl, and so far the only foolproof way to figure that one out is to check between the legs.)

anyhow, here's what we've found though - most point to us having a boy:

first, the chinese gender chart - using how old the mother is at the time of conception and the month the baby was conceived, found 700 years ago in some cave? supposedly, it's said to be over 90% correct. the funny thing is, i've seen charts that vary... but of the various ones i've looked at, all have said "boy" for 26 in january.

then there's the wedding ring test - dangle the mother's wedding ring on a thread or strand of hair over her belly while she lays down, if it swings back and forth, like a pendulum, the baby is a boy, but if it swings in a circle, the baby is a girl. the first time i picked up the ring, it went back and forth immediately. i tried it a few more times, and sometimes it'd start out in slight circular motions, or the ring would be twisting around, but it would always end up pendulum. i'm guessing the laws of physics have more to do with this one than my child's anatomy.

next, the knife/scissors test - someone puts a knife (we did this at my baby shower, and don't worry, they used a butter knife) under a pillow and a pair of scissors under another pillow while the mother is in another room. they have her come back and decided which pillow to sit down on. if she sits on the one with the knife (which i did), then she's having a boy; scissors for a girl.

and according to this questionnaire, i have a 54% chance of having a boy and a 46% chance of having a girl. might as well call it what it really is at this point - 50/50! :P

last but not least, there was the very "courteous" older gentleman that came in for a tasting when i worked at the wine shop back in wyoming.

as i was pouring him a glass of wine, he told me i was having a girl, and that his method has only been wrong once or twice (he failed to mention how many times he'd been right... or how many time he'd been throat-punched by not-so-patient pregnant women as myself). i curiously asked his method (as i'd heard so many), and he replied "well, when a woman is pregnant with a boy, she is beautiful and radiant, because the two compliment each other. but when she is having a girl, she (and this is when i could tell he was starting to eat his words, but i kept smiling and nodding anyhow), well, she looks more worn down and tired, and you look tired. it's because you and your little girl offset each other."

"oh, okay, that makes sense." i really didn't know what else to say. i think we made more small talk, and then he paid and left.

but really, mister, even if she's the love child of quasimotto's twin sister and frankenstein's monster, you never - even inadvertently - tell a pregnant woman that she's not glowingly radiant or gloriously beautiful. that's just not good manners, and definitely not safe for your health (especially if you run into us on our highly emotional, completely sleep-deprived, overly agitated and feeling aggressively angry sort of days). just sayin...