We went to Theo's three-week well-baby pediatrician appointment on Monday. In two weeks, he's gained two pounds. In three weeks, I've lost 25. The kid wakes up four times a night to eat. Oof.

Author David Foster Wallace, who wrote Infinite Jest, the best book I read last year, is dead. Hanged himself. 46 years old. Shit.

…and where has the time gone? Oh yeah. Nursing. It's going a lot better than it did with Alexander. Actually, so far, most of the baby stuff has gone better than it did with Son #1. Thank God.

Theo lost six ounces when he was in the hospital from Sunday – Tuesday. Then on Wednesday, the visiting nurse came to our house and said he'd gained two ounces. By Friday, he was back up to his birth weight.

His pediatrician was astonished. “That never happens. How'd you do that?”

“He eats every 20 minutes,” I said.

Oh yeah, the trip to the pediatrician. The building where he works had some extensive flood damage from the Great Rains of Massachusetts this summer, so the main entrance was blocked off and we had to go in through a 45-degree angled ramp at the ambulance bay. And before that, we'd had to hike (hike!) a quarter-mile from the “new” parking area because the old parking area? It's just a field of dirt now, complete with bulldozers.

“Glad I'm not here for a broken leg,” I puffed, 10 paces behind Monstro.

By the time we reached the ambulance bay, he was getting concerned. “How you holding up?”

“If I can get in the door without crying, I'll be fine. Whoops, too late.”

So we filled out the paperwork at one area of the health center and then, because the main entrance was blocked off from the inside, too, we had to go to the bank of elevators on the left-hand-side of the building, took the elevator up one floor, crossed through the entire health center to the elevators on the right-hand-side of the building, and then took those elevators down a floor to the pediatric clinic.

I set the tone for the doctor visit by hitting up baby's doc for 600 mg of Motrin, which he happily had somebody fetch for me. Then we spent the next 15 minutes bitching about floods, college students, and delivering babies. Our baby doc (not to be confused at all with Baby Doc) was the last person to deliver a baby at the university health center and he regaled us with the tale:

It was Super Bowl Sunday and around 12:00 so the other doc on call for urgent care went off for lunch. Right after that a young woman came in, complaining of belly pain. I checked between her legs and there was something furry. “Please let that be a prolapsed bladder. A prolapsed bladder I can deal with,” I thought. Because I *hate* delivering babies. It's why I didn't go into family practice. But then I thought, “bladders aren't furry.” Typical story, didn't know she was pregnant. So the two nurses — neither of them very good — went into action. One tried warming blankets in the microwave, while the other hooked a suction hose to the oxygen tank and couldn't understand why it wasn't suctioning. I did what any normal person would do and called 911. By 12:45 the ambulance had taken her away, but I'd already delivered the baby, cut the cord, and suctioned out the kid by sucking on each nostril and spitting. I did not deliver the placenta — let the hospital take care of that. And then, five minutes later, the other doc came back from lunch, picking his teeth, and asked, “Did I miss anything?”

Have I mentioned that I LOVE our pediatrician?

He deemed the baby hale and hearty and handsome. We're going back in a couple of weeks to make sure baby continues to thrive. So long as he keeps eating the way he has been, I'm not concerned. 🙂