V-E Day (That's Violet Extraction Day to You)
You probably won't be hearing much from us for a while...or at least, nothing from me for a while, as tomorrow we are going into the hospital for a scheduled surgical delivery of baby Violet Mai Holbo. Exciting stuff. I have to admit that the prospect of feeling, not pain, but the sensation of being "unzipped" sounds a bit creepy, but that's why a) they put up a screen so you don't see knives and b) they sedate you. Anyway, this has been the longest 8 months of my life and I am very excited to get a baby out of the whole deal. Everybody wish us all luck. I am ready to see some trailing clouds of glory.
jholbo-at-mac-dot-com
First! --I mean, best of luck. (The Pogues are singing "Summer in Siam" somewhere in the digital guts of iTunes, which actually doesn't have nearly as much bearing as I'd thought it might when I started typing this on a whim.)
Added bonus: now you can tease Zoö about being a first draft.
Posted by: Kip Manley | April 21, 2004 at 01:43 PM
Ah. Should have been Zoë. This is why you should always preview your posts, boys and girls. Especially when you're trying to be all fancy with the Unicode.
Posted by: Kip Manley | April 21, 2004 at 01:48 PM
I know you're Miyazaki fans, so just in case Violet's middle name is Totoro-related, I thought you should know that many people think that the spelling "Mai" used in the subtitles is a very strange choice. (If the name comes from somewhere else, feel free to ignore the rest of this comment.)
There are several Romanization systems for Japanese, but in all of them the name in the movie would be spelled "Mei", whereas "Mai" would be pronounced like English "my".
One interesting thing about names in that movie is that the older sister Satsuki's name is the name of the fifth month of the year in the old Japanese calendar--the characters literally mean "five" "month"--so both sisters are named "May".
Spelling/pronunciation issues aside, I think Violet Mai is a beautiful name.
Good Luck and/or Congratulations, depending on when you read this.
Posted by: Big Ben | April 21, 2004 at 02:57 PM
Here's wishing you a safe and uneventful delivery! Talking about delivery: I can almost see it now: a new partner at Kiki's...
Posted by: loy | April 21, 2004 at 03:16 PM
Thanks, Ben - and everyone. It's sort of Miyazaki-ish (yes, there's definitely that) crossed with Tove Janssonish settling on what is actually an old family name from the Scandinavian side of our family - that is, my side. Mai. So we have Zo Snow (Zoe Snowden) and Vi Mai (Violet My). And Zoe is allowed to call her Mei Mei and pronounce it the Chinese way (May May).
Posted by: jholbo | April 21, 2004 at 03:35 PM
Good Luck !
Posted by: Ted K. | April 21, 2004 at 07:02 PM
Yay-- naming your children Tove Janssonnishly! You two are my kind of geeks. It astonishes me how many people I know who seem to have had the right kind of tastes and childhoods have never heard of Moomins. I've been known to buy the books for thirty-year-olds as a result.
Anyway, good luck (and, at the appropriate time, congratulations!)
Posted by: Jacob T. Levy | April 21, 2004 at 08:22 PM
Good luck!
Posted by: JFD | April 21, 2004 at 09:13 PM
Good luck to mother & child!
Posted by: Data | April 21, 2004 at 11:37 PM
Good luck to all!
Posted by: Timothy Burke | April 22, 2004 at 12:08 AM
Good luck!
Posted by: ogged | April 22, 2004 at 12:49 AM
Best of luck!
Posted by: Mitch Mills | April 22, 2004 at 01:34 AM
Good luck! And it's probably too late for this to be an option, but I found that the best way to avoid creepy feelings beforehand was to learn as little as possible about the procedure.
Posted by: Rich Puchalsky | April 22, 2004 at 02:07 AM
Prayers and best wishes to both. I hope we'll all be able to hear about the safe arrival of Violet soon.
Posted by: Russell Arben Fox | April 22, 2004 at 02:30 AM
Word.
Posted by: Carlos | April 22, 2004 at 02:41 AM
Break a leg. Wait, no, don't. Good luck.
Posted by: Mike | April 22, 2004 at 08:01 AM
Best of luck to all four of you from all four of us.
One valuable tip I got from a doctor friend of mine: take a small, hard pillow with you. When you need to get up, or laugh, or cough, or sneeze... or put any kind of pressure on your lower abdomen, press the pillow hard on the incision site. Works miracles, believe me.
And try to get back on your feet the first day. Also works miracles.
Claudia - experienced c-sectioner
PS: Hm, I'm a little late. So, John, please get that pillow for her. :-)
Posted by: Claudia | April 22, 2004 at 01:54 PM
John wrote:
And Zoe is allowed to call her Mei Mei and pronounce it the Chinese way (May May).
Cool! Parenthood is definitely "ding hao" !
John & Belle: here's an old .sig line for you ...
Two hoods raided my house: motherhood and fatherhood.
Posted by: Rick | April 26, 2004 at 07:09 AM