I hope my autobiographer will be so kind as to gloss over the boring parts of my life, for I don't want to be remembered by the three people who will proof-read the book as a dull boy. Prefaced that way our last three-day weekend as unencumbered, childless, nearly-carefree middle-aged adults was far from thrilling, and hopefully not defining. It was a weekend filled with an exercise in building patience, stamina enriching events, a life-sized game of Tetris, some homemade pizza, and a wee bit of sloth.

Friday afternoon I left work to sit at home, programming my little brain away, whilst waiting for the Fed Ex man so I could scrawl my John Hancock upon his overgrown PDA in order that I might take rightful possession of our camcorder. I finished out my day, putting in the overtime I was afraid I'd need (due to a June first deadline) and crashed on the couch watching a forgettable movie (I think). Normally I consider my weekends to start at the end of my work day on Friday, I wish this were the case with this one.

Saturday found us sleeping in, scrounging the kitchen for breakfast, and then heading into Keizer to get our car seats installed and certified by . . . people who certify such things. How hard can this be right? You just drive up to the fire station in Keizer, say "Hi, I'm about to be a new dad and I've been told I need a post-doctoral degree just to install a car seat in my car, for that rare event when I'm hit by another car, so I can feel secure that a collision of such kinetic force won't harm my little genetic sub-class, unless of course it is a collision of great kinetic force in which case I wouldn't expect anyone to survive it, so can you do this for me? Thanks." No, life only works that way in the movies and my daydreams; what really happens is you drive up, put your name on a list, only to find you'll be waiting 45 minutes. So we grab a drink, some lunch, come back and wait 90 minutes. The best part is a moderately strong child with the barest ability to follow pictorial instructions could have installed the car seat. Four years of "higher education" and I'm reduced to looking like a ape with a really massive goatee. The only positive thing to come out of this was our discovery that we had in fact purchased the wrong base for the second car; this alone avoided what would have been a tremendous argument where Holly would accuse me of not knowing how to put a car seat on a base, and I asserting she bought the wrong base. Maybe that was worth three hours of my day.

While on the topic of cars, car seats, and babies, I am convinced the 2001 Toyota Rav 4 was not intended to be sold to rational people with real needs. Its cargo space is laughable, and anyone with legs cannot comfortably fit in the back seats. Sure it gets us from point A to point B, but that is with two grown adults in the front seats, enjoying blessed legroom (unless you are the driver in which case the petals are positioned such that unless your knuckles drag upon the ground while walking fully erect you will cramp both legs while attempting to drive any distance greater than 20 minutes away). That legroom is in jeopardy when you install a car-seat, because now the seat won't fit unless the driver likes to steer with his knees or the passenger feels comfortable bracing their knees against the dash (which I'm sure is in some handbook of how not to ride in a car in case of an accident, where they will site all kinds of horrible scenarios not least of which will be the one where the force of the impact will send your thigh bones through the back of your seat, through the car seat, and into your child; cars kill). In short we found out our main car will be a great inconvenience wherein I either drive everywhere we go, or I get to sit in the back seat with our little bundle of crumbs.

Shocked, alarmed, and saddened to find our reliable car may not be all that reliable in the very near future we finished out our day watching more forgettable TV while we wallowed in visions of car loans and further child-related discomfort. I know children are expected to be a disruptive force in the lives of the parents they are given to, but only now am I understanding why so many parents choose to be blindsided by the changes; ignorance sure would be bliss right about now.

Last week we decided we would take an entire three-day weekend of sleeping in, meaning we warned the pastor we would be absent from church Sunday morning. It was nice to wake up and find I had slipped into vacation mode, that blessed mode of waking up and not caring what day of the week it is, only knowing it's a day where there are no demands upon your time. I think we woke up two or three times, smiled, rolled over, and went right back to sleep.

I had decided to attempt to bring some order into the chaos that is my study (also known as the Temporary Holly Storage Depot) during my weekend, for the state of it was driving a bad mood that was only building. Holly managed to score me another bookshelf identical to one I already have in my study. And so it was that we played a live action game of Tetris in my study, only this occurred after I cleaned out the garage. The garage tends to be the depot for all things To Be Recycled Once We Know We Won't Need That Box To Return The Defective Item To The Idiot Manufacturer. With the influx of baby gifts the depot was full. Two hours of listening to British people withstand the Horror[s] on the Orient Express found me with a clean garage, which is important mainly because when Holly goes into labour and we decide to rush like mad men to the car I don't need her tripping on cardboard boxes and yelling at me. I'll be getting yelled at enough, I don't need her to have a rational reason to do so. I also needed the garage free of clutter so I could re-clutter it with the flotsam and jetsam from the shipwreck which was my study.

Live action Tetris is fun, if you haven't first tested your stamina and endurance by lifting heavy objects, like say 19 inch CRT computer monitors, over your head repeatedly, or assembling a bookcase made of sawdust and industrial glue. If you've already sapped your strength and your wife happens to be nearly nine months pregnant, best of luck to you. Think fast, think well, and watch out for falling boxes that won't fit anywhere (tip: toss them into the Master Bedroom, that way your study looks cleaner and you can feel happy until you go to bed).

Some well meaning fool once told me that the secret to a good night's sleep and to curing insomnia is physical exercise. Given that statement I should have dropped off into a deep sleep anytime I wanted to, and yet after crashing on the couch rotting my brains on imported Japanese Anime and taking a long hot bath sleep was nowhere near me. Oh sure my entire body ached and wanted that blessed oblivion which comes so easily to others (I almost wish I were pregnant, just so I could drop off to sleep as fast as Holly can) but sleep would not come. Thus I submit that this weekend provided empirical evidence of an anecdotal kind that exercise only helps keep me awake.

This brings me to today, in which I spent the morning further straightening my study whilst the little incubator was off shopping with some friends, getting the moral reassurance she needs from a mother of two. I found myself wondering what in the world I was doing spending my last day off working, but when I was done shortly before lunch I was done. My study is livable. It has a few organized messes, but I can use it once again, and the relief that brought with it was better than a nap. So it was that I sauntered into the living room, arranged the love seat and a gliding rocker's footstool into The Perfect Gaming Setup, and spent a few relaxing hours playing Folklore. It has been a long time since I have been able to just sit and play a game without my mental list of Things To Be Done nagging at me the entire time. And lest you think I was being too slothful I did mange to do a couple loads of laundry, bought cat food, rented a movie, made pizza dough from scratch, and topped it with a spectacular array of delectable toppings to create the ultimate pizza for watching movies.

How did we spend our last three day weekend together? We spent it getting ready for Emma to join our lives, slept in as much as we could, and enjoyed some down-time watching unremarkable stuff on our TV, but only after we earned the right to be lazy. Holly is heading into her last four days of work; she starts her leave on the second of June. We are more ready for Emma than we were last week, and unless I'm mistaken we have enough done that we can catch our breath and relax a bit. Who knows, it may be the last bit of relaxing we ever do.