Here we are with a mere twelve (!!!) days to go before my wife’s official due date, as official as these things get at any rate, as we all know that obstetrics is not an exact science. Be that as it may it definitely feels as though we are in she-could-go-into-labor-at-any-time territory. And there have even been a couple of faint but encouraging signs that things are heading in that direction, as of course they must. But as I half-joked to my wife last night, I really don’t want to go to work all five days this week if I don’t have to. (NB: this is true basically every week, I just happen to have a semi-plausible alternative at the moment.)
Thus I find myself hedging my bets somewhat. As I was picking out clothes this morning I determined that I have just enough clean shirts to get me through to BizCasFri, and I proceeded to wonder if I should go to the drycleaners to pick up the last batch I dropped off and drop off the latest load. If the baby comes this week, I’ll have plenty of time to sort all of that out, but if I have to come to work again a week from today, I’ll be glad to have already restocked my side of the closet, even if sidetripping to the drycleaners after work is kind of a drag.
Same token and no pun intended, my commuting plan for this week has to take into account the possibility that I may need to head westward at a moment’s notice at any time. Which means both the bus and the VRE, with their rigid and limitedly intermittent schedules, are out. My wife is actually on a much-reduced schedule this week and home today, which normally would mean I could have taken the bus. But I Metroed in because it’s the most flexible option, while still not being too onerous. If I’m still coming to work next week, assuming my wife’s doctor lets her go past the 39-week mark she’ll hit on Saturday, then I may very well start driving all the way in to give myself the ability to drive straight to the hospital as that scenario goes from possibility to probability to near-certainty. Which has a certain onerousness about it, but which would in turn be outweighed by sheer necessity and mental comfort level with the circumstances and so on.
And on top of all that, the office move is really taking shape. I had my computer equipment inventoried today! Boxes for packing up our stuff are supposed to arrive tomorrow! I’ve been shown my assignment on the new seating chart! And it’s all allegedly going to go down on April 21st (really starting April 20th because that’s when the IT department is going to start dismantling workstations) and at this point I honestly have very few reasons to doubt the dates. But there is always the possibility that some monkeywrench could foul the gears between now and then, but but but there’s an equal-to-greater chance that I won’t be around to see that if it happens.
At this point though the thought of the birth of my daughter is more or less all-consuming so I don’t have much feeling to spare for the office move one way or the other. I definitely won’t drag my feet about packing up my stuff since I don’t have much of it to begin with and I can’t count on being here much longer myself. I really should be thankful to miss the bumpy transition period associated with moving day itself because, despite my protestations about not wanting to miss getting paid to sit on my duff doing nothing, that’s really not terribly fun and I am better off missing it. Still, will I even make it in tomorrow to receive my official moving boxes? Will I come back from a few weeks paternity leave and find that the agency actually hasn’t started the relocation at all? I just don’t know, and I don’t really have any way of knowing.
P.S. Trying to get back on schedule here so I’m leading off with the usual work-and-commute-related stuff. Chuck E. Cheese’s was non-traumatic and actually pretty fun but I will get into that in more detail tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment