[Dad can’t seem to decide whether or not to hook me up with my own blog, since it looks like GoDaddy requires a separate account for another WordPress install, so I’ll keep my notes for one here until he does.]
April 15, 2010: Born. OP (occipito-posterior), too, so I gave mom a helluva time and had to be suctioned out. First time the cap popped off, making dad nearly piss his pants, but I’d make it out fine, with only an abrasion from the electrode which left a scab on top. To this day it reminds him of those nails Lo Lieh would drive into the heads of his zombies in Black Magic II—
And I saw you watching the first one when we got back from the hospital! Serves you right that neither was the late-night kung fu movie you were looking for, where Ti Lung had to drain black leeches from the backs of his attackers.
April 17, 2010: Screw SIDS; I’m sleeping on my face.
April 19, 2010: Dad, I see you sitting on the floor staring at me into the wee hours of the morning, hallucinating that you’re some time-transcending wormhole alien seeing me walk by the crib at two years old, then running into the room yelling for you and mom at five or six, called in as a disinterested teen and finally a grown man, but I ain’t gonna make it as easy for you as a flash-forward on TV. You know very well that reality includes all the bits on the cutting room floor.
April 21, 2010: Mom hates Stewie Griffin (she might say it’s his precocious irreverence, but dad suspects the overt homosexuality might have something to do with it), but stuck this guy on the side of my crib—
April 23, 2010: Been at it a week now, this thing called life. (Let’s steer clear of the whole viability debate for the time being.) Dad keeps saying how he’s gonna get even with me someday, when old age has reduced him to little more than I currently am, limited to indiscernible noises for communication, including not only the cries but the grunts, yelps, belches, snorts, gasps and whimpers—and those while I’m asleep; ruining what’s left of his back and his taste for spices like mustard and wasabi with the hourly contents of my diapers and between the folds of my skin; and my best trick of all, lulling him into thinking I’m finally off to slumber only to stir back up just before his shows start. Little does he know, I’m already planning to set aside a portion of my allowance for a long-term money market fund to dump his ass into a nursing home!
Meanwhile, stop putting it off and go watch that copy of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button mom ripped from Netflix.
April 25, 2010: So I haven’t quite got control of the hose yet… and don’t expect to, not for another few years. Dad’s been pondering a solution that’ll spare me a change of clothes, and him the stress from the bomb-defusing ritual, because his makeshift paper-towel dam comes down with a good squirm. He and mom snuck out today to Babies “R” Us and spent gift credit on this proto-cup apparatus—
April 27, 2010: Mom’s on leave but my three-to-four hour feeding schedule is surely taking its toll on her once-reliable biological clock. Dad sleeps like me, though, through anything, House at Volume 16, fireworks from a nearby carnival, grandma’s Taiwanese, anything, which brings to a total of four our similarities so far: the un-tapering shape to his fingers, mammophilia (which at least I may grow out of) and a preauricular pit Barton Schmitt says puts us in the 99th percentile of congenital misfortune.
April 28, 2010: Dad, please stop with the hovering over me saying “My son…”
With my limited eyesight, you’re really looking like Marlon Brando’s disembodied head. And don’t be tempted to take me outside at night and do the Roots Kunta Kinte thing, either! Face it, you just don’t have John Amos’s arms.
April 29, 2010: Four diaper changes in 15 minutes. I owe you, dad.
April 30, 2010: Almost an hour of feeding within 2 hours. I owe you, mom.
May 1, 2010: Third consecutive day of runny poop, but I’m not showing any of the other signs of diarrhea-related dehydration, like poor feeding, bloated stomach, new congestion or fever, so we’ll trust it’s all good. Mom & dad’ll gladly part with the $15 co-pay to confirm this with the pediatrician.
The acne is also quite to be expected, from mom’s hormones and me stressing out all the time, and should clear up within a few months. And if it doesn’t, I suppose we can just put it off until I’m a teenager and take care of it with a subscription to Proactiv. Or whatever they’ll have then, some future version of it that’s so effective digital-TV advertising will no longer be necessary, Korean-made home plastic surgery kits, maybe even perfect avatars like in that movie, Surrogates, the parents Netflix’d over the weekend. Dad sure has a lot of faith in technological advance, but I bet my own kids will still be waiting on air-cars.
May 2, 2010: Chart on Wiki got me thinking about my relatives, too, so here’s a chart dad put together of the ones I’ve met so far (click for the imagemap-enabled version), and how much I have in common with them genetically—
May 5, 2010: What, dad, no dreams with me in them yet? It’s the same ol’ superhero stuff where you’re indomitable and can fly? Just because you had a partner last night whom you had to carry, seated on her silver one-wheeled motorcycle, to a mission in another city and who had the power herself, apparently stabilizing your usual lack of control over altitude… Wait, I see what you’re doing! You’re hijacking my blog with reports of your frivolous idiosyncrasies! What next, you’ll be filling this entry with news that you’ve tried the latest lime-flavored Mountain Dew being test marketed—!
May 7, 2010: Dad quietly logged into FF outside after the cholecystokinin knocked both mom and me out and shared news of my birth to his in-game mates. (And racked up a measly 1.8K EXP in campaign on his BST, the details of which I’ll leave to him to go on about elsewhere.) A fellow recent parent acquaintance of his happened to be online and congratulated him, and recommended washing my face with Cetaphil and moisturizing with Aquaphor for my worsening acne—it’s not bothering me, and probably won’t until I’m trying out for higher social status in grade school, but dad’s paranoid about the Chinese gender gap, not to mention our likely reduction to third-world status, and is actually considering shopping me around at an early age—which he picked up for me today, despite our pediatrician telling him this morning through his receptionist to do nothing. Or come in. What’s with doctors, they don’t have e-mail addresses or can’t receive an MMS? House does it all the time, but at least he’s a douche who gets results.
Jon also suggested the Moby Wrap, as apparently modeled by Seal:
May 9, 2010: More acne now than skin. God’s seen fit to punish dad with the thing that disgusts him most. (Why can’t you You just settle your Your score with him, let him with the lottery then have a heart attack or something, and leave me out of it?) Seems instead of having cool mutant superpowers that always made you a serial killer on the X-Files, I’ll only end up one of those real-world grotesques Mulder would show Scully pictures of to prove how possible it all was.
May 10, 2010: Dad had this idea of recording himself being beaten by Uncle 남재—technically a first cousin once removed, as if I’ll be addressing him as such—in Super Street Fighter IV, falling to the side in slo-mo spitting up blood to Barber’s Adagio for Strings, while I watched lying on my side from inside my crib. Years later I’d be shown playing with the controller, picking up the game (probably one of the sequels), then over the course of my childhood, improving my skills, eventually challenging and defeating my father’s foe. It would certainly make for a more entertaining home movie, but I doubt he’ll get any further past ordering the latest reprint of Executioners of Death.
May 11, 2010: Dad took the rest of those awful dry wipes back to Target, along with the other bag of Seventh Generation diapers whose “green” moniker also belied the waste of resources from ill-fitting leaks, and was surprised when the gal in Customer Service issued us a full refund on the case of ten 70-ct. packs. Mom said the store probably couldn’t care less about online orders, but when dad asked if he could instead attribute it to his charm, she replied, “You can think that, if it makes you feel better.” /facepalm, that’s what they say nowadays.
May 18, 2010: No updates because I’ve been at my fussiest, sleeping an hour at the most and expecting to suck mom dry each time I get up. Few days ago I overheard dad doing the math before pronouncing one month down, 215 to go! Better “milk” this while I can.
May 19, 2010: Early birthday present for dad—I finally broke from my 45-minute pattern and slept through the entire last episode of Lost (there may have been a cry or two, who can tell with all that racket from the rest of the house), and even though I actually had to be woken up near midnight for feeding, don’t get your hopes up for that all-night event they’re making out of the finale Sunday.
You guys and your TV shows; it’s like that scene in Lisa’s Pony when Homer’s watching Fantasy Island instead his daughter’s first steps. Funny how these things tie together.
May 21, 2010: So my erratic schedule kept dad from stepping in the ring against a Father Time-Death tag team and running like he does on his birthday every year, but it’s entirely his fault when his heart does take him from my life that he took in a Boneless Filet combo and a Double Down for lunch today.
May 24, 2010: So much for the vaunted Pampers. After less than half a box, mom and dad are convinced their leakage protection has got nothing on Huggies, lacking any sort of dam around the waist, and they wouldn’t be too surprised, either, if there’s the slightest truth to the recent chemical scare, given the timing of my increased irritability and incidence of diaper rash. Softer tabs at the waist won’t make up for any of that, nor the higher price. Internet scuttlebutt is that they’re better for girls. Then again, with all the different models in their line, and that I’m between sizes, could it also be a fit issue? Was 阿嬤 even following dad’s instructions to lower my nozzle when changing me?
May 31, 2010: This is the best modern medicine has to offer, to describe the dangerous kind of bloody stool as “currant jelly”? Maybe dad’s spent too much of his life watching TV shows where there’s always an immediate chemical analysis available, but mom ought to have better recourse than having to drop nearly everything from her diet to avoid passing allergens. I’m just scoring with the hereditary traits, aren’t I? Dad’s single eyelid, and mom’s lactose intolerance.
June 1, 2010: If there’s anything that makes dad want to Tony-Stark, it’s a project like Twoddler (or even one of these that’ll send out a SMS or chat message), but he’s afraid mom’ll get way more tweets than he does.
June 3, 2010: Face cleared up for the most part, though you never know, every day’s yearbook-picture day for a baby. [Update, later that evening: Yup, spoke too soon.] Mom freaks out each time it looks like I’m never gonna sleep through the night, and dad’s started making a list of reasons to kick my butt presumably when it no longer qualifies as child abuse. Or maybe he’ll hold them against future nice’s, in which case I may as well not bother ever learning the meaning of Christmas. Remember your traffic light counts, man—you got to balance all the reds with your greens!
June 7, 2010: Third straight 6-hour night! Trick seems to be to keep me up from 8 or so, then offer up a good 4 ounces of warmed milk around 11:30. Maybe I should suggest dad try it, too.
June 8, 2010: Maybe I won’t. Only 4-and-a-half hours last night.
June 14, 2010: Changed up my cry in the past week, working my vocal cords more to produce a lingering sound which dad can only describe as 짜증. He and mom have how many languages between them, yet it frustrates them when I replace my standard “neh” (奶?) with something new like this.
June 15, 2010: Metaphor of the day goes to mom, who said I went to sleep looking like a robot whose battery had run out, having conked out and left my arms and legs mid-climb. (Give it up, dad. She got you beat.)
June 16, 2010: Three 5/8″ needles today in my legs for the first round of state-mandated vaccinations. Stupid human race, late with my laser hypo! Dad’ll be glad, at least, that they’re gonna be too sore now to kick him in the nuts like I do when he’s changing me. With a smile on my face. Grape-flavored Target-brand acetaminophen ftw (because Tylenol® is recalled, again).
And doc also said my height’s in the 95 percentile for two months and weight 75, but that from only a quick look at today’s measurements? Either he’s one of those savant calculators, or was fudging. Again.
June 21, 2010: Looks to be a double eyelid in my future. That, or dad’s fake one began as a faint line this early on, too.
June 24, 2010: Mom’s latest obsession is with a ring of thinning hair around my head. Losing the fine stuff is apparently yet another normal condition for my age, because at any other, I’d probably qualify as a medical curiosity. Little does she know it’s from wearing my crown as king of the faeries when they’re all asleep. Hey, it’s all I got. Crib. Drool-stained sheets. 0-3 months-sized pajamas. Kingdom.
Dad, don’t get any silly ideas:
June 29, 2010: Cradling’s just not doing it for me these days, as I’m generally inconsolable unless perched over a shoulder, or there’s something in my mouth. Speaking of which, I’ve developed a new taste for my thumb during those lonely moments when I’m set down and it’s all I have to look at, though I’m having difficulty separating it from the rest of my fist. Fortunately my body proportions are still such that I can perform feats like this without being labeled a freak.
July 2, 2010: Nothing that qualifies strictly as speech yet (despite what dad swears sounds vaguely Cantonese), but an awful lot of cooing and babbling. And snoring after feeding, which is easier to capture. Chances are I’ll grow up bilingual, at the very least, but here’s hoping one of my languages is jive:
July 13, 2010: Dad’s only recently noticed my pulsating fontanelle, and he can’t help but think of the Talosians:
July 19, 2010: Phở Tasty told dad “An important word of advice may come from a child. (B/W: 11 17 19 23 43 46)” over the weekend. This might take a while, as he’s probably not getting what I’ve been telling him all along.Dad’s advice—no, his wish—is that I don’t be this guy:
July 20, 2010: 10 hours of sleep last night, freeeoww! That’s what, a lifetime in my dreams, according to that movie mom & dad left me in the care of a household with an average age of nearly 70 to see on Sunday? (There’s not much yet for me to populate them, anyway. Just giant breast-mountains and faces I can’t remember …then again, doesn’t sound too different from dad’s.) It isn’t the only part of my day I’ve started organizing better: I’m down to pooping only twice now, but the amount that I have for dad at once has him crying instead.
July 26, 2010: Hopefully this oral fixation won’t last past reciting the Gospels, though if they help as much as they do hereabouts to keep the noise level down, maybe it should. Note that Linus was on dad’s short list, but maybe it was too obvious a connection to mom’s family. Or he didn’t want me looking back and thinking I was named after a character on the TV show-of-the-month.
My first cousin! Now let’s see if Uncle Chris follows his own helpful suggestions about what to name him or her (notice how he took over an hour for that last one):
Tuesday, January 05, 2010
chultek (10:01:08 AM): V.J.
chultek (10:01:11 AM): VeeJay
chultek (10:01:37 AM): M.Night Shamaverajay
chultek (10:09:34 AM): Trevor
chultek (10:10:34 AM): “Crying” Freeman
chultek (11:16:52 AM): Outstanding Youth of Canton
July 27, 2010: My parents missed it when they smudged my footprints in the scrapbook, but 阿嬤 made a discovery literally on my soles that reinforces my X branding. (Not that I buy into fortune-telling, especially when “English language teacher[s] from England” can’t be bothered to look up what pedology really is.)
July 30, 2010: I’ve been read to for a while now (and curiously have yet to tire of the monkeys), and while dad’s always entertained an idea about writing a children’s book himself, I just hope it’s less of a downer than this:
August 2, 2010: Mom first called them horns, but the way my skull flares out is more like one of those garish Porsche Turbo bodies. My skull’s undergone significant deformation since birth, what with the Pyramid Head-like shape from being stuck in the birth canal for so long, so who knows how it’ll settle. My fleshy ear lobes, though, makes dad ponder my reincarnation pedigree.
August 10, 2010: Seriously, Nintendo ought to use this in their marketing. It’s no secret dad likes him some videogames, so I see a lot of this in my future, too.
Mom and dad’s anniversary this past weekend, so they left me for the first time overnight to getaway (again) at a fancy Japanese hotel with those bidet-style toilets in each room. Dad has always fancied installing one for us at home, what with wipes being better the wetter, but might have changed his mind. Environmental concerns notwithstanding, I think it’s the thought of running into 阿祖 coming out of our bathroom late at night that dissuades him.
August 13, 2010: Lower central incisors erupted the other day, my first. That, plus my failure to combust spontaneously when I’m being carted around and despite my parents’ best efforts sunlight hits me at those unavoidable angles confirms, I’m Team Jacob. (Will I even know what that means someday?)
Hair growth, however, still stalled. Keeps the option open for 少林寺, dad insists, and mom will appreciate the orientation benefits of martial arts training:
August 18, 2010: The Beatles, whom dad used to play for me to try and expand my musical horizons—and probably will keep at it until I, too, discover Revolver in a smoke-filled VW bug in high school—said “there’s nothing you can know that isn’t known”, which describes the beauty of the Internet, that most of everything is already done for you. (This is gonna be so handy come term paper-writing time.) Like this guy, who collects books with my initial in the title:
August 19, 2010: If I take away anything from these months it will less likely be from the Dr. Seuss rotation than my five or six-times daily study of the back of our 32-oz. bottle of Target up & up™ Hand Sanitizer Gel during changes.
Dad’s transcribed it for me, to jog my memories for some future distraction:
EXP 01/2012
Drug Facts
Active Ingredient____________________________________________Purpose
Ethyl Alcohol 62%………………………………………………………………………Antiseptic
Uses •To decrease bacteria on the skin that could cause disease. •Recommended for repeated use.
Warnings For external use only-hands.
Flammable. Keep away from heat and flame.
When using this product •Keep out of eyes. In case of contact with eyes,
flush thoroughly with water. •Do not inhale or ingest. •Avoid contact with
broken skin.
Stop use and ask a doctor if skin irritation develops.
Keep out of reach of children. In case of accidental ingestion, seek
professional assistance or contact a Poison Control Center immediately.
Directions •Wet hands thoroughly with product and allow to dry without
wiping. •For children under 6, use only under adult supervision. •Not
recommended for infants.
Other information •Do not store above 105°F. •May discolor some
fabrics. •Harmful to wood finishes and plastics.
Inactive ingredients Benzophenone-4, Carbomer, Fragrance, Glycerin,
Isopropyl Myristate, Propylene Glycol, Tocopheryl Acetate, Water.
Questions? Call 1-800-910-6874
August 24, 2010: Now my on-again off-again double eyelids are most definitely singles, which has mom lamenting my genetic outcome. Dad will just have to get us one of those Japanese photo booths for all my portraits:
September 7, 2010: Dad would be all over these networked pajamas that’d let him track how I was doing—though he’s more likely to drop the sensor down my diapers instead—but by the time they get to market, I’ll probably just let him know with so many words. (Check out Jons Lovitz and Voight on their eerie corporate website.) Mine, incidentally, have gone from a once-loquacious proto-lingual babble to more grumbles and growls, which dad suspects is mimicry of all that throat-clearing from my grandparents’ bathroom.
September 8, 2010: School snipers? When was this survey taken, right after network prime time TV (which ends with an SVU rerun every night of the week)? Ask dad, and he’s likely to add aliens, bugs or the apocalypse.
September 19, 2010: Well, I suppose it was bound to happen. You’d think the required permutation of circumstances defies all odds, but lesson is, never count on avoiding the worst of them: I got shit on dad’s face. (Pee wouldn’t make much of a story.) Mom was feeding me in the dark early this morning and didn’t notice I had leaked onto the boppy; she proceeded to place me in it next to him while she went to prepare a formula chaser. He rolled over to keep me company, felt something wet against him and assumed it was harmless regurgitation… but thicker than usual? The lights came on and there was a flurry of running between the bathroom and laundry, wipes and clothing changes, and cries of “Why me.”
September 26, 2010: 阿祖 and the nanny insisted I’ve been at it all week, but it wasn’t until today the parents witnessed me roll over onto my stomach. (The other way’s been speculated about.) Not sure why this is considered the milestone; I just think the Korean-made Costco playmat is more interesting than the vanilla sky. How do these folks pick the words they do? Yellow, represented by a White crayon no less, instead of yo-yo? I bet what keeps xylophones around at all is the lack of anything else that starts with the letter X… thanks, dad. Oh, and an alphabet book my aunt just brought back for me from Taiwan actually uses “zyzzyva.”