Being a Parent With a Life

Time Wasted

2012-01-29T13:00:00.000-08:00

Today it has taken nearly 5 hours (and counting) to get Siiri to fall asleep. Two and a half hours before her nap and nearly the same time before her night sleep. It is so annoying. Like truly annoying to the point that I'm ready to lock her in her room and just ignore her when she's supposed to sleep and then unlock the door when she's supposed to be awake. We can't do that but I'm allowed to dream, aren't I?

Siiri's nap kept happening later and later until it was usual for her to still be awake at 3 p.m. That's the time when most kids her age have already woken up from their nap. It didn't make sense to even start putting her to sleep before 1:30 p.m. and the one and a half hours waste was all in the daily plan. Then sometimes she kept resisting sleep until 4 or even 4:30, so for a while we didn't even try anything until 2 p.m. Then she fell asleep even later and woke up a couple of hours before her evening bed time. That didn't work either so we put her to sleep earlier again. It seemed that no matter what we do, it takes 1.5-2.5 hours for her to fall asleep. Now we're trying something different - for a couple of days now, we have set her sleeping times to the recommended 12 a.m. and 7 p.m.. That's 3-4 hours earlier than she's used to.

The bed-time routine is great and I really don't see why it doesn't work. I start by getting into pajamas. Then I wash her teeth. Then she gets to select two stories or fairy tales from her books. If she selects really short stories, I usually read a third short story. That takes about 20-30 minutes. Every other day Erkki does that, but it's deliberately identical. Sometimes she wants to play with a snow globe while I'm reading, but usually she tends to wander around the room and comment what I'm reading. Sometimes I get her to stay put and lie in bed, but that doesn't make any difference so I don't enforce it much. When stories have been read, she lies down, I tuck her in and we wave good-night. The routine is the same for both nap and night time sleep. And then 3 minutes later Siiri is jumping on her bed. I order her to lie down. 2 minutes later she wanders away from her room, I order her back in her room.   Then she spends 10 minutes talking and playing with her stuffed toys.  I treat this as "at least she's in bed", but then she gets bored with that and walks out again. And that goes on for a couple of hours until I get irritated and short-tempered and whenever she even makes a beep, I don't even bother going to her, but I just yell from another room, "Siiri, back to bed, right now!". And then eventually she is so sleepy that she just crashes in her bed, because that's where she happens to be.

So why is it so bad if she spends such a long time falling asleep. I could just, you know, get used to it and not have a problem with it. Well, it's not that simple.  When it's sleeping time, we don't play or eat. I don't teach her anything, she doesn't practice drawing or play with Play-Doh. It's pointless wasted time. It's my life (or Erkki's) and Siiri's just ticking away completely uselessly. I don't get to concentrate on anything because every 5-10 minutes I get to order Siiri back to bed. (I guess now you see the potential usefulness of getting a lock for her door, except there's no bathroom there.). When I'm in the other room putting Liisa to sleep, Siiri takes advantage of the situation and wanders around and then starts playing with the volume of her voice: shrieking softer and louder. When I was cutting Liisa's hair while Liisa was asleep, Siiri came out and casually woke up Liisa with pointless talk. That was one time I was really pissed off and didn't want to talk with Siiri for a couple of hours. I totally see the enjoyment I would get from physical punishment. I really have a cruel streak in me.   Some parts of my childhood have taught me to be cruel because to me it seemed that everyone else is cruel too. That's not completely true but I do still have to work on my temper. Physical punishment would be a bitter sweet revenge for not going to sleep at the right time: but that sounds way too mean for any good parent, so I won't do that.

I don't have any plan. Currently it seems that Siiri falls asleep when I am already cranky and on the verge of losing my temper, so perhaps I should start this way.  Brillint idea, eh? So when I read her the fairy tales and say good night, I can add, "and don't you dare getting out of bed, or I will hide all your toys and you won't see them until you wake up. And if you get out of bed again, I start throwing them out the window. One. By. One." Or I could take a devil's mask that I could buy in some carnival store and put it on and not take it off until after she falls asleep, so that she could be too scared to come out of her room, and while I wear it I could be really mean and angry. Or I could do it easier and "accidentally" start watching horror movies after her bedtime, so that when she wanders out of her room, she happens to see them and won't ever dare to come out of her room at bedtime ever again. (Except when she starts having nightmares and runs out of her room screaming...  ) I don't know. All of it sounds like a good idea at the moment. Anything sounds better than 5 and a half hours (yes, that's how long it finally took) wasted during an otherwise perfect Sunday. Half of that time Erkki was the active party, the other half I was the active party, not none of that time we could spend together, just watching something together or having a meaningful conversation. Today Liisa was in a foul mood as well, so even browsing the net was not easy. I didn't find any useful information how to improve nap times. It seems like we've already tried everything.

Any ideas?

PS! Liisa is doing really well. She learned to turn to her stomach before she was 4 months old and now she turns on her stomach whenever possible. She does't interfere with Siiri's daily schedule much and sometimes she's even helpful in getting Siiri to fall asleep. Siiri is still much more likely to wake up Liisa than the other way around (ratio about 4:1).

Even Greedier Bastards

2012-01-24T13:22:00.000-08:00

After my last post about Internet piracy I discussed the topic with Erkki and I also kept reading about it. I found out some things worth sharing.

It is possible to buy games online through Steam. Well, actually I knew that before but I don't use it myself (I only play games on Xbox lately) and I forgot all about it. With all the criticism I have about how the world works and how piracy is caused by the lack of fast, simple and affordable supply, I should have mentioned Steam so I will correct it right now.

Steam is an online game platform. You log in as a user and you can download and play a very wide variety of games. What they get right: Their wide selection of old games easily completes with what pirates have to offer and, even better, they sell all the well-marketed new games. This allows even the people living in nearly abandoned countryside to legally purchase games that would definitely be found in the local store. Now piracy is no longer the only option for them (aside from not playing at all or ordering a physical copy and praying it gets delivered intact). There is one thing that they do perfectly: they let people pre-download games and when it's finally the release date of the downloaded game, people get the codes to start playing it. Excellent. Ingenious!   they have understood that people can't wait so and that their servers would be overloaded during the release day of major games if everyone started downloading at the same time. But... (of course there is a 'but') ...they might be the greediest bastards of all.

Steam sells the new games for the full price. They do occasionally sell games with huge discounts but the normal prices are just what you'd expect from a new game: €30-€60. "What's wrong with that?  ", you might wonder. Sure you don't get a physical disc or a manual, but that affects the price very little and who needs those anyway. What's wrong is that you buy the game only after you sign a contract that the games will only be for PERSONAL use. That does not include a wife and a couple of kids. If you let your wife/husband play with your account, you're actually breaking the agreement.  I don't know how that is even possible because such user agreements just can't be above marital law. What's mine is Erkki's and vice versa. Sure, it doesn't apply to all things, for example I have no right to modify or delete Erkki's Facebook account or to even view his e-mail accounts but the games he buys on Steam are just as much bought with my money. If it's really possible to sign an agreement that makes those games belong to only him, then why do people even bother signing prenuptial agreement before they get married. One of the partners could just sign separate agreements so that all the best things he buys only belong to him/her.

Actually, I realized there are things like membership fees which only belong to the person who signs the contract. If the husband joins a country club that has huge membership fees, it still doesn't make the wife a half-member. Same with gym membership cards. I have no idea what would happen to a World of Warcraft account during a divorce if the non-player spouse wanted half of it. There was some case where a woman deleted her husband's WoW account and was fined, so I guess the account is worth something. But maybe Steam is selling something completely obscure, like the right to play a game. However I think about it, I'm sure Steam found a legal loophole which justifies the "personal only" agreement, but never in a million years would I believe that they actually thought couples will buy two copies of each game that they both like. Or 4 copies if their kids also like the game. So basically they set up a system that guarantees that there will be people all over the world violating the Steam agreement.  That means Steam sows as much morally bad Internet behavior as the overpriced game industry in general. Or in other words, they re-define what to consider immoral: is it immoral to break a end user agreement? What if it's a stupid and unfair agreement?

Also, Steam games or accounts can't be sold (agreement violation), which makes the games relatively even more expensive. In Europe that's not such a big issue but in USA there are stores that actually buy back the used games and sell used games for (I would guess) a reasonable price.

Another beef I have with Steam is the regional pricing and availability of games. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, for example, costs €49.99 in Europe, €46.14 in USA, and €41.92 in UK. Deus Ex: Human Revolution is even worse, costing €49.99, €23.06, or €35.93, respectively. The EXACT SAME GAME. Just as much data is moved across the Internet, except some people have the privileged to pay more for a game they can't re-sell or let their spouse play. And it gets even worse. Erkki bought and pre-loaded Skyrim on Steam. When it was the release date, he came home, eager to start playing, except there was a surprise. At the last moment, after his purchase, the game had been changed to "unavailable" in some parts of Europle, including Estonia and several other countries. And presumably it was all fair because Estonia is some weird country anyway, where people live in mud huts and walk around in waist-deep mud in extreme poverty.   Why would they want to play games anyway...

I'm not against Steam as such. I think it's a great start. If they enable family accounts and combine the regions, then it would all be great. And if they keep experimenting with game pricing (cool information about pricing experiments), maybe games will end up being affordable to average people and gaming piracy will become something that only poor people do.

Damn I took so many words to describe all the subtle ways how Steam secretly sucks. But there is another thing I wanted to discuss: Estonian Authors' Society, EAS (Eesti Autorite ühing, EAÜ). Most countries have similar organizations that work towards ensuring that artists get the profit they deserve and people don't break copyright laws. The idea behind it is very noble and I give them my respect for making sure that people who sing professionally actually get paid for what they produce. As you can guess, I wouldn't mention them only to praise their cause. In stead, I'm mentioning to bash their means. EAS collects money from all the digital songs (8-12%, with a set minimum fee for a song), they collect money from TV-channels and TV broadcasters (for showing channels with copyright material, they collect money from all the empty CDs sold in the store because they COULD end up having copyrighted material on them (8%), they collect 5% every time a painting is sold, they collect money from concert organizers, night clubs, restaurants with background music, etc. Basically, they get their dirty little nails behind every cent they can hoard to themselves. In the year 2008, they collected over 70 000 000 EEK.

And now it gets tricky - they only pay out fees to registered members for registered works of art and only for the member's contribution in that work of art. A song is 50% music and 50% words, so if the singer didn't write the ENTIRE song, they won't get the entire money for it. And even if he did, he still had to pay 25% that was already removed "for representing the author's rights". EAS has some partner organizations abroad as well, so they pay some money to them as well, for the authors that are registered with them, but there is still a lot of authors who are "being represented" but don't receive the money that EAS has collected on their behalf. Even the artists who are supposed to be paid, often have to contact the organization to get the money, otherwise it will go unnoticed. For that reason, in 2008, EAS distributed only 26 000 000 EEK to it's members.

I would call that robbery - they take from everyone and only make it seem like they are giving it to the people who deserve it. Their website has listed several people who owe them money, including for Anne Veski's solo concerts and a child protection day event in a park. I wish I was making it up. They're like the ultimate bad guy, taxing a person's own solo concert and robbing money from child protection day events. They should just rename their organization Musical Artists For Indulgence Association.

This "helpful" organization sets a minimum price for all songs sold online, increasing the price and thus encouraging piracy. One online music store in Estonia just went bankrupt because they couldn't pay those fees. EAS started asking for 12% which was too much for the store. It would be less tragic if Microsoft music store Zune were being distributed to Estonia, but they're not. EAS is also famous for having videos removed from Youtube. That includes any video that looks slightly dubious and they don't check if any copyright laws really were broken. One guy found that his own video of him singing his own song was removed by EAS "just in case". It was in the news recently. EAS also inhibits any fringe cultural events that don't make much profit but have to pay to EAS. If you've been to a place called Genialistide klubi in Tartu, you might not have noticed that it's a "night club".  At least that's how it's being taxed by EAS.

I hope it gave you something new to think about.

Also, almost forgot. There are no movie rentals in the 100 000 people town I live in. I guess everyone buys the movies in the mall (selection is mostly made up of 3-10 year old movies that no one ever wanted to buy) or rents one of the 77 movies in Elion digital rental (if they're Elion clients). Or they just watch movies on TV, because they know that commercial breaks are for their own good, so they can be up to date with products sold in stores.

Greedy Bastards

2012-01-20T06:08:00.000-08:00

I live in a mythical country. We have ancient forests and beautiful maidens. We have medieval city walls and castles. And most importantly, sometimes our country exists and sometimes it doesn't. The ignorant people involved with entertainment industry usually can't see us but the modern all-knowing oracle, the Internet, knows we're here in need of entertainment. Thus our fairy tale features a lot of pirates.

I read Cracked.com very often. It has humorous articles about everything from women clothing to zombie apocalypse. One of the writers there (can't remember which one) condemned Internet piracy, saying it only made sense when he was young and entertainment cost too much and wasn't even always available for all people. I was confused - how is that different from our current situation? Music records are ridiculously expensive and a nuisance to buy. I would literally have to WALK TO THE STORE to buy an expensive music record with only a couple of songs that I actually like and if the CD gets scratched, I get to throw it away. That is so ridiculous. I would really have to hate money and have no respect for my time to do that. Buying CDs is so damn ridiculous that downloading a few songs or even playlists full of thousands of songs with a few easy clicks doesn't even count as piracy in our society anymore. So when I talk about piracy, why even mention music at all, right? Besides, I could just legally listen to free random music on Pandora.

Or not. Pandora website:

Dear Pandora Visitor,
We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative.
We believe that you are in Estonia (your IP address appears to be 80.235.58.120). If you believe we have made a mistake, we apologize and ask that you please email us.

Oh go to hell. Licencing is like the evil spell that makes us not exist.  Come on! Estonia has real people who might want to listen to music too. Ah, to hell with it. I'll just download something later.* (*added later: Just kidding! I'm too lazy to even download music because I'd have to actually know the artists that are worth downloading. I might find them on Pandora, except... Never mind. Music is overrated anyway)

The situation is worse with movies. It's not really possible to stay up to date with the movie industry by only watching movies after buying them. Movies are really expensive and it takes so long for movies to be released in mythical countries. Me and Erkki are really fond of watching movies and for a while we had a weird delusion that we want to support the movie industry by actually buying movies every once in a while. About 10% of movies (that we watched) we saw in the cinema, 30-40% we bought and the rest of them we saw by other means. After a few of years we had possibly over a hundred movie DVDs. We had nothing to do with them because it's tedious to watch something old when we barely have the time to watch all the cool new things. We eventually gave most of the movies away and the rest of them are collecting dust and taking up space. It's stupid really - we have all those movies what could fit on a regular hard drive. And we can't even use a "search button" to find the right movie. We have to BROWSE AND FIND the right DVD and actually OPEN THE BOX and INSERT THE DISC.  Are you kidding me? What year is it - 1992?!

Besides, the price. Oh my god, what price they ask for it. Most people have really crappy TV-sets and even worse sound systems (if any at all). And even with good quality technology, most people live in apartment buildings so they can't turn up the sound. Now can you imagine that the DVD version of Inception costs 13 euros? For such a price you can buy one movie that everyone has already seen, and are already forgetting. For a standard family of 4, that would be a good deal because going to the cinema once would cost about as much money and then you couldn't watch it over and over again. Except it would be on your crappy TV set with that crappy sound system in that thin-walled apartment. Another aspect of entertainment prices: what's your entertainment budget for a month? For most people 35 euros for a month of gym membership is too much. How would they ever manage to watch more than 2 movies in a month if they also want to listen to legal music of their own choice.

And the stupidest thing of all - the reason why the movie industry should just do a huge face palm at their own horrible idea - DVD regions!  Some of the movies sold in Estonia aren't even meant for our region. One Estonian guy told a story how he used to be completely legal in terms of Internet piracy (sucker!). One day he bought a cartoon DVD for his kid but when he got home and tried to play it, he found out it was meant for Australian region instead or somewhere similarly far away. He hadn't cracked open his DVD player regions, and I think that would have been illegal anyway, even though everyone does that. He was furious and called some official line to complain and ask for advice. As it turns out, the store did nothing wrong, there are no grounds for getting a refund, it would still be illegal for him to download the same movie and he should have bought an Australian disc only if he had a plan on traveling to Australia to watch it. That was the day he turned to piracy for justice.

Movie industry just doesn't get it. The entire world is paying for those blockbusters so it's just horribly unfair to treat some countries worse and give us the movies much later. Also, if there is any statistics out there saying that movies make more money in US than in the rest of the worlds then DUH! That's because the rest of the world decided they won't take that crap and just went and saw the movie for free. The movie Inception premiered in UK, was released in USA on 13 July 2010, already on 23 of July in Estonia and then finally on 1st of September in China and 24th September in Italy. So, they they expect Italians to just wait around for all that time to actually see the movie? And people who enjoy watching films in their own home had to wait until 7th of September for the DVD to be released. In the modern age, that translates to AN ETERNITY! Enjoy your regional favoritism, movie industry and don't worry about the common people - the Internet offers an alternative.

The movie industry bitches and moans about lost profit while they still think its possible to screw people over with regions and delayed release of movies. If you're assholes enough to say: "you have to wait three weeks to see the movie just because you live in Estonia and you have to wait even longer if you want to watch it in your living room" then people in the world will simply find an alternative. People can't wait. The proof is the existence of screener copies of movies. There are plenty of people out there who would watch a low quality version that has been filmed with a hand camera by someone with shaky hands in stead of waiting a couple of months for a good copy of the film. The world is too fast paced and global for the current system of movie release dates.

Don't even get me started on programs that cost more for the European market than they do for the USA market and come with a price tag close to minimum wage or much more. Between the choices of not using the ridiculously expensive programs at all or using freeware crap, the market found a third option, which unfortunately isn't legal. I once tried to find out how much I would have to pay to use Photoshop at home.

From Adobe forums:

Hi,

could someone from Adobe give me a real answer to this question?
Photoshop CS5 is 999$ in the US but....1434Euros in France!
If I use the current change rate, it should be something like 735 euros!!!
So, why do you simply multiply the price by 2?
(And please, don't tell me that the shipping in France and the translation of the manual cost 700 euros)

Thanks

JM

Good going Adobe. Nice of you to make sure no one actually buys your program for their home computer and to guarantee that there will always be pirated copies available online. I don't use photoshop very often so I would pay 10 euros for Adobe Photoshop if I could download it in from a fast server and get some extra benefits (like removing ads that could be included on the FREE version that you yourself upload - so, what do you think? ). I would not pay the ridiculous money it costs now. It costs so much that piracy seems to be the assumed way of using the program at home. Besides, it's truly inconvenient to actually download and install the official Adobe program, as I know from workplace experience. As long as the legal option is infinitely more tedious, piracy isn't going anywhere.

E-books.  That's possibly the issue that justifies piracy more than anything else. The translated, hardcover copy of Dan Brown's "Digital Fortress" costs 14.19 €. That makes sense. The original language hardcover copy is 12.11 € (calculated with Google currency conversion). Translating and transporting books is very expensive. Paying only 2 extra euros for translation and transportation is a bargain. Printing a hardcover book is also expensive, especially a book with 408 pages. One online printing company says that the price of printing hardcover books is $8.50 per unit +$0.02 per page, which is 16.66 € for a 408 page book. I guess Chinese sweatshops do it for much less, but nothing can explain why the e-book of translated Digital fortress costs 12.14€!!! Absolutely nothing except for evil greedy manages who are laughing their evil greedy laughter in their Bad Guy castles that are surrounded by moats full of hungry piranhas.

So basically what I'm saying is that piracy is so mainstream only because the entertainment industry (and some greedy companies) have made so many bad choices and now there is no turning back. There would have been some piracy no matter what they did, but in their attempt to squeeze more and more money out of regular people, they have made piracy the widespread norm that it is today. Those regular people actually like to eat and pay electricity pills and can't seem to find leprechauns  to give them pots full of gold. There is one way to stop piracy - no it's not ACTA or PIPA or SOPA. The solution is for the entertainment industry to stop living in fairy tales and realize that they live in the real world where all countries have access to the Internet and people do not have unlimited money and time that they are dying to give away to support greedy bastards.

PS! I have officially lost 18 kg (4 months and 1 week) and I'm now back in the pre-pregnancy weight. For a long time it was 18ish kg (0,3-0,6 over the goal) but today the scale was my friend. I am very happy about it!

Confusional Arousal

2012-01-10T15:53:00.000-08:00

I know what inspired the movie Exorcist. Just imagine a kid waking up at night and screaming. Mother enters the room, "Mommy's right here. Everything's okay!" and the mother touches the child's arm. The child starts screaming twice as loudly as if touched with burning iron. The father joins the scene and also tries to calm the child who still hasn't opened her eyes. The child cries and cries and screams and then cries some more for 10 minutes while both parents are confused. Then she walkes around the room being angry at everything and suddenly calms and goes back to sleep. In the morning the child is happy and playful as if it had all been a dream.

The contrast between nighttime Siiri and daytime Siiri and is like the difference between night and day, or the difference between being possessed by a demon or not being possessed. (A lot of good that baptism did. ). I've done a lot of Google research and it's actually a sort of sleep disorder ( a parasomnia) called confusional arousal. It mostly affects infants and toddlers. It's almost like a form of sleepwalking, because the child is still asleep during the episode. Siiri is very difficult to wake up when it happens. At first we tried to wake her up every time. What else are you going to do if the child is screaming at 3 a.m. for no particular reason. It sometimes worked but usually it just made her mad. And I really mean MAD! She was still not very responsive, except she started making demands. "Bunny doesn't want to be tucked in! BUNNY DOESN'T WANT TO BE TUCKED IN! BUNNY... "

A few days ago she made up a new demand "Put Siiri back!". Neither me nor Erkki knew what she meant by it until Siiri started demanding it in the middle of the night, screaming it as loud as she can. Finally Erkki picked her up and placed her in the last place she had been standing and that solved it. Erkki must have casually nudged Siiri, thus "helping" her move further and now had to restore Siiri's location in the room. You see, any kind of help is completely forbidden at night. For Siiri it's all about "myself!". I do like to encourage Siiri to try to open buttons herself, open the door herself, put on clothing herself, but it's not quite the same when a sleep deprived (or still askeep fidgety toddler picks up a class full of water, says, "I will do it myself." and then attempts to climb and sit on the bed while still holding the glass. If I take away the glass, she will say (I mean, scream as loud as possible), "do not help me!".

Some of the demands are perfectly reasonable. If a stuffed toy falls off the bed and she wants to climb down and get it, it's a perfectly reasonable request. However, if she holds on to her thumb with the other hand and cries, "Remove finger!", that's not quite as reasonable. I thought she was simply confused but then she told me to get the scissors from the kitchen to cut the finger off. There's also a thing with hating her left hand. At night, Siiri's left hand isn't allowed to do anything. It can't help adjust the blanket or pick up a stuffed toy. Sometimes it isn't even allowed to help hold that glass of water. Sometimes Siiri lets me help her hold the glass with my right hand, but not with the left hand.

The nighttime tantrums are really annoying and cause sleep deprivation to all of us. It's been going on for months, with some nights worse than others. Sometimes all is quiet for weeks and then sometimes there isn't a single quiet night for a week. Lately it happens several times a week. After I read up on confusional arousal (or sleep terrors, whatever the difference really is), I found out we're not supposed to wake her up at all. Actually we had tried just waiting out the crying but only for a few minutes at a time and then we interfered. When we finally tried to not interact with her in any way during the episode, she cried for 6 minutes and then simply went back to sleep, not saying anything or doing anything. It won't always work though. Even touching the blanket in the wrong way can end with 30 minutes of confused tantrum. I call it confused because even if she gets exactly what she wants, she decides she wanted something completely different in stead.

Confusional arousal is really interfering with potty training. During the day she doesn't use diapers and doesn't have any accidents. She often wakes up in the morning completely dry, except when she has one of those nighttime confusional arousal episodes and can't make it to the bathroom in time. She tries, but it's just doomed effort. She tries to do everything with only her right hand, including taking off her pants and climbing on the toilet seat. When something fails, she has to do it again from start, all while crying and screaming. By the time she's sitting, it's 20 minutes later and too late.

Some mothers think that the episodes are caused by discomforts such as wanting to pee or being too hot or too cold. Doctors are mostly just confused themselves. The description of the episodes varies a lot but tantrums are rarely mentioned. They often say that interacting with the child will make the situation worse but they don't say that the child might want to cut her finger off. One thing that all the medical descriptions say is that lack of sleep causes such parasomnias as night terrors and confusional arousals. And since parasomnias cause lack of sleep, the condition starts to feed itself. For Siiri, lack of sleep is most definitely an issue. It takes HOURS to get her to fall asleep. Lately we start putting her to bed at 8 or 8.30 but she falls asleep near midnight. Nap time isn't much better: I read her the stories at 1.30 and she falls asleep around 3 p.m. or later. The smartest solution suggestion to a similar problem was to put the child to sleep even earlier, at 7 p.m. because of the child's circadian rhythm. If we do that, Siiri can only see Erkki in her dreams. I don't like that solution one bit but we might not have a choice.

...or perhaps a priest with holy water would be more convenient.

Gingerbread Cookies

2011-12-21T13:31:00.000-08:00

I really do have too much energy for spending my time being idle and doing really boring repetitive tasks. Thus I find stuff to really care about. Yeah, okay, I really care about my kids but it would be really unhealthy to obsess about their development too much. I can just imagine it, "Siiri, I see you drew a sun, again! But you already knew how to draw it! Now try to draw a cat. Practice!" . If I really want to push someone to change and improve themselves for my entertainment, I'd rather it would be me. So I try to learn new things.

I have horrible memory, so at first I tried to do some memory exercises. Pretty soon I realized that it's frustrating to spend my time doing something I'm terrible at. Then I thought I would learn to dance better. I'm not good at it, but it's not nearly as bad as with memory. I took on the challenge to master all the dances on Kinect's "Dance Central 2". That was also going badly enough that I kind of gave up. It's wonderful physical exercise but I'm pretty sure that's one challenge that is not really worth the effort. At least not with my grasp of choreography and my lacking physical memory. Then I thought - I haven't made the perfect gingerbread cookies!

Gingerbread cookies are not just a sugary treat. They symbolize my favorite holiday! There's so much tasty food that is only eaten during Christmas. I'm not religious at all anymore and the entire baby Jesus theme is just a nice childhood memory, especially because I barely hear anything about Jesus anymore now that I'm surrounded by spiritualists, pagans, atheists and agnostics. I love Christmas for all the candles and spices, the smell of a spruce tree and the activity of baking and eating fresh gingerbread cookies. As long as I remember, Christmas has always had those things. Most people don't really think about it but when you have kids, the things you do become their childhood memories. How could Siiri have a childhood memory of family Christmas if we're too lazy to celebrate Christmas. That just won't do! We should make the most of it! I want my kids to have childhood memories of Christmas that are worth remembering. One thing that I always remember about Christmas, is when we were kids, we took a bunch of gingerbread dough and made all kinds of shapes and a lot of cookies. Everything was covered in flour and the entire home smelled like gingerbread spices. We always bought the dough and the quality was different every time. How about if I learn to make our own gingerbread dough, so that it will be good every time. My kids could some day eat store-bought cookies and say, "yeah, it's good, but not as good as the ones mom makes.". It's a silly thing to take pride in but I really want to be able to make something better than can be bought in a store, something uniquely excellent.

I started by researching recipes on Internet. The basic idea is that you melt and caramelize sugar, add water, butter and more sugar, then let cool a bit, add spices, let cool a bit more and then add egg and flour. Easy enough. Except it's such a classic treat that everyone has their own recipe. Another problem is that the recipes have been modernized to contain margarine, "gingerbread spice" and special caramelized sugar syrup. I really wanted an ancient-sounding recipe, like something that grannies might have used decades ago. I picked two recipes that were as different as possible. One of them was a really basic gingerbread dough recipe from an old soviet era cooking book. Those cookies were good but nothing special. The other recipe was interesting, though. I found it in some forum post (that I haven't been able to find again). It said, "This is my great-great-aunt's recipe...". WOW, cool! A recipe with genuine ancient family background. That's exactly what I'm looking for! Also, the recipe said, "and then add hot coffee". Plus it had twice as many spices and herbs as any other recipe!

Both recipes contained orange zest (orange part of the orange peel) but I know from experience that adding orange zest sometimes it leaves visible small pieces of orange peel in the pastry. My goal was to make perfect cookies so I wanted to avoid that. Then I had an idea - I will dry the peels and then quickly grind them to dust with a mortar and pestle. So I took the orange and peeled it with a potato peeler. Superb thickness, without any of the bitter white part. Then I let it dry overnight. The next morning I got up and inspected it - the long orange peels had turned into long pieces of orange rubber. I tried to grind one piece. After two minutes of grinding it was still the same piece of rubber. Sugar will surely help! A added some sugar and used the mortar and pestle for another couple of minutes and inspected it - now it looked like an orange piece of rubber half-hidden in powdered sugar. "No, that doesn't look right!". I searched it on the Internet and found out I was supposed to dry the peels for 3-4 days. I didn't have 3-4 days! Okay, but I could just apply a bit of heat. So I put it in the oven at 120 C and the oven fan turned on. About 30 minutes later I was walking around the kitchen being happy with my idea to try the oven until I smelled something strange - cooked orange peels! Gaaah! I rushed to the oven and took them out. They were completely dry and crispy but half of it now looked slightly brown. Well, at least it was dry. So I tried to grind it: in stead of orange dust, it turned into orange sand, leaving visible small pieces of orange peel in the cookies. Epilogue: The next time I just used a fine grater on fresh oranges and ended up with fine wet powder perfect for the cookies!

Okay, so I'll give you the recipe as well. I'll add the spice names in Estonian because even I don't know the translation of some of them. 1 dl is 100 ml. 100 ml liquid weighs roughly 100g. The first time there wasn't enough water or I added too much flour. The result was a very crumbly dough which couldn't be used until I added water and flour just before we made the cookies. The second time I made it, I added water to the dough before I let it sit in the refrigerator. The second time I also used twice the amount allspice and caramelized the sugar even darker. It looks and smells even better than the first time.

PS! We actually baked the gingerbread cookies with several friends and we had four different kinds of dough, including two (Eesti Pagar and Vertigo) that had got the best rating in two separate articles comparing gingerbread doughs sold in Estonia. This dough was most people's favorite that night.
PPS! Vertigo's dough was very good. Eesti Pagar's dough was bland and the cookies turned into wood the next day.

Gingerbread Cookies

2 dl sugar (for caramelizing)

1.5 dl hot coffee

3 dl sugar (originally 2.5-3 dl)

250 g butter

Spices:

---0.5 tsp clove (nelk)

---1 tsp cinnamon (kaneel)

---1 orange zest or 1 lemon zest (riivitud koor)

---0.5 tsp cardamom (kardemon)

---0.5 tsp powdered ginger (jahvatatud ingver)

---a bit of nutmeg (muskaatpähkel)

---5-6 allspice berries, ground (jahvatatud vürtspipra tera)

1 egg

800-900 g flour (I used pastry flour 405)

3-4 tsp baking powder

Pour 2 dl sugar into a thick-bottomed pot and caramelize. This is the tricky part. I had best result when I used two spoons and when the sugar started to melt, I kept the sides of the pot and the spoons clean of the melted sugar, otherwise it will turn hard in only a moment. When sugar is sufficiently brown, remove the pot from heat andthen add hot coffee. Be careful. Mix constantly and beware the steam. Then mix (on very low heat) until sugar is dissolved. Sounds easier than it is. I kept adding small amounts of water because it took so long. Remove from heat and add butter. Add sugar and butter and mix and melt it all together. Let the mixture cool. When it's half-way cooled, add spices. When it's completely cooled, mix in the egg and flour, with baking powder mixed into the flour. Add water if the dough is too crumbly. Refrigerate for a couple of days before using the dough.

Glass of Water

2011-12-11T11:01:00.001-08:00

If I ask you, "is the glass half full or half empty, you will probably say "it's half full" because that's the learned answer. Everyone knows that it's wrong to point out the negative. How about we give it another try. Quick, think of the answer before you continue reading, "Describe winter!". Remember the first words that popped into your head. Did you think of soft beautiful snow or the cold moist wind? Do you see winter as a wonderful season with lots of holidays or a wonderful opportunity to slip on ice and get hurt. For me, the first word I thought of, was "cold, blizzard, being indoors cuddled up in a warm blanket". This includes the problem with winter and a solution to the problem.

I'm a very negative person and I can't change it. I didn't really notice it until I was already in the university. I met so many new people and I talked about old and new topics and I realized that people actually have such different personalities. It seems like an obvious thing, but during school years I was too busy trying to conform to the majority mindset to really understand my own personality. Some people are always positive, no matter what the topic is. It's almost like they live in a different world where the reality is fundamentally different.

I like to think of myself as an energetic and ambitious person but when I have a discussion with someone, I tend to energetically say the most negative things possible. It's horrible! Even when I say something positive, it is often really something negative in disguise. "I love this cereal, it doesn't get as soggy as most of them!", "It's so warm outside ... that all the snow has turned into mud", "This is one of my favorite shirts, too bad I don't have anything to wear it with.". I've tried to stop myself but I can't. Even when I'm in a really positive mood, I'll just have better control over what I say out loud.

It's a weakness and a strength but mostly it's just really annoying. I even annoy myself with it. Can't imagine how others put up with it. It actually makes me less able to go along with new ideas. I notice the potential problems way sooner than the potential gains. Initially I'm usually very pessimistic and trying really hard to hide it and keep an open mind. After a while I have finished thinking about the problems and the possible solutions and I'll realize that it actually is a good idea. Or I'll be stuck on a small problem and I need someone else to point out that the potential gains are still worth it. This sort of negativity doesn't even make me unique or special in any way either, as about 50% of people are really like that.

In the first year of university when I realized that all people are different, I became obsessed with personality theories. And yes, it seems I am always obsessed about something - food, nutrition, extreme embroidery, personalities, reading, drawing, hair, kids, etc. Most of my obsessions pass after a while and leave something behind. Being obsessed with personality theories was one of the biggest obsessions in my life, perhaps even worse than nutrition. Actually I was planning to be a psychologist when I graduated high school but the competition was too tough. Among other things I learned from my obsession that one of the personality dichotomies of Grigoriy Reinin divides people into two groups: positivists and negativists (that's how they were translated to English). Roughly half of all people are the "glass is half empty" kind of people whether they like it or not. Well, I don't like it. I think it would be better to think about all the positive stuff first but the best that I can do is to try and hide it better.

I should also mention that being a negativist is not the same as being a pessimist. I notice the negative stuff so I can ensure that I avoid them on my journey to a positive future. Like when I bake a cake, I'm convinced that it will turn out delicious (otherwise I wouldn't waste my time) but while I'm baking it, I'm constantly thinking about the possible ways I could ruin it so that I can avoid them. It's a kind of skepticism which can be very useful but unfortunately can't be turned off.

If half of all people are really skeptical like that then perhaps some of you recognized yourself in this post. Perhaps this personality trait isn't so obvious in my general writing style but that's because I usually write about things after I have already formed an opinion about. My first thought might be negative but when I finish my contemplation, my opinion is rather balanced between positive and negative.

Also, being a negativist doesn't make me any less self-absorbed as we can see from this totally egocentric blog post.

PS! Kids are doing great. Liisa holds her head really well and already tries to crawl. I haven't told her that she won't be able to do that until she's 5-6 months old. Siiri has reached her terrible twos and she gets really demanding in the middle of the night. I'm still planning on writing a longer post about that in the near future so I'll leave it at that.

Daily Torture

2011-12-08T10:36:00.001-08:00

Pain tolerance is difficult to quantify. I usually see myself as having rather high pain tolerance, but it really depends on what kind of pain we're talking about. I've experienced several kinds of pain in my life and childbirth wasn't even the worst of it. I think I handled those very well, so perhaps my pain tolerance is quite high, except when it comes to using mouth wash, I am really truly sensitive. I'm like a little baby. Or perhaps I'm making some bold assumptions. I'm assuming people don't usually get tears when they use a mouth wash. Is that normal? Mouth wash stings like crazy. Maybe it's just one of my traits - I'm also VERY sensitive to spicy food. Often when eating spicy food, I feel like my mouth is on fire, tears are running down my cheeks, I'm desperately holding ice water in my mouth and reaching for a handkerchief, someone else eating the same food just shrugs and says, "it's a bit spicey, but not THAT hot" .

Speaking of tooth-related torture, I think dental floss is just brutal. I get shivers down my spine when I think of cutting my gum with a piece of string. Like really! That's horror movie level of horrible. That could be a scene in the Saw movie series and it wouldn't be out of place. Still, I can't argue, it is effective in dental hygiene. I just wish it wasn't so horrible. I started flossing a month ago so I'm still getting used to it and I hurt myself really often. Some of you might think, "you didn't floss before?! OH MY GOD!!! Nasty.". And the rest of, I guess majority, would think, "people actually floss? ". In Estonia people don't normally floss. Perhaps dental floss wasn't available during soviet times. I know some women who started flossing in their twenties but it certainly isn't widespread in Estonia. Even in USA, where people have been taught to floss since they were children, only 10-40%* of people floss daily (*as I read from Wikipedia).

Oh god, why am I thinking of teeth so much?! Oh yeah, I have a dental appointment tomorrow.

About a month ago I went to a dentist's just to get my teeth checked. The dentist wasn't happy at all. She described how I need about €2000 worth of tooth care. No, my teeth aren't horrible and she didn't even find any cavities. That's the cost of having crowns fitted on the teeth on my favored side. Maybe that's a good idea, maybe not, maybe it's just a sales tactic. I'm going to a different dentist tomorrow to get a second opinion. Actually I'm not going to a different doctor because the number scared me. I'm going to a different doctor because that place looked creepy. I'm not too fond of going to a dentist but the modern dentists offices, full of sterile gadgets and expensive high-tech equipment, are kind of soothing. That place wasn't. Imagine an old soviet apartment building. On the first floor, one of the apartments has been built into a dentist's office. The chair looks like it might squeak but it doesn't. The soviet era reception desk is equipped with a simple laptop. The laptop isn't connected to the Internet (!!!). The drill looks about 10 years old. The dentist ensured me that only the drill tips really matter but the drill did look questionable. The cupboard full of cotton and other such things didn't even have a door. It would have been okay if it was meant that way, but it looked like the door fell off at some point and they didn't have money to fix it. But the prices were somewhat cheaper and the doctor seemed very skilled so initially I thought I would ignore the problems. But then I started paying for the check-up and found out they only take cash! "You don't take card? Uhm, really? No card?". I barely had any cash with me but fortunately spare change at the bottom of the bag made up for what I was lacking in my wallet. I even considered it before I left home and we agreed with Erkki that there is no way they won't accept card. Even some second-hand stores can afford to enable card payments. Even the small corner stores that only sell stale bread and booze accept card. I am not going to carry hundreds of euros in my wallet for each of those dentist's appointments just because the dentist's office is stuck in the soviet time. If I fix my teeth in a place like that and something, anything, goes wrong, I would just ask myself, "Well, what did you expect?". So tomorrow I'm going to Maxilla, which is the most modern, but also the most expensive dentist in Tartu. For a while I felt really guilty about it - I'm going to pay a lot more to have the exact same procedures just so I can pay with a card. But then I realized that I wouldn't even buy a cell phone in a place that looked that iffy.

I still wonder how important it really is to floss daily. Is it like a "must" rule or more like a suggestion. As a mother, I try to take this sort of universal advice seriously. At first I tried to treat all of them very seriously because some of them really do make sense but when you start paying attention, you'll realize how surrounded we are by rules. Never leave a baby alone in the tub. Always wear a helmet when riding a bicycle. Always wear your seat belt. Bathe children every day. Wash your teeth after every meal, or at least twice a day, 3 minutes. Floss every day. Test your smoke detector every week. Dust every week. Change bed sheets every week, or every two weeks. Eat fish twice a week. Do not eat more than half an egg on average per day. I could fill a page or two with rules that everyone "must" follow, or else! While some of them really are important, no exceptions allowed, this flossing thing seems like more of a suggestion. But I guess it's good for the gums so I keep on torturing myself. And after flossing mouth wash actually is a good idea, so torture is followed by more torture. ...And people think masochism is most widely spread among emo self-cutters.

Tall Like Us

2011-11-23T13:10:00.001-08:00

"Oh they grow up so fast" is something that people in movies and forums say all the time. I'm not sure if that's true. The first two months with Siiri lasted FOREVER. Like really: sleepless nights, getting used to feeding all the time, still trying to maintain some level of activity at home and also social activity. Siiri was a very calm kid but it was tough with the night-time feedings and I sometimes lived for my daily cup of coffee. It was the best moment of each day. Well of course it was great to observe the early development of a baby and the first smiles and her cute struggles to lift her head, but it was always better after I had had my coffee. I remember being very sleepy. Now with Liisa I don't even notice the night-time feedings most of the time. I fall asleep while feeding and put her in bed when I wake up.

The perception of time has been very different with the second child. Weeks just whooosh past me in a blur of multitasking. I sometimes see social events being announced in Facebook and it feels too inconvenient to actually try to attend them. I did go to the events that I really wanted to go to and I don't have much regrets about other events. I do miss movie nights but there really haven't been many good movies lately so it's not a huge loss. What's important is that I don't feel left out. I kinda miss playing role-playing-games (e.g. Dungeons and Dragons) but I really can't imagine how I could do that at the moment. Maybe in a couple of years. Or maybe just short one-session games that don't demand any weekly commitment.

The perception of child's growth had definitely been different with Liisa. With Siiri, as was expected with a firstborn, I was constantly observing everything. I mentioned to Erkki when I thought Siiri had grown another centimeter, I observed how Siiri played with toys , I counted how many seconds she can hold her head, I fussed about every time Siiri cried loudly and tried to figure out the cause. With Liisa, I just take it easy and just make sure she looks healthy and seems to enjoy her life. She seemed to be growing quite a lot but we had no idea how much because me or Erkki never bothered to measure or weigh her before her first doctor's visit. The nurse finally weighed her and she had grown 5 cm and 1 kg in her first month. That's a lot. The two-month measurements we had to do ourselves because there are no vaccine shots at that age and there was no reason to take her to the doctor's. During her second month she grow another 5 cm and gained another 1,4-1,5 kg. No wonder Liisa keeps growing out of her clothes. She's as tall as Siiri was at three months. Liisa feels very strong.

While Liisa is getting bigger, I am getting smaller. I lost 8 kg in the first month and another 3 in the second month. Out of the 18 kilos, it's 11 down and 7 to go. I'm currently still on the weight loss trend so I expect to reach my normal weight soon enough. I'm also using some of my free moments to do achievements in the physical games of Xbox Kinect which is quite a workout.

One thing that hasn't changed is my dislike for walking the baby like it's a dog or something. Daily walks shouldn't be a social obligation in a place as cold as Estonia. It easily takes over an hour to coordinate the clothing and feedings and diaper-changing to get two kids outside... so I could carefully walk around with them, making sure no one gets hit by a car or falls in the water or steps on dog poop. I only do it for Siiri's entertainment. I was going to take them outside again today and I was guilt tripping about not having the energy to start getting us ready for the ugly cold and wet outdoors but then I realized it was already close to noon, I had been awake for 4 hours and I still hadn't made it to eating my breakfast (a truly rare occurrance) and according to schedule I was already supposed to start preparing lunch. Soon after lunch it would be Siiri's bedtime. I was relieved I didn't have time to go outside.

Schedule is one thing I didn't have when I was at home with Siiri. I ate whatever I could whenever I wanted. Mostly fruit and fairly healthy snacks and then dinner with Erkki. With Siiri that's not enough. She really does get three warm meals per day: porridge in the morning, last night's leftovers for lunch and a proper dinner all together in the evening. It would be stupid of me not to eat with her so I do get to eat regular healthy meals and it makes a world of difference in how I feel emotionally and physically.

Despite all the hassle of sticking to Siiri's schedule and making sure she's enjoying her life, I really enjoy having her around. I know conversations with a 2.5-year old aren't very complicated but it's still much more fulfilling than checking the messenger every two hours to see if any of my friends has time to chat a little bit and going to an internet forum when all my friends are doing something useful. Besides, it's actually very nice to explain the world to Siiri. I especially enjoy describing which casual-looking household items could kill her and how.

By the way, my paranoia about online Xbox is very much justified. I finished all the missions and all the achievements in Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, except for the multiplayer part. I couldn't leave it at that so I made a 3-month purchase to get online access for my Xbox account with Xbox Gold Membership. I got right at it. When the kids were asleep, I logged in to multiplayer and spent 40 minutes getting used to the gameplay. Then Erkki came into the room and I we started preparing dinner so I logged out. The next day Liisa was asleep and Siiri was playing on her own so I logged in. I played a 10-minute match and I was about to start another one but noticed that whenever Siiri says something (and she talks quite a lot), my player's name has a sound icon. I wasn't using any headphones and no one else was using them either! I replied to Siiri, and again there was the sound icon. I frantically started looking for options but then panicked and just turned off the console. As it turns out, Kinect has a built-in microphone and as soon as I logged into multiplayer, it started broadcasting my living room sounds to seven strangers! Oh my God I feel my privacy was so violated. And I feel embarrassed because in AC Brotherhood it's not possible to turn off the sounds of someone else's microphone. Someone had to put up with some casual Estonian conversation between me and Erkki and some Siiri's ranting, but that's about it.

Despite the privacy issue, I still have achievements to get, so I turned off Kinect and joined the multiplayer of the new Assassin's Creed Revelations. Other players there are just as new at the game as I am and it's much more fun this way. Surprisingly, it's so easy to get addicted to the unpredictable nature of online gaming and I have made very little progress with the single player part of the game. Soon I'll have all the achievements of AC Revelations multiplayer and I can get back to the story part of the game.

Porcelain Pony

2011-11-11T13:21:00.001-08:00

I've been playing Assassin's Creed Brotherhood and trying to get more achievement points and right now I totally hate the game. There are still many frustrating parts in the game that I can't complete with high score and I'm starting to think it's impossible for me to get maximum achievement score anyway. I could handle the nasty difficult missions but I just can't handle the pressure of joining multiplayer. I don't like multiplayer games. I've tried at least one and I constantly felt awkward knowing that there is a real person behind every human (and other) that are running around on my computer screen. My computer is almost like my safe haven. I don't want anyone running around in it! The same with the TV. It's a part of my home, my own safe zone. But whenever I turn on Xbox, I start to feel a bit awkward. My subconscious keeps reminding me that Xbox Kinect has a camera and it's connected to the internet. And it's filming ALL THE TIME. I don't even know if that's true but it could be. And there could easily be Xbox viruses out there for the sole purpose of broadcasting the video feed to some pervert's computer. I make sure not to get caught walking around in underwear while Kinect is broadcasting... *khm* I mean turned on ...I mean switched on.

I do understand that my paranoia is unnecessary. Still I'm sure most people who own a a webcam understand it. I actually don't know about other people but when I bought a webcam to talk with forum buddies from across the world, I also developed a habit of always checking if it's switched on. I even got a webcam with a plastic slider that physically covers the camera, so that I can safely keep it closed most of the time. Kinect doesn't have such a slider. I guess Microsoft itself is to blame for the paranoia. Xbox Kinect came with a "free game" that had a habit of making surprise photos of the player. I was really surprised the first time it showed me a picture of my living room and in the middle of living room I was jumping. I was wearing very casual clothes and it was a really bad picture. Ever since then I try to look nice in front of Kinect because I never know when it might start making pictures. Basically it makes me really self-concious whenever I notice that Siiri has accidentally switched on Xbox and the room or myself look messy.

This absurd paranoia wouldn't be helped one bit if the people on the TV screen in our living room were actual people who could really see my character walking around. And I really would feel uneasy about XBox Live Gold membership which would allow video conversations with my Windows Live Messenger contacts. Even if I would never use it, Siiri accidentally might. So I don't want anything to do with Assassin's Creed Brotherhood multiplayer but then I can't get all the achievements and then the game feels incomplete. And if I can't REALLY complete it, then it feels weird to start playing the next Assassin's Creed game which should be released at the end of the month. So now I'm at a standstill. Assassin's Creed used to be my favorite game but now I really truly don't want to do the multiplayer part of the game and that's alienating me from the entire series.

Actually that's not what I planned to write about. There's another issue that has been on my mind. Many issues really. I have too much time to ponder dumb thoughts. Anyway... There's a fairy tale that's bugging me. Me and Erkki bought a fairy tale book titled, "Fairy Tales for Girls". The entire idea of such a book is annoyingly sexist, but it was the only fairy tale book with so many pictures and so many good classic fairy tales that we still didn't have. Apparently Three Bears is well suited for girls, as well as Little Red Riding Hood, Three Pigs and many other Siiri's favorites. There are a couple of novel fairy tales that I certainly didn't hear when I was a little girl, and a good thing that is. The novel fairy tales lack any logic, thus making them perfect for those young future women (makes sense in the twisted mind of a sexist publisher who would publish such a book in the first place). My favorite is a fairy tale called the Porcelain Pony.

Once upon a time there was a little girl living with her father. A strange lady showed up and introduced herself as her aunt who has come to take care of her. The aunt moved in but she was very mean to the girl. One night the father disappeared. The aunt made the girl work a lot and treated her badly and one day when the girl was out grocery shopping for the woman, she found a porcelain pony on a shelf in the store. The shopkeeper had never seen it before and told the girl to keep it. She took it home and hid it under her pillow. The porcelain pony turned into a real live pony at night. They suddenly found themselves outside together and the pony told the girl that he's there to help her father who is locked up in a tower several-day journey away on top of an unclimbable mountain. A cannibalistic monster is planning to eat her father in the morning. The only way to save the father would be with the help of a golden flower that grows nearby and gives the ability to fly, unfortunately no one has ever seen the flower. The girl and the pony set out to find the flower. They search the entire night with no success, but as the first rays of the sun become visible, the girl sees a golden glimmer in the snow. In the snow they find the golden flower. The pony eats it and the girl sits on the pony and together they fly to save the girl's father, so that the monster can't eat him once the sun is up. They reach the tower that has three floors. Each floor has a chest full of treasure that the girl is warned not to touch. She finds the father, gets the key off the sleeping monster, releases the father, then accidentally touches a piece of treasure and they escape the tower with the monster chasing them. Girl and the father get back on the pony and fly back home. The aunt, who is really an evil sorceress, is waiting for them and sends a big storm to bring them down. The pony kicks thunder with his hoofs, sending it toward the sorceress. The sorceress gets hit with the lightning and disappears in a flash of light. They safely land in front of their home and suddenly the pony turns into a handsome prince. He tells them that he's a prince whom the sorceress enchanted to be a white pony at night and a porcelain pony during the day. Now the sorceress is dead and the enchantment is broken. He then asks the girl to marry him. The girl says yes and they live happily ever after.

As you can see, the fairy tale has everything - a white pony that flies, golden flower, treasure, a girl saving the day, and a prince who wants to marry. Everything except logic. Where to begin. Perhaps at the point where they all plummet to their early death at the exact moment when the sorceress gets hit with that lightning and disappears, thus being effectively dead and breaking the enchantment that made the prince a pony. Or maybe there would have been the awkward moment when a girl and her father sit on the back of a prince who has the ability to fly. Actually that shouldn't have been a pony at all because it was no longer nighttime. The fairy tale should have ended with a scene where the girl notices the golden glimmer in the show and starts cheering with joy and hope, but as she turns around toward the pony, she sees a porcelain toy standing on snow, shining in the early morning sun with sad eyes.

Okay, but imagining that it was a 12-hours-porcelain and 12-hours-alive kind of an enchantment. Kind of rare, but lets imagine that the fairy tale didn't have a gloomy ending. The monster is supposed to eat the father in the morning. Usually in fairy tales that means dawn, but okay, that monster indeed was a heavy sleeper. The pony later said that the monster will eat the father when the sun is up. So lets say noon. So they fly several-day's journey in a few hours. If the sun comes up at 8 a.m. and they have four hours until noon, and lets say the "several" is three days journey to that tower (although it might as well be five or six or more). That means they travel 72 hours worth of distance in only 4 hours. I found in a forum that wild west mail courier Pony Express riders averaged about 120 km per day. That's 360 km in 4 hours, or 90 km per hour. WHOOOOOSSSSSHHHHH!! That is quite some speed. Especially if the girl is in her night gown. (The pony woke her up at night and they "suddenly found themselves outside" so I see no reason for her to be in a winter coat.) Spending the entire night outside in the winter with only a night gown would have left her with frostbites but those 4 hours flying through the air at 90 km per hour is totally icing on the cake. They fly towards the father as the girl gets more and more stiff. When they reach the tower, the pony realizes she is long dead.

That's just the tip of the iceberg (no pun intended). Why could the pony teleport outside and away from under the pillow? The sorceress would have never given him that ability. And if she did, why didn't they just teleport to the tower? How did the pony even know about the father and how did he manage to get to that shelf in the store just in time for the girl to find him? How did he "kick" lightning? What happened to the sorceress's smoking burnt body?

Erkki often warns me not to look for logic where there is none. Perhaps some day I will be wise enough to listen.

Wolf Eats Meat

2011-10-31T08:06:00.000-07:00

Life is cyclic. And now is the part of my life cycle when I become obsessed with food again. Do you know what your energy consumption is in a day? For most women it's around 2000 kcal and for most men it's around 3000 kcal. Compared to those numbers, it seems extreme of me to aim for an energy deficit of 1000 kcal each day. And, surprisingly, on some days it happens with little effort. Breastfeeding alone uses up 500 kcal per day and looking after two small kids doesn't give the luxury of sedentary lifestyle. I recently started using an Internet website where I log all the food I eat and it calculates all the nutrients and vitamins and everything. Estonian national institute of health development actually manages this website for free, just so they can routinely collect data about the eating habits of Estonians. Pretty amazing since they have entered the correct nutrient composition of many Estonian products that are very different in USA.

The other goal of Estonian national institute of health development is to get Estonians to eat more healthy. And they're convinced it's healthy to eat 55-60% of energy in carbohydrates, 25-30% in fats and 10-15% in protein. That's the numbers I get when I eat horribly by my standards. Like when I eat a plateful of pasta with a bit of meat sauce, and then some dessert that has some milk in it. I don't mind fats in food - they don't make my blood sugar spike and they usually come with proteins, which I consider the healthiest part of food. On most days I eat 40-50% carbs, 30-40% of fats and nearly 20 % of protein. The program keeps complaining that I don't eat enough carbs and I eat too much protein and I am really happy about that because I'm convinced that the national recommendations are flawed and I'm sure that it's not healthy to eat 60% of energy in carbohydrates. I'll tell you why. Yesterday I let loose a little. I ate half a cheesecake that I had made. I also ate pasta wok, fish pie and oatmeal porridge and I even had a two sugars in my coffee. That's a lot of sugar and carbohydrates, right? Actually that amounts to 41 % carbohydrates, 41 % fats and 18% protein. I still let Siiri eat pretty much whatever. As long as she has appetite for decent warm food, I don't restrict her sugar consumption. I've gotten used to seeing her eat sweet foods without feeling the need to have some too. She spends the day running around in the apartment and she has gotten slimmer and taller in the last few months so I can definitely offer her candy for dessert if I feel like it. I'm very strict about some food additives, especially taste enhancers and artificial food coloring, but sugar is just energy that she'll use up quite fast.

Besides, Siiri needs sugar for brain activity, especially for memorizing fairy tales. Erkki learned to read at a really young age and Siiri has learned all the letters but she doesn't get the whole reading thing yet. She sees us opening the book and telling the same story over and over again. Siiri does the same: she opens the fairy tale book at the right page and starts "reading" from memory. She skips a few words and abbreviates some of the story, but some entire paragraphs are quoted word by word. She even adds the intonation and gestures that we use while reading. She makes cute low voice for wolf's monologue and, being a little girl, she really has to make an effort for that. You can just see the effort in her face and lips. Also, when she quotes, "we will not let you in" she shakes her head and when she says, "we know you are the big bad wolf and you just want to eat us", she quickly nods. She has many fairy tales that she can "read", for example "Wolf and seven little goats", "Three pigs", "Little red riding hood", "Goldilocks and three bears". Apparently she likes animals, and especially the big bad wolf who tries to eat goats, pigs and little girls.

Liisa stills eats only milk. And Siiri knows all about that. When Liisa becomes restless (she rarely really cries), Siiri states in a matter-of-fact tone, "Lisa wants to eat AGAIN! Liisa drinks only milk.". Siiri doesn't seem to mind, though. She has never requested that I let her suckle as well and she has never made a problem of Liisa being attached to me during feedings. Siiri does sometimes get annoyed that she's not being carried around as much as Liisa but we have two solutions for that: when Erkki is at home, he'll pick up Siiri. When he's not here, I hold Siiri at the first chance I get. If I'm feeding Liisa, I usually stretch out my legs so that Siiri has room to sit on my legs as well. So she sometimes requests/demands the same benefits that Liisa gets, but never gets angry at Liisa for the attention or care that Liisa gets.

We did what we could to make Siiri treat Liisa as her "pack member". People are like pack animals with several layers of packs. People divide others to be either ally or foe. The closest pack for most people is family or household and for a small child that's her entire life. It's not like Siiri has a bunch of work buddies and lots of friends in the gym. Her family is all she has and if some stranger comes and endangers it, she can become very protective. For that reason me and Erkki did our best to make sure that Siiri sees Liisa as her own little sister and a natural addition to our family. We avoid calling Liisa our daughter, instead we call her Siiri's sister. And we call Siiri Liisa's sister. I also avoid mentioning Liisa when I tell Siiri not to do something. Like when I'm feeding Liisa and suddenly Siiri wants to throw a ball at us, I tell her not to throw the ball because I might get hit because I don't have free hands to catch the ball. And I really do my best to do anything that I normally would do even if Liisa is awake. I read fairy takes while breastfeeding, I help put puzzles together while holding Liisa, I dance with Siiri while holding Liisa, and sometimes I make Siiri a priority. Like when I'm almost finished with Siiri's food and Liisa wakes up, I bring Liisa to the same room so she can see me, but I ignore her attention-requesting sounds (except hysterical crying) until I've given Siiri her food. Last time Siiri used that moment to go and stroke Liisa's hair and told me, "Liisa smiled. Liisa smiled a little to Siiri.".

I eat a lot, and Siiri eats lots of sweets, and all Liisa does is eat breast milk, and I often listen to fairy takes where the big bad wolf tries to eat someone, and wolves are pack animals, and people are also kind of like pack animals and wolves eat a lot of meat and I also eat a lot of meat... I like the pattern.

PS! I haven't found a good solution to the emoticon problem. Hot.ee server doesn't have FTP-upload option, zone.ee closes accounts after 12 months by default and requires an Estonian email address for registration and reminders that I should renew my account. None of the good-quality free hosts give simple predictable file locations and I don't trust any of the other ones. I'll deal with it when I get the chance.

... testing...
<--success

Missing Person

2011-10-26T13:09:00.000-07:00

Don't alert the police, don't call in the search squad - I'm still alive!

There are too few hours in each 24-hour day. I notices this in the first years of university when I postponed going to sleep after spending hours and hours behind the computer, but lately it's plain ridiculous! On most days, I get about 2-3 hours for everything that I want to do. That's the amount of hours each day that I'm awake but both kids are asleep. It sound like a lot of hours, considering that it only takes 10-15 minutes to take a shower and the dishwasher makes it much faster to do the dishes and I can watch something on TV while I chop onions or stir the pot. Also, who needs books anyway and internet news isn't really worth too much time. Most movies could be watched in a day and if I'm lucky, I might even be able to watch most of a movie without interruptions. Very lucky. And with supreme timing! For a while I was really hooked on the TV-series "Grey's Anatomy". I watched 7 seasons of it - mostly while I fed the baby but also during those 2-3 hours. Now I ran out of it and got around to fixing the emoticon problem in the blog. Or at least part of it. I'll eventually fix the older posts as well.

But really, writing a blog post without the emoticons just takes the fun right out of the entire thing. Without the use of emoticons I can only insert a small part of the dramatic effect that I'd like to add. I get a bit emoticon-crazy sometimes. There have been moments when I'm having a real live conversation with someone and I want to use an emoticon to better illustrate my views. You guys sometimes get that feeling too, right? Right?!

.....

Emoticons stopped working. (this one is uploaded in blogger)

.....

Damn! It should not be that difficult to put a few moving pictures in a blog. My emoticon collection is nearly 500 files but it's LESS THAN 5MB!!! Most free hosting services offer 100 MB so I could just use any one of those, but I already tried that and that's why I started having problems in the first place. I'm quite convinced that if I just get another free web hosting service, I'll end up having the same problem in a couple of years. If I don't owe them anything, they don't owe me anything and the entire thing is very unstable. Except if I find a company that has a reputation to uphold. Then I might get lucky and get a few free mega bites of space that will be reliable for years with very little downtime. I thought I found that with hosting.eu.pn but now it is sometimes working and sometimes not and it shouldn't be having this problem.

Now I have a few options.

1) I could contact hosting.eu.pn 24/7 customer support. Uhm... No way! Let it be a lesson to IT-companies. Some people would rather look for an alternative to get in contact with actual customer support. I can't be bothered to start troubleshooting the visibility of a gif image. It's a simple situation. I've uploaded a gif image and blogger sometimes can't open it. Perhaps the hosting service sucks. I want an alternative!

2) I could find another free random hosting service. Not reliable enough.

3) I could use Google Sites. As far as I saw, they don't even have FTP-uploading option! It's not free hosting. It's some ridiculous dumb-user website builder. I couldn't even upload my own HTML file!

4) I could upload all the emoticons to blogger one by one. All 500 of them. One. By. One. And then I could insert them with the "Insert image" function. I'm not some elitist code-writing web programmer but I do prefer to use a little HTML code if it makes my life easier. And honestly, it really wouldn't be easy to insert each emoticon and then remove the code that makes it stay in it's own center-aligned paragraph.

5) I could upload them using Picasa Web Albums, since it would be easier to upload images. Lets test it...

(uploaded with Picasa and using HTML code to insert it.)

Now the ultimate test: if I upload the images in one catalogue, will the image URL stay predictable? I need only the file name to change and the rest of the address to be the same for all the emoticons. So if I copy the image link and change the file name in the code, I should be able to see other emoticons as well...
(fail!)

Nooooooo!!!!!!!!!!

Maybe I should just contact hosting.eu.pn customer support. I mean - how bad could it be?

(imagination goes wild) "Have you tried turning it off and on again?"

NOOOOOoooooooo!!!!!!

Bit of a Cow

2011-09-24T07:14:00.000-07:00

First of all, I'm having problems with emoticons, again. The server where I host them seems to be down all the time lately and it seems I have to find another place where to upload all my emoticons and then I have to manually go to each post to change the website in the image link. Fortunately MS Word "replace all" tool will be of great help but I still have to find a reliable server where to keep the emoticons so I never have to do that again. Any suggestions where to host a bunch of emoticons? Until I solve it, I will just skip the emoticons.

Back to the title of this post. I don't really feel like a cow but I just couldn't resist using this title because I probably should feel like a cow for two very valid reasons. First reason, I keep being milked. My main task lately is to sit on the couch and produce milk for a very hungry little creature. Her life consists of eating, creating dirty diapers and sleeping. Like really, no exaggeration what so ever. She wakes up hungry, gets stuffed with milk, gets burped, is hungry again and eats, then fills a diaper and gets it changed, is hungry again and eats, and then falls asleep while eating. A couple of hours later repeats the entire thing from the beginning.

The milk thing has been much more simple the second time around. Last time there was the entire fiasco with a midwife getting me upset over starving my baby and then stuffing a bottle down Siiri's throat in the hospital. The midwife wasn't very successful at getting her eat the substitute milk but managed to make Siiri desperately caugh it out because some foul-smelling liquid was practically poured down her throat. It took me 5 days for the milk to come in and only then I could start breastfeeding on demand without any pumping or offering substitute milk. This time I knew better. I had read a lot about how breastfeeding works and the first couple of days I was just breastfeeding on demand to stimulate milk production. The principle of breastfeeding is that it happens on demand. When milk is removed, new milk is produced. When milk is left over, then milk production decreases. When milk is being sucked out when there is none, milk production is stimulated and there's more milk next time. When the baby is given substitute milk then she feels little need to waste energy sucking a boob so that alone could guarantee the need for substitute milk in the future.

Liisa seemed fairly content and used up diapers (good signs) but she was hungry all the time. On the second day weighing it became clear that Liisa was losing too much weight. All newborns lose weight in their first days of life and doctors ignore weight loss up to 7%. Liisa had lost 7.8% already so they brought me substitute milk and a large syringe (no needle of course). Okay, so that was a bit of a shock. I thought it was going so well this time. She seemed so full of milk all the time so I didn't even suspect that anything was wrong. With Siiri it took me an hour of despair to get used to the idea that breastfeeding isn't all that simple. This time it took me 10 seconds. I took a moment to let it sink in and then made a plan. My plan was pretty obvious: I decided I need to start pumping milk as soon as possible. That's what helped last time and I was sure it will help this time as well. They have a pump in the hospital, usually used to prove to mothers how bad their milk production really is and how they should just start giving their babies substitute milk already. I used the pump so milk would come in sooner. I gave Liisa a couple of small portions of substitute milk as well and also breastfed and by next day she had already gained 80g (that's 2,2% of her birth weight!). I left the hospital with doctor's orders, "Forget about the substitute milk and just breastfeed on demand.". YAY!

The second reason I should feel like a cow is weight. With this pregnancy I gained about 18 kg. The baby weighed 3,6 kg, placenta weighs about 1 kg, amniotic fluid weighs about 1 kg and I lost about 0.4 kg of blood during labor and a lot afterwards (that's quite normal). So, simple math... I got home from the hospital after giving birth and I had lost 3.6+1+1+0.4 kg= 0 kg. Wait, what?! I stepped on the scale and I had lost 0 kg of my pregnancy weight. So yeah, they fed us well and I ate about 1000 kcal worth of extra food and I drank 3 liters of fluid, mostly water, every day I spent in the hospital. I felt my body needed all that for both recovery and milk production and I felt very healthy. In hindsight, I'd still eat and drink the same amount because I did recover super fast.

Any ideas how to lose 18 kg in a few months without any effort? Preferably even 21 kg because I was in winter weight just before I got pregant. Currently I have just decided that scales are evil and I will not step on a scale until Liisa is a month old. I won't diet or try excessive exercising for the first weeks. I'll just try to regain proper posture and I'll start using Xbox Kinect exercise program in a couple of weeks.

I should feel like a cow but I'm actually quite content. As long as I don't step on the scale I manage to delude myself into imagining that my body is getting leaner every day and breastfeeding is actually quite enjoyable. It's so relaxing in many ways and the baby is so cute while breastfeeding. It could just be the hormone oxytocin talking - it's also called "love hormone" because it creates the feeling of bonding. Both of my kids have looked the most adorable while breastfeeding. Liisa is super cute, Siiri is very cuddly lately, Erkki's at home from work and life is good. I'm really happy with everything.

Second Birth

2011-09-18T04:19:00.000-07:00

When I wrote my last post and thought I might be going in to labor, I actually already was in labor. I arrived in the hospital a little later and I was checked by a midwife. Contractions started at 8:30 a.m. and at 12 at noon I was at 4 cm. That is pretty damn good. Cervix goes from 0 to 10 cm before the baby can be pushed out and the speed increases in time. The first centimeters can take weeks and the last centimeters can even take mere minutes in some cases. Last time it must have taken about 30 hours for my cervix to get to 4 cm so on Friday I felt like I had already skipped a lot of labor time and it really can't take very long to get to the big finish.

Erkki arrived to the hospital half an hour later because he waited for the babysitter to arrive. We arranged for Siiri to spend the day with the babysitter and the weekend with Erkki's parents. I have repeatedly warned Siiri that this will happen in the near future so I really think she won't be too shocked to spend a few days without seeing her parents. Siiri will be okay and she'll see us when we come home from the hospital with her little sister.

Unfortunately, I sure did choose a bad day to give birth because it was nearly a full house. I was expecting a birth room with all the comforts that I remembered from last time - from bathtub to a large rubber ball but all I got was some small room with a bed, a small bathroom with shower and a wall covered with a practical cupboard for midwife tools. "We're out of bigger rooms. There are so many women giving birth today." I immediately asked about about the family room for after birth, so that Erkki could stay the night, and the midwife said she can't make any promises. This was just a friendly nurse who happened to be there. My hired midwife arrived soon after and immediately got to work. She got me the rubber ball that I asked for and got me in line for one of the better birth rooms with a tub. One woman had already given birth and I just had to wait for the two hours after birth to pass and for janitors to clean the room. My midwife was really bad-ass when it comes to organizing such stuff. Soon after we talked, she excused herself to the hallway and I heard her tell someone, "She wants a ball..." and I could swear her vocal tone added, "...and you're gonna find one for her RIGHT NOW." .

Anyway, I spent a couple of hours in that small room and I was using all the old tricks for relieving contractions. I paced around the room rubbing my back and my stomach, I swung from side to side on the ball and I waddled my hips to distract myself from the increasingly painful cramping. Erkki timed my contractions and you know what, they were REALLY irregular. 2 minutes, 3 minutes, 4 minutes, 2 minutes, 6 minutes. Whenever there was a pattern, it soon disappeared. Eventually it was around 3 minutes for a while and the contractions were hard to ignore. Me and Erkki calculated when we'll see the baby. Taking into account the last known dilation of the cervix and the statistics that in repeat pregnancies it opens 2 cm in an hour, I should be fully dilated by 3 o'clock and we'll see the baby at 5 or 6 at the latest.

At 3 o'clock I was moved to the bigger birth room and the midwife inspected me. "I have to tell you, it isn't going fast at all. It's at 5 or 6 cm and the amniotic sack is completely tight and won't let the baby's head pressure the cervix to open any wider. We might end up having to puncture it so it doesn't stop the birth process.". So much for being completely dilated at 3 o'clock. We agreed that I'll spend some time in the tub and if that doesn't help then we'll decide how to proceed. The bath took a long time to be filled and finally at 3:45 I got in.

I had a serious talk with the midwife. It turns out I had quite missed the entire point of labor pains. I had kept reading and reading how it's the only "meaningful" pain that exists. It helps the woman in labor understand what she has to do to make labor safer and better. By doing "what feels right", the woman can make labor much more effective and less painful. Actually, what feels right is to do anything that reduces the pain. And since the pain is caused by the head of the baby pressing down on the cervix, it feels very right to tighten up everything below that area and making sure the head can't press down very strongly. That's what I did - I didn't realize it myself but I tightened up to reduce the pain. The bathtub helps because it relaxes the body and promotes labor. So from the moment I got into that bathtub, I tried my best to just go limp whenever I felt a contraction. And I mean totally limp. If it was a yoga position, it would be called, "play dead".

So there I was, lying in the huge bathtub inside a floatation aid and looking absolutely miserably fed up. I tried different positions and I tried to stick with the ones that hurt most but it was so damn uncomfortable. Initially Erkki could read me some daily news to keep my mind occupied but pretty soon I wasn't into it anymore. By the time I was completely lethargic, the midwife walked in and told us that I'll soon come out of the tub and then... "What do you mean out?" , I asked, being surprised and confused. So my midwife explained that it's policy that I can only be in the bathtub for one and a half hours and then I have to be out for one and a half hours before I can get back in. It felt quite uncomfortable to think that I would have to start supporting my own weight again. My midwife gave me another half an hour (which would actually exceed the policy time by fifteen minutes) and started to walk out again but I wanted some more feedback about positions and pain management so she stayed a little longer when I suddenly had some really weird jolts in my abdomen.

WHAT WAS THAT?! And then I felt it again. Like some sort of spasms. "I think I feel like pressing! Somethings wrong! I can't possibly be fully dilated yet! What's happening?!" The midwife started rambling something about "don't be afraid. Go with it!" and I was trying to hold back and to get her to tell me if I might be dilated. I even proposed that she should check just to make sure the urge to press isn't premature. I had read that when that happens, the woman might press too early and the cervix might tear. I sure did not want that to happen. Midwife kept telling me not to be afraid and I kept pressing her for information until she finally told me that being in water might indeed have been such a birth enhancer for me that it's totally realistic that I'm ready to push the baby out. So that's what I tried to do.

At first I tried to "breathe the baby out" like I had read was possible but it felt so uncomfortable to hold myself back so I tried very slowly to let the body push it out without much active pushing. Then I just really wanted to help along and suddenly blop - the water broke. And then the baby started moving as well and 3 minutes later I pushed and screamed (yeah, just like in the movies) and the baby was born. The entire pushing phase only took 12 minutes and it was all so confusingly sudden. I didn't even have the time or the will to get out of the tub so it was a water birth. Everything was really confusing for a while with getting out of the bath and all the procedures but there she was - a small girl with straight black hair. That's an interesting phenotype from Erkki's side of the family. Siiri also had that and now her hair is strawberry blond and curly. And it was quite deja vu because she looks really similar to Siiri. The same nose, similar eyes, same lips.

All in all, it was a very successful birth. Despite the fast ending I didn't need any stitches. Baby's apgar score was 9 and she even cried a little. Weight 3656 g and length 51 cm. A totally adorable bundle of joy. Less than two hours later I sat on the side of the bed and ate. In the evening I was already walking around, unlike the last time when I was only able to eat, sleep and feed for days.

We decided to name her Liisa Nele. I really thought she would be a joyfully energetic contrast to the contemplative and decisive Siiri but I swear Liisa looks even more serious and adult-like. Only time will tell how she'll turn out.

Oh, and we did get the family room so that me and Erkki could spend 3 nights in the hospital getting to know Liisa and to give her some quiet time to memorize our faces.

PS! Sorry for the typos and the lack of emoticons. I wrote it on iPad and this doesn't even have a Ctrl button for easy copying or arrows to move around in the text.

PPS! *post edited later*

Maybe Something

2011-09-16T01:44:00.000-07:00

I've been having something like contractions for over three hours already. Already made arrangements with the babysitter and the midwife and I'm going to the hospital to make sure whether it is "something" or "nothing". I mean it's very regular and it was around five minutes before I started packing and making arrangements and I have no idea how frequent it is now because I already packed my phone (Lap Timer app is great). The "problem" is that it's like casual cramping that barely shows in my face. I'm not screaming in pain like in all those silly teenage movies where they are trying to make a point that giving birth is really serious and truly painful. I should be in pain but I'm not. Maybe being induced really does make a difference in how childbirth feels.

Anyway, I'm going to the hospital with my bag to have a checkup. If I'm giving birth then they'll probably notice, I hope. I was going to walk to the hospital, but now some of the maybe contractions seem to be only a couple of minutes apart so I'm taking a taxi just to be sure that I don't give birth somewhere on the sidewalk.

I'll let you know.

Time Is Ticking Away

2011-09-10T04:22:00.000-07:00

What does a 2-year-old with a growth spurt demand at 3 a.m. in the middle of bed time? The correct answer is, "Lets go to the kitchen right now and eat ALL food!". And that's after a solid lunch, plenty of snacks, a nice dinner and some more fruits and bread. Lately Siiri gets so hungry all the time that she can hardly stay asleep without demanding food. When she wakes up and talks half in her sleep, she says things like, "Both cookies! I want to eat both cookies! Give them to me!" or "Porridge... Porridge... Now make me porridge." Fortunately there's no shortage of food and her increased appetite is mostly just interesting and funny. It isn't good for her sleep, but I'm on maternity leave and Erkki has a vacation so it's still easy to get a lot of rest.

As you might have notices, I used full sentences to describe what Siiri says. That's no mistake. She speaks really well. Sure she simplifies things and occasionally invents new grammar, but she's quite creative with that. She has trouble with letters v and r and she substitutes those with whatever sounds almost correct. There are a couple of things though - first, she still can't tell who's "me" or who's "you". If she says "I'll sit on the floor", she wants me to sit there and if she says "You want to drink water too" then she is asking for water. I try to correct her but it's so easy to get used to it and to stop noticing the mistake. The second thing is that she still repeats word endings. In stead of saying "Emmega" (emme-ga = with mommy), she sometimes says "Emmegagagagaga". One 3-year-old in the play-field kinda commented that chickens make that sound. It wasn't easy to completely ignore it but I decided that reacting to it in any way would make it seem like a big deal when it's just something that will probably pass in a few months. I've never been to kindergarten so I have no idea what's the "cool" reaction to such a comment and what Siiri should do when she's on her own.

My pregnancy is really... uhm... how to best describe it... HEAVY! It's like carrying one of those military backpacks with me all the time. I can't really take the weight off for a little while so it feels like living with one of those military backpacks on me at all times. I'm just really glad Siiri can walk up and down the stairs. I'm less satisfied that I can't teach the 10kg baby stroller to walk up and down the stairs. "Pull your own damn weight you dumb stroller". But nooooo... I still have to carry it up to the fourth floor with all the extra weight that I already am carrying. Bringing the stroller is still a good idea when I go on a longer walk with Siiri, because then I don't have to worry about carrying Siiri home when she does get too tired. She has amazing endurance and she can walk 3 km on her own feet on a good day but I wouldn't want to force her to do it when she's not up to it.

Yesterday I had my final ultrasound. It's two weeks to deadline and her current weight seems to be 3400g. That's as much as Siiri was when she was born. The scary thing is that babies grow 200g each week in this stage. So if I go two weeks overdue she could be 4200g. The weight calculation from ultrasound can be 500g wrong to either side. I could be positive and say that she's only around 3 kg now and ends up being 3400 when she's born on due date. Or I could be grim and think that she's already 3900g and will be ENORMOUS 4 weeks from now.

So only two weeks left. I really can't decide if I'm ready to start all the fun ways of naturally inducing birth or if I'm terrified of the birth starting at any moment. Trying to trigger birth seems very tempting because it would give me control over the situation and the entire thing would feel less random. On the other hand, if I do manage to trigger it, I'm gonna have to give birth sooner and am I really sure I want that? But then again, do I want it to end up being enormous once it's born? With all those thoughts circling in my head I'm starting to feel panicky every time I feel the baby's head nudge downward. At least she seems to feel quite okay, despite running out of room lately. Fortunately she's much less aggressive than Siiri was. She stretches in directions where she finds it most roomy while Siiri got really excited with games like, "I bet I can push those ribs out of my way if I try hard enough.".

I find it amazing how widespread herbal medicine is in Estonia. It all traces back to natural paganistic beliefs in my opinion. While people in the USA believe in the Pill, spending lots of money on all sorts of pills from real medicine to cheap vitamin pills, people in Estonia go to the pharmacy to select which herbs cure their ailments. It's commonly known in Estonian birth forums that Wild Thyme (Latin: Thymus serpyllum; Estonian: nõmm-liivatee) eases childbirth by relaxing smooth muscle tissue. It's also the reason why it's an excellent cough medicine and usually used for that. In foreign websites wild thyme is among the herbs to avoid during pregnancy because "it might cause contractions" but Estonians are pretty much convinced that it does the opposite and makes contractions less intense while still speeding up delivery. It kind of makes sense. Being relaxed in childbirth makes the entire experience less painful and the process much more efficient. And it's not like I'd be taking some untested medicine, right? It's just some plant...

It's not only the freaky natural-birth-promoting pregnant ladies who promote the use of wild thyme during labor. It's also certified pharmacists and childbirth consultants. I walked into a pharmacy and I had forgot the name of the herb so I vaguely described "some tea that women drink during labor." Two pharmacists immidiately knew what I'm talking about, took me to the right shelf and told me it's perfectly safe for pregnant women and for maximum benefit it's good to start drinking it a couple of weeks before due date. This labor-promoting effect isn't even written on the package. They just knew it. Wild thyme was sold next to a wide selection of herbs and herb mixes labeled, "Reduces insomnia", "Lowers fever", "Relaxes", etc. It's as if herbs are a completely valid method for self-medication. I do believe the best herbs are more helpful than homeopathy which is just water in a bottle and certainly less creepy than Chinese medicine with it's insect powder for female sexuality and dried male urine powder for men before Viagra was invented.

I've already packed the hospital bag and I sorted all the baby clothing but there is still so many little things I want to get done before the baby arrives. I feel somewhat nervous as if I'm preparing for some huge event that ends an era - something like a huge exam that finishes the course. Or perhaps more like high school exams because after university exams there would be time for relaxing on your summer break but the end of high school is the time to grow up and be more responsible with your life. Childbirth, just as high school graduation, ends and era and begins another one. We'll see if it's a positive change or not but it will definitely be progress.

PS! If I do suddenly start giving birth, I'll try to post something about it because I really doubt it will happen very fast. In any case, if you suddenly hear that I'm in the hospital and you're wondering whether you should visit me, I'll make it simple: the answer is probably "no" . There are a couple of close relatives who are welcome to call us and then visit us, but from earlier experience, I'll probably be really exhausted, using every moment to sleep, and every waking moment to try to feed the baby and to eat something. Plus there's the risk of infection for both me and the baby. I usually have excellent constitution but I certainly didn't feel very healthy after last time. And no point in bringing us any flowers because they will probably be placed to the general TV area in the hospital. Erkki is allergic to most pollen and I wouldn't want any flowers near a newborn. I'll have my phone with me, probably on silent mode most of the time so I can just respond to calls when it's convenient for me. Okay, that's all.

Parenting Tips That Work

2011-09-03T02:12:00.000-07:00

After spending two weeks at home I was really enjoying all of it. Siiri is suddenly the perfect kid - She doesn't fuss over little things, she responds well to any suggestions, she offers her opinion about things and she's just super cute most of the time. She really is amazingly reasonable for her age so I decided to analyze what parenting advice and tips have worked for us. Of course this is all with the disclaimer that her excellent behavior might just be temporary and might end as soon as she has to share her parents with another sibling. Also, maybe her "horrible threes" will be much worse than "horrible twos". But right now things are much better than I could have anticipated.

Before we had any kids, me and Erkki said that life would be much better if we could completely skip the first three years of the child's life. I no longer agree with that. I think it's okay to just skip the first two years. Some children are perfectly capable of compromise long before they're three and it's truly adorable to see them learn to talk. Siiri said about 150 words a month before she turned 2-years old and didn't combine any of them into phrases. Now nearly 5 months later she talks in long sentences which might not always be grammatically correct but they're very easy to understand. Her grammar is WAAAAAY better than what I'd expect from anyone her age - she ignores word order in sentences (not so important in Estonian language) but really tries to add proper word endings (very important in Estonian language). Most of what she says is also understandable to strangers because her pronunciation is good. Her speaking skills are probably a major reason why she's so easy to compromise with.

Things that work:
1 - Basic needs are satisfied. A kid will always make your life hell if they're starving, exhausted or feeling very uncomfortable. If your kid wakes up hungry and tired then assume that you can't expect anything good of their behavior until they get some food and properly wake up. No point in making any ultimatums or punishing them for "bad behavior". The bad behavior will pass once the problem is solved. That means it's more important to give them what they need in stead of what they think they want. And sometimes what they need is a cookie until food is done so it's good to be ready for exceptions. Keep in mind that I said "starving" not "hungry" and "exhausted" not "tired". There is no reason for a kid to be fussy and whiny whenever it's bed time or whenever they kinda feel like having a snack and such attitude shouldn't be encouraged in any way.

2 - Never break a promise and treat all casual deals as promises. "I'll give you a candy for dessert" is a promise. "I'll make you rice tomorrow" is a promise. Anything you say must be treated as severely as if you had just promised it on someone's grave. And you know why that's so important? Because if you go to a store with the kid and they REALLY want something and you tell them "I will give it to you after we've paid for it." then the kid will trust you. There will be no reason to argue because they know it's only a matter of time until they get what they asked for. Siiri really will hand over the cookies without any fuss so I can put them in the cart and she won't mention them until we've paid for the cookies and she tells me, "now cookie" and I give her the cookie as soon as I possibly can. If she forgets my promise, I will tell her, "here's the cookie. Now we've paid for it and I told you you can have it after we've paid for it". I will do my best not to cheat her out of it. If we both forget, I will give her the cookie as soon as I remember and I remind her why I'm giving it to her and I apologize for forgetting it earlier. Siiri knows she can trust her parent with any claim.

A couple of days ago early in the morning (7 a.m.) Siiri came to our room asking for food. I told her I'll make her porridge like every morning and she added, "and then candy". "Siiri, I'm not sure if we have any candy right now". She thought for a moment and repeated in a calm tone, "porridge, then candy". "okay Siiri, we might have some weird licorice candy. I can give you one candy after porridge.". But I was so tired I completely forgot. I remembered the promise late in the evening and also mentioned it to Erkki. The next day I got up when Erkki had already made her porridge and just gone to work. I took one licorice candy and gave it to Siiri with the full explanation of forgetting it and how she was supposed to have it "yesterday after porridge". Siiri looked at me very oddly. She accepted the candy looking really confused and ate it very slowly, almost like she was feeling guilty for eating something she wasn't supposed to have. I assumed she had completely forgot about the promise and was simply confused. I found out later that Erkki had already given her a candy after porridge, a candy that she had received very happily with no confusion or guilt.

3 - Be willing to compromise. For me, a simple "no" is still negotiable. If I say, "No, don't jump there.", Siiri sometimes replies, "Jump a little bit". I agree, "Okay, only jump a little bit". She jumps a few more times and says, "now is enough" and stops jumping. We had a deal and she was just as eager to do like we agreed. That's a 2-year-old making a deal and staying true to it. Sometimes she continues to argue for a better deal but she won't demand that I let her continue to jump after we have already reached a compromise. Exceptions are possible if she's exhausted or feeling starving.

4 - Have a non-negotiable way of saying "NO!". Sometimes a no means no. That's the best way you can get the child to take you seriously. The kid can't assume that you're always willing to be flexible. We usually use the word "last" as an absolute. She can't watch any videos after the "last video" and she can't have any cookies after the "last cookie". It's simply not negotiable and won't even try to negotiate. Also, "no, it's dangerous" is a non-negotiable way of saying "no!".

5 - Differentiate between "must" and "not good" and "not polite". Kids live within hundreds of rules and people keep telling them what to do and what not to do. That's normal. Kids need rules. Just never treat suggesions as rules. It isn't nice to tell the kid, "Now you must say thank you." and a bit later, "you must not run across the street". Those two can't possibly be told as equally severe rules. The child will soon find that she can ignore most of the "must"-rules and might try ignoring some that really do matter. I always try to rank the rules and also give a reason for the rule whenever possible. "It's polite to say thank you", "you must never run across the street, otherwise you might get hit by a car", "You shouldn't/It's not good to climb here, it's too easy to fall in here.", "I really wouldn't recommend...", "Be very careful with...", "Please don't yell, it might bother other people" etc. Don't just tell the child to blindly follow hundreds or equally strict rules because when you think about it, some "rules" are really only suggestions. As a result of ranking rules, when I tell Siiri that something is dangerous, she will stop immediately and she's becoming more and more open to any suggestions that might make her "more polite".

6 - No physical punishment. I still think that physical punishment becomes "necessary" only when the parent is doing a horrible job with parenting and such a parent is usually just lashing out their own disappointment with their own failure. The kid breaks rules because of not understanding why it was important not to do that (parents didn't explain well enough) or thought he/she could get away with it (parents did something wrong). Sometimes a kid will deliberately break a rule for attention or for simply being Damien-incarnation. Then the parent should consider a child psychiatrist to find out what went wrong with parenting and what can be improved. If the parents are too poor and too uneducated for any other solution than imminent physical punishment, then okay - I do accept that there are different families and situations. Simply, the parents shouldn't think it was either unavoidable or a valid parenting method.

7 - Treat your child as a human. Her ideas, thoughts and feelings matter. That being said, parenting is basically just extended human experiments. Pavlov is sometime seen as a jerk for teaching dogs to drool when he rings a bell but most of parenting is pretty similar. Parents teach children to get tired when they lie down in bed, have appetite when they sit at the table to eat, think of a toilet when they need to pee. It's all about habits and it's all taught with repetition.

8 - Actions have a consequences. Give the kid opportunity to make her own mistakes and let her deal with the consequences. Warn her about the possible dangers and stop her if consequences would be too severe but everyday life is full of opportunities to let her make decisions that have clear outcome. The kid doesn't want to finish her meal? Fine. It's up to her. She'll be hungry until the next meal but that's her choice. I might give something really boring (e.g. bread) as an alternative. Or if she's disrespectful with electronics, I will put it out of her reach.

9 - Let the kid decide some details. "Rice or potatoes?", "Doll or Legos?", "Blue dress or red dress?" - it's just details. Kids seem much more agreeable if they're the one who decided in the first place. By letting the kid decide some things you can make your life easier and also let the child practice making her own decisions. It will help her be less of a tag-along later in life as well. Besides, Siiri has a natural talent with making decisions and sticking with it. Some might call this personality trait stubbornness but I really love it about her. A colleague of mine joked that Siiri is more decicive at the age of two than she herself will ever be. Siiri knows what she wants but she's still willing to compromise with most things. It's perfect.

10 - Respect the child's "no". Try not to force her when it's not truly necessary. Respect her wishes too! Some parents tickle their child for a long time after the child clearly has told them to stop. That's just being a jerk towards the child. When Siiri says "no", then we stop and then she takes a breath and often says, "now tickle more". . When we need to give her medicine and she says, "no" then that falls under non-negotiable and then we explain why it's necessary. Parents still have the final say.

Hope you got some ideas and thoughts. Siiri's just so wonderful. I hope the next kid turns out just as awesome.

Doctors Are The Worst

2011-08-16T13:02:00.000-07:00

I had the craziest revelation. I'm not really afraid of giving birth anymore, except for the usual fear of complications. I've done so much reading that I have a very solid and detailed plan for the entire event. But this does not reduce my fear of labor. Now I'm just afraid of the midwife, nurses and doctors who will probably treat me like some hormone-driven maniac in pain, incapable of any reasonable thinking. They'll tell me what to do, in stead of suggesting, they'll give me limited information to manipulate me to do what they want me to do. They'll tell me what I absolutely have to do so the baby won't die except they are simply getting me to do what they find most convenient. That's what happened last time. Hard to name all the lies I was told during labor, but the most serious one is that baby's vital signs can't be monitored during pushing phase and if I don't push the baby out ASAP, it will probably suffer from oxygen deprivation. Oh how I'd like to meet that midwife now and give her a piece of my mind. I'd probably be able to do it in a way that she'll feel insecure about her profession for years, and she'd deserve it. Lying to patients is simply monumentally unethical.

But I have found an individual midwife, wrote a new birth plan and I have told Erkki my preferences (poor guy! ) so he can help me fight off manipulating and lying hospital staff who are likely to treat him with much more respect than a woman giving birth. Come to think of it, no one would stereo-typically take that seriously. That's like the ultimate two-in-one: woman and giving birth. A drunk guy would be taken more seriously.

Anyway, I finished Twilight. The fourth book is CRAZY!!! I kept reading and gasping in horror, trying to imagine anyone making a movie out of it and serving it to 13-year old girls. Good luck with that! And then I saw the trailer! They actually did it. The trailer makes it look like a sequel to a soap opera or something. The fourth movie really seems so cute and sparkly, especially compared to the blood and gore in the book. Or maybe I just imagined it worse than it was written. If you've read it (which I doubt, considering the people who read this blog), you understand why it was shocking for me.

The first three movies of Twilight were okay. Initially I really hated the casting, because I imagined Edward to be handsome and the actor's version of Edward looks quite pathetic. The actor is trying to portray a tough guy who is having a hard time with his craving for blood but it looks somehow weak and insecure - not holding eye contact, having wobbly body language in some critical scenes, and so on. The entire Cullen family looks all wrong. There isn't even one whom I'd consider sexy, but they were all supposed to look inhumanly alluring. The female main character Bella keeps pouting and bitching and looking so unsure of everything. At first I couldn't see any beauty behind all that teenager complex ("no one understands me, I'm so different") but she actually gets more pretty with every movie. In the last one she could become a model. Overall, the Twilight movies were well written and horribly directed. The script is good, and the actors seem to fit their roles well, but somehow it still ends up looking like a low-budget B-movie or even a school play.

Siiri's been ill for a few days. Fever has gone near or above 39.0 Celsius for four days in a row already. At first I thought it means Siiri's immune system isn't nearly as good as I had imagined, but then I read up on what she has - adenovirus (diagnosed by the doctor) - and found out most kids have it much worse. The list of possible symptoms is really long but Siiri only has fever so far. It seems the illness is already subsiding and I get the feeling she's just really enjoying having me around for several full days in a row.

I've gone to maternity leave now, starting with Siiri's illness, and I'm already starting to feel the different life rhythm. Today I made bread for the first time. It wasn't sour bread with rye (very popular in Estonia). It was whole wheat "healthy bread" with yeast which tasted somewhat too healthy for my preference. It was surprisingly good for bread with no butter, oil or milk in the dough, but next time I'll make it sweeter and perhaps also add some butter to the recipe. The home life really is different though. Today I started thinking about washing the curtains. It's a rental apartment for crying out loud. I wouldn't be thinking about it if I wasn't so eager to do something useful. I wish I could just work on my computer but that really isn't possible lately. My head is just filled with pink fog and I keep having very pregnant thoughts - like how big my belly is and I'm hungry again.

The baby is moving around a lot. Mostly stretching and making me feel even more round. I have no idea how I can be this pregnant with over a month of pregnancy ahead of me. I wish the weight gain had gone to areas other than my stomach because it really is at it's limit. I keep thinking the belly will just pop and burst open and the baby will feel really triumphant, thinking "Freedom!". I can't even tell how much of the weigh gain is justified by the pregnancy. I guess I'll find out later. I have a feeling it won't be good news but I really don't feel like going on a diet right now. Damn I've gone much more lazy compared to my last pregnancy, which I started on a low-carb diet. If I get fat it will be all my fault. I know it and I'm still thinking about food full of carbohydrates. Hopefully I'll feel more determined after the baby is born.

Maybe I'm feeling less afraid of child birth because it beats the Aliens version of birth and lately the direct route to baby's freedom seems all too possible.

Sauna 24/7

2011-07-28T11:16:00.000-07:00

Being pregnant comes easy to me. I'm quite a bit more drowsy, but this is a good thing - I'm far less edgy than usually. Otherwise my mind can get somewhat intense and it can increase my stress level but now I just feel so mellow and chill. Combined with the decreased coordination from the changes in body shape, I almost feel like I'm a bit drunk. There is one bad side-effect though - I constantly feel a bit warmer than usual. It wasn't a problem until the outdoors temperature rose above 30 degrees Celsius and now I constantly feel too warm to think or move. Usually I like high temperature but now I mostly feel like drinking cold kvass (almost like root beer) all day long and putting my feet up.

I still go to work. I'm mostly just giving all my projects to other people so I can stop working in two weeks time. I'm sure something unexpected will interfere with that plan but so far so good. I did spend two weeks at home with Siiri and it was a nice reminder of what it feels like to be a stay-at-home mother. It mostly just made me much lazier than I'm used to, but also, suddenly I started having all these ideas of what food I'd like to cook or how I would like to re-arrange furniture in Siiri's room. It's like I finally had room in my head for things I didn't even think about while I was also working in the lab. I'm sure I would have also baked a few pies, except I mostly just want to eat fresh fruit in this heat. Five fruits a day suddenly isn't a problem at all, except if I try to count an 8-kg watermelon as one fruit. When we get a good watermelon, I manage half of such a watermelon in one evening, or even 3/4, but I might just explode if I try to reach anywhere near 5 fruits during that day.

I've been reading a 4-book series, I've already finished two and started on the third. The story is quite odd to say the least - it's about a schoolgirl being obsessed with her personal stalker. The guy constantly sneaks into her room when she's asleep, monitors all her conversations with her friends, follows her everywhere and annoyingly treats her like a little kid who can do nothing without his supervision (lies and even temporarily wrecks her car to get her to cooperate) and even tells her who she's allowed to hang out with. I mean, the guy is so controlling that he tells her that she's never allowed to meet her best friend again because he doesn't like him. I'd understand if the best friend was a romantic rival but it's not exactly like that. It's really freaky to read that the girl really doesn't notice any of it. She's so blindly obsessed with him that she only wants to spend all her time with him for ever and ever and ever til the end of time... It's quite a compelling glimpse into an obsessive highshool romance and it even has vampires and werewolves in it. You might wanna try reading it - the first book is called "Twilight" by Stephenie Meyer and it's pretty famous. They even made movies about it!

I still haven't gotten over my craving for sushi. I eat a lot of it and then two weeks later I start thinking about it again. At first I just feel like having some sushi but as days go by I become obsessed with the idea of having a pile of sushi for dinner and it won't pass until I eat like 20 maki and manage another two weeks. I think this time it's been 3 weeks because I ate freshly salted raw Atlantic salmon last week. I want to eat sushi so often that Erkki doesn't find it at all appealing anymore. Now I simply wait for moments when he has plans for the evening and I order a lot and eat all of it by myself. Yumm! Ah the simple pleasures in life.

I made an appointment with an individual midwife and I'm hiring her to be my personal midwife for when I give birth. I'm sure it's a much better choice than not hiring her but she's not really the sort of person I'd enjoy spending time with. Her professional views are exactly what I'm looking for: no intervention unless it's unavoidable, promotes breathing the baby out, birthing baths, moving around during birth, not cutting the cord too early, etc. She seemed really open to anything that could help me give birth in the most pleasant way possible, but she said some things that started haunting in my head. For example, she likes it when the husband also participates in the birth, because "if the woman isn't cooperating, the husband can help communicate with her and make her understand what needs to be done.". That makes perfect sense if it's something really stupid, like the woman turning purple from forgetting to breathe enough, but otherwise it sounds like she's planning to get Erkki to turn against me so they can all bully me when I'm at my weakest to do things that feel wrong. Why else would I not be cooperating? Maybe I'd have a good reason to tell her "I won't do that!".

Also, she said that when the woman is unable to breathe/push the baby out, they tell someone to bring the vacuum (used for pulling the bay out by force) in to the room and this always scares the woman to have more energy for pushing and usually the baby has a regular birth because of this extra effort. I really don't want anyone to try any manipulating scare tactics on me. I'd just get really stressed and anxious if that happened during my birth. I told her this but she didn't seem to be the sort of person who would understand anyone else's views after just one conversation. I still think I'm going to hire her because she really seemed to believe that birth is something that happens the easiest when the woman gets to do whatever feel right. That really is what I'm aiming for, so I'm sure it will be okay. Quite sure... Uhm, almost sure. At least I have a fair amount of hope and a lot of self-delusion: The second birth will be much more pleasant than the first one. Really.

Now I'm gonna go back to my psycho obsessive high-school romance and I'm going to get a bottle of kvass and put my feet up. I'm really hoping for heavy rain tomorrow.

Pride and Prejudice

2011-07-04T13:11:00.000-07:00

This time the title of the post isn't some wordplay or a hint at something. It really is about Pride and Prejudice. Ever since I got a new phone - HTC Desire that used to be Erkki's - I have been spending a surprising amount of time reading from my phone. With iPod of iPad, which can also be used as an eBook reader, it wasn't that simple since we allow Siiri to play with those and there was always the risk of her demanding that it was her turn to play. Saying "a risk" is a gross understatement. I barely finished a few pages on iPod when it was no longer reasonably easy to tell her it STILL wasn't her turn to play with the toy.

Recently I started reading Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and it wasn't long until I found myself enjoying the odd vocabulary and the peculiar grammar. I googled it and found out it was published in 1813 - that's nearly two hundred years ago. Amazing that something so old can still be so captivating. The dialogue was really enjoyable and the characters so vivid. I finished the book and went on to download and watch two versions of it on screen. First being the movie "Pride and Prejudice" from 2005, with Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen and the second a 6-episode mini-series, called, lo and behold, "Pride and Prejudice" with Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle, which was made in 1995 by BBC. This blog post is more like a movie review than anything I've written before.

First of all, I'll say what this book is about. The Bennet family is a family of five young women who barely qualify to belong to the high society. Their father has a manor but since there's no male heir, the manor will be inherited by someone else and the girls are destined to receive only a small dowry. This makes their prospects of a good marriage quite grim. A couple of really rich young bachelors join the neighborhood (Yay! ) , one of them the most pleasant gentleman and his best best friend Mr Darcy who manages to make everyone hate him by not being neither sociable nor polite . Appearances can be deceiving and people start falling in love and so on. All the courting is done properly as it was customary for high society around 1813. No kissing before marriage and even spending any time alone with a partner was something to be very cautious about. Sex before marriage was a far worse fate than death. Although there are more than one marriage formed by the end of the book, it's really a story about Mr Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet, the second daughter of the Bennet family, who is very opinionated for a woman of that time but uses all her skill and wit to express her views in a polite and positive way.

In the movie Elizabeth, played by Keira Knightley, is a hysterical giggling outspoken farm girl. Well, no wonder, the entire family is a bunch of hillbillies living in a big house. They don't mind pigs running around in their kitchen or chickens occupying a the area just by the garden door. They don't care about decent fashionable clothing or proper hats. The younger daughters desperately throw handkerchiefs to low-ranking soldiers when in the book they were spending their time with officers at private events. The mother has reddened complexion like the kind you'd expect from a homeless person with alcohol problems and the father is about as gentle-manlike as a rich farmer. I'm sure even regular merchants looked more decent back then. Such a shame really. Keira Knightley was exactly who I pictured as Elizabeth when I was reading the book but the gap between what I imagined and what I saw was too great to forgive. I expected her to deliver her opinions like an unexpected sting that you might not even notice if you're not paying attention. However, she was just impolite and outspoken with no witty subtlety.

Mr Darcy, played by Matthew Macfadyen looks very similar to what I imagined, although I have to agree with something I read in an IMDB user review of the movie - he looks more constipated than proud. Perhaps it's even more accurate to describe him as suffering from Asperger syndrome. He just looks so awkward but redeems himself so many times throughout the movie that I grew to like his version of Mr Darcy quite a bit. Colin Firth in the 1995 BBC series is seen as the perfect Darcy by so many Jane Austen fans that Matthew Macfadyen never got a fair chance with the fans. I did find Colin Firth very believable and he's seemed both proud and introverted like in the book, but he simply looks nothing like I imagined him. He did a really great job though.

Also, I never did get used to Jennifer Ehle as Elizabeth. She was supposed to be quick-witted and opinionated, not a younger version of Mary Poppins. She was so pleasant and friendly like she had just come from Sunday School. Something just wasn't right. Indeed she was a very positive person like in the book but I expected some mischievous smiles and a very young and fresh spirit. She delivered her lines much better than Keira Knightley. In the movie the dialogue from the book seemed so foreign that it felt like I was watching Shakespeare or some school play. In the series the same lines were delivered so believably and fluently that I can't help but think that Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth must be much better actors than Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen.

The family life of Bennets was much nicer in the series, though. Just like in the book, they constantly do their best to seem like they rightfully belong to the high society. The girls are expected to be tidy and conventionally dressed at all times and when there are unexpected visitors the girls have no reason to start running around CLEANING the house like in the movie. They have maids for that!

Amazingly, the most beloved and memorable scenes from both the movie and the series were the kind that never happened in the book. In the movie, Elizabeth and Mr Darcy meet at dawn while they have gone for a walk in their undergarments. This would never have happened in those times and they would have been mortified if anyone saw them like that. In the series Mr Darcy goes for a spontaneous swim in the lake outside his manor and later runs into Elizabeth while soaking wet. That also never happened in the book but is is actually mentioned how improper Mr Darcy looked so it's forgiven. Worst extra scene of all was from the movie - in the middle of the night when everyone's asleep and Elizabeth is sleeplessly in her nightgown, Mr Darcy enters her bedroom without knocking, leaves her a letter without saying a word and rides off into the night. If they had got caught with something as outrageous as that, they would have probably been forced to marry.

It would be fair to say I enjoyed both the movie and the series and was happy with neither. The movie had excellent casting, the best I've ever seen. Most of the people looked EXACTLY like they were supposed to look but it was so accurate that it was bordering on being a caricature of the roles. Mr and Mrs Bennet were the only people who were much better cast in the mini-series. The series was occasionally boring to watch and it had some extra dialogue that could have been left out. The movie, on the other hand, skipped some very nice dialogue because it didn't have time for it.

Over-all I wouldn't really recommend the movie or the mini-series because both had their faults. I wouldn't recommend the book either, only because I don't want to be one of those tedious people who say, "Oh the movie was nothing. You MUST read the book in stead." That is like sooo conceited. But if you happen to see the movie, be sure to remember that the Bennets didn't really live on a farm, okay?

Afraid of Giving Birth

2011-06-16T12:26:00.001-07:00

Today I was reading something I never should have read - an article about some women choosing cesarean because they simply are too afraid of giving birth. And then I read something I REALLY never-ever should have read - the comments to that article. Some people saying that childbirth was painful so they don't want to do it again, some people saying that cesarean was even worse and some people saying that regular birth was painful but seeing the baby made up for the horrible experience. Well yeah, I do seem to have a very high pain threshold - I didn't scream or curse and I didn't beg for an epidural. And still, as I was reading other people's experiences, my mind took me back to that day with all the horror and desperation of being helplessly alone and suffering. I've tried to gloss over it thinking that Siiri made up for it and that it became okay the moment I saw a healthy baby. Of course nearly passing out from exhaustion did feel so wonderfully heavenly at that moment. But then again, when I think back at the entire experience, I get butterflies in my stomach and the urge to hide under some blanket.

I thought I was supposed to forget childbirth. There's some stupid urban legend about women being able to forget childbirth the moment it's over and then it becomes really foggy. For me, I think it keeps getting worse and worse. I mean, I remember how it didn't seem such a big deal right afterwards. It was simply a foggy memory of a truly sleep-deprived night that tested my patience and mental stability and all time became just minutes passing by, with the clock ticking too slowly and everything being a hazy nightmare that has to end sooner or later. I guess it's similar to soldiers going through their extreme hiking trip with heavy equipment and too little food. They survive it, it makes them feel stronger for surviving it and later becomes a foggy memory of past hardship. They don't really think about the experience but when they do remember it, they really want to avoid ever going through that again.

I didn't really think about birth for a long time but last week my pregnancy crossed over from carrying a fetus to carrying a potentially viable baby. If I have a preterm baby now, it will probably survive! This makes it all so real. I'm not simply pregnant - I'm actually carrying a baby that will soon want to come out! I'm gonna have to do that child birth thing again! It really is a horrible thought. It's like knowing that your dentist's appointment is approaching, only many times worse. Cesarean isn't a solutions either. With the dentist analogy, if a regular birth is like having your tooth yanked out bit by bit, then cesarean would be the doctor proposing, "There's an alternative to all that yanking - I could have someone punch the tooth out.".

I shouldn't think about the subject but on the other hand, I can't ignore it indefinitely. If I had birth right now I'd panic. Well, okay, I wouldn't panic. I'd simply get really defensive and spiteful in the birth department. I'd treat all the midviwes as potential enemies who just want to leave me alone with my contractions and everything. I keep reliving what I should have told them two years ago. I should have demanded a piece of paper to write my complaint on it. I should have told on them and accused them of endangering my life and Siiri's. They left me all alone - I could have died of a bleed in there! They didn't show me any emergency "call for help" button and even when I managed to tell some passing-by nurse to send someone to see me, it took an hour for that someone to arrive. Outrageous! Some people give birth in less than an hour. Should I have screamed for help? Should I have called the ambulance for some attention? I keep thinking that the least I could have done is to accuse them of neglecting me. If they told me I seemed perfectly healthy the moment they left me alone, then I would have just told them that I was giving birth and if giving birth is really so safe then I could have done it in some remote cave in the mountains. Why bother visiting THEIR hospital in the first place if it's as safe as giving birth in a remote cave...

I'm so angry at them for making me be afraid of childbirth. I know they're the best hospital in the area and they simply made a small mistake. It was some student who took me to that birth room and she really thought I wasn't really giving birth and I was calmly sleeping in that bed. When she left, she dimmed the lights and nearly tried tucking me in. I guess she had never seen an active birth with irregular contractions and there's a first time for everything. On some level I don't blame her at all but still, when I think about that night, I get really scared. The worst part is that I don't simply start thinking scary thoughts, I get physically scared. I get all tense, pull my shoulders up, feel shaky inside my chest and I bet I look deeply worried as if the doomsday is approaching. That's extremely far from the inner calm and well prepared attitude that is needed for a pleasant birth experience. I have to deal with my fear, otherwise the second time might be even worse than the first one. I could get very tense and make a potentially bad experience into a horrible one.

I'm gonna have to start preparing myself for the inevitable. I have no plan of action. I'm hoping tomorrow I'll be back to ignoring that the due day is approaching.

Iron Rich Foods

2011-06-11T12:12:00.000-07:00

The last time my hemoglobin level was screened, it had dropped from 129 to 112. I was expecting something around 125, which would be very healthy for anyone, especially during pregnancy, but all I got was a lousy 112. The midwife said they don't worry until it's under 110, then realized how close my result was to 110 and corrected herself by saying that they don't recommend iron supplements until hemoglobin level drops below 105. Not so reassuring .

I have an idea why it might have dropped so fast during this pregnancy. I eat less meat. During the first trimester I suddenly didn't feel like eating meat and I didn't mind eating similar food to the one I make for Siiri - lots of carbs, plenty of vegetables and a bit of meat. I didn't fry a pork steak or serve a plate full of chili con carne with a slice of bread. I made REGULAR food. You know, the kind that is usually considered "healthy" . And this "heatlhy" nearly vegetarian menu almost made me anemic.

Problems are to be recognized and dealt with. I clearly don't get enough iron with food so I should eat more foods that are high in iron content. Right? Well that's what the midwife said so it must be right. So I should just eat plenty of beetroot, strawberries, beef, spinach, cereals and soybean?

There are so many foods loaded with iron but it's important to note that there are two kinds of iron: heme iron and non-heme iron. I've understood it has something to do with iron oxidation states. In animals iron is usually stored inside a structure called heme and has an oxidation state Fe(II). This heme with the iron is then used in red blood cells for oxygen transport. This kind of iron is quite easy to absorb from food. The other form is called non-heme iron, usually Fe(III) and that's hardly absorbed at all.

It's actually helpful to consume non-heme iron with antioxidant vitamin C, partly because it helps reduce Fe(III) to Fe(II) (source). Otherwise non-heme iron is actually pretty useless. Also, non-heme iron is usually consumed with lots of fiber. You know, "eat lots of healthy fruit and vegetables, they're full of fiber!". Fiber is horrible for iron absorption! It gets even worse. Most fruits or vegetables contain oxalates which bind divalent metallic cations like calcium or Fe(II). So the little amount of iron that gets reduced to Fe(II) and could possibly be absobed, in stead gets stuck on some oxalate and gets peed out. All you vegetarians out there, good luck getting your iron from food!

Lets talk numbers. Men need 10-20 mg of iron per day and women need around 20 mg. Pregnant women require roughly 30 mg of iron daily and anemic people are supplemented with 60 mg of iron once or twice a day. I should aim for at least 30 mg, if not even more. To simplify matters, I want to know how much I would have to eat each food to get 30 mg of iron. What I'd have to eat in one day, starting from heme iron: I would have to eat 860 g of beef, 2300 g of chicken leg, 1300 g of turkey, 670 g of trout, 3750 g of canned tuna or 350 g of oysters. That sucks. I can't eat that much meat every day! How about vegetarian sources of iron... Lets see, 860 g of cooked spinach, 670 g of oat flakes, 680 g of almonds, 1760 g of dried dates, 2140 g of potatoes, 1760 g of brown bread, 3000 of beetroot, 7500 g of strawberries, 3000 g of broccoli or 860 g of beans. That doesn't really help a lot.

Today I bought strawberries thinking they're a good source of iron. If I had known that I'd have to eat 7 and a half kilos of strawberries to reach my daily iron need, I would have only bought them for their taste. Also, I didn't know strawberries were a rich source of oxalates so the iron won't get absorbed anyway. Another food usually mentioned as a great source of iron is spinach. Popeye ate it for its high iron content and it made him strong. I guess he never read that spinach is so full of oxalates that they practically negate all the iron they contain. Rhubarb is sour because of oxalic acid and in not recommended for people with iron deficiency. I think this fact I'm going to have to ignore. I want rhubarb pie! I need my rhubarb pie and I'm gonna eat it no matter what those nutritionists say!

Uhm... I guess all that talk about simply eating iron rich foods is about as trustworthy as taking homeopathic medicine to relieve iron deficiency. It is nearly impossible to get the recommended amount of iron with food and it's practically impossible for vegetarians. 200g of beef each day with various iron-rich foods might add up to 10 mg of iron and that seems very realistic. However, three times that would simply make me fat.

I dislike the idea of food supplements, and I dislike the idea of having iron pills in my home since iron poisoning is the leading cause of poisoning in children in USA. Not the safest thing to have in the same apartment with a creative and curious toddler. I'll try eating lots of heme iron and non-heme iron with vitamin C with various foods. I doubt it will help much but at least now I know not to eat strawberries with the intent of getting my daily iron.

Back from France

2011-05-31T13:42:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago I came back from a wonderfully improper trip to France. I assume it was improper because I broke some "rules" and I other people seemed more worried about stuff than I was. Okay, so flying while pregnant is perfectly safe in most cases, so this "danger" was only in their heads but perhaps I shouldn't have eaten that raw beef...

Already at the start of the conference, people were discussing the wine that was being offered. I'm sure it was great. Although it was just regular conference wine, it must have been great because we were in Burgundy region of France. The discussion group was really small, so one guy turned to me and said, "But of course you can't try this wine.". That made me cringe inside, so I smiled and clarified, "I could try it if I wanted. There's a difference between trying and drinking. I CHOSE not to try it." I later realized the absurdity of a man (what do they know about pregnancy anyway) with a scientific background (calculating concentrations is like a second nature) telling me I am not allowed even to taste wine. Fortunately I knew he didn't really mean it that way - he was really friendly and sweet. Also he didn't comment when I tasted the good wines during conference dinner. There the waiters were really adamant to fill everyone's glasses with wonderful red and white wine that were picked especially for our 4-course superb dinner. I seemed to be the only one sending back two nearly full glasses.

One of the things I didn't plan on was eating raw meat. I have really horrible memory for trivia. I knew for sure that boeuf in French means meat, usually beef. I also remembered that there's some raw meat dish called "Boeuf de la something-something". But the menu item "tartar de boeuf" did not light up any warning lights for me. I would have been suspicious if it had been some sort of high-end restaurant specialized in variety foods, but it was just a small clean restaurant that looked like a place ideal for an early morning coffee and croissant. Of course Tartar de boeuf, also known as Boeuf de tartar, is the raw dish that I shouldn't have ordered. I tasted it and suspected what it was, then I had my friend ask the waitress how it's made. The reply was, "Take meat, chop it and mix it." It was really late, I was quite hungry, it didn't taste so bad and the meat looked, smelled and tasted completely fresh, so I just ate it. Just at the beginning of the month I declared that this raw meat dish is something that I want to try at least once in my life, but certainly not while pregnant. Oh well. I guess it was meant to be.

I also rode metro trains, although we were advised twice to take the bus in stead. I also drank coffee and I even went over my 1-cup-a-day limit. It was a CONFERENCE! How could I have skipped the coffee and not feel like I'm missing out on something. One waitress asked, "Coffee or tea?", I said "Coffee", she looked at me and brought me tea. I sent it back and had her bring me coffee. Another think not good for pregnant women was when I walked 20-30 km in Paris and finally returned to the hotel nauseous and dizzy. When we got to the hotel I googled why minor sunburn would make me nauseous and I found out I'm actually having a slight heatstroke, which is often caused by dehydration. I drank all the water I had and immediately felt better. Ah how I love the Internet.

Flying while pregnant felt adventurous, since I never knew what airplane company policy I was in disagreement with. The first time I was asked to switch seats with someone because I just happened to be sitting right next to the emergency exit. Company policy says that this is not the proper place for a pregnant woman. At first we thought it's because that's the least safe seat in the plane - if anything should happen, the door might detach and pull the closest seat with it. Later I found out it's because the person sitting there must be able to open the door and help people get out of the plane in case of emergency. During another flight, the flight attendant saw my belly and asked me to switch seats. Apparently it's company policy for pregnant women to be seated by the window. I don't know the real reason but I figure it's the safest spot in case people panic. I wouldn't want anyone trying to climb over me to get off the plane and I really would like to wait for a good safe moment to get out of my seat. Also, as long as I'm in the window seat, no one can accidentally drop a suitcase on me while opening the overhead compartment. That was all fine and sweet. Nice of them to make things safer for me.

However I was less happy when I was nearly denied a boarding pass on my way back. I knew I can't fly after 32 or 36 weeks of pregnancy but I'm only around 23 weeks, so there is no reason to worry. I didn't think I'd have to prove it! Just a week earlier I was still contemplating whether I look pregnant or simply out of shape and now one person thought I need a doctor's note proving that I'm not about to give birth any minute now. The check-in lady was actually calling someone to make sure she's allowed to let me fly without a certificate of pregnancy. Finally she let me proceed so she spared her company the discussions I was planning to have about my medical data being my private matter and, how ridiculous it was to think I was 2 months more pregnant and so on. I was even planning on demanding them to prove they have any right to keep me off the plane, and since I knew they don't have any right, since I wasn't a danger to anyone and not braking any rules. In case they would keep me off the plane for not having that certificate, I was going to demand refund and a compensation for any discomfort or I'll go to the press claiming this company has prejudice against pregnant women. The situation really was too ridiculous to be true. I'm glad they came to their senses while I was still nice and polite.

During my stay in France I visited two places - Dijon and Paris. Dijon is truly beautiful. I recommend visiting it to anyone who wants to experience France in all it's glory. I also think you should consider skipping Paris. There are some wonderful places worth sightseeing, like the magnificent Arc de Triumph, which was about 10 times bigger than I expected. Just find a picture on Google with tiny ants on the bottom edge of the picture - those are people. Eiffel tower is also really pretty. It's quite ugly from far away but up close it's a masterpiece of symmetry and perfection. Notre dame is also amazing. It's simply so huge! That's the thing with Paris - it might be a loud, crowded, unpleasant, smelly, dirty and impractical city full of people wanting to cheat money out of you, but their tourism objects are simply so BIG. All the things I mentioned - arcs, monuments, churches - can be found elsewhere but they are simply bigger in Paris.

Siiri didn't see me for 5 days in a row. I thought she'd miss me a lot and people would have a hard time with her because of it. The reality: she barely noticed I was gone. I did warn her several times that I'll be gone for many days and then I'll be back, and she seemed like she might even be listening, but she didn't even ask for me while I was away. She spent a lot of time with her grandparents and was too busy playing and having fun to remember I even exist.

Long Time No See

2011-05-09T14:56:00.000-07:00

Life is a blurry rollercoaster. Stuff happens and time goes by. Siiri's turning 2 years old today and has started to talk in sentences. My last post was a month ago so she didn't have much time to learn it but I like how she does it. Most of you know that Estonian grammar is HELL . There's 14 cases. Even the most basic words like water can be vesi, vee, vett, veega, veeta, or other. Or the word home can become from kodu to koju or kodus and so on. It makes it so difficult to widen one's vocabulary, but it makes it even worse to find the right word for the sentence you're trying to piece together. Well, Siiri's much better at it than I would have expected. Maybe all kids are, but she's the one whose progress I've been observing. Just a month ago she wasn't combining words at all, and in the past couple of days she's said "Seda putru ei taha" (This porridge I don't want) and "Siiri joob vett" (Siiri is drinking water). She even used a plural for dinosaurs when she referred to several at the same time. She uses very few made-up words. Her version of "tüdruk" (girl) is "küke". It's always küke, even though for nearly all other words she really makes an effort to say it exactly right.

She likes her dinosaurs - small rubbery toys that she constantly dips in her glass of water, commenting, "Saurus's are drinking". I guess that's somewhat better than what she did the other day. I heard "Rabbit drinks" and stopped her just barely from dunking her hairy soft stuffed toy feet first in a glass of water. She likes to comment her actions in words. Today when she went to bed, she suddenly felt too crowded with her four bed toys, so she sat up, pushed all of them to the foot of her bed and announced, "Out of (my) way. Girl to sleep." (Estonian: "Eest ära. Küke magama!") And then let herself fall on the pillow again. She can be so wonderfully clear in her wishes. Or bossy, if that's the word you prefer. She's really growing up to be a strong-willed person who'd probably do well even in military if she wasn't so girly and pink and fond of pretty glittery things.

Siiri's also quite orderly and neat, but I'm not quite sure what causes it. Her stuffed bed animals always get her attention in one specific order. Rabbit always comes first and then Puppy and two small puppies, first black-and-white and then brown. She might be holding one of her puppies but if she decides to give her toys some water, she'll drop the puppy, ignore it, and go looking for Rabbit.

Pretend games are really IN with a 2-year old. She likes the invisible crown that is so easily accessible on the picture printed on her pajamas. She asks for the crown, we "take it" from her shirt and then put it on one head after another. It's important to remember who's wearing the crown. One time she had me put the crown on her pillow. When she lied down, she had very little room left at the edge of the pillow so I "pushed aside" the crown to make more room for her. She also picks flowers from books and tells me, "Two of them" (kaks tükki) , then puts them in her pocket for safe-keeping. She has even brought me something I couldn't really see, so I asked her, "Siiri, what did you give me?" and she replied, "A flower" and walked back to her book. The game took a whole different turn when she "picked up" Snow White's poisonous apple and quickly took a bite. I have been using the word "poisonous" to mark things she must never-ever put in her mouth so I "put back" the poisonous apple and conversationally told her she shouldn't eat it because it's poisoned, but I caught it in time and she'll be okay. Suddenly she looked so grim. She sat there completely serious and contemplative for nearly a minute and then burst out crying and sobbing as if she had just committed the worst crime possible (whatever that might be). It took a long time and a lot of effort to convince her that no harm was done, I'm not upset with her actions, and she'll be okay.

Me and Erkki took the most of my not-too-pregnant-yet second trimester and went to Prague (Czech Republic) with Siiri and Erkki's parents. The trip was nice but only the parts that depended on us. No significant disagreements among us, Siiri loves traveling and barely even made a sound on the plane, nothing got stolen, and Prague was such a great choice for it's wonderful buildings and statues. However, overall it was the least lucky travel experience I've ever had. The weather was atrocious. It had been 20 C during the week before we arrived and 20 C during the week after we left, but when we were there, it was constantly near 10-12 degrees and dropped as low as 4 degrees one morning. Not really the weather for walking around town and sightseeing.

On top of that Siiri got ill during the second night. She had 38.6 C with laryngitis. I had never seen it myself. It mostly affects small children and can easily become life-threatening within one night. It's basically throat swelling which obstructs breathing. We didn't diagnose the symptoms at night but we went to the hospital emergency room with Siiri first thing in the morning. Siiri got proper medical care and was well enough for travelling back 3 days later. Quite a scary experience to be honest. If that last-era place had had a proper internet connection in the hotel rooms, I would have easily found out about laryngitis and I would have called the ambulance in stead of waiting until the morning. Siiri was already wheezing in each breath when we started going to the hospital. It could have gone much worse but all went well in the end. Due to the medicine that was prescribed, we also found out that Siiri probably has some allergies we didn't know about. She reacts to antihistamines as if it's opiates we're giving her. From whiny and mean to happy and mellow in minutes.

As for the rest of my life, the one that doesn't revolve around Rabbits and dinosaurs, that has become quite routine aside from a couple of refreshing parties. I don't go out often enough and I still haven't taken up exercising again. Now I'm almost pregnant enough to join one of those creepy pregnancy yoga classes that discuss natural childbirth, details of labor and benefits of eating placenta. Or perhaps I can postpone it a little longer...

BTW, I'm about 20 weeks pregnant and I could hide a watermelon in my totally huge tummy. It's really big, even though I don't think it's got anything to do with food. I can barely and rarely feel any movement. I think he/she simply has too much room. Tomorrow's the moment of truth - is it a boy or a girl, or too shy to tell the difference.

Planning Ahead

2011-04-10T05:30:00.000-07:00

Early warning! This post is about childbirth and scientific evidence about it. If you're uncomfortable with the topic, skip this post. For the rest of you, I've been obsessing about childbirth in the last couple of days. My only earlier experience turned out not quite like I imagined. 52 hours long counting from the time the water broke, about 40 hours of induced labor, including 9 h 42 m of "active labour", starting from the time I insisted that I really am giving birth and a physician finally gave in against her better judgement and moved me to the right room. No anesthesia because until the very end no one was around to offer it to me and afterwards it made no sense anymore and finally being so exhausted that after childbirth, I passed out for at least 24 hours, only waking for brief moments.

The entire experience was rather traumatizing. I know I've said I want several children but after that experience, I didn't want to think about going through that again. Maybe if it hadn't been like that, I'd already be a mother of two. Finally I just decided I have to stop postponing a second pregnancy. Now that I'm really growing a tummy and I've even felt the baby move (as early as 15 weeks) and all the routine pregnancy tests have been good, I can't avoid the thought that I will have to do that again. So I've been thinking, how can I do that better?

The most important thing - being alone during childbirth sucks. I'm hiring my own midwife to attend the childbirth. This way they can't neglect me just because another person in labor can make more faces and look more desperate. I don't regret sending Erkki home so he can get some sleep because after birth I needed him to stay awake when I couldn't. But I do kinda regret not looking more desperate and pitiful just to get a decent amount of attention from the local hospital staff at Tartu University Hospital. They're still the best in the entire Estonia and they did most things right. I would even recommend it to other people. I simply wouldn't go there without my personal helper. I don't know how much it costs but it's probably worth it compared to the pricelessness of a psychological trauma.

Some basics about childbirth: giving birth on your back is the worst possible position. Getting the baby out in that position requires much effort and is described as more painful compared to alternatives. In a modern hospital I was encouraged to get out of bed although that makes things more difficult for the midwife. Squatting during labor is the fastest method and opens up areas below by 10%, but can cause tears because it is so fast. It's also a very difficult position to stay in. Water helps childbirth but I chose against it because being in water restricts my movement and makes me feel clumsy. Besides, water gets cold after a while and I've heard it can get quite icky during an actual labor. Episiotomy, or deliberate cutting down below is pointless because doing the cut to avoid a natural tear is kind of counterproductive and the cut can tear up more as the baby comes. Women who have an episiotomy are more likely to end up with a very deep tear compared to women who don't have an episiotomy.

One thing that most people don't know is that there isn't much natural lubrication going on during childbirth. Ain't that cruel? Long ago people used oil to make things more slippery but now women are supposed to believe that the greasy substance called vernix on the baby's skin is enough. Babies who are carried to full term don't have much vernix left so that certainly isn't enough. Now there's a new product called Dianatal gel which is designed to be a birth lubricant. Quite ingenious in my opinion. It costs a ton of money, around $130, but if it might help, I'd try it. Some midwives say it helps, some say it doesn't make a difference, I say the product makes enough logical sense to pay the cost.

Pushing during the second stage of labor is also under debate. It's criminally common for childbirth to be portrayed completely wrong in movies: woman lying on it's back, people yelling "PUSH, PUSH! Take a deep breath, then hold your breath and push!". Although I wasn't instructed to stay in bed, I was instructed to push as hard as I can. This is the wrong thing to do. In normal labor when woman is not even drugged on pain medication, there is a natural force insisting that the woman pushes. It's hard to hold back. But when pain gets very strong, that can mean that it's really time to hold back a little to let skin stretch. That's how I felt. I wanted to pause for some time. "Push through the pain!", they told me. I was given the clear impression that the faster we get the baby out the better and that the second stage of labor is very dangerous for the baby. The longer it lasts the worse it is. Well, that's not quite true.

I found very clear data that the second stage of labor can last for HOURS (up to 5 and more) without any adverse effect to the baby - no decrease in Apgar scores. There really is no hurry. Very long second stage labor can be evidence of other problems but as far as everything else is okay, there's no need to force a hurried pace in the first three hours of "the pushing phase". After three hours there's an increased risk of significant blood loss. I did it in an hour and I was hurried along the entire time as if the midwife had a bus to catch. I haven't found any reliable data about "pushing through the pain", I've only found stories from women who say that there's less tears when you don't do that. I got the impression that the baby's heart rate decreases during the pushing phase but now I read that it only decreases because women hold their breath to push harder. Do try to push your hardest without holding your breath - it can't be done. Ironically, women aren't even supposed to push their hardest. If a woman just relaxes and pushes very gradually, slow and steady, while exhaling during a contraction, the baby comes out nearly as fast, with better Apgar score and causing less tears. Funny they never mention the side effects while yelling to push harder. And they certainly don't look sorry when they're stitching up tears they helped create.

I've been thinking about pain medication and frankly, that's been my last concern. Maybe I have indeed forgotten the pain but this time I'm planning to avoid any pain medication. It's not about being a martyr and a hippie. I just really don't like the side effects. Most pain medication have only limited usefulness for the mother and can make the baby dizzy and unable to start breathing on it's own. All pain medication wears off after a while so its not likely to stay drugged the entire time. Pain is strongest in the end when also pain medication is the most dangerous. Epidural is effective against the pain, but it has side effects that I am not willing to agree with. It can make the woman unable to move her legs or to support her body for better birthing positions as opposed to lying flat on her back. It also makes the woman unable to feel pain on the inside so tears are more common. Also, it can completely lose the sensation of needing to push. The large amount of women having an epidural is actually the reason why midwives give the instruction to push, no matter what the body wants. Basically, epidural loses the woman's control over her body. Water injection into the skin is still an option I'd consider because it's only side effect is short term discomfort but it can relax the body by relieving pain and thus help with childbirth.

After all that I've read about childbirth in the last days I'm actually somewhat eager to test my theory that it doesn't have to be so bad. I can't control whether labor is induced or not and I haven't made plans about that but I will probably try Dianatal gel, a personal midwife and lack of strong pushing. Also still avoiding pain medication, forbiddings epiostomy and avoiding laying on my back. So, the experiment plan is done but I still have to wait a whole 5 months until I can put it to test.

PS! Just to spread bad publicity for a dumb technological failure that should have been fixed long ago: IE9 is no longer beta but I still can't publish posts in Blogger using an updated IE9 browser.

Pregnancy Loop

2011-03-29T14:32:00.000-07:00

You know the situation where you're in a conversation, talking and suddenly you feel you've already told the story to that person and they're pretending not to remember it. This feeling is also the reason I haven't written anything in a while. I'm totally in a pregnancy loop. Just like with previous pregnancy, at first I was in denial, "Early pregnancy is too fragile - I shouldn't get used to the idea of being pregnant." Well, now I'm past the first trimester and everything is going perfectly. Ultrasound was very successful and the fetus was even slightly bigger than expected. Some organs are functional already, brain looks like it should, the heart beat is regular and the fetus was moving around and seemed to be playing with the umbilical cord. Again only one fetus but I can live with that . Chromosomal aberration screening was also very nice. Everything they measured was diagnosed as "no increased risk and no need for additional tests." That's a relief.

So now I'm really pregnant. And I do mean REALLY. Judging by my size and shape alone, I'm about one month ahead compared to my previous pregnancy. I'm at week 14 and I look like I'm at week 18-20. Every time I pass a mirror, I stop in disbelief. I confirm it several times a day: no matter how much I pull in my tummy or adjust my posture, I still look very pregnant. Weight gain is a bit on the high end but it seems to have all gone on the front side.

The next phase after denial is again, "what does this change?". Okay, it was easier this time. I'm way less panicked. We already have a crib and baby clothing. We know how to hold a baby and how to change a diaper. Hopefully this baby will be as chill as Siiri was when she was still small. Now Siiri's anything but chill. She can get so excited about a game that she bounces up and down, shrieks like an eagle and giggles maniacally . I'm always torn whether to let her have her fun or to tell her to tone it down for the sake of the neighbors. Usually the spectacle is too cute to interrupt.

Siiri's vocabulary is amazing by the way. She is still very reluctant to form even the simplest sentences but she says all the separate words. When she looks at the night sky through her bedroom window, she sometimes says, "Star give-me" I reply that I can't give it to her, so she re-states my reasonings from earlier conversations, "Hot far-away big". She then takes her toy puppy, holds it upright by the window and points at the train tracks, "Puppy train watch standing. Train give-me. No. Big far-away cold." I do try to form simple sentences when I'm talking with her, just so she can observe how it's done. It seems to be helpful but sometimes it sounds really creepy like that crazy guy from Silence of the Lambs: "She puts the lotion in the basket". I say things like "Siiri is holding a hairbrush. Siiri put the brush on the floor. Siiri picked up a car. Siiri is playing with the car." It sounds even weirder in real life. I'd use "you are brushing/you are playing" but when Siiri points to herself, asking "this?", the correct answers include Siiri, girl or kid but she rarely accepts "you" as a valid answer. Hence creepy sentences are formed.

Back to topic, what does pregnancy change? It really depends on the person. I just do whatever. I have very few rules for myself. First, don't do anything uncomfortable. When Siiri feels too heavy to carry, I put her on the floor. She's already getting used to it. Second, no drugs (typo fixed from "do drugs" to "no drugs" ). No cough medicine, no preventive pain medication, no hard drugs, no flu shots. I don't even take unnecessary natural medication and I even avoid strong herbal teas. One of the greatest tragedies of modern science was when thalidomide was prescribed and recommended as sleeping pills for pregnant women. Over 10 000 babies were born with defects, which is 20-90% of the children whose mothers took thalidomide. Natural malaria medicine quinine also causes birth defects in sufficient doses and is sold as tonic water in supermarkets. It might be impossible to drink a dangerous amount of it but I'd better just avoid because I haven't seen any studies about constant consumption throughout the entire pregnancy.

Third, alcohol and tobacco must be greatly reduced. With tobacco it's easy since I don't smoke and normally no one dares to smoke near me because I'll ask for a cigarette just to annoy them. It's been years since I quit so I wouldn't smoke it even if they offered but it's still worth the effort to motivate them not to tempt me with cigarettes too often. Alcohol is more tricky. It was a planned pregnancy so I limited my alcohol consumption even before I knew I was pregnant. And still I don't see the science behind the no-alcohol rule. Actually, what I meant to say is, this rule is not scientific. It's so unsupported by science that I'd say it's chauvinistic. Light drinking (up to 6 drinks per week, never over 2 drinks in a day) has not been shown to have any adverse effects. This is the conclusion from literature reviews. There might still be a few badly conducted tests which can be taken out of context, otherwise it would be extra stupid why the reviews say, "no adverse side effects, but pregnant women still shouldn't drink any alcohol." Those jerks would probably include fermented sour milk kefir with up to 1% alcohol, a drink that is recommended by Estonian doctors for young babies. I've even read some doctors in England secretly prescribe wine to pregnant women who have a risk of miscarriage - alcohol relaxes the body and has no adverse side effects in small doses. I'm playing it safe enough. I don't worry about alcohol content below 0.5%, I drink as much kefir as I want and if the wine is excellent I'll have half a glass on a special occasion. This is quite in accordance with the ambiguous view presented in one pregnancy study-book that's distributed for free to all pregnant women in Estonia - seems Estonia might not have a strict no-alcohol rule during pregnancy.

And that's it with the rules. I eat sushi when I feel like it (I'd eat sushi every day if it wasn't so damn expensive ) , I eat salted raw salmon because it just feels right on my tongue, I eat smoked meat or fish when I like it, although I usually don't, I eat eggs with runny yolk because it makes eggs so much better. I just make sure the eggs are very fresh. I eat good quality soft cheese when I want. I don't peel all vegetables and fruits and I often eat uncooked salad. I eat a lot of things that some pregnant women wouldn't. My reason is weighted risk: my chances of getting hit by a car on my way to work are much greater than the chances of getting poisoned by fresh food. Being extra safe just isn't worth it most of the time. I didn't sand down all the corners in our apartment when Siiri was learning to walk and I won't give up sushi just because it would make things less than 0.01% safer. Stress over little things isn't healthy either.

So yeah. It's all the same issues as with previous pregnancy. Is alcohol really never safe? How dangerous is sushi really? And so on. For a while I felt so boring and repetitive even to myself. There's nothing original about going through the exact same thoughts twice. After long consideration, I actually felt glad about the repetition because it also means that I'm still the same person as I was before I had a kid. Sure, some of my traits are now enhanced and some are hidden but I'm still me.

Kitchen and Other Tips

2011-02-28T11:53:00.000-08:00

You know how every person has their own tips and tricks how to make life better or how to avoid some great problem or simply how to do things faster. In the last couple of years I've found out so many things that I decided to share them. Some of them make me wonder how it was possible to live so old without hearing about them.

First of all, vinegar is so cool. You and everyone else knows that vinegar dissolves lime scale, but did you know that vinegar also takes care of burnt food? I had a constant problem with burnt milk. I had to deal with it nearly every morning and sometimes it's so bad that the pot is covered with a thick black crust. There's no scratching through that. Finally I Google'd it and found out that vinegar helps. I cover the crust with vinegar, put the lid on to avoid the smell in the kitchen and I leave it for a few hours. After a while the black stone-hard crust has become spongy and soft and comes right off when I wash it. Sometimes I have to repeat the process but at least I don't have to spend an hour scrubbing.

Second, baking soda should be renamed "magic powder". Did you know that soda absorbs smell? Small cup of baking soda removes refrigerator smell in half an hour. When it doesn't help, throw out that 2-week old lasagna hidden in the back of the refrigerator. I've also tried putting half a lemon in the refrigerator... Don't try this at home. The refrigerator was just as smelly except for the pungent smell of lemon trying to hide everything else. It smelled like a bad taxi with too many scented trees. Eventually defrosting rescued us from the smell.

The next time you're cleaning your stove, try using baking soda as a scrubbing powder. I really dislike the smell of household chemicals so I tend to wash surfaces with only water. Baking soda doesn't smell at all and it just removes ancient dark areas from the stove like magic. It's really nice plus it's really cheap and it's even edible in small doses so it's perfect for use in the kitchen.

Weighing salt can make life easier and cooking less stressful. I hate guessing when I can just calculate and measure. When I boil water for pasta, there's no reason to either add a random amount of salt, sometimes too much sometimes too little, and ruin a meal. There's also no reason to add a little, then stir and wait, then taste, add a little more salt, stir and wait... It's much more simple to pour two liters of water in a pot, take a bowl and a regular kitchen scale and weigh 12 grams of salt (you might prefer 14 grams). Pour salt in water and forget about it. Weighing salt is even more convenient when you're adding it to something you can't taste - like a large chunk of raw meat. Eighteen to twenty grams per kilo is appropriate for most meat. If you're adding cheese or salted bacon, or if half of the meat is just bone, adjust the amount of salt accordingly.

It's very likely that there's cyanide in your table salt. It's used as an anticaking agent so the salt doesn't get lumpy with air humidity. Sure it's in the form of sodium ferrocyanide or potassium ferrocyanide which has been shown not to be hazardous to rats until the ingested long-term amount was 0.5% of dietary intake. In salt it can be up to 20 mg/kg, so if a person eats 1 kg of food per day, they can handle 5g of potassium ferrocyanide, which can be found in uhmm 250 kg of salt?! That can't be right. Okay, maybe E535 and E536 ferrocyanide salts aren't that bad. You'll die of sodium poisoning long before you even start feeling the minor long-term side effects of ferrocyanide salts.

But still, always read the food labels at least once to see what horrible additives they have put in your food. Avoid the following food colorings: E102, E104, E122, E123, E124, E128, E129, E131, E151, E154, E155 and E180. You might wonder, if they're bad, why aren't they disallowed. Well, almost all of these are forbidden in some country, mostly in USA. If it's too dangerous for people in the USA, known for their great health , are you sure you want to be eating it? Did I mention it causes hyper-activity in children? Siiri won't be tasting much of those. When I discover that a product I've bought is laced with those azo compounds, I throw it in the trash and I boycott the company in the future for trying to profit at the expense of my health. Also avoid E621 whenever possible. A study in China showed that people who use a lot of sodium glutamate (E621, MSG) are 3 times more likely to be overweight compared to people who use very small amounts of sodium glutamate. Have fun trying to avoid it since it's even in most spice mixes sold in the store, not to mention all meat products and much else.

Corn starch is NOT the same thing as corn flour. I kept using corn flour in stead of corn starch for way too long and I wondered why the texture is not very nice. Eventually Erkki got real corn starch from the store and it's quite a different story.

Avoid buying margarine. It tastes awful. Besides, don't choose a product that vaguely reminds you of real food (butter), it sends the wrong signal to food companies.

Don't blindly prefer Estonian food. Estonian companies have sold their souls and mix all sorts of foul additives in your food for easy money. They'll literally add 5 dangerous additives to save 5% of production costs. Some companies are excellent but those you have to find yourself.

Darn... It seems many of the "most important" stuff that I've found in the recent years has to do with food additives. I know most people don't even read the tiny labels and don't care what is in the food as long as it doesn't kill immediately. I guess I'm just obsessed with food but that won't surprise anyone.

One last tip - get a dishwasher if it's at all possible and if you don't own one already. It really is a life changing gadget.

I bet I'll remember all the other tips when I'm nearly asleep but I don't remember any others now so it'll have to be enough.

Bad Vote

2011-02-23T13:09:00.000-08:00

Brrrrr... I just got out of a cold shower. It wasn't voluntary - the damn boiler just can't handle Estonian winter and keeps running out of hot water. But now I'm ready to talk about politics, especially with the government election right around the corner. Electronic voting will begin tomorrow at 9:00 AM so I might as well make up my mind about whom to vote for.

Lets be honest; the choices suck. I keep hearing that there's no one to vote for and I agree with that opinion. Still I feel I need to give my vote to someone to be justified to bitch about government's bad judgement calls in the following 4 years. For a while I've been a supporter of Reform Party which is a centre-right, free market liberal party in Estonia (as Wikipedia phrases it). I'm all for liberalism and I love the idea of free market. They lowered taxes and made Estonia very lucrative for foreign investors. I think it's thanks to them that Estonia is currently in a much better situation compared to Latvia and Lithuania. Our economy looks nice, there have been wonderful advances towards electronically advanced country where we no longer have to fill in paper forms to be piled in some dusty basement, but in stead, everything is made available electronically and information travels faster and much more reliably. I think it's just so cool that Internet access is a basic human right in Estonia.

I kept voting for Reform Party because they are mainly concerned with advancing economy and money is the root of everything. They feel strongly about reducing costs in stead of taking loans. They even pulled Estonia through the global economic crisis without huge debts. I do love them in many ways, but - and this is an important BUT - I don't think I'm politically on the right side anymore!

Having a kid has changed my world views more than I ever imagined, although the change has been so subtle that I didn't realize it for a long time. A couple of years ago I was nearly a right-extremist if such a thing exists. I felt strongly about every man for himself. Some make it some don't. Some people didn't deserve to make it. I kept seeing people who failed at life and I saw many places where they had taken the wrong turn. No one pushed them toward it - they chose to not pay attention in school or to skip classes or take jobs with no perspective when they could have settled for temporary worse pay and a better future. I saw that homeless people were always drunk on cologne or cheap booze - no one poured it down their throats - and I saw how people ended up in dept because of loans they never could afford in the first place - loans they should have declined. All those people had made their choices and failed. I felt very strongly: Why should I care if they have no motivation to strive for a better live? I myself managed on student's loan (little over $1000 back then) for nearly an entire year (I didn't have to pay rent) and I felt proud that I can handle anything life throws at me. I didn't have any pity for people getting minimum wage (more than I had) and kept whining about government not giving them free money.

The change was subtle. When Siiri was very small I sometimes thought about mothers in third world countries and the high mortality rate of babies there. I thought about the poor little babies suffering from illnesses that are routinely cured here. Someone really should try to help them. How about all those 3-year olds crying because they are just so hungry and their parents don't have any food. It's very painful to even imagine it. Okay, that's where my level of empathy stayed for a while. I realized that other people's minds have been tormented by world hunger as long as people have known about it and this hasn't solved the problem. It doesn't help if I also think about it because it's not a problem that I could ever solve.

A while later I realized there are people in Estonia who are suffering from hunger as well. Although all children are entitled to free health care (Yay!), there is no law about making sure their parents can afford food. Lately many people have lost their jobs and food prices have gone up. Now all over the Internet, forums and news comments are describing the everyday lives of common Estonians. They barely have enough money to buy food but the rent is overdue and bills are piling up. They don't see Estonia being a wealthy country by any standards. Of course they've never lived in Indian slums. People are miserable and there's an increasing gap between the wealthy and the poor. Politicians have been focusing on economy so long that they have completely forgot that there are people here, too.

In 1991 Estonia started from the soviet union mindset, where people believed that the government has to provide people with job, apartment and everything they might need. From that time on, Estonia has been on a path towards free market and individual responsibility for one's own fate. Much like the American Dream - you either make it or you don't. Taxes are dropping and the prices of necessary things are going up. Already dental care is so expensive that cavity-free teeth are a luxury that most people simply can't afford. Waiting lists to see specialist doctors are extreme - with some problems you either wait for a year for the doctor to see you or you pay for a private visit. Essentially, even health care has been made into a luxury most people can't afford. This approach isn't working in the USA and I don't want Estonian health care to become anything like that. By the way, I'm very happy for USA for the discussion of the so-called ObamaCare health care reform.

So basically I think it's up to the country to make sure that free good quality health care should be provided to all working citizens or children. Poor people often end up doing the nastiest jobs that simply need to be done and the entire society should be responsible for patching up their various job-related illnesses. And when the poor lose their jobs and they have children then we can't tolerate letting the children starve. That's why we have a society, to make the most of our common potential. There is no greater potential than our next generation. I've heard that society is judged by how the weakest members are treated and I do agree that there is a line that should never be crossed - in a proper civilized country, all people should have the basic necessities. The luxuries are what we all should strive for.

I'm not so hard-core leftist that I would collect all money from all people and divide it equally. However, I do think that there should be no homeless people and no one should be left to starve or cool to death. I don't think poor people should have nice lives, Utopia doesn't exist. Poor people deserve to have crappier lives for the wrong choices they've made in life, but there is still an invisible line. If we let our societies weakest to live below certain standards then our own humanity and compassion suffers and we are worse people simply for letting people starve and not doing anything about it. Perhaps the solution would be to build more soup kitchens or better options for poor people to get free food for food stamps - perhaps only basic food items (flour, milk, bread, etc) so they still have motivation to improve their lives. For homeless people I'd even provide basic beds in some over-crowded old building, with toilets and showers. It doesn't have to look nice, I'd even say it shouldn't look very nice, it just has to serve a basic function. Or I don't know. It just feels wrong that there are homeless people in the -20 C weather that we've been having for a while now. It feels wrong that some people don't wash themselves for months because they have nowhere to wash themselves. It seems barbaric.

Another issue I never used to think about is kindergarten availability. By law, all children are entitled to get accepted in kindergarten before they go to school. Unfortunately, the waiting lists are so long that some kids don't get accepted until they're 5 or 6 years old! Officials say, "well, that is before school." But what is the mother supposed to do? Not everyone can afford personal babysitters and some women have no choice but to postpone going to work. No point in spending time away from your child when all your wages go to the nanny. The mother might as well babysit her own kid. Or should the father stay at home? For equal rights, definitely, but that's usually not the way it goes. The mother sits at home, doesn't contribute as a working citizen, doesn't get any income, can't afford to spend money. Maybe she'll even apply for subsistence allowance to stay alive and she'll become a burden to the society, while she would be happy to go to work, if only she could put her kid in a kindergarten. It's such a stupid problem. It's not cheap to fix but it's well worth whatever costs. The current situation encourages poverty in families with small children, it encourages some people to be forced out of job market for so long that they won't be able to get back and it encourages inequality between sexes.

This kindergarten problem has been a heavy burden ever since I realized that by the time Siiri finally gets into kindergarten, I'll be at home with a little baby. So if I put Siiri in a kindergarten, I take away some poor woman's chance to finally go back to work. It will be so selfish of me not to give Siiri's place to another family whose dinners might depend on it. Yet I feel it's not something I should feel responsible for. I have also waited for years to finally introduce Siiri to children her age. Kindergarten will be so important for her social development. It simply feels wrong to tell Siiri, at the age of four, that she has no friends because some other lady might be more desperate to put her child in kindergarten. No, I can't punish Siiri for the government's mistakes. I shall punish the government - I will not vote for Reform Party.

During their time in charge they have done very little for the people. Their most important accomplishment in this area is mother's wages. After childbirth, a woman gets paid her normal wages for 18 months. This enables working women to have children and it encourages birth, especially among people with high income, as the maximum monthly wage is over $2500. This means that only stupid people with no monetary thinking have children before they're well-established in their careers and near age 40. I'm one of the poor suckers who got the minimum mother's wage last time and I'll get the minimum this time as well. No one wants healthy young people to have healthy babies. Obviously they want middle-aged women having fertility treatment to be able to have even one baby. Mother's wages with such a high maximum has a positive effect on birth rates for a while but in the end it encourages wrong kind of family planning.

So all-in-all I will give my vote to... dun-dun-dunn... Social democratic Party. I can just hear how some people just hit their foreheads against their desk, so I'll explain. Yeah, they're socialist and they want to increase taxes to increase benefits to all. But they are promising to provide kindergarten places to everyone, plus they support free school lunch to all (now it's only for some age groups I think), they are concerned with life standards in the countryside, which has been too badly ignored. They want to increase child support three-fold to €60. I think all those are worthy goals and they make up for the progressive tax they are proposing. In their view, salary over €1000 per month should be taxed with 26% in stead of 20%. If that 6% from some people helps provide all children free lunch, then I think it's worth it. They had a whole set of very expensive and very lucrative election promises and all those are impossible to turn into a reality any time soon. However, I believe most of their goals are a step closer to what Estonian people need. I really hope they don't get majority of votes because they are too socialist, but I do want to see them breathing down Reform Party's neck to remind them that country doesn't consist of only economy - there's people too.

Okay, now I'm all warmed up after the cold shower and I feel much better now that I have decided who to vote for.

Broken Horse

2011-02-12T02:29:00.000-08:00

Theory confirmed - pregnancy cravings are a sign of bad diet! When I was pregnant with Siiri, I barely had any cravings. There was only my relentless appetite for oranges. I also had a very nice scheduled diet. In the morning I ate porridge and two fried eggs, at lunch I ate a full meal with lots of meat, a bit of carbohydrates (2-3 potatoes or a little pasta or rice), then a fruit in the afternoon, always roughly at the same time, and a then protein-heavy dinner with lots of delicious salad. I made sure I eat a lot of protein and very little carbs.

Now I eat all wrong. I often eat my morning porridge with jam or honey, I rarely eat eggs, my lunch is always different, but often without veggies. Even when I have my dinner, the meal which should probably contain around 40 g of pure protein to compensate for the rest of the day, I usually eat carbs covered with a sauce that has some small bits of meat in it and some hidden vegetables for Siiri's sake. Siiri has an extra meal of fruits and vegetables so she's better off than I am. Now I've started to dislike sweet things and foods with too much carbohydrates. Yesterday I sprinkled my porridge with cheese flakes in stead of jam. With my diet from hell, it's no wonder that I keep craving pizza, sushi and cheese.

Pizza is really quite healthy with a large variety of vegetables and with cheese full of good protein. The little bit of bread isn't any worse than pasta. Pizza's major problems are high fat percent and high sodium content. Well, at least fat doesn't play with blood sugar so it alone isn't really all that bad. Salt is another matter. Some say it's very bad for our health. But if it's so bad, how come I'm craving it so badly?! We have reduced the amount of salt we eat at home, mostly to avoid feeding Siiri too much salt. But the tiny amount we have reached apparently isn't enough for a growing fetus. Suddenly I add more salt to everything I eat. The last time me and Erkki ate sushi, I kept soaking the maki in soy sayce and commented that it must be diluted with water quite a bit, but Erkki said it's all in my head and the soy sauce feels very salty to him.

Yeah I eat sushi. Anyone who has a problem with a pregnant woman eating raw fish can just go and find out the odds of listeria. Some say that it's always best to choose the best for your baby and to avoid all risks but I think it's never good to blindly follow some paranoid rules that have been created "just in case". When we talk about risk and odds, consider that all pedestrian roads are covered with a thick crust of ice - slippery and uneven, sometimes tilted just for extra challenge. I'm not gonna stay indoors until spring to avoid the slippery roads where I could very easily fall and break a bone or two. The odds of me being one of the dozens of people EVERY DAY who visit hospital emergency room because of falling on the icy street are much greater than say, me being one of roughly 10 people in a YEAR who get listeria in Estonia. It's all about risk assessment.

I also still go to sauna, because Sunday sauna night has been such an important part of our weekly family ritual for a while now. There have been some changes though. In stead of 80-degree (Celsius) sauna, which is already quite low, we now go to 60-degree sauna. Any less than that and we risk catching a cold in there. I can't even wet my hair before I go in, the water won't have time to warm up and that's not comfortable at all. Also, I switched my cider to non-alcoholic. That is, after I found out I'm pregnant. No worries, I was very careful with alcohol already when I suspected I might be pregnant, including on new year's eve. I drank more water than alcoholic beverages. In some countries it's still recommended that women drink an occasional glass of red wine or a bottle of beer which is full of B-vitamins and I don't know of any studies showing that small amounts of alcohol really do any harm. I think it's okay to taste something with alcohol in it, but even a glass of wine seems quite a lot and it's best avoided during pregnancy.

There is one thing I maybe shouldn't have done - I stopped exercising when I thought I might be pregnant, which was an entire month before I actually was pregnant. I just felt really uncomfortable with the idea of heavy jumping and energetic kicking in all directions until I'm sweating and panting and then at the end of the song letting myself fall to the floor to catch my breath. That can't be good for a pregnancy. I think that's just tempting fate. I know exercise in moderation is okay, but me and moderation don't really get along that well, especially when pumped full of endorphins from the cool moves, great music and the best exercise coach.

I do miss exercising. I'm just starting to realize how much I need to exercise. I have gained weight, I spend much more time moping - for a while I thought I might be on my way toward depression, I avoid walking to work and back. The slippery ice is a good excuse for that, though, so it's easy to hide that I've simply gotten so very lazy. Some of the recent changes must be from pregnancy, but I remember pregnancy making me more positive rather than negative. Maybe it will get better over time. I'm already getting my appetite back and I feel much healthier than last week.

By now the title of this post must seem very odd. No I didn't mean that pregnant women are like broken horses if that's what you imagined! We have a borrowed rocking horse at home, which Siiri sometimes plays with. Yesterday she took hold of the handles and started rocking it gleefully. She didn't notice that every time she rocked it, the horse moved a bit further until one end got stuck under the radiator. The horse stopped rocking. Siiri tried another couple of times, then stated casually, "broken.". I was on the phone but I told her from further away, "Siiri, it's just stuck, it's not broken.". Siiri already walked away and laconically replied, "is.". That's almost like dialogue!

Siiri knows so many words already. I showed her pictures from her picture dictionary and I picked the kind of words she has never said. I'll translate the words: "Siiri, do you know what this is?" (elephant) - "E", "How about this?" (Owl) - "ow", "How about this one?" (butterfly) - "utty". Yeah sure, she was unable to say the full word, but it was obvious nearly every time that she knew what the word really was.

She also learned how to jump. It was the cutest thing ever to see her train for the first time. She squats really low, almost to the floor, then pushes herself up as high as possible and ends up on tiptoes, barely keeping her balance. Then she walks a couple of steps in a random direction swinging her arms, almost like athletes do when they're hyping themselves up before a big challenge, "I can do it, I can do it..." and then goes for another try. I don't know what motivated her but the first time I saw it she spent a whole lot of time trying. Eventually her legs were so tired she kept falling into a sitting position when she squatted. Now she's been practicing a bit more and she can jump an entire inch, sometimes even more. She's very excited about it and I'm very happy for her.

I'm Pregnant

2011-02-02T13:01:00.000-08:00

I haven't been quite honest with you. Or, more precisely, there's something I haven't told you - I'm pregnant. Currently it's barely less than 7 weeks and I know most people wait until they're walking around with a "basketball" under their shirt before they start hinting that they MIGHT be pregnant. That's so unlike me. Even the 3-week waiting time made me uneasy as if I have a big secret that I was really anxious to share. I had decided that I'll at least wait until after the doctor's appointment before I announce it on the Internet but after a while even that seemed exaggerated. I knew I couldn't be more pregnant with all the pregnancy symptoms and those three positive home tests. Yes, three! I had to be sure.

I don't know if it's a boy or a girl, I don't know if it's healthy or even viable. It's still so early in the pregnancy. However I do know that if something does go wrong, I don't want that to be my personal huge secret problem that no one even knows about.

If old wives tales mean anything then it's a boy. Mostly because I've been feeling my fair share of nausea this time around. With Siiri I had none of that. I'm also super tired all the time. It was only a couple of months ago when Erkki often came to remind me at 2 a.m. that it's getting kinda late and I hadn't even noticed. Now he often finds me asleep in front of Mass Effect (Xbox game) at 12 already and sometimes even earlier. I can't remember such exhaustion during my previous pregnancy, not even at 9 months pregnant.

Unfortunately this exhaustion isn't just physical. I'm having a really hard time focusing at work. It almost feels like I've had a concussion. Everything's in a blur and I just want to sleep. Mhh... Nausea is also one of the symptoms of concussion. At least I don't feel nauseous all the time. I feel a bit queasy in the first half of the day but quite okay after that. It's like that every day. When I pack my lunch in the morning I always think that I won't eat it and I wish I had something more appetizing to take with me, but during lunchtime I eat all of it and I'm sorry I didn't pack more food.

In the meanwhile, Siiri keeps getting wiser. She learns 2-3 new words in a day, although she can't remember all of them the next day. I also count the words that sound odd. Yesterday Siiri stepped in front of me and said, "Kaii". I asked, "käsi?" (Eng. hand) because she had her arms stretched out, but she seemed confused, and repeated, "Kaii!". I tried to figure out what she was pointing at: "Käsi? Lagi? Laud?(Eng. hand, ceiling, table) I'm sorry honey, I don't understand what you're trying to say." She gave up and started to walk away somewhat disappointed. Then I realized - she can't say the letter L and this was her version of "kalli" (Eng. hug). I quickly said, "hug! You were saying hug. Of course you can give me a hug!" and she stretched out her arms, ran back and gave me a hug. Adorable.

One time I was giving her a bubble bath. She sat there in the middle of a mountain of foam and toys and I was pouring water on her hair. Water level rose too high so I started to scoop out water and throwing it in the shower. Siiri panicked and tried to stop me, shouting "Whale! Whale!" (She says "aaaa" with specific intonation which stands for vaal, one of her favorite bath toys). I asked her, "Where is whale?". She sobbed and with a panicky look in her eyes pointed firmly toward the shower. I laughed and found her toy under the bath foam and gave it to her. After that she let me continue scooping water.

As time goes on Siiri's personality is more and more clear. She is a very daring person - she likes to try things that slightly scare her. She doesn't like being too close to Roomba when it's working but Siiri sometimes confronts her fear and hurries past Roomba simply for the challenge. She's also very careful. She rarely does anything dangerous after we've warned her of the dangers. She likes order. She sometimes insists that her letter cards would be put neatly in a symmetrical pattern. She's quite social and straightforward but that might just be age-related. She still doesn't feel comfortable around other children but I haven't had time to do much about it yet. I think she'll also somewhat grow out of it so I don't want to push her too hard. I can see Siiri as someone who stands up for her rights at any moment but only if she gets used to children her age.

We have raised Siiri to be independent and now it's becoming a blessing and a curse. It's not a problem for her to spend some time playing on her own. Yesterday I accidentally fell asleep for 2 hours and Siiri was just playing with her toys, rearranging the laundry basket in the living room, watching cartoons from youtube and doing whatever and seemed quite happy with her own time. But it's a curse because she doesn't want to be told what she should do. I don't like it when she spends much time watching cartoons, but sometimes she outright insists, "Paa! Siia." (iPad, here). I do understand that when something is important then no means no, but I'm not even sure it's such an important thing to forbid. It's almost like taking away her Legos because I want her to play spend time drawing in stead. I think the issue is not worth much drama and tears so I just distract her and offer an alternative activity. Still I kind of like that she has strong will even in issues that make my life more difficult. Strong-willed is always better than an obedient tag-along. She'll have much greater chance at success and happiness if we manage to raise her to be caring and respectful towards other people.

If the second kid is anything similar to Siiri, I'll consider myself a very lucky person.

Technological Standards

2011-01-18T12:38:00.000-08:00

Over the years I have realized that I am a person with very high standards in some areas. I'm a bit of a perfectionist - I want things to be absolutely flawless. Or at least theoretically. Practically it takes so long to get some things perfect that I end up ignoring everything else. I can forget myself making the perfect Excel sheet but I forget to tidy up the desk or to ask myself if I even need the Excel sheet to be that complex. I can't name too many things that are more enjoyable than really obsessing about something that I have control over and then making it as perfect as I can. This need for perfection makes it very hard for me to appreciate modern technology.

It's been said that technology is as advanced as it can get. Anyone with any kind of mental capability knows that's rubbish. Technology is just getting started. My perfectionism will not be satisfied until:

1) All files could be connected from any device to any device and would be supported by every modern operating system/program. Don't you ever get annoyed when the computer plays an "avi" file and then Xbox can't open it and home cinema system can't even find it? Yes, the home cinema system is connected to the local network and ought to be MADE especially for playing video files. And getting the subtitles working is a nightmare in any setting. I know only one player that doesn't have a problem with subtitle files and that's some ugly piece of freeware called VLC-player. (By the way, it's the best video player out there! ). Windows Media Player is simply horrible and can barely open any video files, not even the ones downloaded from my photo camera.

If I ever get my way, there will be STANDARDS for what can be called a video player. The first requirement would be that it plays any modern video file without needing any extra codecs installed manually. It can open any subtitle file and subtitle size and style can be changed in less than 15 seconds. It can stream video into anywhere, even through local network into the TV. I mean, if both TV and computer are connected, what's the hold-up? It's rather mind-boggling that I even have to name these things here. Technology is very far behind on its potential.

2) All devices with a hard drive or anything similar can be connected to any other appropriate device and used as an instant flash drive. I am very disappointed that most devices can't even recognize a perfectly normal average portable hard drive. Most devices can't even recognize most flash drives! Like OH MY GOD how lame. I don't know whom to blame - the companies that make bad flash drives, or the operating systems that are horrible at finding hardware.

If I had it my way, I could take my phone or my camera, connect it straight to any TV and show what clip I filmed earlier. This should also work with any tablet or anything with a screen.

3) Technology should be smaller, faster and better! People say that technology is getting smaller but I say, not fast enough! It's nice that phones don't take so much pocket space anymore, or when they do, it's because of a good big touch screen. Touch screens are something I really approve. However, laptops are HUGE and so heavy. Do they really need to be that heavy? I'd gladly own a laptop, but then I'd want the store to provide someone to carry it around for me. It's not that I couldn't do it - I just really don't want to. Besides, backpacks are almost never cute or feminine, at least not the kind of backpacks that could fit one of those monstrous laptops. Laptop bags are normally one-shoulder bags and with the heavy laptop in it such a bag would simply murder my back.

I've seen the tiny laptops but who would want one of those - the screen and the keyboard are tiny too. Their batteries have too short lives and their processing power is way less than what I'd need. As for laptop batteries in general, I think it's quite ridiculous that laptops overheat fast and quickly run out of battery. I think cooling the processor must also take a lot of energy, so that too is being wasted. Can't they really find a way to lock up that heat energy? Why does it have to be wasted? Well, maybe that's impossible or so impractical that it's pointless but either way that's something that technology fails at.

I'm not even sure what would solve the problem of technology needing to be small but screen and keyboard needing to be big. Perhaps it will be some sort of touch screen that can be folded for transport or maybe it will be hologram technology that will eventually save the day.

4) Programs should actually work! I am disappointed at any program that crashes, freezes or works too slow. Large programs take more and more processing power when new versions are released. It would be okay if it were justified and all that processing power went to good use, but how come there are always freeware programs that do the same thing with much less resources. Lets give credit when it's due - Adobe programs are the best things ever. I'm a true fan. Photoshop, Acrobat Pro, Illustrator, Dreamweaver - there is no alternative! But do they really have to use up so much computer resources? I don't feel it anymore but when I had a slower computer it took forever just to start the program. Newer versions took even longer to start and offered little benefit aside from a prettier design. I bet most such companies build their new program versions on top of the last one and there's always some useless code left over.

A whole other standard is Windows Media Center. I gladly use Windows programs like Internet Explorer, Windows office, Windows 7 or XP so that I don't have to use Firefox or Open Office. I'm glad those exist - a little competition never hurts in this business. Windows Media Center, however is a horrible failure. It takes forever to start the program and then it doesn't play most files (if it can even find them) and doesn't like subtitles.

Also, Internet Explorer 9... I know I installed the beta version and I was warned that it will have bugs in it, just like any beta version. I expected them to periodically provide updates that would patch bugs until the program is good enough to be sold. The reality is, that I installed it nearly a year ago and am currently writing this post from Google Chrome because IE9 doesn't work well with Blogger.

Don't even get me started on how buggy Oblivion is on Xbox. The entire Thieve's Guild quest line the pointer was always pointing at the wrong guy, game froze unexpectedly, quests didn't update when they should have... I would forgive such problems for a new game that is so big but Oblivion was released in 2006 and fans have found, documented and FIXED all the major bugs. Unofficial patch for PC is available for free download. Couldn't the makers of Oblivion just download it and release something for Xbox as well?

5) Fast Wireless connection should be available everywhere for anyone who has a contract. In proper terms, G4 should be as widespread as good quality mobile network and shouldn't cost much more than that.

So, did I convince you that technology is very far from being advanced?

I was so excited about CES 2011, the big technology conference in the beginning of January but in the end I still haven't found a tablet that I approve or a new piece of technology that will give me hope for the future of technology in general. All the companies are still doing their own little things, making hardware and software that is incompatible with anything else and thus they are working against perfect technology. Maybe things will be better in 10 years... or 100 years...

Happy Hands

2010-12-30T13:50:00.000-08:00

I wanted to tell you guys about something that happened today. I'm currently taking it easy and resting from the busy times. Conveniently now it's also Erkki's vacation so it's an excellent time to spend some family time. Siiri hasn't even seen her babysitter for a week and she absolutely loves spending time with her parents. Suddenly she's so attached to both me and Erkki. When she wakes up and Erkki goes to pick her up, she asks for mommy. When I go there, she asks for daddy. She shows me hew primitive drawings and she even lets me fix her hair. She also loves playing with my hair or combing it or just patting my head.

So it wasn't very surprising today when Siiri walked up to me and rubbed the tips of my hair between her hands. I was playing with Xbox and Siiri was running from one room to another. The rooms are as baby-safe as necessary with Siiri. There are places where she could harm herself if she got creative, and trust me, kids are very creative in that respect. However, she rarely ever harms herself in our home. When she does, it's mostly just by accident and it's things that could have been avoided if we kept Siiri safe in a locked padded room with no tables to hit her head and no corners to run into. Well, me and Erkki sure have a LONG-LOOONG way to go toward keeping Siiri "safe". I mean, we actually let her open and close drawers by herself and we have not taped up any cupboards. Heavy DANGEROUS books are at hands reach, and since we didn't have any bright ideas where else to keep our cutlery, Siiri also has access to table knives (which are sharper than some people's "real" knives). Well, if Siiri tried any funny business, we'd have it differently, but Siiri's just too bright to be kept locked in a padded room. She reaches cutlery easily and takes out spoons and sometimes forks to "feed" her dolls and stuffed animals. She never takes the knives. The first time she opened that drawer I explained why knives are bad. Now sometimes she very carefully touches a knife and says with a serious expression, "OW!" .

She's also super-fast. When I try to tell her, "Hey, Siiri, it's bedtime. It's time to put on your night clothing." and I reach the word, "beeedd...." PAT-PAT-PAT-PAT-pat-pat, and she's already in the other end of the apartment. I wait one second, she runs back to a safe viewing distance. I finish my word "..bedtime", she laughs maniacally (in a cute kid way) and off she goes to the other end of the apartment. She usually does this 4 or 5 times before she's in her night clothing. Unless I put her in chains, there's no way I can keep her from doing what kids normally do - run around and have fun doing it. This gives a whole new perspective to the typical slogan, "you have to keep an eye on your toddler AT ALL TIMES". I think that's just what childless people say. Of course I keep her close when we're outside and I keep household chemicals as far from her as possible because she can't read labels and can't sense the dangers involved but looking at her at all times is just ridiculous. At home, I let her run free until I get suspicious that she might be up to something. I'm talking about minutes here and I check on her immediately when she gets too quiet.

I'm getting awfully side-tracked, like I always do when I'm telling a story. But that all stuff was necessary to create the setting.

I was playing with Xbox and Siiri was free-roaming around the apartment. She drew a little bit, then took a toy from one room to another, then took a quick look if I've added anything fun to any of my drawers, closing them with a slam. All familiar sounds. Next she went to the master bedroom - the safest room in our apartment - and spent some time there. Then she came and rubbed and patted my hair. Then she ran off again. Cute! I kept playing and a moment later she was back. Again she came and rubbed her hands in my hair with great care, patted me and left. Mhh? I tried to make some dialog but she was too busy to notice. Then she did the same a third and a fourth time and ran back to the master bedroom. This time I put down the Xbox remote and followed her. She ran through the door straight to the closet. But in stead of playing with the clothes in the closet, she headed straight for the 2-inch/5cm crack between the closet and the wall. It's full of spider webs and dust. I never clean it because I'm arachnophobic and I won't even go near those spider webs. Siiri's not arachnophobic. She squeezed her hand into the dusty dirty crack, ("Siiri, no don't!") pulled it out and then rubbed her hands together to clean away all that dust. It wasn't very effective so she came to me and signaled me to get closer so she could reach my hair so she could rub her hands clean of all that dust and spiderwebs.

I should have known. Just a few weeks ago Siiri was eating (more like warming it up) some cheese and just wasn't happy with how greasy her hands felt. I gave her a paper towel. She rubbed her hands in it, put it aside and carefully looked at her hands. Then suddenly she demanded that I sit next to her RIGHT NOW. It seemed an odd request but I couldn't really ask her for any explanation so I sat with great curiosity. Siiri stepped up to me and patted me firmly from the top of the head to my shoulders, "Paaaaat!" (Estonian "Paaaaaai!", or "Aiiii" as she says it). Then she took another look at her hands, smiled, and hurried back to her toys.

Something I wanted to show you... Some of you will think, What the heck? and some of you will nod with understanding. Here's my Oblivion character:

Have a happy New Year's celebration and a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Different Holidays

2010-12-26T01:28:00.000-08:00

I don't think I've ever had a Christmas season like this before. I spent time in the lab during some weekend days, including the third advent Sunday. I had experiments, a verbal exam, text editing, graph touch-ups. I gave a scientific presentation in front of 50 something people, which I totally botched because my presentation was the last of the entire conference and I had built up so much tension that I couldn't even think straight anymore. My advisor later said not to worry about it, although "the people here will be paying you salary one day." Geee, thanks. Eventually I turned in a really long essay on the 21st and I could finally not worry about stuff. Until the 25th when I just had to go to the lab to save my plants from horrible torturous death by drought.

I wish all problems could be solved with watering. My computer, however, really wishes I don't try this in practice. Recently my monitor died. It started flickering and turned itself off a couple of times. Until one time it didn't turn on anymore. Me and Erkki had matching monitors before and now we got new matching monitors. That's when things really got weird. Erkki's monitor works like a charm but my monitor likes to surprise me with special effects. There I am just browsing and minding my own business when my monitor suddenly produces a mysterious light blue shadow. It appears to the right of every line of text, every dark area of a menu. It appears in the browser, in the image processing software, on the desktop and even on the start menu. It's everywhere! Then I open another browser window and it disappears, then I open a new tab it's there again. Then I open a third tab and suddenly the new tab looks clear but the rest of the screen still looks weird. I didn't even know this sort of problems were possible. I have tried uninstalling and re-installing video card drivers and I tried some sort of ATI tweaking tool. Now it's not as bad as before but the image is still corrupt whenever it feels like it.

Speaking of corrupt, one very influential Estonian politician Edgar Savisaar got caught asking money (1.5 million euros) from Russian Railways President Vladimir Yakunin. Savisaar is the kind of man that has no morals and who is as undemocratic as his power allows him. As the mayor of Estonia's capital Tallinn he uses city funding to publish his own propaganda newspaper and a TV channel. Not only is it dishonest to the taxpayer, but it's also totally creepy that he's getting away with it. Estonia's counterintelligence declassified their findings of secret fundings and now he's in a big scandal which might just be the end of his career. I'm afraid he'll just buy his way out with money, favors and outright lies (e.g. he announced he was working WITH Estonia's counterintelligence all along). Whatever happens in the future, Savisaar is certainly in a pickle now and this is one guy who's misfortune gives me much joy. Actually it's not even misfortune since he was the one who was going to sell out his power in Estonia out of his own free will. It's karma!

Good karma, bad karma. For Estonians and also for me, that's just a saying. People rarely believe in resurrection. We mostly believe that people collect their karma dept during their lifetime. Bad things happen to bad people and good things happen to... well, Estonians believe that good things only happen to BAD people. Anyone with any sort of financial comfort is a "crook, liar and a thief". So I suppose everyone in Estonia are bad people. That doesn't sound quite right. Nearly everyone I know are such good people...

Karma is nice though. I think I could easily be a Buddhist if they weren't such pacifists. And if they didn't meditate so much and if they didn't worship Buddha statues and if they didn't believe that rocks have souls and if they ate MEAT! Or perhaps I could be a Hindu - everything is allowed there if you find the right religious group. Except, again, I don't really believe in universal resurrection and that's not so negotiable. This religion thing really is tough. A few days ago I went to the bookstore to buy a good theory book about Spiritualism. You know what I found out? Surprise-surprise: Spiritualism is the religion of the Dumb. Spiritualism books are mostly in large print. They contain "wisdom" not much worse from TV-shop commercials for energizing bracelets. There was a book about haunted places - probably all just hoax and publicity for "haunted hotels". There were books about reading minds (along with instructions), reading palms, interpreting tarot cards, doing white magic, black magic, dowsing, etc. Even the most promising books about the spirit world ended up containing stupid self-help sort of advice for a cleaner spirit and quick tips to unleash your supernatural side.

That's not my kind of Spiritualism. My beliefs are pretty basic - there's a higher intelligence God, but it's not the sort of authority figure that in most religions. I mean, if God has ultimate power and ultimate wisdom, why would he micromanage everything people do. He already knows if those people are going to do the right thing and what would have to happen so that the right choices are guaranteed. The sort of micromanaging that organized religions enforce kind of defeat the purpose of free will. I also think people have souls and I think those souls persist even after the person dies. I don't know how long they persist, perhaps just a few hours before they become part of something else. I think there's a shared unconscious level where people communicate without words and I think it's even in places with no other people. That would explain why people get a vibe from other people as well as different places and also why people sometimes just know when they are being watched.

But maybe human mind is simply designed to imagine that there is something or someone out there that people can't explain. Someone who decides who's living a good life and who isn't, or who's naughty or nice. Someone who is all-knowing and remembers all the people individually. That sounds so familiar... Someone who is everywhere at the same time... Mhh... SANTA is god!!!!!! Someone should build the Church of Santa. Or is that what malls are for?

Candy in the Slipper

2010-12-10T14:57:00.000-08:00

It's Christmas time and it is the time of glorious lies that parents tell their children. "Be a good kid and Santa will bring you nice gifts!". Not many parents really write down what their child does or doesn't do within an entire month. They mostly just use Santa as a tool of manipulation and then buy their children whatever presents they were going to buy anyway.

The same goes for elves - I mean Santa's Little Helpers, not Legolas and Arwen. In Estonia elves put candy in the slippers or stockings of good kids every night. In the morning children get up to go and see if they had been good kids. This is easier for the parents because they only need to judge behavior one day at a time.

Elves visit even Siiri's slipper. Every morning she finds one candy there. The first morning I was getting all enthusiastic, "Siiri-Siiri! Go see if elves brought you anything!". Siiri saw me pointing at the slipper but walked the other way. I followed her and took her back to the slipper. "What's inside here?". Siiri looked at me, looked at the slipper, felt that it really did have something inside and then got bored and walked the other way. Now the elves have consistently visited her slipper for over a week. Today, in the quiet haze of morning, I asked Siiri, "Siiri, go see if elves brought you anything." I had barely finished my question when Siiri ran to the slipper, pulled out the candy and started laughing maniacally as if she just struck gold. And -really cute- she took the candy, her most prized possession at that moment, and without hesitation handed it over to me so I could open it up and cut it into smaller pieces for her. So even if she does behave somewhat mischievously one day, how could I really have her find the slipper empty the following morning. She would be so sad and confused with her empty slipper. Conclusion: elves don't inspire cute kids to behave well.

I had another one of those religion themed seminars and at some point the lecturer said something like, "it is very hard for us Christians to find sense in some of the controversies in the Bible". I had two automatic thoughts about it. First, "it is very hard for you Christians indeed" and second, "well, if something proves time and time again to be full of controversies, then perhaps it's time to realize it's false.". I didn't comment anything about it but it seemed like a step forward. I did not feel any inner hesitation whispering that I belong with them. I have gotten used to the idea of not being a Christian. And I still believe in God, just not in church or the Bible.

By the way, you know you have spent too much time in a lab when 50 uL (that's an entire drop! )suddenly seems like a large amount of liquid. Or when, in the evening, you think about playing Oblivion but it seems too much strain on your hands after all that pipetting. I am still playing Oblivion. It's an old classic open world role-playing computer game that was adapted for Xbox. The game is kinda boring and tediously slow-paced, and leveling mechanism is a disaster. It is actually possible to level up into being much weaker than all the monsters. But there is a system: if you level up in the exact right way every time then it's possible to create a powerful Jack of all trades - master swordsman, master mage, master thief, master assassin - THE MASTER OF EVERYTHING in a stupid boring game.

When I heard how much effort some people go through to level up in this game, I thought it was totally pointless and I simply laughed at them. I myself started playing Oblivion only to get Xbox Achievement points and to pass some time. Pretty soon my game went very sour - my character was so weak and I started to understand the mechanism behind building an overpowered badass. I could not resist! I made a new character and I planned it right from the beginning. Now I'm over level 30 and I have 4 attributes maxed out. I constantly fall asleep while playing it and I'm not even all that interested in playing the game. I just want my character to be all-powerful. Soon (in Oblivion time) I will have 100 in all the attributes and then I will go get the achievements.

I'm gonna leave you with this:

iBad or iGood

2010-11-25T13:55:00.000-08:00

I have some issues with my mp3-player. I had considered getting an mp3 player for years but never really managed to buy one. I spend a lot of time walking around humming a song in my head and sometimes it's not even any song that I like so I might as well really listen to music. Well, recently an mp3 player was "left over" so it was given to me. It's so big it doesn't fit into a pocket, almost no computer recognizes it so songs can't be added, and it has a playlist function where songs can't be rearranged, deleted or added. If you didn't already guess, I'm talking about my iPod Touch.

It looks good, and it can be used as an instant Google device but it's without 3G so it only works in wireless Internet areas. The issues I have with iPod are so big that they almost make it worthy of a dumpster if it wasn't so expensive. First of all, what annoys me the most is that it has nearly zero connectivity to any other device. It has plenty of space on it but it can't be used as a memory stick because no computer recognizes it. Imagine an mp3 player which doesn't allow songs to be added... Okay, for the sake of fairness, it connects to Erkki's computer but even there it can take an hour or more to simply upload one song, and the procedure is so complicated that I've only managed to do it once (actually I watched and pointed at a folder and Erkki did all the impossible technical stuff). There's also Dropbox program but I'm still testing if it's useful to me. Theoretically iTunes is supposed to be used for adding songs to this impossibly annoying but pretty device but Apple is like a stupid American hippie, "Ummm... Estooonia... is that a country?" so iTunes doesn't work here.

Another problem are the playlists. With this much processing power, I'd expect iPod to have a really good program for listening to songs but it doesn't even come close to the ancient lightweight freeware Winamp. For one, iPod has nonfunctional playlists function, which is the only reason to make an mp3 player that big in the first place. I have very humble expectations for this level of technology - I would like to create new playlists, add songs, put songs in specific order, see information about the songs, remove songs or even delete completely, make another playlist, and perhaps I'd also like to easily make a third playlist that includes songs from the first two playlists. That's not much to ask for, is it? But noooooooo... The technological wonder allows me to make one on-the-go playlist and for that I have to add all songs manually while not being able to hear the songs I'm adding, then I get to delete the songs I don't like - one by one. I would MAYBE do it if I could have several playlists for different kinds of music, but currently I just listen to all my songs in random order and cringe and reach for iPod every time I get one of the children's songs I added for Siiri's sake. Theoretically I could "sync" it to Erkki's computer and then figure out how to make proper Apple playlists there but I'm really reluctant to make so much effort for something that ought to take a few minutes with working software. There must be an Application for this, why didn't I think of it sooner?

Anyway, I have a love-hate relationship with my iPod. I love it when I need to kill some time in a place with decent wireless network and I've realized I love listening to songs while I walk, but I have learned to hate some fundamental things about Apple's approach.

And that is why I have truly mixed feelings about the coolest popular gadget in human history - iPad. At last there is a simple device for reading electronic books, surfing the net, watching video clips, listening to music, playing games and it has a touch screen. How cool is that! It looks good, it works well and it's the best buy we've had in the last years. The last time any piece of technology changed our lives so much was when we upgraded from an old flickering CRT television to a 37' widescreen HD-ready LCD. I feel warm and fuzzy just thinking about the first couple of weeks. With iPad the change came more slowly - as we constantly find new uses for it, the demand for it increases. It rarely sits idly and even Siiri is very proficient at using it, especially for being an illiterate 1,5 year old. She can turn it on, open and close applications, put on music, select songs, change volume, finger paint, find images, scroll and zoom images and apparently delete Erkki's entire eBook collection. Fortunately Erkki had all the books backed up but it did take some time to restore them to iPad.

In the evenings me and Erkki read our seperate books. Erkki reads from iPad and I read whatever I can get my hands on, but sometimes I'd like to read a computer document and then we have too few iPads. It would also be very convenient to be able to claim a tablet computer as my very own and use it during lectures. I couldn't let other people casually play around with it if I have important files there so it would be best to claim it as a personal tool. It could also be useful for viewing my work-related Excel charts and showing them the my supervisor without printing anything out. Erkki himself has said that we need another iPad and he is right, but (and it's a HUGE "but") I'm not willing to give any more money to a company with such control issues. It's none of Apple's damn business which computer I connect MY gadget to. I won't buy a pretty toy which doesn't even have a file browser. Maybe I'm old-fashioned when it comes to file management but removing access to files in iPad and iPod has effectively reduced their usefulness by 50% in my opinion. I always thought Apple is user-friendly but after the first hour of getting used to the system, PC beats Apple gadgets in usability.

Now I'm eagerly looking for iPad alternatives and I've read several news articles of developments in that area. There is one that I'm really looking forward to: Notion Ink Adam Tablet PC. It's coming out in December and I'm so excited about it. Its screen is slightly bigger with better resolution compared to iPad, it is claimed to have BETTER battery life (up to 2x-3x longer), it's thinner, with touch screen and it has 3 USB ports!!! It even has a file manager... There must be some catch, aside from not running on Windows 7, and I want to know what it is. I won't buy it until I've read some decent user reviews how it performs in everyday use.

Anyone planning to buy an iPad - go ahead, it really is an extraordinary device.

Decision Made

2010-11-15T05:07:00.000-08:00

Regarding my chance to go to Spain (see previous post), I've reached a decision. I'm not going. I kept making up new reasons why I should or should not go. I had several concerns. I was afraid I might pass up on a wonderful opportunity because of fear that I could end up homesick in a foreign country. I was afraid that Siiri will stop trusting me - currently she gladly waves goodbye when I leave home because she trusts that I will come back at the end of the day. If I go away for a month I could shatter that trust and not regain it for a long time, or never. I was afraid such travels will get increasingly difficult to organize if I have more children and then I'll regret it later. I felt guilty that so many people would have to make extra effort for my sake because I'm not around to decide Siiri's food, bathing, clothing, etc. Erkki wouldn't be able to have an active social life if he has to get someone to keep an eye on Siiri every time. Currently we mostly take turns for late night events.

I kept jumping for one reason to another while none of them were convincing enough to make a decision based on that. Then I thought, what if it was reversed? What if Erkki came home one day and said, "I have a job opportunity to spend a month in Spain. I would learn new things, but if I don't go, then I will be able to learn them later from whoever goes in stead. My career doesn't depend on it. It would make little difference on my CV. I don't have to go... but... It would be fun! Sure you'll have to take care of Siiri, and I'll THINK of you guys. But imagine, I could have my lunch under a palm tree, I could party with people I don't even know yet, I could spend time in Spain surrounded by warm and friendly people. I bet I would have a great time!". I thought about it and I was immediately convinced I would consider him selfish if he proposed something like this. I thought, what do you mean you want to spend a month apart? And I'd do all the hard work while you're enjoying yourself? I couldn't realistically imagine him asking something so selfish from me. I realized he would probably have said no without even considering it for more than a few minutes. He might have thought, "I can't do that to Kristiina. It's not fair.". And that's when I decided it would be fun to go, but it would be unfair to Erkki and Siiri and even to the nanny and Siiri's grandparents for expecting then to make extra effort while I'm in sunny Spain.

Actually if Erkki had a chance like this, I wouldn't tell him not to go because all of us have only one life and chances like this shouldn't be passed for little reason.

I'm sure I'll have many chances to regret it but there is one thing to remember: I travel a lot. While many people only go abroad a couple of times during their life, I've been to England, Denmark, Germany, Finland, Egypt and USA in the last few years and during my entire life, I've visited almost all European countries, plus USA and Egypt. There is no way that I will suddenly stop traveling and I shouldn't feel sad that I missed one trip. Perhaps I'll go to Spain in 10 years with Siiri and I'll even visit the countryside instead of living in a big city for a whole month without a car or a driver's licence.

Tough Decision

2010-11-12T14:34:00.000-08:00

Today my boss came to my desk and asked enthusiastically, "Would you like to go to Spain?". My first thought - WOOOHOOOOOO!!!! WIN! It's a scientific project to study a method and to do experiments. Certainly no easy task and it can't really be done in a hurry. Now here's the catch: it would last a month.

What's a month, really? It's just 30 days of blogging daily and having as much fun as possible so that I have something to blog about. That really is a good way to make sure I spend every day to it's fullest. I learned that when I went to San Diego two years ago for 6 weeks just before Christmas ( my San Diego travelogue); I barely made it back for Christmas Eve. It was just so cool. It was the best trip I've ever had and it was an experience that I remember very fondly. San Diego is an amazing place and I've never seen another place like it. Most similar is Los Angeles which I also visited when I was staying in San Diego.

Erkki will be okay, I'm sure. He'd have both xBox and iPad all to himself. He'd miss me and I'd miss him but one month just comes and goes. I have his support, either I decide to go or not, even though I'm sure he's really hoping that I stay.

But it's Spain! S P A I N! It's not like my supervisor is trying to send me to Lapland in the middle of winter. I'd be going to a warm place with palm trees.

I got the suggestion today (Friday) and I have to decide by Monday. I was quite confused with all my options and pluses and minuses and then I arrived home after being away for 8 hours. As I unlocked the door with my keys, I already heard a gleeful shriek from the apartment. I opened the door and Siiri was running towards me, her smile as wide as her face. She had abandoned all her toys the moment she heard me unlocking the door. I greeted her with hugs and felt sorrow.

Now I just don't know. I have a couple more days to decide. I'm sure I could work out the technicalities so that someone takes care of Siiri. It actually made me feel good about my importance when I realized that it would require a lot of extra effort from 4 people if I decide to go. Sadly, none of those people will replace "mommy" for Siiri. One moment I'm thinking, "I shouldn't go! Think how sad Siiri would otherwise be!" and an hour later I think "Of course I should go! If I have more children, such travels will be even harder if I have more sad children at home waiting for me.". I'm just bouncing between my options.

Of course I would miss Siiri and Erkki both. I'd talk with them on web cam as if everything is peachy and then go to sleep feeling very lonely and sad. But I'd also see wonderful new things, I'd meet new people, I'd experience completely new things. It would be an experience that makes my life more real, and myself more alive in it. It's a chance that I shouldn't pass up. My head is about to explode. ...I'll let you know what I decide.

I tried to finish up some important things in the lab but everything got tangled again and it still needs more work. I've been feeling spectacularly demotivated by it. I even took a couple of days off to spend with Siiri and found that we're both happier if I also work. I don't think the positive effect would be greater if I stay away for a whole month in stead of 8 hours.

Teaching Social Skills

2010-10-20T11:40:00.000-07:00

I was talking with the father of three wonderful children, and I boasted how Siiri can recognize all the letters of the alphabet! Really! At 1 year and 5 months she immediately points to the correct capital letter when I ask her, "where is E?". She only mixes up letters when she's distracted by something and that doesn't happen often - she is occasionally more focused than I am. She is absolutely unnaturally focused for a kid her age. I would be worried if she sometimes didn't have completely excited and playful moods as well.

So I told about Siiri's wonderful skill to that father and he got quiet. He contemplated whether to say anything about it but then told me in a slightly concerned way that it is not necessary to educate children so much. He is actually right. Lately there has been much talk about Lost Childhood - children are no longer allowed to simply behave like children. They are constantly prepared for something, whether it's kindergarten, school, or university. Some Estonian children who go to kindergarten have already been tutored in English language to give them an advantage in life. Their parents are so eager to make them into something that they never allow them to simply be kids. He casually added that preschool children gain more from education of character (e.g. role-playing) than from the kind of education that school is meant for. I quickly reassured him that Siiri is genuinely interested in such knowledge and no wrong has been done. Learning the letters was simply a logical next step to learning different animals from books. Siiri pointed at things, whether dogs or cats or different letters, and grown-ups told her what she was pointing at, and later asked her to point to the correct picture, giving her an opportunity to show off her new knowledge. But it still got me thinking that role-playing is a wonderful idea. The following day I went to the store and bought a couple of glove puppets - Hedgehog and Monkey.

For most of my closest friends, when I say role-playing, they think: GOBLINS , magical armor, DRAGONS, priests kicking ass and vanquishing evil, damsels in distress, LOOT! For children less than three years old, it's something quite different. There's puppets and dolls, make-belief scenarios being played out and later Spiderman costumes and pretending a mere twig found from under a tree is a lazer gun. I haven't done much puppet theatre to Siiri but recently she has started to show readiness for such games. Namely she often offers snacks to her dolls and stuffed animals. One time she took a small toy cow and dipped it head-first into a bowl of snacks and made content sounds as if the cow was enjoying the meal. Another time she took the hand of a Barbie-like doll, submerged it into a bowl of snacks and pulled it out with a snack between her finger and doll's hand, or in this context, with the doll holding the snack and then feeding it to Siiri.

Role-playing for children can be quite educative because it can give them experiences that they hadn't yet gotten from real life. Lately I've been especially concerned with Siiri's paralyzing fear of other young children, perhaps because of some earlier experiences with loud children running and screaming like lunatics (something Siiri sometimes does herself ). So I got a wonderful idea . I should role-play positive social situations to Siiri so she's better prepared for when she makes her first attempts at being social with other kids. It's not absurd in any way. Role-playing is frequently used for improving social skills and it is one of the best methods for this goal, possibly second best after real experience.

My first puppet-lesson to Siiri was Sharing. As an only child, Siiri rarely has to share with anyone else and she is very unaccustomed to it, so I decided to show her how sharing works. Siiri brought Monkey a snack and Monkey happily ate it. But then phlegmatic Hedgehog came along and said, "Monkey, you have a snack. I don't have a snack, but I would also like to eat it". So Monkey said, "Hedgehog, lets share!" and they both started munching on the snack. Siiri looked at it with confusion and then with disapproval. She made an agitated sound, came and took back the snack and cave it back to Monkey. I snickered and continued with the lesson. Again came the Hedgehog, "I no longer have a snack. Could I have some, too?". Happy and energetic Monkey said, "Come! I have plenty, I can share with you!" and they both started eating the same snack. Siiri was not pleased! She came, took back the snack, pushed Monkey further from Hedgehog, gave Monkey the snack, and kept a close eye on Hedgehog. Of course Hedgehog came along and acted all hungry. Monkey proposed, "Lets split it!". I carefully made the small puffy snack into two halves and put one in front of Monkey and the other in front of Hedgehog and made munching sounds. That seemed like the perfect solution until Siiri came, took away hedgehog's half a snack, gave Hedgehog a mean look and ATE IT!

All is well that ends well. Siiri got to use her imagination to solve a recurring problem and I got a good laugh out of it. Everyone wins. Except for the Hedgehog.

PS! Siiri currently has at least 16 actively used phrases or words. There are so many that she has forgotten, but I'm not counting those. She can follow simple commands, such as, "Siiri, please put the rabbit in your cupboard". I don't point to either the rabbit or the cupboard but she does it anyway. She understands most of every-day talk. Perhaps I should have taken it into account when I was reading some child developmental stuff out loud to Erkki. "They say Children Siiri's age should already be drinking from a cup. We assist Siiri, but do they mean she should be able to do it without any assistance? They can't possibly mean that.". The entire next day Siiri demanded to hold the cup herself and by nightfall had learned to drink from a cup unassisted.

Spiritual Level-up

2010-10-05T14:08:00.000-07:00

Tonight I feel odd. I feel like the entire day has been a journey to a next spiritual level. Actually perhaps it started on Friday. I was walking to my very first university lecture. My lecture, as in, I was giving it. I had a missed call and called back on my way to the lecture. It was my colleague who asked me if I was interested in being a Bachelor's thesis supervisor. I was all hyped up on pre-lecture adrenaline, but I gave it a brief thought - "yeah! Sounds like a totally new experience! I'm in!".

I had my lecture. At first I was trembling a bit but then it passed and I even stopped looking at my lecture notes. I walked back and fourth, clicking on next slide, sketching on the blackboard and pointing at diagrams with a long wooden stick. A wooden stick beats a trembling little red laser dot any day. It went quite okay! There were a few things I explained horribly because I realized during the lecture that I missed some important details when I was studying the slides, but I think I explained the important things well enough. I had 49 slides for 90 minutes and I still finished 20 minutes early. But when I sat down and assembled my notes I felt at peace. It was a conscious effort not to grin as everyone was gathering their things to leave. I was suddenly a grown-up. There was only a few years gap between me and the people leaving the classroom but I felt like those are pretty damn important few years. My growing up had nothing to do with getting married or even having a child. I grew up when I gave my first lecture and accepted my first Bachelor's supervisee.

Today I gave my second lecture, also the last lecture this year. This time I knew exactly what I was talking about. I made more slides just in case and I finished the lecture in 88 minutes with only 2 minutes to spare. I had so much to tell that I rushed through some things that deserved more attention but I paid enough attention to things that will be in the exam. At the end of the lecture I met my supervisee. I invited him to the lecture because he wanted to do the thesis on the exact same topic as my lecture. He seemed potentially lazy, but motivated to finish school. I think he'll do fine. Curiously, I'm not at all intimidated by the task. I'm actually eager to find out more about him - what his strengths and weaknesses are and I'm even more eager to show him all the cool tricks that help with writing the thesis. There will also be a co-supervisor who is more experienced so I won't be alone.

Perhaps it's not by chance that I was strongly pushed off balance by a lecture that I attended today. The lecturer told us about near death experiences and events that can only be explained with the existence of a soul that does not depend on any brain activity. The course is called Science and Religion. It's my yet another attempt to find faith. I've been on strange terms with faith for years. The last time I was a good Christian was when I was about 15. Then I got interested in psychology and learned about suggestion. After that I never felt comfortable in a church sermon. I felt I was being manipulated into thoughts that were not quite my own. I still kept trying to keep my ties to church. I even went to a minister one day - I was walking past a church and I just went to see if he was there and if he had a moment. It seemed like one of those moments from movies where the main character does something impulsive to find faith and she finds it. However, life is not the movies. The minister gave me some boring politically correct reply which was so unspectacular that I can't even remember what the question was, let alone the answer. I thanked him politely and walked out just as unwisely.

I had been baptized nearly all my life so I went to confirmation for some "real" faith. My quest was never about not believing in the existence of God. I simply really had a problem with Christianity. Jesus was great, but he lived a whole lot of time ago and his view of the world might have been progressive then but it was completely too restrictive for me. I simply couldn't fit his teachings into my world view without distorting one of those to a point of nonrecognition. It was completely unfair to distort his teachings and I wasn't willing to completely change my world view for some dude who lived 2000 years ago!

Anyway, confirmation steered me toward a more balanced liberal Christianity but it still wasn't enough. Christianity has so many inner flaws that no one could possibly take it seriously. For one, Jesus was a pacifist. And Bible teaches more evil violence than any other book I've ever attempted to read. Whenever I saw a "pink and fluffy" quote from the Bible, I felt like quoting something from the Old Testament. And don't tell me Old Testament is not a part of Christianity because the entire creation story, ten commandments and much else came from there and it's all a part of this religion. Simply, someone is preaching their own version of an old and outdated semi-evil religion and calling it Christianity. I never really agreed with most of it. I felt more and more disconnected from God and oddly, more and more at peace with myself because I didn't have so much Christian guilt wearing me down. I was nearly an atheist, except for the minor little detail: I still intuitively assumed there was God.

So finally today at the Science and Religion lecture I saw a picture of a soul leaving the body and I thought, "who am I kidding. Of course there is a soul and a God and all that. I'm not a materialist! Not by a long shot. I have to find a way to connect my body and my soul." It was little more than a mental note. In the evening I went to see "Eat Pray Love". It was quite good, except with a target audience 40 years old, female and divorced (At least I got the sex right). It still had some wonderful thoughts about one woman's journey to find herself through Hinduism.

So I walked out of the movie theater, ears whistling from the loud speakers in the movie theater and my steps echoing in the empty streets. I continued my thoughts about finding more inner peace. Happiness is not about what we do or what we have. A lot of happiness comes from within. I am a happy person by most standards but I feel I have the potential to be much more happy if I figure out my spiritual beliefs and find peace within myself. I have tried so long and I have failed. So it seems I have been going about it all wrong. I will not find faith in Christianity. I have to find my own way. That's it. Yes, that is my big revelation: Christianity isn't for me. Seems so common when I see it in writing.

Now I have a lot to think about. At this point I feel I'm much more likely to end up worshipping Taara, an ancient nearly forgotten Estonian god, than a Christian god. Perhaps it would even be the more respectable choice in Estonia, the official least religious nation in the world .

Explosion

2010-09-29T22:13:00.000-07:00

The title is pretty damn literal. Two days ago we had an explosion in our apartment. Siiri was home with the babysitter when the living room light bulb outright exploded upon lighting. I don't mean "light bulb blew out", I mean exploded, as in, there were shards of glass all over living room floor, table was covered with glass and white dust and the *BOOM* was very loud. Usually Siiri sits on that living room floor and browses through her books or plays with her toys and when it gets too dark, babysitter goes and turns on the light. This time, however, they were running around, playing hide and seek or whatever and babysitter picked Siiri up and made a small detour and turned on the light. The light switch isn't even near the light itself - there's a huge bookcase inbetween. Neither of them were injured, except later when both of them found a tiny shard of glass that had remained even after clean-up.

Siiri found her shard of glass while climbing on the armchair. She knelt on it for a moment and made a sound of distress. A second later she had a tiny drop of blood on her skin. I don't think she had ever seen her own blood like that. I reacted quickly and told her, "Look, blood. Now we need a band-aid!" and I took a band-aid, made sure the glass is no longer in the wound and covered the wound. Siiri was so unsure how to react that she didn't make a sound. Suddenly she had something like a sticker on her leg and it was so cool! She wriggled free, ran to the mirror and admired her new decoration with a proud look on her face. Perhaps, for next time, I should get some band-aids with cartoon characters on them.

Also, I finished reading the "Assassin's Creed gone bad" trilogy. Khmm, I meant to say, "The Night Angel Trilogy" by Brent Weeks. It started out SOOOOOO well. The first book was among the best books I've ever read and then it went so bad. Suddenly everyone's a stereotype, having stereotypical conversations in stereotypical surroundings for exaggerated blot. Everyone becomes a ruler, except for the main character (and a few others). The women in this book range from cute and cuddly moral girls to hot and sexy objects of desire and the men are all undesirable! One's old and mean and ugly, another one is handsome but whines like a teenage girl during PMS and a third one starts out as truly beautiful and strong and ends up crawling in shit and loosing so much weight that he looks starved thin. In the end I couldn't read more than a few pages without huffing in annoyance. What was most annoying was that the cool main character can't do anything right after the first book and becomes a stupid kid who ruins everything all the time. He is indeed the main character because he drives the plot forward by screwing everything up. And even when it's finally his time to shine, he is so incapable that everyone else does everything for him. OMG, I so need to read something better to get that bad taste out of my mouth.

But not today. Tomorrow I give my first lecture, so I need to get back to work, but I wanted to share that.

Cute After Work

2010-09-07T13:33:00.000-07:00

I'm a bit of a workaholic. I had initially decided to take on only a little work in the lab but now some weeks I spent 9 hours a day from Monday to Friday working. This week I'm "taking it easy" so I was in the lab for 6 hours on Monday, 4 hours plus one university lecture on Tuesday and 8 hours on Thursday. Honestly, I am kinda stressed because there is so much to do and so little time to do it, but I also feel so alive! It also makes me appreciate Siiri a lot more and I'm more eager to spend time with her. My relationship with Siiri actually got closer because of it. Before we were often testing each others limits and patience but now she goes around doing cute stuff and I give her as much slack as I can within her everyday rules (like It's-bed-time and no-running-around-naked ).

I don't even know how stuff at home gets done with me spending so much time elsewhere. It used to be so much more difficult. Laundry keeps piling up but I ignore it as long as I can and I do it in as little time as possible. We do dishes when we're running out of clean ones, and nowadays we often discover it after it has already happened. I don't even find the time to have weekly entire-apartment Roomba marathons, so I just run Roomba in critical areas when it feels appropriate and when I can find the opportunity. I even bake a little but I don't even plan it much because that would require commitment. In stead I try last minute recipes. I'd try almost anything that doesn't require ingredients that I don't have. Basically I shifted my values a bit and I stopped wasting all my energy on worrying about stupid things like weekly cleanings. I mean, sometimes it wasn't even all that dusty. And now sometimes there's dust on the TV and there's fingerprints all over the glass table in our living room and so what? When it crosses my tolerance level, I deal with it. When Erkki beats me to it, he deals with it. Often though, our adorable babysitter wipes the table and takes the dishes out of the dishwasher.

I'm still learning the art of spontaneity. Yesterday I found out about a stand-up comedy show in Tartu Vilde pub. Since me and Erkki wanted to go together we had to go on the same evening, even though the show was repeated in the following evening. I talked to our nanny and I so saw stand-up comedy in Tartu for the second time.

...and this is certainly worthy of it's own paragraph (probably worth even an entire post but I have other things I want to share as well)... but stand-up comedy IS SO COOL!!! Especially this group that has been going around in Estonia, well, at least in Tallinn and Tartu. Some stand-up comedy that's very popular on the Internet doesn't even come close to the quality of Tartu Comedy Festival. If you hear they're performing in your area, do yourself a favor and go check them out!

Meanwhile Siiri is getting more adorable every week. For instance, she loves playing hide and seek and she has one favorite hiding spot. When she wants to play, she drops all her toys, walks straight to her hiding spot behind an armchair and stands very still. I pretend not to notice and I say, "Siiri? Siiri... Where did you go? Siiri..." and she stays put. When she hears me walking around the room looking for her she can't always resist loud giggling. Actually it's more like little shrieks of joy from knowing she's so well hidden that I can't find her. Not much talent for being a catburgler but cute nonetheless. When she feels like it, she steps out of her hiding spot with a wide grin, as if to say, "HERE I am!".

Even potty training is going well and it's surprisingly effortless. I thought there would be lots of drama but nope. She says when she wants to go and sometimes she doesn't and it's all good. No pressure before kindergarten. She has lost nearly all interest in the letters of the alphabet and she is already forgetting most of them. For a little while she recognized quite many but now when she sees written text somewhere, she randomly points at letters and says, "aaaaaa uuuuuuuu oooooooo aaaaaaa äääääää".

Remember I told you Siiri got a stuffed toy, puppy dog, for bedtime. However, she doesn't notice it and she keeps it in the foot of her crib. Except, as it turns out, she DOES notice it. One time I used puppy to distract Siiri while getting her in her bedtime clothing and I forgot to put it back in her bed until I had already closed the door and it was too late. An hour later me and Erkki heard the bay monitor turn on. "woof. woof. Woof-woof." (actually Siiri said "auh auh-auh auh-auh-auh" which is the sound that dogs make in Estonia). And then quiet until Siiri started asking for something to drink. I used this chance to return puppy to its usual spot while I gave Siiri some water. Minutes later we heard puppy being rattled (yes, it's also a rattle) and Siiri contently playing and saying, "woof. woof-woof". It's secret friendship - the next evening when I offered Siiri the toy puppy, she tossed it in the foot of her bed and completely ignored it.

Siiri is now 1 year, 4 months and 2 days old and she can run and climb on beds. Fortunately she's even better at climbing OFF beds safely. We keep making pictures of her and she is getting more and more of an attention seeker. She loves grown-ups but unfortunately she is afraid of children her age. Babysitter thinks it might be because they're so unpredictable. Siiri feels unsafe with anyone under 10 years of age. In a way, it makes sense - when she was little, she had a few scares when children near her acted unpredictably, screamed and ran right by her. She doesn't realize that she's not much different from those children herself anymore.

It's quite amazing that children are like programmed to be so similar. Don't get me wrong, every child is unique and bla-bla-bla... But why does Siiri call out "woof-woof!" when she sees a dog, even though me and Erkki have always replied, "yes, it's a dog. DOG.". Why does Siiri love playing hide-and-seek and why does she get super excited when I play along? And most of all, as Siiri does not have any brothers or sisters and has never seen children aged 2-5 years put to bed at night, then how does she know to do the following: When she gets out of her diaper, she swiftly crawls away, climbs off the bed, runs a few steps away and stops at the door. Then she turns around with a wild look in her eyes, lets out a small laugh and then TAKES OFF as fast as she can! I catch her, get some diapers on her and then spend the next 20 minutes asking her, "are you ready to get into your night clothing now?". It's such a stereotypical scenario, isn't it? If Siiri hasn't seen other children do it, then how does she know to do it? I have no answer. I don't think anyone has an answer to that one.

Anyway, I often think, "OOOH! I want to write about this in my blog! I'll probably get a chance to do it tomorrow" and before I realize it's 2 weeks later and I think, "maybe I'll have a spare moment tomorrow.". I haven't given up on the blog, simply, my grasp of time has given up on me. I'm hoping not to get too caught up in work but it's too easy to get hooked, especially when it's team work and I can see that my efforts are useful to someone. Way more useful than scheduled home-cleanings just for the sake of being "a good housewife". OH I've missed being part of something bigger than dishes or laundry. I still want more kids even though I've seen other people being much better suited for "baby time" than I'll ever be. I hope I'll be better at answering Siiri's why-questions. Can't wait.

Mystically Nonscientific

2010-08-25T10:21:00.000-07:00

I just lost an hour's worth of blog post and I'm mad but better I still finish it today than someday.

A couple of friends of mine have been into astrology lately. Not the kind where random people get paid ten bucks to make up something for the newspaper horoscope column. I mean the kind where people have their sun sign , Moon sign, Mercury sign, Venus sign, and also influences from sextiles, semiquadrats and oppositions between different planets in the Solar system. It's so complicated and requires so much memory that I don't expect to ever really understand it fully, especially because I'm not convinced it's even partly true.

Lets avoid the word "pseudo scientific" and lets just say that no one has ever really been able to scientifically prove that astrology is true. Yet most people believe it even a little bit. I read on Wikipedia that astrology has been around for more than a millennium and it has had a huge influence on our culture. Makes sense, especially because astrology (horoscopes and such) and astronomy (physics of planets) used to be united under astrology. I might be very unfaithful to the entire scientific community with my next thought, but don't you agree that it's truly annoyingly arrogant of scientists to scavenge through a huge field, pick out the most reliable parts, steal them and then act all smug , "Bhahahahaaa, you astrologists don't have anything you can prove!".

Well, astrology hasn't been proven and it seems like people treat it as greatly inferior to religion. At least religion can make you feel good because it makes you BELIEVE that you ought to feel good, not like astrology which only tries to explain the entire world and all the people and events in it. I don't suppose there's many daily newspapers that print "A Daily Prayer for All Mayor Religions" and not many that DON'T print a daily horoscope, which helps people of all sun signs make serious everyday decisions, for example, whether it's a good day to buy socks.

I like mysticism too much for a biologist. I still can't really ignore that my in depth astrological chart says I could have mystical abilities and another planetary pattern indicated that I have a tendency toward (mystically) sensitive mind. I also find it very flattering that my chart describes a mentally superb person with great intuition, full of original ideas, highly intellectual, energetic, practical, and most flattering of all, it describes a natural born propagandist who can pass forward information in a way that it can't be ignored. On the other hand, it describes a person who is very stingy with money and relies on constant stability. When I had read the entire thing, I had a feeling that the stars are really favoring me!

By the way, if you can read Estonian and this all made you curious, then I suggest you try www.horoskoop.net, pick "sinu horoskoop" and then fill out the form with your exact birth time and place. I'm sure there are similar websites in English as well.

Astrology is just a recent interest, or rather, it's an old friend I bump into once every few years. I never know how long the interest will stay fresh. Soon I'll find myself talking with someone who barely knows me and when I talk about my hobbies, I will rather mention that I cross stitch, which is a very stereotypically boring hobby for people with no grasp on the century we're in, and I will avoid expressing any serious interest in astrology with the fear of sounding silly and dumb. And then I will tone down how much I spend time with it because I can't even talk about it.

It's a real nice change to not breastfeed or grow anyone inside me - at last I get to party without obsessively counting glasses and staring at my watch. I went to a great party on Thursday and I went clubbing til the morning with my sisters on Saturday.

Today I had one of those super productive days when things just get done and more got done than I'd usually plan for three days. The vast amount of energy was all fueled by procrastination. Tomorrow I'm doing a really scary procedure in the lab and so much could go wrong. I could perhaps help my situation a little if I go over my notes again in detail, but I really didn't want to do that because I know it would do very little good and it would make me more nervous, so in stead I made sure I have something else to do while quilt kept gaining on me whenever I slowed down too much!

PS! Today I saw two young boys messing about in the car park outside our house. It looked and sounded like they were spray painting the pavement next to our car, but I only saw them huddled there next to the car. It was odd that boys this young would get their hands on spray paint so it caught my attention. Really I thought it must be something completely innocent but I wanted to take a sneak peak anyway. When I stepped toward them, they ran. As it turned out, those boys were letting air out of our cars tires. Oh so it wasn't spray paint after all. If I ever see them near our car again they'll be sorry. What a pair of apes!

Controlled Crying Method

2010-08-14T00:55:00.000-07:00

The most controversial thing we've done while raising Siiri is using controlled crying method to get her to sleep better. I keep analyzing our reasoning and trying to figure out if I've done anything immoral or has it really been worth it.

You might remember that the first months of Siiri's life we reacted every time she cried even a little. We decided crying is bad for her and we have to help her however we can every time she cries. It worked just fine until she started loathing going to sleep. She had 3 naps during the day (she must have been 8-9 months) and she woke up a few times per night. With her weight increasing she got too heavy for me to cradle to sleep several times each day. Erkki helped when he could but during work hours and night time it was mostly just me (except when I was so exhausted that Erkki woke up even before I did). But even then I kept cradling her to sleep.

Then things got even worse - Siiri needed help falling asleep but when we tried to help, she protested. I remember using my last strength to cradle her to sleep while she screamed and wriggled because she didn't want to go to sleep. It took me up to 30 minutes to cradle her asleep and even then she sometimes woke up an hour later. Enough is enough - the situation clearly wasn't for anyones benefit. The worst of it was that Siiri was starting to depend on it, so when she woke up for even a moment at night, she cried louder and louder until someone helped her asleep, and she kept crying while I was helping her. Sometimes she was wriggling so much she risked falling out of her sleep-deprived mother's arms.

We started with the controlled crying method carefully, trying to ease into it. We made a bedtime routine which ended with a lullaby. It was going well until Siiri realized that we only sing lullabies when it's bed time. After that she started screaming when she heard even a couple of notes of it. We tried staying in the same room to make her feel less abandoned but she spent all her time displaying how upset she is at us by crying extra loudly and not even trying to fall asleep, so our presence just made things worse. Besides I had planned to stay calm so I don't make falling asleep even harder but I became fidgety after having spent 10 minutes in an intolerably noisy environment and that wasn't helping anyone. Then we tried to at least leave the door open so she doesn't feel like a prisoner in her bedroom, but then she saw all that awaits her on the other side of that bedroom door, and cried even louder because she couldn't reach it.

So finally we settled into the approximately 10-minute long cycle. We signaled that it's bed time (bed time routine!) and we sang a lullaby, and then closed the door behind us when we left. It seemed important to portray a very calm aura even though it was very stressful for us. Siiri cried and tried to get us to stop this nonsense but we just occasionally, perhaps once every 10 minutes, went to her to say a few kind words and to offer her water. It took a couple of weeks to get used to it but then it all worked out. It usually didn't take her more than 20 minutes to fall asleep in this way, which is FASTER than when I cradled her. When she woke up during the night it was because she was hungry and even then fell asleep faster.

This sort of changes work best if they're universal so we tried not to make too many exceptions, at least not without a good reason. The worst time was when we were visiting Erkki's relatives. Siiri had settled into one nap per day but this time she also had a second nap not long before bed time. So when it was bed time, she was habitually sleepy but unable to fall asleep. It didn't help at all that she was supposed to sleep on a mattress on the floor and she constantly went wandering. We tried several things to get her to fall asleep - until we let her cry alone in the room for a while (after making the room safe). It was probably more stressful for me than it was for Siiri. There were too many curious people coming to spy why Siiri is crying. There were too many people coming to check if they can perhaps save the day and I was explaining to them that Siiri is already able to fall asleep if she chooses so. I told them I can't FORCE her to fall asleep and I can't help her if she doesn't want to be helped. Maybe it was just in my head, but I felt like I got at least a couple of looks saying, "what kind of a mother are you?!". Eventually it turned out that with enough determination, a baby can be rocked to sleep against her will if she's sleepy enough. All in all, it was a very uncomfortable situation.

I also told our babysitters about how we put Siiri to sleep. I told them that they may do the same. One babysitter asked, "But don't you cradle her at all anymore?" "no, I haven't done that in a while. It just doesn't work on her when I cradle her. It doesn't help her fall asleep faster, it just makes her more dependant on my presence when she needs to fall asleep." I kinda left it up to the nanny how she puts Siiri to sleep, but hinted that controlled crying might be better because it's more consistent for Siiri and she does know how to fall asleep on her own, even if she doesn't like it. So when I came home, the nanny said she put Siiri to bed like I suggested and Siiri was asleep in less than 20 minutes. She also said it was ghastly and said something along the lines of her not being used to this sort of thing and preferring cradling. The way she said it sounded very judgemental in an annoyingly polite way. Damn it, girl, you don't even have children! I was very polite to her and have never called her again.

So, what I'm trying to say is that even though it wasn't what I had planned for Siiri when she was younger, and it wasn't always easy, we used controlled crying method and it was much better than the alternatives. There was even a study about it recently which concluded that controlled crying method or sleep training doesn't lead to later emotional and behavioural problems. Sleep problems often don't magically go away when the child gets older and by ignoring the problem, the child might not grow out of it until they're 4 or 5 or something. I think there a lot of important stages in child development during those years and it's certainly not good if the child spends all that time being constantly somewhat sleep-deprived and the mother is almost always stressed. That could easily be worse than letting the child cry a little.

"The findings form part of a longitudinal study by Murdoch Childrens into infant sleep, which has shown intervention during infancy significantly reduces sleep problems in children and depression among mothers during the first two years of the child’s life." source

Before I intervened, Siiri was cranky not only during the night but also during the day. I didn't even know she was being cranky until sleep training started working and she became much happier during daytime.So perhaps sometimes it is best to simply let a baby cry. It's certainly not something I'd advertise as the best option for all babies but sometimes it's much better than the alternatives.

Epilogue: months after we started sleep training, Siiri almost seems to like going to sleep. She doesn't cry when I place her in her crib, and one time she actually cried when I didn't put her in bed fast enough. She no longer tries to force me to take her out of her crib whenever she sees me so it doesn't bother her if I stay in the room. I keep her company by quietly reading my book in the same room. I'm not sure she needs it but I think she likes having me stay in the room, as long as I don't make any noise. She sometimes smiles to me while resting her head on her pillow. I give her water whenever she asks and then she puts her head on her pillow and falls asleep without crying.

Books

2010-08-11T12:27:00.000-07:00

I've started reading books lately. I never really fancied reading when I was younger. I remember reading a 200-page book completely voluntarily when I was around 15 and it seemed like a big thing. I was very proud of myself for years because I had READ A BOOK during my summer vacation. No one had forced me. Yesterday I finished Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy that consists of three books (DUH! ) that have 2130 pages altogether.

Yes, I might enjoy reading a good book but I can't help but count the pages. Assuming my reading speed hasn't improved much, it took me 71 hours to read this one trilogy. For comparison, Naruto original anime series was 9 seasons and 220 episodes. With each episode only 23 minutes, it would take a little over 84 hours to watch the entire series from beginning to the end. So was it really worth the time? I can tell you that Naruto series gave me a lot more emotion. It was intense - there were times I giggled manically about silly cartoon romances, there were times when I were sitting on the edge of my seat at the end of the episode and when it ended, both me and Erkki said in unison, "Next episode!". With this book trilogy the feeling was never this intense. I got an inner nag, "want. to. know. what. happens. next." and then I casually took the book and continued reading. At the very end I even preferred reading to watching a TV-series.

After finishing, I'm not sorry for the time spent and it really was a very good book. Well, it must have been good because I read it. I'm very picky about books and if it kept me intrigued long enough to finish it, then it must have been very good. And when I finally did finish, I took the next book in the queue: Brent Weeks' "the Night Angel trilogy". Another 2000 pages, here I come. I've actually read the first book a long time ago. I even mentioned it in my other blog: San Diego travelogue last days. It's the book with the bad-ass 11-year-old who is just so cool that it gives me goosebumps. The "second" book I bought from San Diego, Raymond E. Feist's "Magician: Master", was so horrible that I made it Siiri's first paperback fantasy novel. It was her practice book when she could barely fold the pages and hold herself back from licking the book.

The worst book I've ever really tried to read was "Myrren's Gift" by Fiona McIntosh. It's even worse than "Magician: Master". It just kept getting worse with the courageous hero squeezing through the toilet hole to escape a fight and with the long self-pity thought descriptions and awkward conversations where the main character is still praised for being eloquent and charismatic. The best book I remember reading was "The Last Wish" by Andrzej Sapkowski. It's a collection of stories about one monster hunter called the witcher. I can't even remember why I liked it so much. I just know that when I read the book I felt I had truly been missing out on a lot during all that time when I avoided books. This book is the reason why I've been trying out so many books ever since. So perhaps it's fair to call it my favourite book even though I can't even remember why it's so good.

I haven't talked about Siiri for so long. She learned to walk and then she started practicing walking faster and faster. I've even seen her spinning on foot until she gets dizzy. Having confidence in her walking skill has made her a lot more adventurous. Just recently she followed me around as much as possible and suddenly I'm following her around. She's very independent and opinionated and I really like that about her. She keeps learning new words and forgetting old ones so her vocabulary stays pretty much the same. She can use a spoon and she has even managed to take a sip from a mug without help. Usually she tilts the mug too much and pours water all over herself so I rarely let her practice. She has gorgeous yellow blond hair that's really soft and I haven't seen anyone her age who has as much har as she does. I'll soon be able to make two pony tails. And she's so vain! She found my bracelet in my drawer, took it to Erkki and extended her arm with a demanding tone. She waited until Erkki had put the bracelet around her arm and then walked in front of the mirror and started to admire the bracelet around her arm, looking at it from different angles.

With my long days in the lab Siiri has become more demanding of my attention and I've started to miss spending time with her. So when I get home, I take Siiri out to the sandbox behind my house. Yes! A sandbox right outside. I didn't know about it until I got an SMS from the nanny mentioning that they're playing there. It turns out it's always been there. It was simply abandoned and had some plants growing in it. And, because of this sandbox I realized that I'm much worse at calmly relaxing than I thought - I've started to weed it and throw out any leaves or twigs. I'm about half done and it looks much-MUCH better than before. ...And I always wondered about parents fixing up things for their children. I never thought I'd be such an activist. I even had my book with me but I was too busy to read.

So I guess I'm still not a book person even though I've been spending so much time reading lately.

Cat Person

2010-08-04T00:55:00.000-07:00

I'm not very fond of dogs. They bark and drool and bite. One time me and my sister were taking a scenic shortcut through a patch of trees near our home. There were only a couple of houses there on the hill so we didn't expect to run into anyone. We didn't expect to find two insane dogs charging at us either. My first instinct was to stay calm and not to run but this tactic didn't seem to work. When the dogs had already crossed half the distance to get to us, and they were getting awfully close, me and my sister turned and ran. Dogs chased us quite far from their owners house. I got away clean but one of the dogs bit my sister's leg and ripper a hole in her JEANS. Fortunately the wound wasn't very deep and my sister did not get rabies!

The owners must have simply left their gate open because there was no owner nearby who could have been walking the dogs at that moment. Dogs wore collars but no leashes. We later heard that those dogs are often running around free. So basically the owner leaves the gate open for the dogs to crap in random places and charge young girls who are taking a walk. How is that right? If I didn't hate paperwork so much, I would have gone to the police to file an official complaint. Such dogs should be put to sleep. Or perhaps it's the owners who made the mistake?

I started thinking about it when I read an article about Estonians being too prejudice about dogs, calling all dogs dangerous even if there's no clear reasoning for such an opinion about a particular dog. Well, ALL DOGS ARE DANGEROUS! Dogs have the instincts of a killer, whether or not they've killed someone already. They're carnivores and they have evolved to attack. Horribly, they are more likely to attack those who they are not too terrified of and those who make them angry - for example, little children who want to pull on that furry tail or those cute killer ears. Especially with children's throats and faces so conveniently close to those sharp and pointy teeth. Happy little dog owners might think that sort of thinking is indeed prejudice, but when you think about it, even dog owners themselves say revealing things about their pets, such as, "My dog is so good with children. He hasn't tried to bite them even once!". In my opinion it's about as good as someone describing an employee, "She's such a good employee. She hasn't stolen from me even once!". Such a comment would make sense only in a world where employees are assumed to steal and dogs are assumed to try to bite children.

Perhaps calling all dogs potential killers is just as good as calling all people potential killers. That second one is, of course, also a true statement. It's not at all unusual to read about a disgruntled employee killing a few people and then themselves. One moment it's a normally functioning average person and the next moment body bags are being zipped closed. The scary part about most murder news is that most of the murderers were perfectly normal people until they suddenly killed someone. Some "normal" people look more like potential killers than others: a twitchy looking man with prison tattoos is worse than a friendly Sunday school teacher, even if neither of them has killed anyone. I would rank a vast majority of dogs in the more dangerous group. Just as the twitchy prison guy, dogs can suddenly flip and attack for no apparent reason.

When I think about it this way, I'm not completely sure why anyone would get a dog. There is perhaps one good reason: a dog is a legal weapon. As far as I know, it is completely illegal in Estonia to attack someone simply because they are on your property. Even attacking in self defence is an iffy topic and I wouldn't try it unless it's absolutely unavoidable. However, it's perfectly legal to keep a dog that requires a sign, "beware! Dog will bite!". Perhaps people wouldn't need dogs if they could just put up a sign, "Beware! I'll shoot you in the leg!" . For some reason the first is a common sign, the second one is not so typical, even though the damage could be similarly bad. Unless it's war time, there is very little excuse for anyone to own a gun "just in case" but too many people keep a dog in their back yard to ward off strangers.

How can I bash dogs so much and not even mention cats... Well, cats are just as dangerous, perhaps even more so, but cats are much cuter!

Not Truly Mommy

2010-07-19T02:11:00.000-07:00

Most people think that summer is an excellent time to take a vacation. However, it has turned out that I have done the exact opposite. I've been spending long hours in the laboratory. I've been planting and watering, wearing latex gloves and pipetting, I've arranged numbers in tables and tracked lines on graphs with my finger. Sounds like so much fun, doesn't it? Well, sure there's also some work stress about experiments not succeeding and everything taking too much time, but my thoughts finally have some complexity. My main problem of the day is no longer, "what shall I make for lunch?".

Figuring out what to make for lunch is no easy task. And unfortunately I'm still not able to escape this responsibility. When I know I won't be home during lunch, I simply have to prepare lunch even earlier or to figure out something simple enough for the babysitter to prepare. I'm not evil enough to give her a chunk of raw pork and a jar of sun dried tomatoes with a comment, "do something with them". That would be especially evil taking into account she's vegetarian!

Vegetarians are a truly rare breed in Estonia. She's the first Estonian vegetarian I've seen in years. Or perhaps there have been vegetarians who are hiding their eating habits. This could seem odd to anyone who hasn't seen how little respect vegetarians get among Estonians. This particular vegetarian spent her Jaanipäev (summer solstice) in the same place as us. Grilled meat, especially pork, is a traditional food during Jaanipäev celebration. She doesn't mind other people (including her own children) eating meat but apparently other people truly mind her NOT eating meat. "I see you don't have any FOOD on your plate. Why don't you eat meat? Is it some allergies? What's wrong with eating meat?". Eventually it got really nasty. "Why don't you like real food? What's wrong with you? ". I eat easily three times as much meat as an average Estonian and I would restlessly argue with anyone who says that meat, a rich source of both protein and iron, is unhealthy food to us omnivores. However, this babysitter simply feels sorry for the animals and has decided that she herself won't eat meat, and somehow her choice makes me respect her more.

Siiri gets along with this babysitter so well that I can leave for work without worrying about Siiri's well being. I plan her meals and I'm free to think about other topics. It feels so nice to be useful for things besides housework or helping Siiri. Stereotypes make us believe that mothers ought to be near tears when they don't see their children for a few hours but I really enjoy spending time in the laboratory. So maybe I'm not really made for motherhood because I'm happy to go to work and later I'm equally happy to come home to Siiri again. Erkki barely sees Siiri at all, but it doesn't make him a bad father and he doesn't seem torn apart by it all! Perhaps it's simply sexist to say that good mothers must hate working because it separates them from their children!

Sometimes it seems Siiri is also happier if I work. I'm really bad at playing with Siiri. After a few hours of playing I get bored and I start to dominate the game. In stead of Siiri pointing at pictures to ask "what's this on the picture", I end up asking her, "Siiri, where is dog?". When I don't dominate the game, I get really sleepy because my mind is so under stimulated. Usually I try to do anything else to keep myself vivid and I play with Siiri only as background activity. So even when I'm at home, Siiri doesn't get my full attention. Babysitter plays with Siiri for real and Siiri loves her for it.

Not the entire summer is about work. Tomorrow we're going on a 4-day vacation. We don't want to take Siiri on a plane so we rented a small house in Estonia, near Otepää. We won't have to worry about cooking and we can spend time in a sauna or we can grill meat and drink cider outdoors.

Speaking of cider, Siiri is completely weaned from breastfeeding. Her last remaining breastfeeding was some time between 5 and 7 a.m. so now she wakes up at 7 a.m. and won't fall back asleep. Me and Erkki take turns in keeping her company in the morning. It took time for her to get used to not being breastfed anymore and she was very upset with me even during daytime. It all ended a couple of days ago. Siiri asked for breast milk during daytime and I chose to give it to her because she was asking so nicely. She took a taste and looked like the happiest baby ever. She just wouldn't stop grinning widely , but then she let go and asked for water in stead. She thirstily drank half a glass of water and hasn't asked for breast milk ever since.

Sometimes I wonder: am I really a "mommy" or am I just someone who has a child? Perhaps there is a difference and not all people are really able to truly be mommies?

Happily Obsessive

2010-06-29T13:57:00.001-07:00

I really hope my neighbours don't completely hate my guts right now, as I just finished making this year's third "Final end-of-rhubarb-season rhubarb pie". Ain't my fault that a proper rhubarb pie needs 8 eggs separated and perfectly beaten...

I've got news: Siiri can walk! ***DING! Upgrade Complete!*** She kept playing with the idea until she got up on her two feet and, with a clever look on her face, just started making careful steps towards me. At first it was 4 steps and she thumped diaper-first on the floor, then she got to 7 steps, then over 10. The next time you see her (since so many of the readers here actually see her every now and then), you might ask with disappointment, "you wrote she can walk so why is she crawling?". I'll save you the trouble of asking and I'll give you the answer in advance: Just because she CAN walk on her own, doesn't mean she constantly uses the skill as a way of getting from one end of the room the the other.

I finally hooked up to Xbox Live and now I've got a freaky new goal! I want all my favorite games on the maximized achievement score list. When I told Erkki, he *paused* and said in a quieter tone, "I think it will take a while." That's his way of saying, you're really gonna spend a LONG-LONG time on this obsessive compulsive idea of yours. At least now I know it's not impossible. I already have Prince of Persia, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands and Assassin's Creed 2. I'm missing Assassin's Creed 1, Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2. I'm currently working on Mass Effect 2 and I'm only 2 achievements away from complete list. Problematically, one of those is the Insanity achievement which simply states, "Complete the game on the "Insanity" difficulty level without changing the setting."

Eeek, if my neighbours didn't hate me earlier, they might hate me now. Siiri woke up and she's completely hysterical. I tried to calm her down but she was so angry at me in her sleep daze hysteria that I only made things worse. She's currently crying it out. I'll go offer her water again when she's calmed down a little but right now it won't do any good. I've grown used to ignoring such situations. If I can't do anything then it won't help to get all worked up over it. There's enough stress over things I can control.

There's a spider on the wall. I wish it was just a saying, like there's a skeleton in the closet, but it's not. It's there and it's stalking me. It's trying to make me leave the room and you know what? It's succeeding. I'm glancing at it every 10 seconds or less and I'm typing as fast as I can.

Siiri fell asleep, the spider still hasn't moved, a pie awaits tasting and I found a new tip on Mass Effect 2 Brawler Achievement and I NEED to try it! Obsessive compulsive tendencies may seem odd on the outside but it can occasionally be so much fun to really get involved with these small goals.

Perhaps I'm not obsessive compulsive if I choose to happily obsess over achievement scores on Xbox or getting eggs perfectly beaten for a cake.

My Little Hobby

2010-06-13T05:44:00.000-07:00

I had an epiphany: child is a high maintenance self-upgrading entertainment center. It's also interactive and personalized. I can understand some people being too busy for maintaining one but it's no wonder most people want at least one. My child has become my primary hobby. Sounds pretty miserable, but in hindsight it seems inevitable that this happened.

It's not easy to think in terms of how active I still am or how much energy I have for hobbies outside home. For a few months it was so much trouble to get out of the house that I quite started to enjoy staying in. Before I had a child I went out for a social event (I mean PARTY!!!!) once or twice a week, sometimes even more often. Nothing out of the ordinary really - I didn't drink much and I always went home to sleep. Now I go out to such a party about once a month, or perhaps every couple of weeks. I drink less and I drink only things I know the exact content of. I don't let anyone else mix me a long drink, if I can help it. I've even brought a measuring cup to a party to make sure I don't drink more than planned. In restaurants I ask waitresses exact content of drinks and when people pour me too much wine I don't finish my cup. I've gotten used to it. It used to be a big deal but I don't notice it anymore. Now I don't fret over a glass of wine a few hours before breastfeeding and I'm not upset about not being able to have three or four. Partying as a hobby is still much more on the background and no longer a remarkable part of my weekly plans.

While it wasn't so easy to go out partying, I needed to make sure I had some hobbies left. I used to like playing pool but I haven't played since my pregnant tummy really started to get in the way. I also liked to go clubbing but I've only managed to do that a couple of times since I had a child. It's not caused by a difference in mentality - I don't think I should avoid clubbing now that I have a baby at home. If anything, now I have even more reason to make sure I don't fall back too far in the female vs. female competition. The real reason I don't go clubbing anymore is that I don't have any new clubbing outfits. Besides, 90% of the time I went clubbing, it was mostly just to hang out with one certain friend. Now I rarely see her at all.

I thought my indoors hobbies would really start taking up more time - for example extreme cross-stitching. HUGE canvas and millimeter-by-millimeter stitches. Think about it for a moment. This means there's 100 stitches per one square centimeter. With a project this big, hands always need to be washed while I stitch and I don't let any staining foods near my cross-stitching canvas. When I have unpacked all my stitching gear it's not easy to put it all aside for a minute to watch over a baby. For this reason I have barely had an opportunity to continue my cross-stitching hobby. Perhaps I'll finish it when I'm old and gray.

I love beginner level web programming but it needs a bit more concentration than I've had the opportunity for so that too has been on pause for the past year. Watching TV is nice but it is horrible for child development to see too much TV or completely wrong movies. For this reason, I'm not very familiar with what's going on there and I rarely even turn it on. Well, I did manage to keep one hobby: watching TV series, except not from TV. Jon Stewart's Daily Show is so much fun that sometimes I feel like I'm more up to date with USA's politics than Estonian.

Perhaps the best hobby that I managed to keep is Xbox games. I was playing the new Prince of Persia when I was waiting to return to the hospital to have a baby and I'm playing the new Prince of Persia now that my baby is learning to walk and talk. The games are completely different. Prince of Persia (2008) was simply so much fun. I recently finished 1000 achievement points there, just to find out it's got a downloadable epilogue! The main character had some nice dialogue and he was bad looking in a good way. In Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, the main character is an ugly dude with disturbingly British accent. Very off-putting. Despite that, I'm on my way to getting all the achievements. I did the toughest one already, now I just have to finish the rest of them.

For the loss of so many hobbies, I compensated by getting a new one: cooking! I love hosting dinner parties and I love baking cakes. I'm not too fond of daily cooking because it's so difficult to think what to give Siiri for breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner. That's a lot of thinking for each day. After all that, I barely have any creativity left, but it's always refreshing to stumble on something new. It's even better to seek out new recipes and prepare them. Just thinking about it makes me want to browse recipes!

And the rest of my free time I hang out with Siiri and try to keep to her schedule. Five meals and a nap is quite a lot. She sure has gotten smart, though. I still tend to think of her as a baby who barely understands anything but this is certainly starting to change. She's learning new words so fast. She only says a few words, perhaps around 10: mommy, daddy, water, milk, whatisthat (mis? misseeon?), whatchadoing (mis teed?), this, bread etc. She recognizes a lot more words. She can even understand simple questions. One time we were outside she was holding a flower. She pointed, I said "flower", we did this a few times. Then she forgot about the flower and was looking at trees and cars when I asked, "Siiri, where is flower?", so she raised her hand and pointed at the flower in her hand, "this!". Another time we were out playing in a sandbox. It was her very first time. I was telling her about sand and rocks and then asked her where rock is, so she picked up a small rock, placed it on her palm and pointed at it! I was just, you know, making conversation. I really didn't think she would learn it so fast and I was surprised to see it.

It's nearly half past 9 in the morning and Siiri is still asleep. She ate breast milk once in the early morning, as usual, and she could wake up any minute now. She always sleeps this long now, sometimes even until 10. I'm wondering if today will be the day that my primary new hobby gets a new upgrade: will today be the day when Siiri learns to walk? Don't get your hopes up - I've been wondering that for over a month now, but this Monday she stood up without any help from her hands and yesterday she made two tiny independent steps when she didn't notice.

By the way, I had my PhD review and I passed. It was decided I had achieved enough during this year that I can go on the the next year of PhD studies. I also finished another version of the article manuscript and perhaps I'll be less busy now. I took a few days off and spent time with Siiri and it was a lot of fun. This week it's just the two of us because Erkki is in Washington, USA, performing at a huge conference.

Morons Slap

2010-05-19T10:26:00.000-07:00

Violence is fun only in movies and video games. In real life, violence only suits criminals and morons. Absurd how many people think that good children can only be raised with physical punishment. Recently there was a lot of public debate about a new law that would forbid hitting children. I was surprised that this debate was very balanced. It almost seemed that some soft idealistic politicians are trying to introduce a stupid new law and then "normal" people are trying to talk sense into them. Politicians say, "With fear and violence you can't raise good people." and then people said, "but if my kid does a bad deed and I can't even punish him, he will turn into a crook!".

Whenever I hear such talk, that children NEED to be physically punished , I get really angry. It is unfortunate that some parents are only able to think that punishing a child involves a leash and a crying and fearful child. If a parent raises their child with a leash, they deserve to get beat up in the street. It's not very different: a stronger person beats up the weaker person for some obscure reason. Okay, I will admit that most of the time parents THINK that they have a good reason for beating their kid, but I'm saying that almost always the reason isn't good enough.

I imagine that there must be an enormously huge reason that gives cause for beating a child. I don't mean that there is cause when a kid behaves very badly one day and breaks something in rage. I mean, if a kid gets caught dissecting a live frog for fun or torturing another human being and laughing maniacally , this could be reason enough to give the kid a punishment to remember. Or perhaps one should consider, what would the beating help?! Perhaps even then it would be better to start visiting a psychiatrist and find a way to help the child before he becomes a serial murderer.

Beating is a harsh punishment and maybe I shouldn't generalize that all physical punishment is the same as violently beating a kid up. Some people say that beating a child is wrong but children are best disciplined with a short strong tap on the wrist. Well, is that okay? Hell no! Imagine your boss in your workplace used this against you. Whenever you break one of his hundred little rules, he slaps you! "I told you not to leave your coffee cup in the sink! *SLAP*". That's just degrading and it's wrong and disrespectful. Then why would it be okay when it involves a small helpless child who is prone to forgetting such little rules? It's much worse because he can't even report you to the police for constant violence.

A friend of mine said that that a lack of physical punishment doesn't necessarily mean that children get a good up-bringing, and that constant mental humiliating would be much worse than an occasional physical punishment. I agree with this. Indeed it is even worse when a parent constantly degrades and belittles their child, "you're so stupid, you can't do anything right, you'll never be anyone important". However, I don't imagine it's possible to pass a law: Don't Be An Asshole Toward Your Children.

I've voiced these opinions in some form before in this same blog, so I hope it doesn't seem repetitive, but in all honesty, this opinion deserves to be voiced again. Anything that's repeated enough times becomes more true. I really wish more people would see this child violence issue like I see it and it's nice to think that this blog post could convince people whose opinion still wavers.

Or perhaps all people who read this blog already agree with me. All the people that have ever mentioned that they have read this blog are way above average smart. I can't really imagine any of them thinking that the only way to discipline their child is by causing them pain. And all the people I have ever discussed this topic with, have said that they are against violence. So who are all those morons who are openly against a law that forbids physical punishment of small helpless children?! It's like with a populist Estonian political party Keskerakond: they get hundreds of thousands of votes each time but when you start asking around, you can't find anyone who voted for them. There are hundreds of thousands of Estonians who think it's okay to beat a helpless child but when you start asking around, no one will admit they share that view.

If you think that it's not "small helpless children" who need a good beating, then consider that big and strong people don't get beat up. People who are subjects of physical punishment are helpless by definition, because if they could help it, they wouldn't get beat up.

I know Siiri is very young and it's usually a bit older children who "need a good beating", but I'm still sure it would take a lot for me to change my views on this issue. Siiri is exactly in the age when she can barely understand the rules but it is impossible to make her understand why she should follow them. Because mommy says so will only help as long as she's in a good mood and very cooperative. In a bad mood she breaks one rule after another - pulls on the curtain, pats the window glass and plays with Xbox game DVD boxes. Sometimes when I'm not well rested I get quite annoyed after a while. It's not easy to tell something again and again and again and again . It sometimes seems like a short tap on the wrist could be much more effective and it would save a lot of effort. What holds me back is the idea how furious I would be if a person I trust and love - my husband - would deliberately hit me to teach me a lesson. I can't imagine him ever doing that, and I don't want my child ever to imagine that I could do that to her.

I'm not sure if that law was passed or not but I really hope it was. Anyway, thanks for listening to the rant and have a nice non-violent day.

Lip Balm for the Win

2010-05-17T12:19:00.001-07:00

Experimenting is nice, even if it is uncontrolled human experiments where the test subject is me. Okay, I knew there can't be too many side effects to experimenting living without a lip balm. Lip balm addiction websites say that if you think you're addicted to lip balm, it's best to live without wearing any lip balm at all. They say that in enough time lips will simply adjust and start to rehydrate themselves. I sure was addicted to lip balm so I tried their suggestion and you know what I found out? It turns out lip balms exist for a good reason!

It's generally well accepted that people with dry skin ought to use skin lotion. People don't talk about letting skin peal off until it learns to rehydrate itself. When I researched chapped lips, I found that good quality websites, like different public medical databases, say that some people constantly have dry lips and that even healthy lips can become dry due to temporary environmental conditions, like dry air, cold air, or excessive sun exposure. Perhaps lip balm should be treated like skin lotion - some people simply have dry lips and they need to apply something to keep lips from getting chapped. The only difference is that there aren't too many skin lotions which are designed to irritate your skin to feel even more dry. Lip balms do just that. Several common lip balm ingredients are RUMORED to irritate lips and thus increase the need to apply lip balm. (I discussed it here: Chapoholic)

When I started this whole self-experimenting, I had something like five or seven lip balms hidden throughout the apartment. One in each bag and in every room. I had to re-apply very often, sometimes every fifteen minutes. Still my lips were so dry that I desperately kept buying lip balms. I even bought one extra nice lip balm that a make-up expert recommended. She said it is very effective and lasts for a long time. She also said that people who buy it usually stop using any other kind of brands. In hindsight, I should have made the conclusion that they stop using other brands because they become addicted to this one, because this conclusion would have been the correct one. This extra nice lip balm cost roughly $20 and when I got home, I discovered that the package stated in very fine print, "do not use when pregnant or breastfeeding" and it contains menthol. This lip balm gives lips a really pretty shine though so I might eventually use it despite the menthol.

The experiment was this: If I stop using lip balm (especially the kind with irritants), will my lips become LESS dry?

So I stopped using lip balm and within a few hours my lips became chapped and aching. They were visibly swollen and very uncomfortable. I only held out for two days until I found a safe ointment that's not specifically meant for lips, so it's guaranteed not to have such ingredients, and it even promotes skin healing. I started applying it in the evenings for overnight treatment. It helped for a few days but not as much as I would have liked. I tried applying olive oil a couple of times because it's all natural and then I tried butter because milk fat is more similar to natural human fat, but neither olive oil nor butter is very good as a lip balm. Then I read that dehydration causes chapped lips so I tried drinking water each time my lips felt dry and it helped a bit but again, not as much as I would have liked. Besides, I still dislike drinking water and it's a struggle to drink even a liter of pure water per day. After a week of semi torture I started became fond of greasy food for all the wrong reasons - after eating it, my lips felt slightly greasy as if I had just applied lip balm.

The most effective method to help my lips was to wash them! My lips felt the most dry when I had eaten something sugary and then licked my lips "clean". It wasn't much better when I left my lips slightly sugary because then it dried and the effect was the same. So in stead of licking my lips, I started to wash them with clean water. This was helpful for a while but once my lips got visibly chapped, water didn't help one bit. My lips were getting so more and more chapped and even my overnight lip treatment wasn't enough to help them heal.

Eventually I said, "Screw it! I have naturally dry lips and I need to use a lip balm!" I researched what are the best alternatives for those evil Blistex and Carmex type addictive lip balms and I found that some people use pure vaseline! They apply it on the lips in the evenings and don't need anything else for the rest of the day. I kept researching and found out about many cases where people got horribly addicted to applying vaseline on their lips. Someone said vaseline is so unnatural it makes lips much less able to rehydrate themselves in the long run. After reading about too many people addicted to it I didn't dare to start using it on my lips daily. The ointment I've been using has vaseline in it so I didn't want to use that anymore either.

Then I read about the ointment Aquaphor by Eucerin. People on the Internet say it's absolutely the best alternative to regular addictive lip balms. I would take that information with a large grain of salt but Eucerin is a pharmacy brand that specializes in making effective yet non-irritating skin products. I went to a pharmacy to buy Aquaphor but even the pharmacy with the best Eucerin selection in Tartu didn't have this product. In stead I bought Eucerin's regular Lip Repair and it's perfect. It's got minimal amount of ingredients and none of the horrible ones I've read about. It's simple and it simply works. I wanted to start with something that's as mellow as possible so I decided not to try Eucerin's Acute Lip balm until I get really desperate.

Result of the experiment: I'm no longer addicted to lip balms... but I can't live without my Lip Repair balm! I only need to moisturize my lips once a day. My lips still get a little dry on occasion but it's not a constant problem anymore. While using a lip balm every 15-30 minutes is definitely an addiction, using it only once a day is called skin care.

Also I learned to avoid licking my lips , I learned that sometimes lips feel more moisturized when rinsed with clean water than they do after applying the wrong lip balm, I learned that all lip balm labels need to be read VERY CAREFULLY. The general rule is, that if it's sold as a lip balm, it will irritate your skin. There are very few exceptions to that rule so be careful or you might end up with lip balm addiction, chapped lips, and half a dozen evil lip balms which only make the problem worse.

Birthday!!!

2010-05-10T13:07:00.001-07:00

It's Siiri's first birthday and I'm sick. I'm suffering from involuntary-bulimia-induced-voluntary-anorexia. In other words, no point in eating anything because it won't stay down anyway. Siiri's also sick, but she was the first to get infected and she seems to be the first one to recover. Erkki is worse off than me because he's a guy. Is it just me or are men just really sensitive to being ill. Oh wait, I think I've read something about it somewhere sometime that women handle flu better than men.

This time even I am so ill that I spend hours during the day just sleeping and I just can't get up. Me and Erkki take turns trying to stay awake and babysit while Siiri is actively crawling around and playing. She hasn't made a full recovery - her appetite is still low and she's making long naps during the day but at least she's not completely apathic like she was a couple of days ago. Siiri really is sweet though. I was lying in bed and Siiri crawled to me, spent ten minutes playing with stuff in my bedside drawer, then took a paper tissue, ripped it in tiny-tiny pieces, stood up and started offering the pieces to me one by one. When I put them on the bedside table, she just picked them up and offered them to me one-by-one again as if was her gift from her to me so I would feel better. Besides, she's been doing her version of hugging a lot in the last couple of days. She comes and rests her head on my arm or my chest. It always makes me smile. It's very therapeutic.

Anyway, Siiri' first birthday is kind of ruined since me and Erkki haven't been that sick in years or maybe even NEVER. I even had a plan of making Siiri a fluffy pink cake. I would have dyed whipped cream with home made beetroot juice and I was even planning to light one candle in the center of the cake. I had a recipe that was baby-safe and I think Siiri would have enjoyed it. We still gave her her first birthday present which was a picture dictionary. It's small, a little bigger than pocket book format, it has lots of picutres and I think it might be useful when she's starting to expand on her vocabulary. Before that, it's just pretty to look at. Quite lame, right? A BOOK! Well, Siiri likes books and she deserved a book that she can "read" as much as she wants. She liked it so much she leaned forward and gave it a nice wet lick. She hadn't done this with a real book yet, only with cardboard baby books.

I might be sick but I'm quite busy this week. I have a practical course: 4-hour days in a lab near my home. The first day was quite difficult to endure - it was mostly a lecture while sitting on really uncomfortable lab chairs. I'm hoping I'll feel better tomorrow.

Happy Birthday, Siiri!

How Time Flies

2010-05-02T14:17:00.000-07:00

It's really been an interesting year. Yes, it's almost been a whole year since Siiri was born. And I've decided to review some of my previous ideas and thoughts to see what's changed and to admit how much of a house hen I've become.

First things first - Any regrets? No. I've been living with an idea that parenting must be minimal effort task. Any parent who says that their child "only sleeps in a moving carriage" or "only falls asleep in the car" has obviously given their children such habits which are time-consuming for the parent and needlessly tiring. Siiri has been a total dream child with no gas pains, good health, decent sleep habits and a happy outlook on life. It's easy to give baby advice when there are hardly any real problems! Still, there were those few months of teething which were horrible for my sleep and there were several times that she had a cold. She didn't take the bottle so I had to be with her whenever she was hungry during the first months of her life. You get the picture. It's all subjective. I say she's a godsend, but someone else might only remember the teething months.

By the way, she got her 8th tooth this week. Teeth are supposed to come in pairs, but she's been crawling around with 7 teeth for three months already and finally her tooth is here. It was getting quite suspicious already. I kept checking on that part of the gum. At first Siiri was resistant but eventually she got used to it and almost showed it to me herself.

Lately it feels like everything that's got nothing to do with children is just same old stuff. Like TV-shows. There's always been some TV-shows and people talk about them but it's become somehow distant for me. Movies are also somehow same stuff over and over again. Don't get me wrong, movies are fun to watch, but they're just so casual. It's as if all the entertainment in the world that used to be an important part of life has now been demoted to the status of being just background to real life. Some of this has become just random noise. Facebook keeps emailing me but I never quite have the time to see what's going on with my account. Yet I always have time for baby-topics forum where people discuss how many layers of clothing do babies need to wear on a drafty day.

In a way I have become distant from life but it's not in the way I expected. When I stay indoors it's because I have chosen to not make plans for the evening. I'm rarely sad and lonely home alone and feeling like I'm missing out on life. It really just depends on the week. Sometimes there's just one plan after another but sometimes nothing really happens and I end up being completely exhausted anyway. Lately I've been increasingly overwhelmed with how much work it is to take care of another person. Erkki has been very busy with work, doing longer hours and even bringing work home with him and involuntarily I have been doing extra hours as a housekeeper and a babysitter. Also, my primary babysitter found a stable position in another home and can only help me out after hours. All this is already resolving itself. Erkki has a vacation coming up and I'm already on the lookout for new babysitter alternatives.

Last week I was mostly just trying to conserve energy while living in Siiri's life pace, preparing for her meals, getting her ready for naps, making sure she's feeling good. It was very exhausting. This week I was rushing to do one thing after another - visiting lab, exercising, shopping, taking the baby out - I even made it to a REAL stand-up comedy show in Tartu and it was AWESOME! Now, after this busy week, I feel alive and full of energy. It seems I'm not really made for quiet family life. Currently laundry is piling up and there's too many toys on the floor but I'm just happy that I got to run around actively. I'd love to take my family to the park or to go traveling with my many children in the distant future, and I even see myself baking a cakes or piles of pancakes, but still I don't see myself using up all my energy to keep my home tidy, kids fed and clean, laundry nicely folded and for the rest of my time, slouching in front of the TV watching soap operas. I tried the low-energy life and it just kept making me have less and less energy. During my more active week Siiri was also well fed but I felt better so I was happier with Siiri which made her happier. Next week I'll aim high: I'll even do the laundry!

So perhaps I am a house hen since I keep talking about how cute Siiri is and about fun stuff that happens here but that's mostly because I just really want to share what a fun experience parenting sometimes is. Yet, I am most definitely a different from the stereotypical soap-opera-watching-candy-munching-fat-house-hen whose life only revolves around her children and soap operas and candy. I'm the kind of house hen that I like to be, nothing more nothing less, and I'm happy with that. No regrets.

Food or Not

2010-04-20T14:24:00.001-07:00

Imagine you're in a strange new place full of curious objects with various textures and smells. How do you decide what's edible and what's not? Well Siiri, in her fresh baby wisdom , has figured out the solution this question: if it's on the floor it's edible!

Siiri likes going treasure hunting for food. When she gets tired of her toys she sometimes crawls to her feeding chair. The floor there is often covered with food crumbs. Siiri is quite a neat eater but still the floor often has something to discover. That's because Siiri makes sure to maintain her secret food stash. Almost like a squirrel hiding nuts in the soil, Siiri casually throws bits and pieces of her food on the floor. Just a couple of days ago she spent minutes eating half a slice of bread and then she asked for the other half. I looked away for a moment and suddenly the bread was gone! "Siiri, what happened to the bread I gave you?". She gave me an innocent look , as if she had never even seen that bread. I went closer and stepped on something - then I saw that she had carefully ripped the bread into inch-by-inch pieces and tossed them all around her feeding chair. I laughed, collected all the pieces and asked her with a smirk if she knew why there's bread on the floor. She stretched out to see the floor and started to giggle.

She has obviously already learned that you reap what you sow because she often finds a moment during her eating time to sow some of her food for future need. I check that part of the floor at least twice a day. I'm usually not that fond of cleaning floors but I need to make sure she doesn't eat any spoiled food. A day old bread is dry and crunchy but otherwise perfectly okay. Even a week old cereal puff is still a cereal puff. However, if she finds anything moist with meat in it that's been kept at room temperature for more than 24 hours she is likely to get food poisoning.

She finds food elsewhere as well. I keep raisins, nuts and dried fruit in a drawer that Siiri can reach. She likes to take out the packages and shake them. I make sure they're all properly sealed and if she does manage to get her hands on any raisins, I simply confiscate them. My babysitter (the one I found on the Internet) is less skilled it seems. I came home and found some nuts and raisins on the floor. She didn't comment any of it but one bag was ripped open seemingly in an attempt to confiscate it. I didn't think much of it. I collected everything in sight and forgot about it. Until later that day. I was cooking and Siiri was free roaming on the floor. I noticed she was quite concentrated and she was eating something. I jumped to her and asked her, "Siiri, what are you eating? Please open your mouth." I pried open her mouth and retrieved one complete hazelnut and another one chewed in pieces and half gone. The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests avoiding peanuts and tree nuts until the child turns 3. Hazelnut is the food that Erkki is most allergic to which means Siiri is in the risk group for also developing an allergy to hazelnuts. I was planning to wait for a LONG-LONG time before I offer any hazelnuts to Siiri but apparently she had other plans.

Obviously, not everything on the floor is what I'd call food. She likes to try anything she gets her hands on, even if it's a lamb wool tuft or a piece of paper tissue. When she finds anything odd she picks it up, shows it to me from across the room and quickly flips it in her mouth. Then she turns around and crawls away as fast as she can while I go after her. I thought she's only eating such things to get me to chase after her so I taught her, "no, don't eat it" and I pointed at the trash she had found and I shook my head. She knows head-shaking means "no". She looked at me, looked at the piece of trash in her hand and shook her head, then gave me another glance, flipped the trash in her mouth and turned around to crawl away as fast as possible.

I only wish she was that adventurous about food when she sits in the feeding chair. In my opinion her menu seems a bit too bland. She likes cereal puffs (Estonian product called "Kamapallid") but she doesn't want them them with milk or yogurt so she eats them plain and dry. She often likes yogurt as well but only plain yogurt. She is suspicious about any new foods that I offer her. Perhaps I should just leave any new foods on the floor for her to discover on her own. Perhaps I would if it wouldn't be so similar to how people feed their dogs!

Although I myself would never try eating random bits from the floor I've heard such behavior is great for the immune system. Bon appetit!

Raising Pink

2010-04-16T12:28:00.000-07:00

I just got back from the movies where I saw Clash of the Titans in 3D. Yes indeed! They finally upgraded one cinema to 3D here. It was a surprise for me. I simply wanted to go to the movies and when I checked the time table, Clash of the Titans was marked as 3D. Well actually I had read that the cinema announced they were going 3D but they announced it on April 1st and I thought it was an unusually cruel April Fools joke. I saw the movie with several friends and when the movie had ended I felt really positive about it. I loved the adventure story, I enjoyed the cast, music was amazingly thrilling, 3D was really cool and I truly enjoyed the fairy-tale-like drama. I mean, it doesn't get much more dramatic than this: Save the princess and defeat the monster! To my surprise, my friends thought it was a really pointless movie with amazing action scenes. It didn't seem at all pointless to me, which could mean two things: first, being a mother and not having time to read the news has really dumbed me down. What seems pointless to others is fun and entertaining to me. Second, it could mean I need to go to the movies more often! Or perhaps, as I just realized, it could simply mean that among my friends, I love drama and fairy tales the most.

In this fairy tale they even had Pegasuses, which is almost as cute as unicorns. I still remember how mesmerised I was when I saw unicorns in Legend (with Tom Cruise). I'm not much of a horse person. Horses eat with their mouth open and they crap where they eat. Normal animals have the decency to dig a hole or at least they move a bit further from where they live but horses just don't care. In that sense, horses are about as cool and amazing as cows! Still, for some reason horses are one of many girly symbols. I would understand talk about the prince who arrive on the horse, but little girls are really interested in the horses themselves. Or better yet, ponies. I used to assume it was peer pressure, until I noticed that Siiri likes horses a lot. She hasn't been around other little girls who are enthusiastic about horses. It's almost as if horses automatically trigger girly "It's so cute, can I keep it?"-response. Siiri also likes pink and anything that glitters. She is extremely fond of glittering tiaras. Siiri seems to be even more girly than I am! I can just imagine a room decorated with pink and fluffy furniture; toy ponies and fairy tale symbolics everywhere.

I recently bought Siiri a new spring outdoors clothing set and it's VERY PINK! When we go out, Siiri is as pink as it gets from head to toe and it suits her so well. Gender-neutral colors just aren't the way to go. With children's clothing the choices are: girly, boyish and ugly. Anything that isn't clearly meant for either boys or girls is a random mix of brown and green. I normally like green and I could have kept buying it for Siiri but lets be honest, green just isn't her color! Pink works with her complexion so much better.

I do understand the entire issue of raising our daughters to be self confident women who stand up for what they deserve in this patriarchal society. I understand that there is a theory about the negative effects fairy tales have on girls and how girls shouldn't be taught to wait for some prince to rescue them. I've even heard that little girls and boys are treated differently from very early age. Girls are treated like small fragile dolls while boys are playfully wrestled with. I do agree that girls should be raised with great self worth, so they do what they like, in stead of what our society tells them to do, and boys should be raised so that they can do (some) girly things if they REALLY want to. The right way to raise gender-unbiased children isn't by dressing our children so that no one can tell what IT is. Girls are still girls and boys are still boys. Dressing a baby as IT might mean that IT gets no gender influenced treatment but my goal isn't to have Siiri treated as some undefined IT.

Also, one thought that always argues in my favor - if we had had a son, would Erkki and all our feministically-inclined friends think it's okay to occasionally dress him up in a pink dress and let her play with dolls? That would be plain freaky! Very sick! Parents who dress their baby son in a pink dress need to get their head examined. Such false gender treatment could lead to an inability to find friends in school. Yet Siiri has worn clothing that is clearly made for boys and she has played with toy cars. How much further do I let it go? Should I also deprive her of fairy tales and little pony figurines? No! Siiri, as a little girl, has a right to as much pink and glitter as she could possibly want.

There must be a way to still raise Siiri to have a high self worth as a female. Perhaps I'll read her the story of Snow White and then later comment on how she married the prince way too fast without even knowing him! Anyway, whats wrong with teaching Siiri that she should never lose hope no matter how bleak life seems? Bad luck can turn into good luck and everything will turn out well in the end.

Roomba Review

2010-04-04T15:12:00.000-07:00

This is a what you've been waiting for, whether you knew it or not. This is what you wish to learn more about, even if you hadn't thought of it before. How many of you have been cleaning your home and thinking, "This is a job even a robot could do. So why isn't there a robot that does it?" In this sense, Roomba is the great dream come true. It's the robot that does your tedious work for you.

When I first saw Roomba, the vacuum-cleaning home robot, I was surprised it was so big. Then I realized it's the smallest vacuum-cleaner I've ever seen, except for the hand held mini-vacuums I've seen on TV. Then Erkki turned it on and I was surprised it was so loud. Again, I must have had some odd illusions about Roomba because it's much quieter than our normal vacuum cleaner. Roomba made cool R2D2 beeping sound (that's the beeping robot in Star Wars) and started to do it's little task of vacuuming all floors. It went on its way in our apartment, from one end of the room to another, making abrupt unexpected turns and moving in annoyingly random patterns.

We knew it would take a long time for it to finish but we didn't expect it to take a couple of hours. Doesn't seem that much now, but I was looking at my watch every 10 minutes, "Roomba STILL hasn't finished!". Finally there was R2D2 beeping again and we rushed to see what Roomba had accomplished. The floor looked cleaner than before but there were several uncleaned blotches covered with crumbs and hair. I was quite disappointed. Until we cleaned and emptied Roomba - it was so full it was hard to believe it had all come from only one room. It looked like the room had never been dusted before. There was so much fallen hair I instinctively started to look for bald spots on my head. Even though Roomba missed some spots it is obviously a much more thorough duster than I am.

I gave it some time until I wrote this review because I wanted to see how Roomba would work over a longer period of time. Now we've had it for 3 months and I'm very satisfied. I've learned that Roomba works best in smaller space. I close it in a room for 20-30 minutes and then turn it off and take it to another room. Roomba is supposed to use it's dock for orientation but I just want it to do it's random movements until the room is clean enough for me. It takes a while to finish the entire apartment but it doesn't require much active time from me. I can play with Siiri in another room while Roomba is working. Siiri called it "oomb-oomb" a couple of times.

Anyone who is worried about the Terminator scenario and robots taking over the world, should just observe Roomba working and they're guaranteed to sleep better at night. Roomba bumps into things, gets lost behind simple pieces of furniture and gets stuck in the most unexpected places. One time it had jammed itself under the dresser and persistently tried to move forward getting more and more jammed. Watching Roomba makes people say things like, "awwwww, don't go there. awww. It's lost again." People treat Roomba like a dumb pet.

All in all, if you give Roomba some borders and enough time, it will do an excellent job. I'm glad we have it.

And I'd like to leave you with this:
Youtube video: Roomba Terminator vs Cat

Shooting and Clubbing

2010-03-21T15:06:00.001-07:00

That's what this week was all about - shooting and clubbing. Except in a really feminine and non-violent way.

I should start with saying that I got a glamour photo session for my birthday. That's a true journey of narcissism and vanity - a perfect gift for a me. I was excited but also scared. Someone will try to make perfect pictures of me. But I'm not perfect. Sure I'm in the best weight I've been in a really long time but I skipped sunbathing last summer so I have the complexion of Snow White. Perhaps it's to my advantage that I stopped dying my hair because I discovered that my real hair color is a nice shade of mocha in the winter. I also wanted everything to be as good as possible so I finally took the time to get a haircut and a facial. When I finally got the nerve to book the photo shoot I started to make effort not to walk into furniture and bruise my legs. A week before the photo shoot I had a silly clumsy second and my arm touched a burning hot over grill, probably leaving a scar for a few months, years or maybe even a lifetime. Great timing, right? I kept trying to ask the photographer how long it's going to last, so I can make arrangements for Siiri, but he always managed to either change the topic of simply ignore that I ever asked.

On Monday I finally had the photo shoot. I got a make-up done, then an outfit was picked out for me and I stood in front of the camera. Two hours had gone by already. Then photographer adjusted his lights and mirrors, and another hour had gone by. On the fourth hour I called Erkki who was already at home ready to relieve our babysitter. We decided it was too close to Siiri's bedtime to bring her out of home for a good-night breastfeeding because she would be too excited to fall asleep afterwards. Me and the photographer discussed which outfits suit me the best. He was really polite and respectful, always making sure he doesn't walk in on me changing outfits. Some clothes I had brought from home, some others were picked by the stylist. I thought there would be a ton of props in the photo shoot but I was just standing on an empty floor in front of a dark screen wearing pretty clothing, fine make-up and a simple fitting hairdo. How many positions can you stand in? Think about it for a moment. Would you still have ideas 5 hours from now? ...Because that's how long it lasted. I got home 7 or 8 hours after my photo shoot started. Siiri got a nice late meal and didn't even wake up to greet me.

I thought Siiri would be pissed. I thought she would cry and scream during the photo shoot and she would be pinching and biting the next day. No, nothing like that. During the day, it was like Monday had never happened. But at night, she suddenly started to have separation anxiety. She woke up very often and cried loudly. When I got to her she was already shaking and scared. It's a normal stage of development but Siiri already had that and got over it. Wednesday I left her with my brother in the morning to go to a lecture and in the evening I left her with her grandparents to go to my twice-weekly Bodycombat class. Again, Siiri was happy and active when I was gone but woke up scared at night. Gotta make it up to her somehow.

My active week continued with a Friday-morning laboratory seminar. I was supposed to have plans to bake a cake with a friend in the afternoon but she couldn't make it, so in stead I proposed, "hey, let's go clubbing in stead! Tonight!". I already had an agreement with Erkki that I can take the night off if I want to. I had no idea what I was going to wear because I hadn't been to a club in such a long time. I didn't even care what I was going to wear because on Friday, with all my unexpected spontaneity, it really did not matter! I picked an outfit half an hour before I went out and I didn't really bother with my hair. Long and loose is pretty and feminine, what more do I need? Club Atlantis had a 90ies summer hits party. In some clubs, like that hipi club Illusion, that means that the DJ simply plays a couple of theme songs every now and then. But in Club Atlantis, it was like a trip back in time. They played all the music that was popular when I had dance parties with my friends. I KNEW those songs. I had danced to them so many times I knew some tunes by heart. I was so full of energy. They announced they've brought hair-stylists to give free 90ies style hairdos and I just knew I had to have it! That's totally in the spirit of my narcissistic and vain week. A little time later I was dancing to Macarena with fluffy nineties hair decorated with funky iron waves. I got home three hours before Siiri woke up to start her day.

You'd think that's quite enough for one week, but actually the "busy day" was only just beginning. We had two parties planned for one day. In the afternoon we took Siiri to her grandparents home and went to the first party. It was with Erkki's colleagues. We tasted rotten shark meat or Hákarl, a delicacy of Island, which was a memorable experience. (See, I can be diplomatic, if I really try! ) We picked up Siiri from Erkki's parents home and went to a friend's birthday party with almost as many children as there were grown-ups. A completely different party during the same day. Siiri had a hard time falling asleep and then staying asleep so we went home a little earlier than I thought.

The week had given me enough chance to feel like a real person that Sunday belonged to Siiri. I spent the morning hugging and crowding her and we went on a wonderful Sunday afternoon walk in the warm March sun. Siiri closed her eyes and enjoyed the warmth of sun on her face. Adorable. We bought her a new a wooden pull-along cat toy because she was running out of age-appropriate toys and her very own mug with Disney princesses on it. I loved such girly stuff when I was young. Yes, it's partly pink. After a day dedicated to her, Siiri went to sleep with a smile on her face and sleeps as well as before Monday's photo shoot.

Pre-Toddler

2010-03-13T12:53:00.000-08:00

Somewhere between 9.5 and 10 months of age, Siiri became a pre-toddler. Technically toddlers can walk. As I understand it, toddlers are the little balls of energy stumbling around on their own feet, climbing over stuff and throwing food. There is no proper link between baby and a toddler. Siiri started out as a baby, then advanced to a big baby with improved mobility and now she is almost everything I'd expect from a toddler.

Siiri has gained the most important skill of all - the ability to communicate what she wants. It came very suddenly. One moment she was simply pointing at things for the heck of it. It was simple entertainment for her. And then she started pointing at things to point my attention to that object. Feeding solids changed the most: in stead of passively being fed, Siiri is actively showing what she wants and when. She'll eat for a while and then she'll purse her lips and point toward her glass of water. She drinks a sip or two and then points toward her plate again.

Sometimes it's not easy to understand what she's trying to tell me so I start checking the options, "Do you want water?". She looks unimpressed and points again. "How about porridge?", again no. "Are you pointing at that banana there?" No, "Or that pear?" No. "But Siiri, there's nothing else in sight. ...I'll get these tissues out the way, maybe I just don't see it." And suddenly she gets really excited, YES YES YES. "What? Tissues?" YES YES YES. "No you can't have paper! You'll try to eat it! I know you!". I hold up a tissue and shake my head before I get them all out of her sight. "Well you can't have a paper tissue, but do you want porridge?". She looks at me, sighs and opens her mouth in expectation of the spoon.

Also, like a toddler, she has become a lot more energetic. She crawls over obstacles, uses anything OR ANYONE in arm's reach to pull herself up and apparently she has discovered that breastfeeding is much more fun when she's upside down. I was wondering when the upside-down phase begins. I had noticed that little children like to do everything in original positions. For 3-year olds sitting on the couch is most fun when dangling upside down over the backrest. And already at 10 months Siiri crawls over my stomach and suddenly stops, just so she can dangle there with a happy smile on her face. No one encourages children to try out creative positions, it's something they start on their own.

We also started potty training! By Estonian standards, some mothers would think, "WHAT?! You didn't start at 6 months?! How lazy you are!" and by USA standards, mothers would think, "WHAT?! Children are incapable of controlling their bladders until they're 3 years old! You are potty training her way too soon!". This is one of those very varied issues with strong opinions in both extremes. Me and Erkki just thought that we will start when the time is right. Well, the time seemed right so we introduced potty. We take it out about once a day and always offer lots of praise when it is used like intended. It's a method of persistent positive reinforcement and so far it's working perfectly. Kate, from a reality show called "Jon & Kate plus 8" used a similar method but she took it a step further. In stead of simply offering praise, she took photos of her children smiling next to a potty, inside was their very first diaper-free crap. Intention was to show her children that it IS a big deal and they should be very proud of themselves. That's the kind of picture the children would never want their future boyfriends to see.

Pfff, Siiri is growing up so fast. Such a stereotypical phrase, right? I actually like it. I love how Siiri points towards her water glass, I love how she shows more and more character and she is growing up to have a wonderfully strong personality. The downside is that I didn't have enough room here to talk about the non-baby topics, like the time on Monday when I casually opened the storage room door and the boiler was leaking like crazy! The light was turned on and even the power light on the boiler was on. GAAH! There was half an inch of water on the floor and our backup computer gadgets were in a cardboard box sitting in water. With Siiri on one arm, I resisted the initial urge to rush in and start saving stuff. I kept thinking, "Electrocution! Panic! DANGEROUS!" and I called Erkki for a voice of quick reason what to do. I put Siiri in her crib and ran to turn off electricity. She was so dumbfounded with the sudden rush she didn't even cry. Then I closed off water to the boiler and started to lift things out of the water. Siiri became restless but I couldn't have her crawling around so I rolled her crib out of the room so she'd have a nice view of me mopping the floor with a towel.

Our landlord is so amazing that we got a new boiler the next morning. The apartment is not damaged and everything returned to normal in no time. Yet I still get an adrenaline rush when I hear water trickling and I can't see the source of the sound.

Virtual Exercise

2010-03-04T14:07:00.000-08:00

I've been bouncing ideas entire week, planning what to write a blog post about. So much to write, so little time to write it... I mean, I have as much time as normally have with Siiri crawling around. Except now I rarely spend my time at the computer since I re-discovered Xbox.

I played Assassin's Creed a while ago and I loved it. There is something inherently cool about being a sneaky cool assassin in a time without any electronics or even proper weaponry. This involves lots of stabbing and running and climbing. I love the freedom and the athletics of it. Except, sadly, there was no story behind all of it. Now they came out with Assassin's Creed 2 and I must say, WOW UBER COOL! It has all the coolness of the first game, and it has a very compelling story. I was so happy with the game that I went and got myself all of the 1000 Achievement Points. I even found every treasure and I did nearly all of the assassination side-quests before I realized I didn't need them for maximum Achievement Point score.

Meanwhile, Siiri practiced her skill of feeding herself. It's not as bad as it sounds. I placed her securely in her feeding chair, fed her anything pureed that I had for her and then placed her finger food in front of her, so she can practice eating without me constantly rushing her on, moving her food around. When I sit beside her I soon find myself micromanaging her meal. I start lifting "favorable" pieces closer to her and "unfavorable" pieces further away. I'm way too fidgety and restless to sit in one place for up to an hour and simply observe without interfering. The solution is to keep an eye on her from a few meters away while climbing up virtual walls and stabbing baddies. Feeding solids just got way more fun.

Solid food issue has somehow resolved itself. Siiri can handle textures so she'll gladly eat purees with meat in them. She also doesn't mind new food and some of the purees she eats are quite tasteless but she still likes them. In our feeding approach it's obligatory to taste everything I offer her but she is still free to choose how much she eats. Sometimes she only takes a couple of bites and decides she doesn't like it one bit. Oddly, she can't stand apples. It's not that she gets any allergic or other kind of reaction. She simply doesn't like the taste of apples. I've tried apples in several variations and all I get is a cautious tasting and a disappointed look, "it's got apples in it, mommy. Couldn't you have made me anything edible?". Fortunately it's now much easier to make it up to her. I give her some rye bread and a slice of pear and she's happy and fed. Later I top it off with breastmilk and she's happily crawling around again.

Yes, at nearly 10 months she still eats breastmilk. Initially I thought I'd stop at 6 months margin but breastfeeding is simply too pleasant to stop. She's so excited, cute and cuddly when she starts to eat. However, I still plan to wean at 12 months so I ought to be making some changes already, perhaps start limiting the number of breastfeedings per day or maybe it would be easier to introduce a meal of bottle milk. I've heard goat milk is easily digested by babies so I might investigate if that's a good alternative to formula milk. I know it's not recommended to very young babies because of a high solute load (probably means it's osmotic pressure is too high, essentially meaning it's too salty) which could lead to dehydration if baby doesn't recieve anything else, but my baby is already eating solids and drinking water as necessary, so it should be okay for her.

As ridiculous as it sounds, I don't like feeding her stuff with obscure list of incredients. I've seen what formula milk is made of and it seems so synthetic that it makes my skin crawl. I know it's just prejudice and baby formula is SUPPOSED TO BE synthetic. After all, it's laboratory-engineered breastmilk. Goat milk, however disgusting, is at least REAL.

Siiri has started learing words again. Our favorite game this week is point-and-tell. She points with her finger and I tell what she's pointing at. And then she tries to repet after me. Unfortunately, everything pronounced by a less than 10 month old baby sound the same: "emme" (english: Mommy). Table = "emme", window = "emme", door = "emme". But there is great progress! Today when Siiri pointed toward lamp, which in Estonian is astonishingly also spelled lamp, Siiri said "emp" or even "amp". Oh, and Daddy is still daddy ("issi"). That's one word she hasn't forgotten.

I MIGHT be getting my cake-mania under control. I haven't baked anything entire week. Oh wait. I made that large apple cake 2 days ago. I mean, uhm, I managed to NOT bake cinnamon rolls today despite the urge to make them. I was such a good girl, it was an amazingly strong temptation to supress. Honestly though, I think the only reason I managed to NOT make cinnamon rolls was because I was fresh our of cinnamon and I would have had to go to the store to get it.

PS! I'm still addicted to lipstick.

Cute Baby Sleeps

2010-02-26T11:07:00.000-08:00

It worked. It really worked! A great new truth to remember: if you want a baby not to assume that she'll be fed at night, then don't feed her at night!

My plan was to prolong the feeding-free time by one hour each night. I started with 4 hours of feeding-free time. That meant we skipped her favourite meal - her 12 o'clock feeding, but it was perfectly manageable because it was only one hour of postponing and shushing. The next night was a bit more difficult. By third day Erkki had developed a new habit. Each evening he asked, "so... No feeding until 5 a.m. today? Oh THAT will be tough." The next morning I breathed out a sigh of relief that everything is still going by plan. As days went by Erkki's prediction of problems ahead started to get hopeful. "If you keep this up, she won't eat AT ALL during the night." Well yes, that's the general plan.

I was persistent and it paid off. Until I got to the final feedings. Starting from 7 a.m. there is a real risk that if Siiri is awake for an entire minute () she might decide she likes being awake. That really tested my skills of getting her back to sleep without feeding. It had been so much easier to just pop in a breast and see baby drift back to sleep. The problem with that was that I couldn't sneak back to bed for the risk of waking her up. So I just took an early morning nap in stead. I had thought if I just don't feed her she won't even wake up at 7 a.m. and I'll get to sleep until morning. I'll be so much better rested without all those nighttime interruptions. However, I overlooked one tiny detail: without all those nighttime interruptions Siiri too was so much better rested and was no longer sleepy after 8 a.m.

After some experimenting, I reached a compromise for us. I feed her at 8 a.m. and she's welcome to stay awake if she wants to. Except I won't. I give her a few toys to play with and I turn off the baby monitor. I can hear distress-crying without it but I can just sleep thought her "entertain me, mommy"-crying. She's fed and safe and I'm happily asleep. She's already getting used to it. Today she played alone for half an hour. I almost went there to take a peek that she's still okay.

A few nights ago Siiri made her all-time sleep record. She had 10 hours of uninterrupted sleep.

I haven't been so well-rested in months. I am almost able to participate in conversations now, without my brain short-circuiting from all that mental strain. My IQ grew a few points overnight. Oh that's why stereotypical mommies are so simpleminded. I can honestly say that for a long time it was really difficult to follow a group discussion. It felt like everyone was talking so fast.

Sidenote... She's been asleep for nearly an hour and she started crying in the other room. I resisted an urge to get up and go check on her. There's a 3-minute rule I read in a book. If I manage to wait for 3 minutes, my baby might actually fall asleep on her own. Even better if I manage 10 minutes because then it's pretty certain she'll just fall asleep. I had no plan. I just sat and listened. It took 20 seconds for her to fall asleep again.

I also managed to write a decent second draft of the article. It kept me busy for a while. I'm almost happy with it. At least now that it hasn't come back all red with corrections and suggestions. I actually managed to read scientific articles. That's certainly a step beyond social conversations when it comes to mental strain.

Baby Update: Siiri weighed 8,61 kg at her 9-month check-up and she's 70 cm in length. There is hardly a surface she won't use to pull herself up. She learned to make careful side-steps while holding on to furniture and she's actively flexing her legs while standing. Her physical development then went to be background and she has started to pay more attention to words again. She doesn't get tired of the game where she points toward the ceiling lamp and I say "lamp". As simple as that. She can play it in every room and even when we're visiting someone else. And today when I was going to the lab for a little while and waved to Siiri, "Bye Siiri, I'll see you in a couple of hours", Siiri stared with a happy expression and suddenly lifted her hand and waved right back at me! Super cute!

No Teeth No Excuses

2010-02-13T15:09:00.000-08:00

I've gone soft. I remember being determined that babies are not supposed to eat at night after 6 months of age. Now Siiri is 9 months old and I still feed her. She does sleep in her own bed but she wakes up every couple of hours to be fed. I'm sure she doesn't need to be fed and I sure as hell don't enjoy getting up at night. So why do I let her walk all over my precious nights? Why do I let her push me further and further into sleep deprivation land where all social life goes to die? Because I'm too lazy to stop her. Or should I say I HAVE BEEN too lazy to stop her?

A few days ago I woke up at 7:45 a.m. at night. Some call it morning. Tell them morning is defined as "the time period between dawn and noon" and sun comes up at 7:52 a.m. which means they're wrong. So I woke up at night in the wrong bed, where I nurse Siiri. I looked at Siiri with tired confusion and a hope of putting her back in her bed. She looked back with lively energy and a hopeful look asking "wanna play?". I quickly offered her food because it usually makes her sleepy. She took a few sips and then looked at me with that after-Christmas-meal stuffed look. Then she quickly rolled away and started to make her way toward the edge of bed. I caught her ankle and shook my head to get my eyes to focus in the same place. I was desperate for more sleep. I tried leaving her to play alone in her bed while I sleep another hour or two but she - surprise-surprise - did not cooperate with that plan.

So I lay in my bed trying to ignore the annoyed complaining coming from the baby monitor. It had been a while since I properly slept in my bed so my pillow felt extra comfortable. I thought, mhhh, there have been too many nights when I barely even get to sleep in my bed because I'm woken up with crying only an hour after I fall asleep and then I go and I try to get baby to fall asleep. I try cradling for a minute at most and then I take the easy way out and i just nurse her back to sleep. It really is a vicious cycle. If I didn't feed her, she might not even wake up and I would get more sleep. But I haven't been getting enough sleep so I'm too tired to do anything but feed her. What would happen if I simply didn't feed her for a little while? Sounds so familiar - wait, I've done that. And it worked!

I remembered Siiri used to sleep so well! And then her sleeping got worse and then I corrected it. And then she slept well again. Rinse and repeat. This is the longest she has had frequent wake-ups. Her sleep has been getting worse ever since teething started at 4 months of age. With nearly every tooth there has been a time when I feed her almost every hour at night. It was so hard to make her feel better any other way and, to be honest, breastfeeding is a really pleasant and relaxing activity. Almost like getting high on happy-hormones without any life-threatening side effects. Teething was a great excuse to let her wake me up and not do anything to correct it. She woke up from pain anyway and I could really make her feel better by offering her food. Babies are creatures of habit - if a baby is fed to sleep at night, at many nights in a row, several times during a night, she will really start to expect her parent to feed her to sleep. Now Siiri is not growing a tooth even though her 8th should be almost here. Now I could be the one keeping her bad habit alive. I only have to stop feeding her and problem is solved.

Right there and then, with Siiri complaining in the background, I decided (AGAIN) that enough is enough and Siiri must be weaned from night-feedings. I made a plan to start postponing her first night meal by one hour each night. Today her no-food time range is from 9 to 3. In a week it will be from 9 to 9. Twelve hours of baby starvation. And after that it must be a helluva good exception for me to feed her between 9 and 9. I'm so excited. If it works, I'll get to go to parties again. My brain will have some processing power. My muscles will get the rest to heal from heavy workouts.

I'll be a fresher and newer me. And perhaps I'll think about anything else besides baby sleep habits and teething.

Chapoholic

2010-02-09T13:37:00.000-08:00

I am completely addicted to chap sticks. I've been using chap sticks frequently since my early teens I guess. In recent years, I have to apply a lip balm several times a day, in the winter sometimes even several times each hour. I have a lip balm in my purse, backpack, baby carrier pocket, desk drawer and bedroom drawer. I had one in my winter coat pocket as well but I used it all up. I've tried every Blistex, Labello, Nivea, ChapStick, SebaMed, and a few others marketed in Estonia today. I've even tried some cheap lip balms without a proper brand name. Still, in the winter the skin on my lips is so dry it peels off!

I researched it a little. There is and isn't such a thing as chap stick addiction. Many people report being dependant on lip balm but medically it's not really an addiction. Usually it's caused by a bad habit of licking one's lips. I don't lick my lips! I've ruled out this cause since forever. When I read about it this time, one website asked, "Now that I mention it, did you lick your lips just now?". At that moment I found myself sucking on my lower lip. BUSTED! I really hadn't thought about it but I do it quite often. Frankly, it does not matter if I wet my lips by pushing out my tongue to touch my lips or by pulling in my lips to touch my tongue. So I do actually lick my lips in this different sort of way. Guilty as charged.

The second thing that I found was that some typical lip balm ingredients CAUSE lips to dry. Menthol, camphor and phenol are thought to be the real culprit in many lip balm addictions. Conspiracy theorists and nature freaks claim that menthol, camphor and phenol are ineffective as lip moisturizers and are added to create the feeling of dry lips. Soon after applying lip balm they feel they need to reapply lip balm. Hence they have to keep using the product. If they try to quit cold turkey their lips get extremely dry and chapped and many people even report having swollen lips soon after they stopped applying lip balm.

Now I'm trying to kick the habit of applying lip balm so often. I keep observing myself so I don't wet my lips and try to use only the best lip balms that I have, hoping it won't have any of those bad ingredients. So far no help. Sometimes I manage two whole hours without applying lip balm but not much longer, except at night.

By the way, did you know there is such a thing as Lip Balm Anonymous! Chap stick addiction is still underestimated. Lip Balm Anonymous website was listed as number 327 in a book called "505 Unbelievably Stupid Web Pages."

Meanwhile, Siiri has learned to pull herself up so fast that she can even do it in her sleep just before she wakes up. Standing in her bed is like a compulsion. She can't NOT pull herself up. It's starting to get in the way of learning to fall asleep. She doesn't seem to realize that standing up is not the best position for falling asleep. Who knew, right? I'm very proud of her for pulling herself up with such ease. Her body is quite solid and still when she's holding balance standing straight. Yet her hands are clutching the bed like her life depends on it. There she stands with a straight body chanting "mmeEmmeEmmeEmmeEmmeEm!" (mmyMommyMommyMom)

Currently she has two bed toys. There's the Worm and Puppy. Worm is very comforting to hold and chew but Puppy is much more huggable. For a while it seemed Puppy will not come even close to how much she likes the Worm but now there might be some toy drama unfolding. Today she was standing in bed busy holding balance. She saw the Worm in her reach. She let go with one hand and grab hold of Worm but then started to lose balance and pulled her hand back, ending up with Worm dangling over the edge. Siiri looked at it and then just let go. Worm fell to the floor with a quiet thump. Siiri was overjoyed and laughed. She ENJOYED seeing Worm fall! Later I had returned the Worm to her bed and what did Siiri do? She carefully pushed Worm between crib bars and watched it fall again and then laughed. I wonder what Worm did to deserve such harsh treatment...

Spamming Theft

2010-02-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

OH MY GOD! My online ME is in danger! Last weekend someone hacked into my email account and sent spam to all my contacts. I don't just mean any email account. I mean THE email account. The one I've had for about a decade. The one I've used when making a personal account in any other website, including Blogger. The one that I use in MSN messenger. This email account is so thoroughly rooted in all my Internet activity that it is practically like my online spirit, my Internet alter ego. Sending out so much spam has got me listed in some email black lists and now several emails that were sent to me bounced back with some comment about untrustworthy recipient. I can still use the email address to log into Blogger, for example. At least Hotmail didn't freeze my account because I got a few new emails today.

It is distressing that THE email address is now unreliable, though. Not to mention it's quite embarrassing to send spam to all those people , including professors, ancient romantic interests, former acquaintances, and all the other people I had gladly forgotten. I really hope no one fell for the "DEAR FRIEND" beginning and I hope no one clicked on that link.

It would be wise to avoid relying on one email account for everything. I have had several other email accounts but I keep forgetting their passwords and then forgetting I even had an account there until it expires. It would be easy if I used one of those (whatchama-call-it) email browsers like Outlook so I could just direct all my emails there but they are all SO UGLY. Like the 90ies exploded all over freeware. Just white boxes and gray edges. Oh I'm sure you can visit options and make it green boxes and blue edges if you want, but in the end it still looks worse than your average beginner web page made by some friendly colorblind highschool geek.

Yet I'm not nearly as freaked out about the entire event as I could be. I wasn't even all that freaked out when I thought Hotmail froze my account and I have to make a new account in every website I use. At first I thought I'm taking it so lightly because I'm mentally in some serene breastfeeding mother's limbo. I have been unusually serene and blissfully calm (most of the time) ever since Siiri was born for which I "blame" breastfeeding hormones. Now I realize my reaction is mostly RELIEF! I'm so calm because I'm relieved!

Think about it this way: I sent all my friends and former friends and all the important and less important acquaintances an email promoting low price "Computers, Televisions,Cell Phones,MP3/MP4 Players,Digital Cameras, Camcorders, Video Games Consoles,GPS and Motorcycles". I COULD have sent them advertising for penis enlargers, xxx-content sites, 50% off breast implants. Or I could have sent them a horrible malware that wipes their computers clean, and not in the good and tidy way. Even those money scams "please send me money so I can give you the millions you inherited" would have been worse. I don't even know how my email account was stolen so it really could have been any random spam. Actually I don't know if I linked everyone to a nasty malware site. I didn't try clicking it.

On other news, Siiri has started to pull herself up. She crawl to a higher obstacle and then just keeps on crawling. Carefully places her hand, then the other one and then tries to pull her knees closer for better balance. Then she carefully places one feet sole to the floor and becomes very wobbly as she tries to get the other sole to the floor and both legs straight. And then she falls down sitting. But sometimes she doesn't fall - she gets a good starting position and manages to get both legs straight with her feet firmly on the ground. She gets really excited with her success and tries to jump up and down, except she CAN'T jump yet. As she tries to flex her knees, her legs get all stiff and start trembling. She can't even sit back down carefully so she lets go with her hands and falls down sitting from quite a high position.

So far I have managed to ease her fall a bit but now she learned that pulling herself up is much easier in her crib. She can simply slide her hands higher and gradually straighten her body. She got an unusual mischievous laugh when she discovered it, as if saying, "What a neat trick! This I have to practice when Mommy's not here to read stories to me". I can already imagine waking up to horrible pain cries and running in to discover that Siiri pulled herself up and then fell head-first into crib bars. I have crib padding but it won't protect her.

Oh well, it appears I'm trying to protect her against the most baby-safe object in out apartment so perhaps I should just forget those over-protecting thoughts.

Meanwhile, during daytime Siiri crawls around this electronics-friendly apartment with barely any doors to stop her and we haven't even begun to turn this place child-safe. It seems it won't be necessary. We'll eliminate some obvious lethal hazards but other than that it's not worth the trouble! An 8-month old baby is perfectly capable of understanding that No means No. We keep a perfectly good laptop on the floor with it's keyboard in Siiri's reach, yet Siiri just sits nearby and plays with boring plastic shapes. No violence or punishing or "quick hand taps" involved. Not even yelling or anger. Simply a lot of persistence with clear serious voice, "No, don't. No, don't. No, don't. No, don't. No, don't. No, don't.". She has a lot of freedom with a few rules she already understands. Lovely smart baby.