Week 29 - Polls

I found out Blogger has this thing where you can create your own polls. So beginning this week, I'll put up a new poll every Monday. Check the right hand column for this week's exciting poll! Rock the Vote!!!!!!

Week 29 - A Visit From Auntie Anne

This past week my sister, Anne, visited us from New York for a little Southern California trip. As evidenced by the picture, she has big plans to fool our kids that she is the sole proprietor of the chain of Auntie Anne's pretzel stores enjoyed by millions of hungry mall walking folk across America. Anne plans to attach a pretzel with every gift our kids receive from her. And how disappointed our children will be when they find out the only thing she is sole proprietor of is a bad case of Monster Book* fever.

*QUICK EXPLANATION: When we were kids, I used to torture my sister with this Scholastic monster book about all of the old Universal horror movies. Each page was packed with frightfully good material to scare the soiled diapers out of a younger baby sister. All I would have to say is "mooonnnsterrr booook" and my sister would have a fear seizure. Jolly good fun. Back to the blog...

When we picked up my sister from the airport, I had Lisa cover her stomach with a blanket (actually a painting tarp) so Anne couldn't see the size of Lisa's stomach. At home, I gave Anne some yarn (okay...a lot of yarn) to cut off what she thought would be the correct size of Lisa's belly of life. Now this is how large Lisa is currently:
And this is how large my sister guessed Lisa was (no joke...seriously!):It is with no surprise my sister ended up sleeping on the sofa that night...which actually wasn't bad because that's where she was going to sleep anyways. Funny how life works things out.

For the next few days, we did activities that weren't too hard on Lisa's condition: saw a play at Pasadena, went to see The Simpsons Movie at the Arclight, had breakfast at the Griddle Cafe, and smoked a bong.

And for a baby shower gift, my sister had these t-shirts made for the kids:
Our faces tell the whole story: Where did you buy this, and can we return it?

We got a doctor's appointment this Wednesday morning, so I'll put another post up to tell you how it went!

Week 28 -- Baby Shower #4 & Anniversary #7

This past Saturday, our wonderful friends, Suzy & Jodie, threw us a baby shower (#4!) over at California Canteen. All of my co-worker friends from the good old days were there: Jay, Colleen, Marilyn. And a few could not make it: Kari and Eric. And a few were not invited because through actions of their own, they caused deep hatred in my fragile heart: the guy who didn't know my name so he called me "Bub"; the inebriated crew member who had to be driven home and from afar looked like he was giving oral pleasure to my co-worker; and the crazy producers who had us feng shui the soundstage and the entire, damn production office for good luck although the show got canceled after three months on the air.

It was great to see everyone, and it was like old times again: Suzy had me clean out a hamster cage, and Jay threw a coffee mug across the room after breaking the restaurant's phone. Those truly were the good old days.

Then this past Sunday, it was our seventh wedding anniversary (And to think it only took six years to finally have sex.). We had a nice big breakfast at this coffee shop in Encino, and then had a delicious Hawaiian dinner at Roy's in Woodland Hills. Every year, we buy each other a traditional anniversary gift: This year is what I call the dreaded year of copper and wool. After having misgivings about giving Lisa a sheep with a penny up its ass, I decided upon a bunch of balls of wool yarn because she is trying to learn how to knit. And after doing a little googling, I found out the modern 7th anniversary gift is a desk set. So I got one of those with a clock, pen, and a picture frame large enough for a picture of the twins or a nice backlit glamour shot of me. Pretty decent gifts, no?

And what did Lisa get me? She got me a pair of wool socks and a DVD of "Groundhog Day." Sock, ok. "Groundhog Day", say what?

I'm telling you...pregnancy makes your wife a bit loopy.

(CUE "I GOT YOU BABE" SONG)

I'm telling you...pregnancy makes your wife a bit loopy.

Week 27 -- To Cervix, With Love

We had another doctor's appointment this morning. Today, Lisa had a blood test to check her glucose level to make sure she doesn't have gestational diabetes; we should find out the results in a few days. And just in case she's diabetic, she called Wilford Brimley to get some information about Liberty Medical (man...all that guy talks about is oatmeal and "Cocoon".) Also, the ultrasound showed that the kids are fine and healthy. And Lisa's cervix is still holding up well, so no need for bed rest. The funny thing is that Lisa makes this very distinct face before the doctor exams her cervix. I call it the Cervix Face:Not only is Lisa not accustomed to her larger girth, but neither am I nor inanimate objects. I have occasionally bumped and swung long objects (i.e. wrapping paper, a broom, timber) into Lisa's belly. And in our underground garage, you need to go in between a couple of cars to enter the elevator lobby. Sadly, as Lisa squeezes herself between the cars, she has set off the car alarm many times as her tummy aggressively jostles the side view mirror. That poor Toyota Celica...

Week 27 -- Crazy Mom

My mom is a bit on the goofy side whether it's intentional or not. For instance, years ago my mom was looking for some biker shorts for my sister. She had no idea what size to buy since they're stretch pants. So she goes up to a rather chunky woman also looking at biker shorts to ask what size she wears - just for comparison purposes. The woman tells my mom she wears a medium. My mom responds with a shocked, "YOU wear a MEEEE-DEEE-UM?"

Anyhoo, my sister sent me this picture of my mom:


I know this picture makes it all so obvious, but the balloons my mom bought for our baby shower started to lose its bounce so my mom was going to pop the balloons but decided that the balloons looked like a hat so obviously she got dressed up and put some make up on and had my dad take out his camera to take a picture of her with the balloons on top of her head like a showgirl from some really cheap Vegas production like Cirque du Balloons and had my dad photoshop it with the words "Senior Show Girl" which goes without saying because the picture makes this entire story all so obvious.

Week 27 - Uuh Uuh Uuuuuuh

Week by week, Lisa is becoming more uncomfortable. So much so her most popular word of late is the word "uuh." It's quite the versatile word since it can mean many different things. One "uuh" means she is about to stand up. Two "uuhs" means she is putting on her socks (one "uuh" for each foot). And three or more "uuhs" means she didn't have enough fiber in her diet.

But I think the situation that has the most "uuhs" is getting into bed. One night I was in bed watching television, and here comes Mrs. Kanklekawa walking down the bedroom hall attempting to get into bed.
#1 Uuh - sitting on the edge of bed.
#2 Uuh - getting right leg on bed.
#3 Uuh - getting left leg on bed.
#4 Uuh - lying down.
#5 Uuh - putting glasses on the nightstand.
#6 Uuh - trying to find her mouthguard on the nightstand, but can't see.
#7 Uuh - putting glasses back on to find mouthguard.
#8 Uuh - finds mouthguard and places into mouth.
#9 Uuh - puts glasses back down.
#10 Uuh - reaching to turn off her light.
#11-18 Uuhs - The next "uuh" could be interpreted as one, but I prefer to think of it as a series of 8 quick "uuhs" as she tries to get herself into a comfortable position with various pillows that makes my side of the bed look like the cheap pillow bin at Bed, Bath & Beyond by morning time. I know this sounds like an exaggeration, but it isn't.

And to think there is still eleven weeks left. Uuuuhhhhh...

We have another doctor's appointment this upcoming Wednesday, so I'll be sure to post about it later this week!

Week 26 - Sacramento photos

Here is a link to some photos from Sacramento while on our Northern California tour:

Sacramento Pictures

Not much to report so far this week, but will post towards the end this week with all of our fun cankle activities!!!

Week 25 -- Dirty Uterus

One nice amenity about our new place is that it has a pool. It hasn't been overly hot yet, but Lisa enjoys the water and being in the pool relieves the belly weight. Although I was concerned about the water displacement of the pool, I figured it is much more important for Lisa to feel comfortable. During one of my phone conversations with my mom, I was telling her how Lisa was going to take a dip in the pool. This concerned my mom.
"Is it safe?" asked Linda, my mother.
"Yah, Mom. It's good for pregnant women to be in the pool."
"But is pool clean? Is it safe for babies?"
"...yes, it's clean..."
"I just...well...I don't want her to have dirty...uterus."
At that point, I grimaced. I no longer wanted to talk about the cleanliness of Lisa's uterus. Now if we were talking about her anus or vagina that would've been totally fine. But I draw the line at the uterus.

Besides the uterus conversation, it was been a pretty busy week for us. We're trying to get everything prepared for the babies before the end of the month because I start my next show in August. I told Lisa not to rush because I'm sure the show will be canceled by October, but she still wanted the nursery ready. She chose the color scheme of the room: pastel yellow and pastel blue. She chose the theme of the room: ocean/beach life. She chose new furniture for the room: a bunch of shelves at Ikea. She also chose me to lug all of the furniture upstairs, make all of the furniture, buy paint, prime the furniture, and paint all of the furniture with the new color scheme. I'm slowly realizing I don't have much choice nowadays.

We had another doctor's appointment this week too. The babies looked fine -- still looked like those creepy television images from "The Ring". The size of the kids cannot be more than 15% different otherwise you may need to have an early birth to save both of them; right now the difference between the two of them is 8% so we're totally in the clear. Also, Lisa told the doctor how her belly has been aching because she jumped off the brick stoop at AT&T Park last week. Our knowledgeable doctor gives us a wise look and tells Lisa, "Don't jump." And that's why he gets the big bucks! Why didn't we think of that? Suddenly my solution of having Lisa jump upside down to reverse the pain sounds amateurish at best.

I think I'll try to update the blog on a more regular basis with shorter posts as the weeks go by. If anyone has any suggestions on how to make this blog more interesting let me know! And I totally forgot to post the photos from the Sacramento end of our trip, so I'll post a link tomorrow.

Week 24 - Northern California Edition Part 2

Here's the Sacramento edition of our trip:

Thursday, June 28th - If we're in Sacramento, there's one thing for certain: we will be going to an Indian casino. Today we traveled about 30 minutes outside of Sacramento to the sacred Indian grounds of Cache Creek Casino. Otherwise known to us losing Ichikawas as Cache Crap or Douche Creek. Fortunately nobody lost too much, and my mom actually came back $100 richer. Sadly she didn't win the money gambling, and I feel dirty talking about this. Let's proceed to the next day...

Friday, June 29th - We went to see a matinee of Live Free and Die Hard in Downtown Sacramento. It was a fun popcorn movie, but why in a fairly empty theater did people have to sit in front and back of us? I swear there must've been at least 150 other seats to choose from yet Elderly Couple #1 with their hard candy wrappers sit in front of us, and Elderly Couple #2 with the wife that explains everything to the husband sits behind us.

Later that night, we met up with some of my friends from high school: Koichi and Jennifer. Koichi brought his wife, Janet, and daughter, Ellie, and Jenn brought her husband, Kenny. The interesting thing about Kenny is that we share the same last name, so Jennifer is now an Ichikawa. Anyhoo, we all hung out at Koichi's place after dinner playing poker and Wii. I've got to say I was quite impressed with Lisa's poker game. Her big tell is when she's not too sure what to do, she'll grab her belly in pain, ask for a glass of water, then peek at her opponent's cards as they grab her a drink.

Saturday, June 30th - Today was the Ichikawa family baby shower sans chocolate fountain fiasco. We all met up at this Chinese restaurant named Fortune House. My mom ordered 12 dishes for 10 people. I thought she went overboard, but by gum, people had a healthy appetite! Even my 92 year old grandma was chomping down on the sweet and sour ribs. After dinner, we all went back to my parent's place for presents, desserts and games. As it now seems par for the course, we got plenty of cute clothes for the twins (The twins are still waiting for their 50" LCD television, people!). Dessert was this huge fruit basket cake that my 92 year old diabetic grandma ate as if she was hooked up to an IV of insulin. And it was hilarious to see my entire family play bowling on the Wii. I must note how competitive my mom is with any games. Once my relatives left, my mom wanted to play Wii tennis. She was all over the place! Up, down, left, right. It's as if she was back at Cache Creek trying to make another $100. Oh god. Flashback. Let's proceed to the next day...

Sunday, July 1st - A fairly relaxing day. My parents took us out to lunch at CPK, then did a little window shopping at the local mall. And at night we watched the Marky Mark epic "Shooter" courtesy of Netflix. But the thing that I will remember most about today is this: I had to cut Lisa's toenails! She's getting so large it's difficult for her to bend over now. I don't think I ever cut someone else's toenails before, and it's not a very pleasant experience. In the first place, if I haven't mentioned this before, Lisa's feet are swollen. Secondly, she wears sandals all the time now so her feet are stanky, sweaty, and calloused. Lastly, I have this fear of clipping nail and skin simultaneously. But I was still a trooper and cut all of her toenails. Lisa assured me that other husbands have to do this for their pregnant wives, but I ask you this: What do fat people do? I mean I'm not an expert at the pedicure habits of the overweight, but my casual observations leads me to believe that they cut their own toenails. Have you ever seen a fatty at the beach dragging their rake-like toenails in the sand? Not me! I say Lisa punk'd me. Case closed!

Monday, July 2nd - Last day in Sacramento. I helped my parents clean up the house in the morning, went out to lunch, and then packed the car and returned to LA. Lisa observed an Ichikawa trait as we were saying our good byes: Ichikawas are not big on hugs. Instead of the traditional full contact hugs, Ichikawas basically look like they are dusting dandruff off your shoulder. "Oh you're leaving? Good bye, and let me get that dead scalp skin off..." I suppose Japanese in general aren't the most touchy-feely people in the world, but I guess we're touchy-feely enough to have twins.

All in all, it was a great trip and big thanks to our families and friends! Lisa's still doing great, and our next doctor's appointment is this Thursday. I'll post a link to some pictures from Sacramento in the next day or so.

Week 24 - Northern California Edition Part 1

Currently we are up here in Northern California visiting our respective families. For those of you who do not know where Northern California is, it is just north of Southern California.

Here is a day by day breakdown of what has happened thus far:

Friday, June 22nd: Traveled to Santa Clara. Did several restroom stops due to Lisa's increasingly pressurized bladder (Thar she pees, captain!). We stopped off at a place called Casa de Fruita which I believe translates to Case of Fruit. As I was squeezing some fleshy plumots, this Asian fellow comes up to me and gives me the secret Asian Brotherhood sign: a quick bow followed by three consecutive yelps of "SONY"; I knew this conversation would be safe. At first I thought he was one of my groupies from my musical theater days ("Will you please do the shipoopi dance for me?"), but he was actually a past co-worker from Warner Bros. in the estimating department. Only goes to show you what a small world we live in -- although for us diminutive Japanese folk the world is relatively larger.

Saturday, June 23rd: Today is what Lisa has called "The Worst Baby Shower Ever." Lisa's sister and niece, Susan and Jamie, threw us a baby shower at their place. We got there a little early to help set-up. Lisa put some appetizers into plates. One of which were cantaloupe slices wrapped with prosciutto. As Lisa dry heaved after tasting it, she muttered, "Worst baby shower ever."

Soon, the guests arrived and couldn't tell the difference between the lemonade and the water. You see the water was in this large water jug with a bunch of cut lemons. Therefore people were confused. As Lisa spit out the water she thought was lemonade, she muttered, "Worst baby shower ever."


We all began to eat and play some some baby shower games like the traditional "How Large is Lisa's Belly" (Although I suggested playing "How Large Are Lisa's Cankles" until I realized we wouldn't have enough yarn.). Then came dessert: cupcakes, ice cream, and a chocolate fountain! Unfortunately as Lisa was attempting to chocolate fondue up a strawberry, a small gust of wind came through the backyard and sprayed chocolate liquid all over the place. As Lisa was wiping up chocolate from her crotch, she muttered, "Worst baby shower ever."

Ironically after talking to all of Lisa's family, they thought this was the best baby shower ever because Lisa dry heaved, spit out lemonade, and stained her crotch with simulated poop.


Sunday, June 24th: We drove up to Emeryville to visit my friend, Maureen, who works at Pixar. This evening Pixar had a screening of their new hit film Ratatouille. Time Magazine calls it "amazing", The Wall Street Journal proclaims it "irresistible", and USA Today says it is "delicious fun" (Is that enough of a plug for you, Maureen?)! Since traffic was pretty light, there was plenty of time to walk around and admire their walls of art highlighting their hit movies: Toy Story, Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Monsters Inc. As I dreamily admired the artwork, I realized how much I have in common with Pixar: one hit television show after another! Nick Freno, Movie Stars, Hype, The War at Home. John Lasseter and I are practically twin geniusses...geniuss...genieies. Cross your fingers for Pixar's full-length animated feature of Hangin' With Mr. Cooper (probably voiced by John Ratzenberger).

Monday & Tuesday, June 25th-26th: These two days were basically days to relax and hang out with Lisa's family which is fairly large: they all weigh over 190 pounds each. Actually she has one older sister and four older brothers; Lisa is the "pleasant surprise" baby in the family. One funny story about one of our nephews, Jason. He was in 2nd grade this year, and his teacher asked the class "What type of liquids do you find in containers?" Jason raises his hand and answers "Bud Light." Silly inebriated boy...


Wednesday, June 27th: Today we did a quick day trip to San Francisco. As we were driving to Pier 39 for lunch, Lisa noticed that there was a Giants game at AT&T Park. "Could we please see a game today?" Lisa pleaded. And since I'm just that sort of husband I said, "Shut up. No." And she continued to plead and whine and beg. So I dropped her off at the box office to see if they had tickets; they did and she bought them. I proceeded to find parking for the bargain price of $30 (I left my wallet in San Francisco). After I parked, I went to find Lisa waiting for me in front of the ticket booth. She was sitting on a stoop with her feet dangling about two feet off the ground. I yelled to get her attention, and then she JUMPED to the ground. Suddenly, Lisa's eyes looked Caucasian as the twins made contact with the bottom of her belly. Lisa is fine except for the fact that she pulled her belly muscles. So every time she stands up, she winces a bit and utters a Merv Griffin-like "oooooo." And since this Giants game was unplanned, we were without sunscreen. Sadly, I am very fair-skinned like a beautiful princess sheltered in a castle. So I now have this weird v-shaped sunburn on my chest created by my button-down shirt. As for Lisa, she looks like a raccoon because of her sunglass sunburn (or a Caucasian raccoon when she stands up. "Oooo.").

Here is a link to some photos from our Bay Area trip:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/scottonewa/sets/72157600593504082/detail/

PART 2 OF OUR TRIP: TOMORROW.