Our house

We now own a house!

And all we got was Robert Redford

Neil Gaiman is the U of C's Presidential Fellow of the Arts for the month of April. He's appearing April 19. Too bad it's 2 days before we move. And that I lost my student ID a decade ago.

Column

Ayelet Waldman back in today's Salon. This will go over a little more smoothly than her last article there, which I admired for its honesty, even as other people were slamming it for putting her children in a position for which they might be ridiculed for her mental health. (Damn, I keep forgetting that as soon as a woman becomes a mother, she must give up her own identity. Note to self.) From today, I found this especially interesting:

"The Hamilton College Youth Opinion Poll surveyed graduating high school seniors in 2001 about their attitudes on gay issues. Two-thirds of them supported gay marriage, as compared with only one-third of adults. This generational shift has been consistent over the years, and there is no reason to think that my son and his friends in the open-minded majority won't continue to increase in number. "

I am counting on my generation of Conservative Jews to change, or at least open the discussion, on gay marriage/partnerships. Everyone I know coming out of rabbinical school in the past 10 years supports synagogue sanctioned monogomous relationships; we just have to wait for the older generations of biggots to die out.

One point of contention to Ayelet's article -- sorry, California is not the bluest of blue sates, you have a big Republican governor. That would make Illinois much more blue.

A good Friday

Wow, this is one of the first times I get to take advantage of our Good Friday early close, since typically it's during one of the first two days of Passover that I take off. Whoever put together the Easter tables forgot about Adar II this year -- I guess they'll toss in the extra Christian lunar month next year. Just think of the alternate history if Jesus' last supper had been a megillah reading instead of a seder.

After a very mediocre Purim last night, I finished A Spectacle of Corruption, which was quite frivolous but enjoyable, in that historical fiction way that turns me on. After reading Stephenson's Baroque Cycle, all other novels about that time period pale a bit in adventure and detail. Just picked up Shteyngart's The Russian Debutante's Handbook which, in just the few pages I've read, has already made me laugh aloud on the el five times. It's weird having seen/heard an author before reading his book; I feel as if I were reading the book of a friend.

It's a...

Baby! Eli caved into my persuasive negotiating powers and agreed to look away while the technician checked out the baby's nether regions. He swears he didn't peak, and I held my hand above his glasses to make extra sure. I did ask if it was one or the other and that if everything was ok down there, and the technician said the child had a definite gender and everything was developing just fine. I can put Middlesex back up on the shelf now.

We did have her write the sex in an envelope. She folded it over well so Eli couldn't hold it up to the light and I tamper-proofed it a bit by writing a warning along its seam not to steam open the envelope. It's not that I don't trust Eli...

The technician said that some couples tear open their envelope the second they're in the parking lot, others wait until a nice dinner, others just never open it. I figure we can always change our minds and check, but we can't change our minds and forget, at least not without some very expensive hypnosis. I was joking with a friend last night that if I can't think of a birthday present for Eli, then I'll give him the envelope. Except that we're seeing Joe Jackson on his birthday. Our friend suggested we get Joe to open it on stage. That I wouldn't mind so much because we'd have a great story and maybe some of Joe's talent would influence the baby in utero. Eli is so gung ho I think he is actually writing to Joe's manager right now.

Other than the gender debate, the ultrasound was awesome! We got tons of great pictures, which I'll try to scan in, once I scratch off my SS# from each of them. Everything looks good, is developing right on schedule and all appendages and digits are present. Our little cub was very active and is a big thumb sucker. (Funny, neither Eli nor I sucked our thumbs as babies, but I imagine there's not a whole hell of a lot else to do in my womb. And practicing suckling is a good thing.) We saw it from all angles and checked out all parts. Toward the end of the ultrasound the baby, as if on cue, opened its mouth in what our technician called a yawn, tucked its wee little hand under its chin, and calmed down as if going to sleep. Cutie!

In terms of size, the baby is in the 50th percentile (51.62% to be exact) -- a very average sized baby, which is fine with me. Baby can overachieve in other areas, but I'd prefer it to be quite mediocre in stature. My brother and I were both six pounds and some change, so I'm hoping to keep our cub under seven. Please God!

Half-way mark

We're 50% there! Eli thinks it's going by pretty fast. That's easy for him to say when he can go home and have a beer. It's not necessarily dragging for me, but I have a feeling I will be pretty impatient by the eighth and ninth months. I think a six or seven month gestation would be perfect. Elephants gestate 23 months so I guess I shouldn't complain.

Crime in a Nutshell

I have got to see this exhibit. It's like the Thorne Minature rooms at the Art Institute meets True Crime. Doh! My Art Institute membership expires this month and I promised the telemarketer I was going to renew.

Weekend wrap up

• In the Line of Beauty was a well written novel but ultimately left me cold. I was making progress in Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare but our Amazon order just came in and I will have to start A Spectacle of Corruption at lunch. I am a little miffed that I only recently learned that David Liss had a new book in 2004. I am a freak for fiction set in the early 18th century. Dork.
• We managed to catch up on some movies this weekend, in a feeble attempt to make our Netflix membership break even this month, watching Maria Full of Grace and The Door in the Floor at home on Saturday. On Sunday, we went to the Music Box to see the new film by Eytan Fox, Walk on Water. More on this stupendous film later.
• We also purchased some furniture for our new home. We bought a sofa and 2 chairs for the upstairs and 2 dressers and 2 nightstands to replace the IKEA crap that is already not much better than firewood. (Eli doesn't even think it's worth donating the old dressers and that we ought to just put it out by the dumpster. I am inclined to agree.) The new sofa and chairs are comfortable without being suburban or clubby. I was looking for simple lines and nothing squishy. And square cushions. For some reason I am irritated with sofa cushions that curl around the arms like a puzzle piece. Quadrilaterals only. We will put our existing sofa in the rec room, so the cats can still squash the back cushions with the weight of their lazy bodies, but I wanted more formal, non-cat-conducive furniture upstairs. The new sofa does not have back cushions, just a nice solidly padded back. The sofa will be covered in a fabric called "thyme" although it does not resemble the color of the herb in the least, more of a darkish beige. There are some burgundy and dark blue threads in the sofa so we went out on a limb and ordered wine colored chairs. I am a little nervous. I think it will look good but, after living with a green sofa for a decade, I was keen on neutrals and only neutrals. As part of the new amenable Mila (yeah right), I acquiesced to Eli's instinct that the wine would look great. After all, he compromised his strange suburban love of leather and sectionals (yuck!) for my need for line, line, line! And a sofa which actually gave back support and allowed the bend of my knees to reach the edge of the seat. Screw tall people, I ought to be comfortable in my own home.

Henry James smiling smugly from beyond the grave

This year's Booker prize committee must have been a Henry James admiration shadow organization. I am almost finished with the winner, The Line of Beauty and, even though it is not directly about James as was The Master, another nominee, it is clearly a homage. A homage with lots of gay sex.

I am not disputing that The Line of Beauty is a well-written, well-plotted book. It's just like reading James transported to a modern idiom. If I were a James-nut, perhaps I would hold the novel in higher esteem. As it is, of the nominees, Cloud Atlas was by far the richer, more insightful and funnier book. With many fewer descriptions of cocks.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I enjoy a well-written sex scene, and even a poorly-written one now and again. And I am not a prurient American: I’ll take straight sex, gay sex, weird sex, whatever you want to dish out. But I like it mixed in a bit, not the whole point of the novel.

I exaggerate slightly but I am finding The Line of Beauty rather superficial. I am praying that the main character, Nick Guest, will redeem himself in the final 20 pages but up until now he has just been soaking up the riches of his Tory buddies and external male beauty without a moral compunction, much like another literary Nick, Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby, passively observes the wealthy and trite. On the dust jacket, Edmund White blurbs that this novel is a "harsh but deeply informed social satire from within." Well, sort of, but in a Jamesian "you are corrupted by your wealth but please hand me some more privilege since, God forbid, I couldn't actually work for a living" kind of way. If one seeks harshness about the Thatcher era, read The Winshaw Legacy. Now that's harsh and hilarious.

Nick, who should serve as my point of entry into this world, annoys me as much as all the Torries Hollinghurst satirizes. The author mentions numerous times Nick’s need for love but doesn’t give the reader any more interesting or revealing backup. I mean, we all need some lovin’, so what makes Nick’s need interesting? His gayness? Whoop-de-doo.

To peek or not to peek

In a week from yesterday we go for our 20 week ultrasound. I am very excited, but now I'm not so sure I want to check the baby's privates. I feel so icky about predetermined gender roles (Don't even think about getting my daughter a Barbie! Unless you want it to end up as an object lesson on how to cut and spike a Mohawk.) that I am hesitant about creating preconceived gender notions this early in the game. I have also enjoyed not knowing up until this point and I think another 20 weeks of ignorance would be bliss. It's not like we'd paint the baby room pink or anything, regardless. But Eli really wants to find out. I'm glad I have six more days to decide, but I'm kind of hoping that the baby will feel modest next Thursday and keeps its fetal legs crossed.

Egalitarian Islam?

Calculating baby

People keep asking me if I plan on returning to work after our little squirt is born. Although my official line at work when clients and random people ask (no one in my department or HR has yet) is that I am or I am in the process of deciding, I truly have no plans on returning full time. Since I work in a financial industry, let me show you the math. (Or as my father would say, the arithmetic, since there are no variables or higher functions involved.)

Hypothetically, let's say I make $71,000/year. I am not saying if I earn more or less than that, but it's a good working number. Why? Six figures is a respectable salary but, according to the latest data, women in Illinois make $0.71 per $1.00 that a man makes, for the same work. Not that women overall earn 71% of what men overall do but that, statistically, I am making 71% of what some dude doing the exact same thing makes. (I have reviewed enough payroll budgets to confirm this general gist; I've seen numerous instances in which women with more work experience and better education make significantly less than their male counterpart.)

So, earning $71k:

• About 1/3 ($24,430) to the coffers of Uncle Sam.
• The cost of decent day care in Chicago ranges from about $15,000 to $25,000+. So, $20,000 to day care.
• Right now, I spend about $70/month getting to and from work. Of course, I will still need to shlep little Liffy around but, if the squirt's in day care I'd have to shlep there before work, since Eli gets to work at 7:00, which is way too early to drop the kid off, thus a transfer there and one on the way home or more gas. And I'm going to ignore the rumors of a CTA fare hike. So I'll keep work transportation costs at $70/month, or $840/year.
• Lunches. We waste way too much money on them. We could bring them, but if we're too lazy now imagine how difficult it'll be with a kid and both of us working full time. Those glorious 7 weeks when I was unemployed in 2002 I made Eli lunch every day, like a good little housewife. (It was easy, they were leftovers, but he was the envy of his office.) I know groceries will still cost, but probably only about 30% of what lunches out everyday do. If we each spend about $150/month (that Whole Foods salad bar is daylight robbery!) that would be an annual savings of $2,520.
• Dining out/take out. Yes, I imagine we'll still do some, but I'll be home to cook. If I go back to work we'll probably be too exhausted to make decent meals every night. Conservatively, let's say we'll save $150/month on dining out, or $1,800/year.
• Clothes. I will have to buy a lot more of them and dry clean more frequently if I work. Unlike Eli, I can't go to work in some shmata! We're a pretty conservative, but image-conscious, industry. Although until this whole maternity thing I have restrained myself as of late, I spend a lot of money in clothes. So, let's say I just cut back by $1,000/year. (OK, so I have a habit.)
• Cleaning. You expect us to keep a clean house while chasing after a toddler and working full time?! But do the cats care? They'll keep on shedding and I'll have to rush Eli to the hospital. We would probably have to get a cleaning service in twice a month, at $100 a pop. Savings: $2,400/year.
• Gardening, snow shoveling, miscellaneous house repairs. If I'm home all day and the sink clogs, I can read my repair book and figure it out. Not if I'm wiped out at the end of the day. Just by having someone around to do the dirty work, we'll save at least $125/month, or $1,500/year.
• Diapers. Yes, the kid will have them either way. But right now Eli and I are taking about doing fuzzi bunz, and not just because we can't stop saying their name. But day care facilities only allow disposable diapers. (Squeamish bastards!) Conservatively, the difference between disposable and cloth diapers would be $40/month, or $480/year, let alone the cost to the environment.

After all those deductions, one is not losing $71,000 by leaving full time employment, but only $17,030 (76% less). And this is aside from all the studies that show parents end up spending a lot more money on children in full time day care.

Now, I think every family needs to make their own decision and I am certainly not demonizing anyone who wants to return to work. If I had an emotionally rewarding job in the arts (even for a fraction of the moolah) or cared about a career path, then I would go back and not feel guilty about it. Other than my paycheck and a chance to surf the Internet freely, I can't imagine that raising a child will be any less rewarding than my job. (I got an art history degree for a reason. Someone with a finance degree might drool over my job.) So, personally, I feel we can make up the estimated $17k through Eli booking more freight, my consulting or teaching, or*gasp* living more frugally.

Grrrr

F%&*ing Senate. Now the Steward of Land can drill the Arctic Wildlife Refuge to smithereens. I bet there's not even that much oil up there, the bastards. I was surprised at the number of Republicans who crossed the aisle for the greater good. (McCain, breaking party ranks? There goes his chance in 2008. Karl Rove is opening the file again.) Alas, not enough, since the two Hawaii dems and that f%&*er from Louisiana are eager to let big oil rape our country.

Languages spoken at home

Here are the results of the 2000 Census in languages spoken at home. Very interesting to look up by metropolitan area. In the Chicago metropolitan area, Serbian came in at #18, Serbocroation at #20 and Croatian at #27. If they could all agree on an alphabet and a name, Serbo-Croation would have come in at #12, after Arabic but before Urdu.

Apres le deluge

Friday night, when Eli was at an office party (yes, he does seem to attend an inordinate number of office parties), I finished The Mill on the Floss. It's a good thing he was gone, because I was bawling so much I scared Theo off the bed. An hour later, in the shower, I thought of the ending and sobbed again. Perhaps the pregnancy hormones were kicking in but, man, that George Elliot could yank a heart string. From reading Middlemarch, I wasn't expecting such a tragic ending. It was like reading Thomas Hardy.

Which reminds me of an ongoing debate with a friend, that one either likes Hardy or Trollope, but not both. Perhaps when I am breast-feeding I can polish off a few Trollope novels and reassess him but, from my very limited reading so far, he seems a bit superficial. But so many people I like like him, so I feel I owe him a second date. And he will be a cheap date, as his copyright has run out.

Just started In the Line of Beauty, last year's Booker prize winner. (That's Man Booker to you!) I love a book about the Thatcher era. And I need to read the last few short stories in the New Yorker: one by Aleksander Hemon, with whom I canvassed for Greenpeace over a dozen years ago, and the other by Umberto Ecco, which Tony highly recommends.

Nothing like the real thing

As suspected, Splenda, like its infertility and yeast infection causing cousins, is truly evil. Of course, this website was put up by the Sugar Growers Association, but the article I read in the last issue of the Berkeley Wellness letter I found in my mother's bathroom pretty much confirms that Splenda is much more dangerous than sugar ever could be. (But we must save ourselves the 15 calories of sugar in our coffee but still have it sweet!) I was also interested to learn that Whole Foods refuses to stock any products containing Splenda in its stores.

If April is the cruelist month, March is downright sadistic

I am back from Southern California, where it was warm, sunny and green. It is miserable here, with a sheet of icy snow on the sidewalks.

45% gestated.

Before I went to LA (on business, with some leisure tossed in for good measure) I finished Colm Toibin's The Master. It was well-written but did not make me want to rush to pick up a Henry James novel, which I think should be the end result of any work of fiction about an author. In The Master a few characters are reading George Elliot so I picked up The Mill on the Floss and am almost finished. I am enjoying it as much as Middlemarch, but it is much smaller in its scope. (Middlemarch and Tom Jones are possibly the two most engrossing novels ever.) I may go on a mini-Elliot kick. All those Penguin classics would certainly be more gentle on the pocketbook than novels written in 2004.

Rats and chipmunks

While watching the Oscars I noted that whereas movie stars were once handsome (Cary Grant, Gregory Peck) or manly (John Wayne, Spenser Tracy, Humphrey Bogart) white American male movie stars these days all look like rats. Those that don't have that baby face thing going on and, consequently, look like chipmunks. Leo DiCrappio - rat, Sean Penn - rat or weasel, Ben Affleck - rat, Tom Cruise - rat. Brad Pitt was a chipmunk and is now a rat, sometimes a mangy one. Ethan Hawke - another chipmunk to rat evolution. Tobey McGuire - a very sweet chipmunk.

African-American movie stars do not resemble rodents. Both Jamie Foxx and Don Cheadle are fine looking men. Denzel Washington and Lawrence Fishburne - handsome! Will Smith - adorable! Samuel Jackson - manly. (On another note, is it just me or is Spike Lee's neck getting shorter? His head appeared to have sunk into his body.)

The British fare much better, either excellent actors whose looks (and choppers) are beside the point or handsome in the gamekeeper kind of way, like Clive Owen, or foppish and charming, like Hugh Grant. School boys who don't look like chipmunks.

Back

Just back from Philly and I'm darned lucky, too, since flights into Chicago were canceled due to high winds. Of course, when I called Eli from the airport he said it wasn't windy at all. I did get the only stand-by seat on an early flight, so Lady Luck was smiling on me.