Week 20 - Halfway There!

Its Week 20 and I'm feelin' kinda funny!

I'm also rhyming a lot, just like Muhammad Ali! Didn't you notice?

Its a time to celebrate, ladies and gents. Word around the womb is that I'm halfway done with serving my sentence in here. Another 20 weeks and I'll make my great escape. I got a few good ideas from daddy when he was watching "Escape from Alcatraz" on TV. That combined with my superior baby intellect might even get me out of here a few weeks early. Who knows?

As long as I get out of here in time to watch all of the BCS bowl games, I'll be one happy little baby. Besides, I'm tired of marking the days on my cell wall in here. Yeah, if you think that feels funny mom, just wait until I start writing my NAME in here! Or better yet, recreating some impressionist painting. You'll call it "kicking", but I'LL call it "slow mommy torture".

And if that isn't enough I'll kick you in the bladder again.

But enough about my scribbling on walls, lets get the Baby Tale of the Tape outta the way so we can get onto more interesting stuff. I'm up to 6.5" "tall" on that moronic doctor's "crown to rump" measuring system. However if you want to see how I stack up when measured like a NORMAL PERSON, I'm right at about 10", maybe a little taller depending on if I'm wearing my running shoes or not. Oh yeah, don't think for a second that I'm not taking advantage of this little bit of extra space while I have the chance. I run laps around that fat-tub-o-lard Placenta every day.

Again, mommy calls that "kicking". But what does SHE know? She calls everything I do "kicking". Hey mom, when I'm finally born and I cut loose with my first soiled diaper of the season, are you gonna call that "kicking" too? Because I'm gonna "kick" quite often. I'm talking several times a day. And it won't be pleasant. Better bring a gas mask for all that "kicking". And a little magazine for me to read.

I've put on more weight this week, despite all of my running. I'm blaming it on the fact that my bones are hardening. According to my baby calculations, I should go from regular bones to stainless steel armor in another 6-8 weeks. That's how it works, right? It only seems natural for a progression like that to occur. Anyways, check out this fun little fact - I'm quadrupled my body weight in the last 4 weeks. Pretty cool trick huh? If you're not impressed, then YOU do it in 4 weeks! So lets can all of the "fat baby" remarks. I'm GROWING, what's YOUR excuse?

On a whim, I checked a website and it said that I'm supposed to be 1/8th of my final body weight right now. So I did some simple baby math using my fingers and toes and based on THEIR calculation I'd be in the 5-6 pound range at birth. HA! Fat chance of that happening. They didn't take into account the "Joiner Factor" which clearly states that anyone in this family must eat tons of BBQ and fried chicken. That ALONE will put me up in the 8 or 9 pound range, maybe even 10 pounds! Yep, right where mom doesn't want me to be. Get ready for a lifetime of Baby Rebellion mama! It begins today!

News from the Womb is a little slow this week, but I do have a couple other things to tell you about. I'm swallowing a lot more often now. That'll give my itty bitty digestive system practice with tearing through things. First simple fluids, but once I bust out of here, I want nachos! And pizza, fried chicken, and BBQ. Not all at the same time though. What do you think I am, some kind of wierdo?

The BEST part of all of the digesting I'm doing is that I'm generating a lot of.....uh....well, the scientific term for it is "meconium". But you'd probably know it better by the street name, "baby poop". TRUST me, I'm building up quite a supply for that first little present to mommy and daddy.

If mommy and daddy weren't such tightwads and threw down a few bucks for a 3D-4D ultrasound, you could probably even see my eyelashes and eyebrows which are now easy to see. I don't really see a use for them just yet, but that's not the point. You could SEE THEM RIGHT NOW if they got an ultrasound! Tell mom and dad to quit being cheap and get one of these things done. I've gotta expand my portfolio so that everyone will know just HOW good looking I really am. Right now all they can see is an old ultrasound pic that looks like a wild weather system.

Oh, did you know that it takes 1-2 hours for the food that mommy eats to get all the way down to l'il ol' me? I'm not sure if this is the way its SUPPOSED to be, or if she's holding back and savoring the flavor before passing it on to me. Don't laugh, its true! The stuff I'm getting through my baby "food tube" umbilical cord is horrible! How bad does it taste, you ask? It tastes like food that's already been eaten, genius! Try choking some of THAT down and get back to me on what you think of the taste. So yeah, this is another thing that mommy is doing to make my stay in "baby prison" as unpleasant as possible. I think its supposed to be motivation for me to break outta here. Curse you woman! Just for that I'm going to eat everything in sight and I'll be 10 pounds for SURE when I get outta here. Large and in charge, that'll be me.

Okay, two more things I've gotta get off my waxy, gooey baby chest before we get to the names of the week, and they all involve VOTING! That's right - I need your input on a few different things. First off, you've only got a few more days to guess/vote on whether you think I'm a boy or a girl. That poll is over on the right side of the page with the rest of them. Go ahead, take your best guess! Last time I checked, a majority of you think I'm a boy, but you won't know for sure until Tuesday! So guess and see how you'll do in predicting things!

Next up, I have a tech-question for everyone. See, there's this new thing called "Twitter" that people are talking about. Mommy and daddy don't really understand it at all, but hey what else is new? These two aren't the most tech-savvy people on the planet. I bet I'll be the one teaching them things before my first birthday! Anyways, Placenta said that I should start to give Twitter updates throughout the week because some people that follow my baby blog just don't get enough from my once a week rants. (To these people, I say two words - CHILL THE HECK OUT!) Now normally I wouldn't take ANYTHING that Placenta says seriously, but it wasn't a BAD idea.

So I'll leave it up to a majority vote. You'll have a week to vote on whether or not you want Baby Joiner updates via twitter in ADDITION to the blog. Trust me, the blog ain't going nowhere. I can rant on this thing as long as I please and there's no WAY I'm giving that up for some dumb twitter thing. Vote with the rest of the stuff over on the right side of the screen.

And finally, we come to everyone's favorite part, the baby names of the week! Notice that I haven't really badmouthed daddy very much at all in this week's blog. Well the reason for that is that I was saving it all for the end. Why is HE allowed to name things? This guy shouldn't be allowed to name a BOAT, much less a person! His boy name of the week was "Trigger Pull Joiner". Yeah, Trigger Joiner. Are you kidding me? This man comes up with worse names for his kids than that Sarah Palin chick, who was naming her kids things like "outhouse", "recycle", and "slurpee"! The girl name was no better - this week's suggestion was "Missing Appendages Joiner", in the hope that would keep the guys away, at least through high school. Lord help me, the man's as smart as a bag o' hammers.

So forget those - let's talk MOM names. At least she tries!

This week the boy name is "Anthony William Joiner" and the girl name is "Heather Lynn Joiner". Like one? Both? Neither? Vote in this poll along with the rest on the right side of the page. By doing so, you're taking part in baby history!

Keep on stalkin'! I'll post a quick update on Tuesday to let you guys know if I'm a boy or a girl. Then expect a full blog-tastic update on friday!
-Baby Joiner