Weekend Addition

Most of you know by now that our little girl, Emily Michelle Clark, was born on Saturday morning. Faithful readers of the Forbidden Donut, however, get special access to the details of our fateful weekend:

Friday Night

• 6:50 p.m. Jared squeals in delight as we make our way into the movie theater for Cars. We battled with whether we should wait until Saturday afternoon and save a few dollars with the matinee, but I was too impatient. Good thing.


• 7:05 p.m. Emily starts kicking Michelle as the movie opens (likely thanks to Sheryl Crow). She seems to have good taste in either movies or music (or both?)


• 8:00 p.m. Nearly all my peanut M&Ms mysteriously disappear from my previously unopened 14 oz bag within an hour. Sheepishly, I take comfort in the fact that I still have 18 bags left.


• 10:00 p.m. With the movie over and Jared down (and realizing I’ve eaten three 14 oz. bags of Peanut M&Ms in the past week) I tell Michelle I’m hoping to play basketball Saturday morning.

Saturday

• 2:00 a.m. Michelle can’t sleep, so she gets up and goes out to the living room. She’s done this the past few nights. Meanwhile I’m regretting having eaten the whole bag of M&Ms. I also realize sadly that Michelle will probably be too tired to let me play basketball a few hours later.


• 2:30 a.m. Michelle comes in the bedroom and says “Aaron, I think I’m in labor.” A few moments of panic overtake me and the thought comes “I’m not ready”. That feeling would give way slightly after a few moments of prayer.


• 3:15 a.m. Yep! She’s having contractions. Three minutes apart?! Michelle calls the doctor, Jared’s sitter arrives, and we try to race gently to the hospital. Michelle curses each and every speed bump we encounter, and I spend the entire drive trying to remember what Cliff Huxtable used to tell his patients about when to come in: was it five minutes apart or two?


• 3:45 a.m. The nurse ushers us into a room, and I try to set up shop – expecting another 18 hour marathon. I’m also really regretting having eaten the whole bag of M&Ms. Michelle is in enough pain that she almost immediately asks for an epidural. This seems to alarm the nurse and sends her into a mild panic. I find this slightly amusing.


• 4:52 a.m. Well that was fast. Two or three pushes and there she was! Emily Michelle Clark, 19 inches, 7 lbs. 13 oz. (i.e. just over 8 bags of M&Ms). Probably the 2nd fastest birth ever since the improbable 30 second labor & delivery at the end of “Saturday’s Warrior”.
  
• 5:05 a.m. The sun hasn’t even come up yet, and I’m wondering if there’s a chance I can swing by a local donut shop for some celebratory donuts.


• 5:15 a.m. For the first time since we picked the name, I remember that awful song on the Book of Mormon Seminary Soundtrack (“Emily, my friend…”). I try to figure out if we’re too far into things to change the name. Ultimately, though, I decide I’ll just pretend like that song never existed – as I try to do with just about anything Michael McLean wrote (and even if he didn’t write that song, it’s the kind of song he probably wishes he’d written). Michelle makes that harder to do by singing the refrain mockingly a few times.


• 6:30 a.m. Basketball starts…without me. Lucky for them I guess.


• 1:30ish p.m. A nurse recommends the cafeteria for lunch, so I put of my urge to find a Carl’s Jr. or something similar. Turns out to be a bad move on my part. I’ve never paid more for worse tasting food (chicken teriyaki and pizza). When I got back to Michelle’s room, the same nurse asked if I found something edible. Feeling like I’d been cheated out of a decent meal (and $9) I couldn’t entirely let things go: “Well, I found something…” I said, as I let my words taper off, noticeably refusing to include the word “edible.” The nurse takes notice and says “Hey…don’t be too harsh. We nurses have to eat there everyday.” I spend the next 15 minutes feeling guilty.


• 3:40 p.m. A quick visit home to send out a mass email with some photos. Can’t…Resist…Peanut…M&Ms. I finish the remaining open bag, secretively enough that Jared has no idea.


• 4:50 p.m. Jared makes his first visit to his baby sister, Emily. He greets her innocently with “Hello, sweetie.” It then quickly becomes apparent that the greatest stress will come from trying to keep Jared from inadvertently injuring Emily with his excessive kindness.
  
• 1:00 a.m.(ish) I elect to spend the night in the hospital with Michelle and Emily, feeling as though it’s the noble thing to do to troop it out with my two girls. I’m very tired. At one point Michelle wakes me to ask me to do something, I get up and look at my little girl and cannot for the life of me remember what I’m supposed to call her. I thereafter decide on the less gallant strategy of ignoring everyone who comes in and out of the room and everything that happens therein (pretending that I am too deep in sleep to notice or be bothered). Cowardly? Yes. The next morning I confess to Michelle, who surprises me by telling me she’d wanted me not to be bothered and to have as good a night’s sleep as possible. Further evidence that I married above my station.

Sunday

• 9:30 a.m. I agonize over whether to make an appearance at Sacrament Meeting and bringing Jared, deciding in the end that I’m too tired to get him ready. I have enough energy, though, to be on the computer on Instant Messenger, giving my 11 year old brother opportunity to chide me for my decision.


• 9:45 a.m. I vow not to eat any Peanut M&Ms today.


• 3:30 p.m. Preliminary indications are Emily is a better sleeper than Jared and even at times is content not to be held!
  
• 3:45 p.m. I give up hope of not eating any M&Ms today and instead decide to find success in having only eaten half a bag.


• 7:00 p.m. Michelle and I enjoy a “celebration dinner” compliments of the hospital that includes Martinelli’s Sparkling Cider. In the end, the cider was the high point of the meal as the meal itself was terribly underwhelming (blasted cafeteria!). Even so, the kindness of the meal and being able to eat it together, alone (with Emily sleeping in her hospital basinet), and as the sun set, made it pleasant.


• 10:45 p.m. Despite agreeing that I’d spent the night at home, I sense that I should stay, though I only have the church clothes I’m wearing. Truly this would be a sacrifice.


• 12:45 a.m. I’m tired, but not enough that I’m not bothered by the constant distractions in the hospital room.


• 1:45 a.m. I realize that, despite trying to sleep in the hospital couch and getting up every 15 minutes, my shirt is not wrinkled in the slightest. I further realize that the shirt is nice enough that I don’t even mind sleeping in it, and that my self-confidence and self-esteem rise dramatically whenever I put it on. How many people can say that about their white dress shirt and at 1:45 a.m.?


• 3:15 a.m. After getting up and trying to go back down for the umpteenth time during the night, my pants split as I try to sit back down. And it’s not even a split at the seam. I try hard to believe that the split has nothing to do with my stash of M&Ms, but the connection is impossible to ignore.


• 3:20 a.m. Michelle agrees that, given the pants, situation, I should go home while there’s less traffic in the halls.


• 3:25 a.m. Our nurse decides its an opportune time to engage us in conversation about living in Boston and having a lawyer husband who is apparently home too much and doesn’t make enough money. She hasn’t seemed to notice my pants though.

Monday

• 9:30 a.m. Jared and I continue the longstanding Clark tradition of bringing the new arrival chocolate milk and donuts for her last day in the hospital. Naturally she didn’t seem to want any, which left more for the two of us.


• 9:35 a.m. Jared also picks out an Elmo balloon from Rip-Off Ralphs that has no price tag. I realize only at the check out counter, after Jared has had time to firmly attach himself to the balloon, that it cost $8.00. I do not even know where to begin in noting how outrageous that price was. (and yes, it bears mentioning that all of the 75% off M&Ms have long since sold out).


• 2:00 p.m. We pack up Emily to head home, but not before Michelle opts to raid the basinet cart for any remaining newborn diapers. She finds an unopened pack, frets for a minute as to whether it’d be wrong to take them, and then stuffs them into our bag. (When asked directly whether I thought it was ok, I only shrug my shoulders, still stinging over the cost of the balloon, and wanting very much for her to take them).


• 2:30 p.m. Michelle, Emily, and I arrive home. Jared and Grandma Arnett are already waiting. On seeing Emily, Jared exclaims “It’s baby Emily, come and play!”

Coming to My Senses

What on Earth am I going to do with 17 lbs. of M&Ms?

Tough Decisions

Jared and I went back to Ralphs today and bought another 12 bags of M&Ms at 75% off, though that’s hardly newsworthy.  What caught us by surprise were that Oreos are on sale this week for 99 cents a bag, with Ralph’s Club Card, limit two (at the regular rip off price of $3.99).  So the dilemma was, if I only get to choose two bags, which Oreos do I choose?

Regular Oreos? The always comforting Original Double Stuf? The Chocolate Double Stuf? Peanut Butter Double Stuf? The Golden “Uh-Oh” Oreos with chocolate filling? Or the Reduced Fat Oreos?

Here was my thinking: Regular Oreos can’t ever compete with original Double Stuf Oreos. I mean, if you’ve only got regular Oreos around, that’s fine (probably even better than fine if you’ve got milk too). But what kind of person would choose regular Oreos over original Double Stuf Oreos? Only a person who is not in love with the filling…and if you’re not in love with the filling, why are you eating Oreos in the first place?

So the original Double Stuf wins over the Regular Oreos.  It also has to trump Reduced Fat Oreos for this reason: If you are going to eat Oreos, I figure I won’t waste time (and lose taste) by going for the Reduced Fat kind.  Fewer calories? Perhaps, but who cares!? You’re eating Oreos for crying out loud! You don’t eat Oreos when you’re trying to lose weight.

Things get a little trickier with the Chocolate Double Stuf and the Peanut Butter Double Stuf, so let’s talk about the Golden “Uh-Oh” Oreos next.  Has anyone actually tried these things? Neither have I.  It’s a risk -- without any of the things I love about the Original Double Stuf Oreos (except that both presumably contain sugar and flour).  I don’t know about you, but I’m not about to risk one of my two potential 99 cent purchases on the wild card “Uh-Oh” Golden Oreos.

That leaves the Chocolate Double Stuf and Peanut Butter Double Stuf.  I’ve had both of these before, back in the day during my finals months in Provo in between college and law school – when they were new and all the rage (I believe there was even a Chocolate/Peanut Butter Mixed Oreo).  They tasted good back then. In fact, too good.  Part of the reason I couldn’t choose either of these is because that last summer in Provo was the summer I ballooned to 310 lbs.  And perhaps my most disturbing memory of that summer is coming home from work for lunch one afternoon, and with reckless abandon eating an entire bag of Peanut Butter Oreos for lunch – with milk.  That singular meal (if it can be called that) will forever typify the pattern of conduct put me at my heaviest, and the Chocolate and Peanut Butter Oreos are unfortunate victims of that stigma.  I’ll likely never purchase those particular cookies again – regardless of price.

So in the end, we took home two bags of Double Stuf Oreos – I’m sure Michelle will be thrilled when she finds out.

Ask and Ye Shall Receive

I have some exciting news.  No, Michelle hasn’t delivered yet (though she’s due Sunday).  This is actually more exciting: I’ve hit the jackpot with Peanut M&Ms!

Last week I made my way to my local Ralphs.  After finding nothing worth investing in on the day old rack, I wandered the isles looking for deals.  Lo and behold, hidden on the bottom shelf at the end of an isle was a treasure trove of “Pirates of the Carribean M&Ms” that apparently have not been selling well! They were at 50% off.

Despite the oddity of having to discount merchandise for a movie that hasn’t even come out yet, I was thrilled.  I ended up buying 4 – 14 oz. bags of Peanut M&Ms last week at an unheard of $1.49 a bag (just about 11 cents an ounce).  The only catch (and the reason why they’re not selling), the M&Ms only come in different shades of yellow.  The M&Ms are titled “Captain’s Gold” also has a picture of Captain Jack Sparrow on the bag. (I would be interested to know if this guy who decided this would be a neat marketing idea still has a job.)  As it turns out, apparently yellow M&Ms don’t sell that well by themselves.  They needed a home, and I wasn’t about to turn them away.

But the heartwarming story doesn’t end there.  I stopped by Ralph’s this evening on my way home from work  to pick up some French bread (for French bread pizza).  I thought I’d check up on my little yellow friends and found, to my great joy, they were now reduced to 75% off!  It took only a moment to decide, and really the only decision was “Do I buy the rest of the box or not?” In the end, I purchased an additional 8 – 14 oz. bags of Peanut M&Ms at an astonishing 74 cents a bag.

These indeed are prosperous times, and I’m sure Jared will be more than happy to share some “Captain’s Gold” with his baby sister when she arrives.  

Stay Away From Molten Lava

Few things have been more disappointing to me in recent memory than Chili’s chocolate molten lava cake.

Last night was supposed to be date night for Michelle & I.  We decided we’d go out for dessert.  We had $10 in gift cards to Chili’s so we thought we might venture over there for one of those delectable, if not normally overpriced, treats on the menu.

Well, things didn’t start well.  We ended up not having a baby sitter for Jared, and then we ended up waiting a little over ½ hour for a table, mingling among those who thought nothing of smoking around a pregnant woman and a two year old.

Ah, but all that melted away when we were seated and given the Chili’s dessert menus, or at least it was supposed to.  We both opted for their signature dessert: chocolate molten lava cake.  The dessert is chocolate cake (with an uncooked? “molten” center), with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top, a hardened chocolate shell, and drizzled chocolate and caramel sauce.

Well, the hardened chocolate shell on the ice cream was good, but that’s about it.  The cake tasted 2nd rate (and who really prefers eating “hot” cake anyway?).  I think I prefer the center of my cake to be cooked too.  The ice cream was nothing spectacular, though the dessert was rich enough to ruin one’s appetite for anything else.  We ate more out of a sense of duty than for pleasure, and spent most of our time there trying to convince ourselves that it was good.  

Not until after we’d left were we brave enough to admit to be completely honest with each other about it. Disappointment is a nice way of describing it.

But not all was lost.  I made a quick stop at the nearby Target immediately afterward to pick up a 14 oz. bag of peanut M&M’s that, as fortune would have it, were on sale for 11 cents cheaper than when I’d last checked.