Pregnant in the Tropics

We just spent a week in Florida, our last vacation before the baby comes. We felt it was important for Katrina to feel what it's like to be pregnant in 85 degree weather. The panting, the shortness of breath, loss of appetite, dizziness, disorientation. Lets just say she's happy for a February delivery in the frigid northeast. Actually, we have a time share down in Palm Beach. And to all those who've heard me gripe about the "baby fund" we had bought the tickets to go down before we knew about the baby. Her doctor gave us the all clear to fly. Sometimes they don't let you if you're having complications. Plus, if you read the right pamphlets, you can scare yourself into worrying about solar radiation at 41,000 feet.

However, a week before we were due to go we got a call from Palm Beach saying that Hurricane Wilma had screwed them up enough to close down for the next few weeks. Apparently their phones and computers had just come back online and they were frantically calling everyone to let them know and send them elsewhere. The options were: A) Don't come and use your week another time or B) Stay in Orlando. Well, airlines won't let you fly if you're to close to delivery and we really wanted to squeeze in a vacation before our parenting adventures began. So, we were off to Orlando ... well Kissimmee actually, the asshole of Mickey if you will. Now, we've done the whole Disney thing and hadn't planned on going back until we had little ones. So we weren't really sure what we were going to do for a week. The main draw of the time share is that it's right on the beach and all Katrina was looking forward to was doing nothing but relaxing on the sand. But Kissimmee is beachless for at least an hour in each direction. That, and the airlines were so booked into Orlando that we had to keep our original itinerary of flying into Palm Beach -- a 3 hour drive away. The best the plane people could do was move our flight to the earliest going in and the latest going out, to give us more time. Knowing that we'd be in the car for most of this trip, I went ahead and changed our Economy car rental to a Convertible. If we couldn't get tan on the beaches, we'd get tan on the Turnpike.

In the airport, Katrina asked for a pat down instead of going through the metal detector. Luckily, it was easy for the rubber gloved security lass to see that Katrina would have trouble concealing anything. She wears very loose fitting clothes these days. There hasn't been any conclusive studies about metal detectors and pregnant women but they say you can get frisked for peace of mind. The baby didn't seem to mind the cabin pressure and was pretty docile through the whole flight. It was a pretty empty plane because so many people opted to cancel their vacations. We flew Song down which has TV monitors in all the seats and they have an interactive trivia game that you can play against other people on the plane. Since the game only allows 6-letters for a name, I chose Herpes. I kinda liked seeing "Herpes is the Winner!" and "Congratulations Herpes!". I'm sure the other passengers didn't like losing to Herpes.

We got on the road after making a brief detour to see the damage at our time share. They had cleaned a lot of it up by then, but we were surprised to see that the town itself still had no traffic lights in some areas and still lots of work to be done. This hurricane was in mid-October and there still isn't power? Then it was off on our 3-hour tour of Central Florida's really really long and really friggin straight highway system. The speed limit was 70 and there were 30-40 miles stretches without any exits. It was citrus and swamp country. It was the first time I was tempted to drive 100 mph just because I could. I don't think we got above 90 though. We needed the convertible to work all week and it would be pretty stupid to get my unborn child in an accident on a straight road with no other cars. I guess 90 mph can kill you too, but 100 just seemed like the sound barrier and the car would start doing somersaults if the needle got that high.

When we finally got to our multi-building "vacation villa" we found that the room smelled like cigars and headboard had been ripped off the wall and placed on the bed. Like, "in case you need this headboard, I've placed it here for you." That and the rest of the bedroom furniture was pulled away from the wall for some reason. It was basically a 1-bedroom apt. Somehow, I had the foresight not to take the luggage out of the car. Well, I was tired and didn't feel like carrying anything at the moment. But good thing, eh? So we had to drive back to the front desk. "Hee hee, all our rooms are non-smoking. Are you sure you smell smoke?" I suppose the previous NASCAR fans in our room didn't agree with the policy. The only room left was on the ground floor, which lessened our view of the highway but made it easier to unload groceries. One just traipses through the bushes and puts them on the patio. That night Katrina realized how much she missed body pillows.

It's hard to be in the theme parkiest place in the world and not be able to go on rides. Katrina is a big roller coaster fan. One day we met up with my sister, her husband, and their 3 year old at Epcot because we figured it had the least amount of temptation for thrill rides and it had more variety of foods for the pregnant mom. Every ride there moves slowly, or so we had remembered. A lot there had changed. The 30-mintue film in the Universe of Energy about why OIL RULES (brought to you by Exxon) they make you sit through before seeing animatronic dinosaurs was replaced by Ellen Degeneres and Bill Nye Science Guy being goofy and talking about alternative fuels. Then they had a few things that pregnant women couldn't ride. Luckily they have this new system where if you're riding alone, you can cut the line. So when the 3-year old was sleeping we would take turns, sometimes just I would go in, sometimes two of us. But not Katrina. I could see her heart sink a little. I think she was vilified when she saw how green we all got from *urp* Mission: Space! Basically a souped up carnival gravitron but with more movie stars, blinking control panels, and claustrophobia. We knew we were in trouble when they said "Don't look to the left or right or you will become disoriented." My constitution has clearly become more vulnerable to G-forces. It was the first ride I had ever been on that screwed me up for pretty much the rest of the day. I felt like I was in my first trimester! Queasy, headache, the slightest movement (even the mild pool current later that night) making it worse.

We took it pretty easy the rest of the week. Everywhere seemed to be "Festivals" which I think places do to try and get people to come down during the slow season. What is Oktoberfest anyway, other than a way to get people to go to Germany in a lame time of year? It wasn't easy finding palatable food. Everything was fried or steak or fried steak. Katrina can't have most fish they serve down there. She loves Grouper and Mahi but wasn't allowed to have that either. The closest she has come to alcohol during her entire pregnancy was at a Fondue place where they put wine in the boiling broths & cheeses. But we had our beach day, though I made Katrina cover her belly with a towel so the baby wouldn't bake. We had our coral reef snorkeling day (salt water enclosure, not the ocean) at Discovery Cove, we got splashed by Shamu, and took a gander and old NASA rockets. But 7 days and 3 tanks of gas later we headed back home.

Overall I'd say Katrina did fairly well. There were some bouts where being an August baby herself made her say, "How the hell did my mom do this in the summer?" But we walked slowly, occasionally put the top up on the car when she would get overheated, and had lots of bottles of water at the ready. We're coming up on the Third Trimester soon and Katrina won't even need a coat to go outside, I'm told. Next year, we'd ideally like to take the baby to Palm Beach but we'll see. Watch, there'll be a Hurricane Alina now. Did I mention we picked her name?