Onwards and upwards

I'm not giving away any secrets by saying that it's New Years Eve.

Days like this always make me a bit nervous. Last days. Last days at a job, last days of a holiday, even bloody Sundays leave me feeling a bit odd at this stage.

Although, that could be the hangovers.

It's really been the fastest year ever, and at times the most excruciatingly slow one.

I look through the blogs I read and I see such an eventful year has passed, some in good ways, and some in not so good ways. Births, deaths, traumatic times, and upheavals.

In all that time, with all that has gone on out there, you keep coming back here. That is humbling, exciting, and not to mention a tad creepy. I jest of course, it's truly encouraging.

This whole thing was not part of any plan, but has turned out to be a very nice distraction along the way.

In the course of 2008, you lot have dropped about six and a half thousand comments here. Some of you just once, others religiously.

I have no idea how many of you read silently. I'd love if you commented just the once, so I could say hello, welcome, and thanks.

Considering that this is just one story, a very simple one, and very repetitive one, I am very, very grateful for all of your input, reassurance, kindness, and something I would have never said was possible, friendship.

At risk of repeating once again, today, New Year's Eve, is CD25. Our best guess is that Saturday, the end of the cycle is due, and we start again. Or, the end doesn't come, and, well, you know the rest...

For those on this side of this messy carry-on I can only say 'heads up', next year could be the one, we can only hope.

For those on the other side of it, I say 'Enjoy it', you've earned it.

For everyone else, I know your own plates are full with troubles off all kinds, so I wish you all the very best for the year to come.

Thank you.

The gift

"It's just what I always wanted!" she cried, tossing the wrapping paper to the floor and wrapping her arms around my neck.

"But it means so much to you, I don't know if I can accept it" she said, the glistening Christmas tree lights reflecting in her watery eyes

"For you, pet, anything" I replied. "It's served me well, and now I think you should have it, you deserve it"

"Wow" ET breathed in disbelief reaching for a tissue, "No one's ever given me a man cold for Christmas before"

"Well you do know" I responded, "That it isn't quite as serious as a man cold now that you've got it"

"Oh, really?"

"Yes, really. Now crack open another bottle like a darling will you?"

The secret

As Christmas eve wraps itself around us (a foggy one too, just like the song), I get drawn into thinking about all the magical and mystical and amazing stories we hear that happen at Christmas.

Unless you've just tuned in, or have incurred a severe head injury of late, you may know we are holding out for one of those wee Christmas miracles of our own. (Although, if we have to wait for the January sales to get 20% off, then how bad eh?)

With all this festive reflection, I have realised something that has eluded me my whole life.

I can't be sure if it was for my own good, or the good of the planet, or the good the season, or the good of all the children of the world, but it was kept from me all this time, and now I know.

Santa Claus is real, and I am he.

Yes, it's true.

'Idiot!' I hear you cry, 'Drunken arse!' I hear you yell, but no! if you look at the evidence, it is as obvious as the face of the virgin Mary in my scrambled egg.

-Who lives alone with his wife with no children that we know of?

-Who finishes his nightly adventures all breathless, exhausted, and red of face?

-Who seems to be engaging in the same futile exercise over, and over, and over, and over?

-Who can be heard yelling about Hos and cracking whips into the night sky?

-Who is guided solely by the throbbing red extremity of his favourite personal beast?

-Who spends his evenings squeezing up and down in, before finally shooting off up, a tight dark space?

-Who has been obsessed this week with delivering the contents of his sack to exactly the right place at precisely the right time?

No question is there?

Now you know.

Sleep well kiddies, I'm on the case.

A very happy oh-shit-I-forgot-the-AA-batteries-and-everywhere-is-shut day to you all.

Romance isn't dead, it has the flu

It's been quite the interesting weekend.

Not so much interesting in the 'oh how unusual, delightful, or interesting that is' kind of way, but more in the 'sweet lord is that meant to happen?' kind of way.

If a child proves to have been conceived in this cycle, I may just offer it, or myself, to a passing circus.

We had a slight dilemma. I drifted into a man cold induced hallucinogenic coma while ET drifted into a state of ripeness.

She was ready for plucking, I was fit for burial.

There was no option, no choice, no way we were going to miss the window of opportunity this month. So even in my demented state, I decreed to put my wife to the sword.

Ladies, you haven't known true pleasure until you've been clambered upon by a fever laden sweaty man, wheezing upon every thrust of passion.

You haven't been caressed in every way that a woman should, until you've felt the tickle and trickle from a runny nose on the nape of your neck.

Never before have you heard a true groan of pleasure until you've heard your man collapse beside you grasping his own aching flu ridden hips.

Don't be fooled into thinking that the physical and mental delights were not just gifted to my good wife this weekend, I too experienced wondrous moments.

Gentlemen, never will you experience such a boost to your manhood, such an indication of your prowess, such an ego lift and sign of encouragement, as when at the moment you finally deliver your 'finest', you hear the words "oh thank God".

Only three, or four, or five days to go....

Pathetic or sympathetic?

We've all heard of funny stories about men having sympathetic pregnancies.
This is of course, where they display similar symptoms as their partners.

Well, I don’t know why I should be surprised, but I believe I've taken this sympathetic symptom thing to a whole new extreme.

I believe I am suffering from a sympathetic ovulation.

My temperature has soared and I have mucous free flowing out of me.

Granted, my temperature is somewhere around eyebrow singeing temperature and the mucous is coming from my upper body and not my lower. (Although, that is hardly surprising seeing as I don't actually have a willy warmer to ooze from.)

So while the maggoty OPKs refuse to co-operate, (possibly a faulty batch,) it seems that ET is ovulating and I've joined in for the hell of it.

There is another possibility, so dark, desperate, and chilling to imagine, I am afraid to speak it's name.

Man cold.

Has our world ever heard tell of seed of man taking root and flourishing during a period of such great evil?

Infertile carol singing

In the first month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
A good old shag, contraception free.

In the second month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the third month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the fourth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the fifth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the sixth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the seventh month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the eighth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the ninth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the tenth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Ten days of constant knicker checks,
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the eleventh month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Eleven months of charting BBT,
Ten days of constant knicker checks,
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the twelfth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Twelve more months to do it all again!
Eleven months of charting BBT,
Ten days of constant knicker checks,
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free!



(bite me Maxi...Not Always Safe For Work)

Two little ducks

I'm going out on a limb and hoping everyone is a bingo call expert, otherwise 'two little ducks' will mean nothing to you.

Two little ducks is the number twenty two. Picture it, see?.

Anyway, here we are again, cycle twentyfeckingtwo and CD09.

I'm not quite sure why I thought it would be otherwise, but Christmas markets are not the best place to visit to take your mind off of that wee minor issue of childlessness and a long and lonely existence stretching out in front of you.

Relax, I'm being facetious. I'm allowed, but I am glad it's over.

It's time for another week or more, of ET pissing on thermometers and shoving OPKs into her gob. Or vice versa, whatever works.

The battery is feeling a little bit flat this time. More so than in a long time. While technically the mechanics will operate as they should, it's better to be looking forward to it.

Hopefully it's just a temporary thing and I'll be (s)laying ET with stallionesque prowess before you can say 'droop'.

So here we go again, one more time into the big bad world of trying to conceive.

Not a certainty in sight, but we'll go anyway, waddling off, two little ducks.

Subfertile sarcastic Christmas donkeys

Wednesday we were back at the specialist for a post operation check up.

Everything is just dandy! isn't that fantastic?

(Give me a few moments to scrub the oozing sarcasm from my useless torso.)

Apparently, we are subfertile, not infertile, which was positively delightful to learn.

I've started to notice the difference already.

What?...don't tell me you can't see the family simply sprouting up around us as I type these very words!

The previously dangled carrot of an IUI in January or February has been ushered further along ahead of us, the pair of fine subfertile donkeys that we are.

We go back in March now, when we can discuss it. Ironically, the appointment which falls on March 11th, will take place just after the end of cycle 24.

This is of course, the magic two year mark when Dutch medical professionals emerge from their cocoons made from pushed paper and recited statistics, and bloom into magic weaving and baby-dust sprinkling butterflies.

Moving along from one donkey display to another, tell me, what do sensible people do?

What do they do if they've had a lousy week, and are facing into Christmas and the end of another year fruitless and weary, and recoiling from the thought of seasonal festivities?

They stay home, rest and relax, shut the world out, and take refuge as much as is possible, don't they?

Now tell me what do stupid people do?

Stupid people forget that they have a long standing arrangement to go and visit with friends in Dusseldorf this weekend, home to the huge Christmas bloody market.

This evening we will drive with some friends to Dusseldorf, Germany to engage in 'festivities'.

Fake snow, fake Santas, fake chestnuts roasting on fake fires, fake trees, and fake elves.

Fake smiles.

Real alcohol though.

It walks like a duck, and talks like a duck, but...

This may give you cause to gasp and clutch at your pearls, but here goes, I'm no John Wayne.

I have many manly moments, mostly involving beer, or football, or breasts, or a glorious combination of all of the above, but I don't really ooze testosterone.

This never really bothered me, there is always someone bigger, or stronger, or faster than you, no matter who you are.

In the beginning of our attempts to conceive, I was quite accepting of the possibility that there could be a problem, and relaxed about what I thought that might mean.

It seems I hadn't thought long and hard enough. I can't get ET pregnant. Twenty one cycles negate any need to dispute that.

Mojo, virility, potency, whatever you want to call it, it's missing, or at best, knackered.

How does a thirty-one year old man like me stand among his peers and not feel, at least a little, inadequate?

This isn't a sexual issue, thank Thor for small mercies, although I wonder does that make it even worse?

Everything works, yet doesn't. Plenty bow-chika-wow-wow, but no bite.

I look at younger guys with their kids, boys that are barely half my age, but they have 'proven' their manhood for all the world to see.

I'm jealous.

Jealous of what they have done, what that makes them as men, and by contrast what that must make me.

I listen to scandalous home town gossip of how some 12 or 13 year old has become a father after a fumble that went too far, and I cringe.

Where previously, I would have been cringing for the situation from my social viewpoint, now I cringe because it reminds me yet again of where I fall fundamentally short.

What I'm not able to do, despite my experience, intent, or tactic.

Yes, there are medical ways around these obstacles, be they on the male or the female side, and ultimately, success in that regard should dissolve any of this self doubt. I can technically impregnate, by all accounts, but I still feel like a dud.

It's almost come to the point where it doesn't matter where the biological issues lie, a real man would be able to knock up any woman, right?

I know this is pithy, has no small amount of self pity, maybe even pathetic, but nevertheless it's just how it is.

Waddle, waddle. Quack, quack.

Am I nuts?

Insert witty and moving title here

So yeah, 4 days eh?

Maybe not. 3 was enough.

You all know how this goes by now, and I really haven't got the energy, so you can fill in your own entry.

[Insert witty euphemism for ET having gotten her period a day early here]

Another one bites the dust, another up, another down, another maybe next f*#^ing time.

[Insert just the right words to say how ridiculously hard this is, and how utterly spent we feel, here]

Again, no doubt, we'll mope for a bit, and start again. Hopeful, rightly or wrongly.

[Insert rousing statement of how even though we feel like we've missed the last train and there's no other way to get home, we'll button up our coats and start walking in that direction anyway, as far as it may be, here]

Weary and sad, and no longer looking forward to the next few weeks like we should have been.

[Insert thoughtful closing statement about life and not getting a chance you deserve here]

4 Days

Today is CD24. You know what that means, give or take.

4 days.

In between talking complete rubbish about offering menstrual blood to pizza delivery folk, and dragging my samples of vomit covered office wear around to various fashion buyers, something has struck me.

4 days.

Like being at a party where everybody is talking to somebody, or dancing like a wally, or pouring more drinks for everyone, and then suddenly someone turns the volume dial on the stereo to zero. Silence.

4 days.

Tomorrow is Friday, followed unsurprisingly, by the weekend. They all tend to pass quite fast these days, but this time, when it does, it will be up. It.

4 days.

I seems like years since we've been able to try due to the operation, and now all of a sudden the trying is done and the reproductive jury are retiring to consider their verdict.

4 days.

After ET's operation, we were given probably 3 attempts to change the status of one the few remaining unknocked up Irish Catholic women on the planet by natural means. After this, the doctor says we move on to less romantic methods. Strike one will be called soon.

4 days.

In one scenario, we get to prepare for the coming Christmas incessantly jibbering like the bloody Gilmore girls, excited and nervous, wrapping our heads around what's ahead, but all the while ridiculously, irritatingly, and probably sickeningly, happy.

In the other scenario, we prepare for just another holiday, another reminder, with yet another 'hard luck, do play again'.

4 days.

Everything that's happened before this aside, this is a real chance. It's probably the biggest one, and the one we can have the most genuine hope for, and be most optimistic about, for over a year. Thanks to the laparoscopy, this can actually, really, physically, mindbendingly, and absurdly be the one.

4 days.

Seriously, God, or Krisha, or Justin Timberlake, or Yaweh, or big bird, or whatever you call yourself, we get the joke. It was really funny, we all laughed and poked fun at the short, pale, over-sexed and under-pregnant couple.

Can we stop now though, please?

I don't want to sound pushy or demanding, but you've had a good run with this one, think of us like your 'fawlty towers' and quit while you're ahead. We'd really appreciate the break. Really.

You can take a little time to think about it if you like. How about 4 days?

Making that list, checking it twice

With Christmas fast approaching, I'm sure you are all frantically worrying about what to get that special 1 in 6 buggered childless couple among your friends and family.

What does one get for the infertile in their life who has it all?

If you are observant, you'll have noticed a lack of advertising targeted at the knackered egg and disorientated semen owning community.

With an eye on the gap in the market, I can't believe that merciless entrepreneurs haven't pounced upon the desperation and misery. There's money to be made in tattered testicles and crippled cervices you know.

There are plenty of companies with whom you can arrange the 'day of a lifetime' - flying a helicopter, swimming with dolphins, becoming an extra on a day-time soap opera etc.

What we need is a company who don't offer you these expensive days out, but do offer you all the evidence that you've been and done it.

http://www.sorrywecantmakeit.com/ could be especially aimed at couples who really can't face another friend's christening, birthday party, or baby shower and who just need to stay home and sulk.
Of course, just turning down the invitation would be rude and insensitive, so being able to say that you already have arrangements to drive a formula one racing car that day, and will have photographic evidence on Monday to prove it, is a good solution.

Painting the illusion that you both still actually live a life is also great for all those who prefer to stay in denial.

Infertility fashion has been largely ignored too. I know I'd be quite chuffed to wear the 'We Relaxed..' t-shirt range, with '...and it still didn't happen' on the back.
For the deeply disturbed infertile in your life there is the 'spit up' label, which is a range of designer office wear for him and her with fake baby spit and vomit on the shoulders. Never again do we need to feel that our tidiness and fashion awareness should make us feel inferior in the workplace.

Movie makers need to get their act together and put together box sets in time for Christmas. What childless festive season isn't complete without an all day 'Children of men', 'Baby mama', and 'The hand that rocks the cradle' movie marathon?

Speaking of Christmas misery, what could be a better gift than the 2 CD set of baby and child noises?
Just like some people like to listen to sounds of the Amazon or whales burping, playing a cd of baby gurgling and laughing noises is a sure fire way to mask the silence of a pitter-patterless Christmas morning.

When it all becomes too much to handle and you realise you are borderline certifiably insane, you can put on the 2nd cd which is filled with screaming, and crying, and yelling, and the sound of Tonka trucks being smashed on sibling’s toes. That’ll bring you to your senses.

Remember though folks, infertility is not just for Christmas!

Dominos Pizza could launch their 'Failure Friday Special' especially for couples who don't manage to get knocked up in a month. This consists of a large pizza of your choice and 7 bottles of dreadful wine, all for just 9.99.

A further 50% discount can be claimed at delivery upon presenting a sample of undesired fresh menstrual blood.

It would reduce the number of pizza delivery guys getting robbed at least.

Not to be seen to be only cashing in on the infertile misery, they might also promote a new range of pizzas to aid the hungry TTCing couple.

The 'Getcha Freak On' pizza to help encourage copulation when the will, or willie, is failing.
One topping. Oysters. 4 inches deep.

The 'Super Swimmer Special' is bound to be a hit. It's an egg white base, topped with 6 quartered limes for vitamin C, fish eyes for vitamin E, sliced baby carrots for beta carotene, and a generous sprinkling of crushed zinc.

For a few extra cents you can upgrade either of these to the 'No Family Feast' and get a shot of mucous thinning cough syrup for her, and a triple shot of espresso for him.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I must go finish my proposal for an infertility version of 'The Apprentice'.

"Hump with Trump".

Vagina bucket

Ovulation has left the building.

"OvFest 21" was a roaring (well, grunting, at least) success, earned much critical acclaim, but we have to wait a couple of weeks to see if it will gain nomination for any major awards.

What I'm noticing more and more is a tendency to give it 'one for the road'.

This is a 'just in case' coming together of weary reproductive organs, long after the realms of possibility and fantasy have been left far behind.

"We have a .0001% chance of it working"
"ah, try it anyway."

"Ovulation was a week ago you fool"
"ah, you never know, try it anyway."

It's come to the stage that the physical act of attempting impregnation is becoming so addictive, and therefore so drawn out past any point of possible success, that my wee baby bullets would have to actually swim backwards in time to hit their target.

Marty McFly meets Spencer, if you like.

Nevertheless, even as I write this and put it out in plain black and white, knowing that ovulation has come and come and come and gone, we'll still end up giving an encore performance of the pubic polka even though the audience have all left and gone home.

We'll take that penile cloth, and wring it out one last time, in an attempt to get one more drop of jolly juice into ET's baby bucket.

All in all, after all the ups and downs of the last year or two, hopeful and randy isn't a bad place to be at all.

Back to square (twenty) one

Our trying to conceive efforts have come of age.

It's with great pride that I announce the systematic ravaging of our wobbly bits is all grown up.

Twenty one cycles old.

ET's battered love cavern can buy beer in New York.

Spencer can legally engage in homosexual activity in Poland.

Ellie can drive a bike over 25kw in Estonia.

Today, Monday, is CD14.
Yesterday we had a positive OPK, so we celebrated in appropriate fashion with a performance of the grunting boogie.

If things are normal(yeah, go on, laugh), we should get the trail off of the positive OPK today, with ovulation then tomorrow, and the temperature spike the day after.

We are then back in the two week wait, which will be an anxious one. That's really saying something considering the last two week wait seems to have lasted about 8 weeks.

The operation ET had is known to increase pregnancy rates in the following months, so this cycle is the most optimistic one we'll have had since the very early days.

Shiny tubes, polished and primed, ready for gallons of man milk to ride the go-goo surf and hook up with some chicks in record time.

Stale sheets, fresh start.

While I dry off my grapes of wrath which have been resting in an ice bucket, I won't even dare tempt fate with mentioning that this is the last chance we have to be pregnant by Christmas.

"Santa, baby" indeed.

Does this make me look fat?

For the first time ever I think I've had second thoughts on posting something.

Half because it's a sappy video clip that has me wondering if I've picked up a head injury unknown to myself, and half because I just don't understand what the post is about.

However, as they say, "publish and be damned".

Or mocked, as the case may be.

I think I have a leak somewhere and I'm losing testosterone, probably in survivable amounts, but I suspect that stocks were dangerously low to begin with.

I'm turning into a woman. One that I wouldn't really fancy either, fabulous hair aside.

I think I'm PMSing.

That last entry was a bit on the whingey side for starters, but I then saw the above video clip on K8's blog the other day and melted into a keyboard assaulting skinsack of contradictory hormones.

In the absence of a tub of ice cream as big as my head, I settled for a bunch of grapes.

Probably subconsciously due to them looking like the testicles I was lacking.

Although, they were seedless.

(Noelie Mcdonnell's track 'Nearly four' and the album it appears on 'Beyond hard places' are both available on itunes. The best link for the artist himself I can find is his myspace page)

One stepping out, one stepping in

They say the draw of excitement and danger is addictive.

I think my wee wifey is hooked.

Barely two weeks after braving surgery she once again put her head in the lion's jaws.

She came out.

This weekend she told her parents about the last year and a half, what we are trying to do, and what we've done to try and achieve it.

It can't have been easy, I know how nervous she gets, but thankfully, the reaction was positive. They are happy for us, and I believe they will be the 'right' amount of supportive.

I'm so glad she has that now, for when she needs it, for when I can't provide. More people who care for, and worry about her. She deserves it.

Funny thing, I think I'm jealous of her now. The people who I have on occasions spoken to about this, seem to either just not understand, or don't really want to hear about it.
I truly don't blame them, everyone has their own plate full, but there's only so many times you can sense someone thinking 'Oh no here he goes again' before you just stop bringing it up.

So, from now on, I think I'll be keeping the public conversation to the football, and my thoughts to myself and my two best friends.

ET, and this blank page.

Suitcase

I knew it was going to happen, sooner or later. Last night it did.

I stood in the doorway as she pulled clothes from the wardrobe and threw them on the bed. I could only watch as she gathered them into a suitcase.

Packed. No more to say, ready to go.

To leave.

This morning I drove her to the airport.
"I'll call you when I get there" she said.

I don't think she will.

It was inevitable I suppose, no matter what I said, or how I pleaded my case.
No matter how many times I tried to change her mind and make her see that she was better off here.

Here with me.

"It's for the best" she said.

That was it. This is it. I'm alone.

What do I do now? How do I spend my days?

Sometimes I have nothing, no answers. I guess this is where this blog comes in.

Can anyone help me now?

Can anyone tell me which pub I should go to?, which pizza place I should call?, can anyone tell me how to work the washing machine and where the key to the back door is?

It's going to be hard. Living alone.

I should be thankful she'll be back from her mother's on Monday.

I wonder will she bring back teabags?

Anyway, now where's that remote...

Clockwise

Last night, nobody noticed when the world stopping spinning.

Well, why would they, it's quite slow anyway.

Yet, stop it did, giving a deep sigh, slowing starting up again in the opposite direction.

Everything back from whence it came.

Cats started barking and mice chased dogs. Muggers stole from one another and gave their loot to little old ladies.

Fish sported canes and giraffes held tea parties. Paperboys placed your daily reads gently on the doorstep and closed the gate behind them.

You stopped on green, went on red, pressed up to go down, and down to go up.

You remembered your mother's birthday, your door keys, and to pay the phone bill.

You forgot your team lost on Sunday, that you can't really afford that uber coffee, and that some guy yelled at you on the train.

Maybe all these things didn't really happen, but I think they must have, how else could you explain how ET and I celebrated her getting her period and the passing of another cycle.

Twenty behind us, the sweltering tarmac of cycle twenty-one stretching ahead of us. Our freshly serviced engine is gleaming in the sunshine, and revving, ready to burst forward at a millisecond's notice.

Roll on next week, spinning anti-clockwise, this could be the one.

Anyone got a cigarette?

As this is a family show I won't be going into details, but suffice it to say that the impending insanity from earlier is no longer a threat on the horizon.

If you live in Western Europe, I apologise if I woke you.

Wounds and scars have healed and I've been saved from the fate of slowly turning into a smurf from the scrotum outwards.

Incidentally, in searching for a picture of one, I've noticed how odd they are.

There is only one female among them.

The male ones have no nipples, so I conclude that Smurfette doesn't have them either.

The guys all go around bare chested, and wear quite tight trousers with ne'er a glimpse of a bulge, or roll, or smuggled banana.

All in all, it's shockingly bad situation to be in, reproductively speaking.

Today is CD27, the red menace should be making an appearance, today or tomorrow, Wednesday at the very latest. She's never bloody around when you want her.

Our 'Fertility Friend' chart shows us a possible ovulation back on CD17 based on OPK result and very slight temperature rise, even though it was higher two days previously.

It's all irrelevant anyway, as to be pregnant this cycle we are missing many vital ingredients.

A stable, a donkey, and three wise men for starters.

Notes from a post surgical desert

Bed - 7:02am

Dear Ellie,

We've left several messages, could you please get back to us as soon as is possible.
Please note that you have previously been warned that you are supposed to inform us if you are going to be away for any extended period.

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Train to work - 8:58am

Dear Reproductive Organs,

Hang in there guys.

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My desk - 11:14am

Dear Blog Conscience,

It's come to my attention that the recent enforced suspension of trying to conceive activity on our part makes it somewhat difficult to write anything worthwhile for a trying to conceive blog.

"Never stopped you before" you say? - bite me.

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Staring out the window - 1:09pm

Dear Red Menace,

Due to unforeseen circumstances this month, we would like to request your attendance at your earliest convenience.
Your arrival and subsequent departure would be met with gratitude and greatly appreciated

No, it's not a trick.

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Basement level gents bathroom - 3:42pm

Dear Spencer,

Don't go towards the light.

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Bus home - 5:31pm

Dear Texter,

I can read the message you are typing, you really should be more discreet.

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Bus home - 5:32pm

Dear Text Recipient,

Change the sheets, you're going to score.

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Bus home - 5:33pm

Dear Texter's Husband,

Your son's skin colour is probably not a throwback, she's not working late, and you may have an STD.

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Couch - 7:19pm

Dear ET,

You look positively ravishing in that torn tracksuit pants and top with fresh lasagna stains.

Care to...?

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Bathroom - 9:01pm

Dear Right Hand,

Don't you dare.

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Bed - 11:20pm

Dear Erectus Nonclimaxicus, Greek god of enforced abstinence,

Help me.

A cold day in ET

Heat.

It's missing.

Not in me mind you, I'm all hyped up on heat. Unfortunately ET's occasional 'Oooh' and 'Ahhh' means that I don't get to 'Oooh' and 'Ahhh' at the moment.

Being the sensitive chap that I am, I'm relaxed about it, I can wait. I wait for her to nod off to sleep before rubbing off her.

I digress, that's not the heat I'm talking about, the heat that's missing is in ET.

We've been charting temperature for months now, and the rule of thumb is that the day after ovulation you get a spike in basal body temperature.

Now, the surgery was on CD14, she tested positive with an OPK on CD15. So we should be all set for ovulation by CD16 - Thursday and a temperature spike on Friday, yes?

No.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday - Nada. Absolutemente nada! (I envisage body temperature as being Spanish speaking).

So I ask all you incense burning, placenta munching, earth mothers out there, where in the name of all that is uteral is our temperature spike gone?

Swallowed by the surgery? destroyed by dye? escaped out an incision?

Has this conception effort taken on a life of it's own and started making conscious resource deployment decisions of it's own accord?

-'They're not shagging this month, no need to spike!'

Answers on a tampon box please.

Someone else that is a tad low in the body temperature stakes is the dead woman I had to walk around on the way to work Friday. Shot in the head so she was.
Normally this would be seen as a bad thing, but in the charming centre of vice and crime where my office is located, it has it's benefits.

With all those extra crime scene investigators, police, and TV reporters buzzing around the place, our friendly neighbourhood prostitutes were expecting a bumper weekend of business.

Their windows, plastic bedding, and crotches all got an extra wipe of a damp cloth in anticipation.

While I am squeezing the last drops of irrelevance out of the wet rag that is our non shagging days into this empty bucket of a post, I might as well mention that last night I experienced a 'first'.

I almost put my foot into a hedgehog.

My wife & a whore

My wife:

She is recovering well, my little drama queen.

No nasty side effects other than maybe going hoarse from all the 'Ohhhh's and 'Ahhhh's and 'bring me tea, gimp boy'.

She is lying in bed with every electronic gadget known to man surrounding her.

The skype handset, mobile phone, land line phone, laptop, TV, and DVD player all form her little nest of recuperation.

Ironically, they are probably frying her newly serviced shiny innards with radiation and undoing all the good that her recent oil change did.

She is also ovulating.

Knowing that, and not doing anything, is a bit of a headwreck. It's like not buying a raffle ticket but being forced to watch the draw anyway.

As lousy as I am at any kind of DIY efforts, I'm tempted to buy a turkey baster but I'm afraid I would never be able to face Christmas dinner again.

So, unfortunately we'll just have to wait until cycle twenty-one, sit on our hands for this one and be patient.

Basically, just suck it up instead. So to speak....

A whore:

You lot have been pretty decent so far, some of you have even been around for most of these twenty cycles. That's not bloody bad at all. We don't know where all this will end up, but just in case we need to ask for a donor egg, or for an extra testicle, or a replacement for a worn out vagina, I want to keep you all onside by letting you in on a secret.

Angie, at the aptly named A whole lot of nothing, has an online store Good For The Kids, there are loads of useful and cuddly infant toy type things there. They don't make your kid's explode or break out in a dodgy rash or anything, she tests them all on her own ginuea pig daughters. (Although one of them is missing teeth, hmmm).

Anyway, she previously, along with Lyssa, did a very nice thing for us, and also for a children's hospital in their native Florida. It seems the blood has gone to her head again and she has offered 2 online vouchers code for you scrumptious people.

Go to her shop here, if you see anything you like, order it and get 15% off if you use the code 15xbox, or 20% with 20xbox if you order more than $100 worth. Simple.

Trust me, the only benefit I get from this shameless, and frankly humiliating, whoring, is peace and quiet from her constant nagging me to do it. Also, I think her kids regularly go hungry and her carpet really needs a good cleaning. Plus I think she has a crack habit, and that stuffs not cheap.

Now if you'll excuse me, gimp boy must make tea.

ET goes to bed

Thor is my current deity of choice.

Why so you ask? You pretty much know where you stand with him, and he woke us this morning at 3am with the loudest belt of thunder I've ever heard.

I'm saying it was a 'thumbs up' anyway.

At 6:10am we were sitting into the car and driving the 3 minutes to the hospital car park.

At 6:13am we were walking the 15 minutes from the hospital car park to the hospital.

By 6:30 we were ringing approximately 14 different buzzers in the hope of actually being let in to the gynecology department.
As my chubby finger hovered over buzzer number 15, the doors swung open and we were greeted by someone who was so bright, and chirpy, and shiny, and new, I nearly went blind from the glare off her piano teeth.

My corneas, however, melted and withered into raisins at the sight of her footwear. Neon orange crocs.

Having never had any type of surgery before, ET was by this point in time, a bit on the nervous side. By 'bit' I mean 'deathly' and by 'on the nervous side' I mean 'had to be held tight or she'd have legged it down the fire escape'.

The nurse ran us through the basics once more, and ET chose a stunning blue button-up-the-back arseless smock with which to wow the judges.

Incidentally, you can not get them in the hospital gift shop and nurses don't find it particularly funny when you ask.

So I sit with ET for the last few minutes before she gets taken away, and with every bad joke I make, with every silly reassurance I offer, and with every line of 'the first cut is the deepest' I hum, she gets more and more nervous.

The nurse instructs her to take her sedative, it's time to go.

Remember those scenes in hospital dramas where the loved one walks briskly alongside the bed being wheeled into the operating room? Fake I tell you, fake.

I rapped my knuckles trying to fit through the door frame at the same time as the bed, and spent the next few seconds chasing the bugger down the narrow corridors of the gynecology wards.

I caught up with ET and her runaway bed at the preparation room doors. I couldn't go any further. She took one look at me and the tears that had been threatening, finally came.

My wife was a scared little girl, and there was nothing I could do to help.

Useless.

In a feeble attempt at wiping a tear from her face, and squeezing her hand in reassurance, and kissing her forehead, I think I may have bitten her.

I try to tell her how proud I am of her, and that in just a few hours she'll be back home with me annoying her, I think what actually came out was something about the cost of parking.

Useless.

I tried to remind myself that everyone there would be gentle and kind to her and I wonder, yet again, why does it take moments like these to remember how much someone means to you?

** ** ** ** **

Flash forward almost 4 hours and I'm sitting in an embarrassingly squeaky chair squeezing that hand again.

Almost incredibly, she is fine, sore in the tummy of course, but no nausea, no cramps, no drowsiness, and no shoulder or arm pains, but very much relieved.

Fast forward another 5 hours which included too much tea to be healthy, a close encounter of flashing a porter, and muchos urine that seemed to be showing it's support for Gay Pride (or skittles, who knows), and we are chatting to the specialist, before coming home.

There will be no more tests.

I am quoting the doctor when I say that ET's uterus is 'beautiful', her fallopian tubes are 'lovely, clear and long', and there isn't even the slightest hint of endometriosis.

The diagnosis, is official and clear; Unexplained Infertility.

This is not the anti-climax we may have thought in the past, our new doctor is very personable and realistic. Pregnancy rates tend to increase after laparoscopies, so she is giving us three months to work our magic in ET's new freshly serviced tubes, after which she suggests we try an IUI.

To have a doctor say that to us after all these months, a real plan, is simply huge, and I am very, very pleased.

To have ET steal the limelight of this, my 200th real post, like she stole the limelight of my 100th, is something I'm less pleased with, but I'm willing to forgive because to have a wife as brave as that daft cow, I am very lucky, and very, very proud.

Sleeping with the enema

The countdown is on.

In just over 9 hours ET will arrive at the hospital, freshly topiarytasticly trimmed and ready to party.

That is if getting your gut slit open is a party.

Either way, thanks to the wonders of modern medicine, and western indoor plumbing, she will go there with her body truly in temple state. A very empty temple.

Also, seeing as she can't eat anymore until the grand opening, I have to fend for myself.

I am lowered to levels normally reserved for street urchins in the lane ways of Rio, and I have to...

...sorry, it's making me emotional...

I have to....

...get my own dinner.

What a selfish cow.

Though, if you are as big hearted a person as I am, you will forgive her these self absorbed insanities and wish her well.

On, off, on again

So.

Where were we?

Oh yes. A whole baby creation type effort was underway, not going so well, yada, yada, yada, 19 months, yada, yada, yada, and we finally get surgery scheduled to have a wee poke around inside the wee wifey.

Up to speed? Good.

Due to their own bollox up at the hospital, the delightful folk there decided to cancel the laparoscopy yesterday.

Cue blood pouring from ET's eyes and ears and the occasional expletive from her lips.

Ever the optimist, I looked on the bright side, bumping uglies was back on the menu, so I ran into town to pick a new tiger print thong.

Rawr.

No sooner was I back at my desk when ET informed me that the hospital had rang, apologised, and un-cancelled the laparoscopy for Tuesday, but only if she could come in Friday for all the preparation.

Cue another 4 pints of blood gushing from ET's eyes and ears, and a couple more colourful phrases questioning the doctor's parentage.

Having been utterly messed around in the space of an hour or two, she was left kind of like a condom on a drunkard, not really sure if she was inside out or not.

As disappointed as I was that I wouldn't get to try out my Tarzan thong, it's for the best, even if I am worried my groin may spontaneously combust in the coming weeks.

In the blog world it's popular to give days of the week a theme name, Wordless Wednesdays, Topless Thursdays, Feet Fetish Fridays and all the rest.

Therefore, now that it's probably, almost certain, very likely, mostly feasible that the surgery will go ahead, I'd like to present to you:

"Hack your wife's guts open & get a day off work Tuesdays".

Admit it, it's catchy isn't it?

Don't listen to me

Many life altering words of wisdom have been spilled from brain, to lips and fingertips and onwards, out into the internet.

1s and 0s, bits and bytes, combining in pixelated perfection to inspire, uplift, and encourage the readers of the world, accidental stumble upon-ers and deliberate seekers of solace alike.

A few well chosen words, combined and delivered with charm, timing, wit, or emotion can make the observer hold their breath in anticipation of the plunging sword of punctuation, and elevate the author to demi-God status.

Chosen from this very blog, concocted by my very own Dr. House defying neurological mass, and presented in literal form to you by the power of my personal chunky appendages, these are a few not good examples.

"So far so good. This should be a piece of piss. "

Yes, it should have been, shouldn't it. A sinch, a doddle, a walk in the park. Christ almighty boy, you showed yourself up to be a prize idiot pretty fast.

"I have a week to swot up on how I can become a prime hunk of impregnating manhood."

A week eh? I think you might need a little bit of an extension on that deadline there sonny. How about we make it, ooh say... 76 weeks? For starters anyway, come back then and we'll talk some more.

"My scrambled egg brain is already creating stressful situations, like what if we are not successful this month? How much would that dent our hope and confidence? "

Or the following month, or the following month, or the following month... see the pattern, emerging yet monkey man?

"People have even commented to me that it's taken them 18 months. Frankly, I could not last that long, my sanity certainly couldn't."

A-ha! Finally. Never a truer word has leaked from your septic brain, your sanity didn't quite make the 18 months, you chubby fingered, sub witted, sub fertile, human equivalent to chewing gum.

If you've quite finished sniggerng into your sleeves and would grant me a moment of your attention, I will admit that yes indeed, I did come up with those beauties. All within the first 5 weeks of this blog.

Naevity, stupidity, innocence, and foolishness, all beautifully wrapped up and presented to you with a big blue ignorance bow on top.

Never let it be said that I don't share the limelight with you out there, those who put up with my over use of the comma, run-on sentencing, and semi valid vocabulary which lies too close to Europe for Americans, and too close to America for self respecting Europeans, my 'Atlantis ramblings' if you wish.

No sir-ee, I've opened my arms, eyes, and ears and I give to you the most wonderous of all comments received here from one of YOU in that same fledgling five week period.

"try not to have a baby and it might happen that way."

Eureka!

So, to ensure I follow this advice to it's fabulous fullest, I'm just about to attend to ET's carnal cavern of contentment with a needle and thread, before myself fornicating with the lawnmower.

Never again shall we wreck our parental prospects with imprudent imbecilic intercourse.

On a side note, do you think this month of not humping is having an affect on me?

Keeping it surreal

Stop.

Stop right where you are and have a really good look around you.

I bet you any amount of our rapidly decreasing in value cash money that you are not in a place, metaphorical or literal, as bizarre as I am.

We all know that there are aspects of life that are wholesome, and some that are somewhat more sinister.

Generally, these remain separated. Separated by social sensibilities and physical environment.

Here, in Holland, that is not always so.

I'm currently working for a customer in a large city. One of the largest companies in the Netherlands, at their plush head office.

Should I fancy a breath of fresh air at lunch time, it would take me about 15 seconds to be standing in the heart of one of the seediest areas you'll find anywhere.

Scores of prostitutes flaunt their asses and assets in the lighted windows.
These same windows that were being freshly washed clean of only God knows what substances as I passed just before 9am, are already being pawed and knocked on by passing lunchtime trade.

By 5pm and home-time, you would be lucky to make your way through the vice seeking crowds in time to catch your train home.

Right now I've just done what I find myself doing more and more lately, stopping and chuckling at the bizarre world I'm stuck in.

A world where the youngest member of the most fertile family this side of the Kununurra Falls, uncle to 17 nieces and nephews, can't get his Irish Catholic wife knocked up for love nor money, where their failings are available for the entire world to see, yet one where I could pop out at lunch in my suit and tie for a French baguette and a blow job, or a ham sandwich and a hand shandy, and be back in time to discuss invoices with the finance director.

'Hold the mayo'

Pick a card, any card

Any time I see or hear that line, I always think of Paul Daniels, the irritating little English magician with the nice bit of totty for a wife.

I'm not sure he ever did it, but I always enjoyed watching magicians twirling their assistants around 360 degrees, in a box on wheels, before attempting to hack them in half.

Classic entertainment, don't ya think?

We enjoy it so much we've decided to try it ourselves, hack open the wife, and see if we can't eventually pull a dead rabbit out of a hat.

One week from Tuesday, ET will undergo a laparoscopy.

For once the hospital seem to have moved swiftly and arranged this between yesterday and today.

It's been a thoroughly shitty week, and so it's really with a sigh of relief that we accept the appointment. Something is being done.

While on the subject of the week that was, I really can't say how much we appreciate the comments and e-mails. Your collective self submersion into a pool of vulgarity in the name of sympathy is honestly appreciated.

It's nice to find you are not left totally on your own at a time like that.

Weirdly, the appointment falls on what will be cycle day fourteen, and basically rules out us being able to try ourselves this cycle.

It seems then, that I'll be in the market for some good pornography this month, all reasonable offers will be considered.

So for now, project 'hump n'hope' is on hold.

Well....just one half.

You know I can be found

"There's something there".

Mmmm. Sleep.

"There's something there".

Fuck, what now? spider? mouse? herd of cattle? Half awake now.

"There's definitely something there..." she repeated, flopping down beside me and shoving it in my face.

"...look".

Shit. There is too.

No way.

Impossible.

Squinting through my sleep glued eyes and sure enough, faint, but obvious.

A pink line.

I'm not sure what we did for the next half an hour, I started it out telling her not to get carried away, it was impossible due to the temperature drop, but I finished it trying to convince her it could be, as faint as it was, it counted as a positive.

Not even 40 minutes after my rude awakening, it had vanished.

3 hours later it was over. Finished, along with cycle nineteen. A false positive.

The red menace sailed into port before lunch and I really don't know what to say now.

I feel like I should use an "At least..." line in here somewhere, but I can't think of one.

An ill wind?

Day twenty seven in the big brother house and the house mates are climbing the feckin' walls.

Hourly emails and calls between our respective workplaces, and constant badgering, have left ET wishing I were a fingerless mute.

Good news and bad news is rampant, and the very fact you haven't seen me running screaming through your streets should tell you what the good news isn't.

No red menace, no Aunt Flo, no painters, no monthly visitor, no yokes.

Absolutemente nada.

This of course, is good news.

Not so good was, that following another great high temperature yesterday, we had a hefty dip in basal body temperature this morning.

Seemingly, instead of hell freezing over, Lucifer directed the cold front right up into the wife's innards.

The reproductive equivalent of knowing you don't have enough in the tank to get you to the next petrol station.

Such a big dip is bad news, and barring some reproductive anomaly, the end of this cycle is imminent.

Then again, an as eternal optimist, (read: idiot), no news is good news, right?

...right?