Belly belly button, you're oh so fine/ Belly belly button, I'm so happy you're mine - Sandra Boynton

The good news is that the doctors are “almost 100%” sure that Dan’s colleague has viral rather than bacterial meningitis. My pediatrician explained that viral meningitis of the type that is most common is actually fairly benign and leaves you just feeling flu-ey for a week or so, headache, chills, etc. Bacterial, while much more serious, is also much more rare. Also, since Dan’s contact with his colleague is “casual” – meaning no diaper changing duties or utensil sharing – we’re pretty much in the clear. So thanks for all your thoughts, looks like we’re ok.

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Last night Dan called me into the baby’s room to look at his (James’, not Dan’s) belly button (my marital obligations only go so far…). It was the weirdest thing I’ve seen in ages – while he screamed, it extruded itself out of his belly, like one of those snakes you light on the Fourth of July, that curls all around itself. We both freaked. The pediatrician said this morning, upon examination, that it was just a little bit infected and that one of the veins hadn’t closed properly, which he fixed with some silver nitrate right there. Here I am, being all cocky that it’s my third and nothing can faze me, and I am running to the ped with a laundry list of things for him to check out less than a week after we last saw him. Oh well, I have never been noted for my calm, and I probably won’t start now.

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The boys each held James for the first time yesterday, mostly because it hadn’t occurred to me to let them do so until Jude asked. So I sat them down on Jude’s mattress-on-the-floor/bed and they each got to wrap their little arms around James and let his head loll over their elbows and smile uncertainly down at him. As usual, my camera was nowhere near. James started crying – wonder why – and Jude obligingly pulled up his shirt to feed James. He’s a swell kid, that Jude. Always at the ready.

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I started reading the Julia/Julie blog, and it’s some really good reading. I enjoy her down-to-earth tone and honesty. I may wait for the book, though, I may enjoy it more in that format.

And I finished The Diary of Mattie Spenser yesterday. Remember what I said about it not being grim? It wasn’t exactly grim, but it was sad. I still enjoyed it, for the most part. I am almost halfway through On Green Dolphin Street, which is a strange yet deft mix of a love affair and political affairs during the Kennedy campaign.

Mr. Darcy has been voted the greatest hero in literature. But Carl MacDougall, an author and presenter of the BBC's Writing Scotland, was unimpressed. "The fact that Mr Darcy is number one says more about Colin Firth than it does Jane Austen…” Yeah, that’s pretty much how I feel. I mean, just because Darcy is a romantic, enigmatic pain in the ass does not make him the greatest hero (even if it makes him – natch - sexy and appealing to we womenfolk). Anymore than it does Mr. Rochester or Heathcliff (both of whom I pretty much want to smack upside the head). I liked Mr MacDougall’s suggestion of Sydney Carton from A Tale of Two Cities.

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Gina, come back from pledge - I miss you!