[this text was originally posted on carepages.com; it is being put here so it will exist somewhere besides my laptop, and Juliet can read it when she gets older]

Last night went better than the night before for Juliet. She still requires the 600 puffs/minute ventilator to breath, but they have been able to turn down the amplitude some, which means it doesn't have to puff as much, because she's breathing more on her own. She's still baking under the funny blue lights, to help with the jaundice.

Don't know what "ordinary" newborns look like, exactly, but Juliet's hands and feet look like those of a tiny little doll. Proportional, not chubby like a baby's. Some of my Illinois friends were suggesting we refer to the unborn Juliet as "Gollum", obviously in jest, and right now I have to admit she looks a bit like a Gollum. Incredibly fragile and frail and skinny.

Her blood oxygen dipped down while I was there this morning, so they had to suction out the tube that was giving her air, and for a while they thought maybe her skin temperature was too low, but it turned out to be more that the temp sensor wasn't sticking to her very well, perhaps because she's covered in lotion. So in an hour's visit I had a lump in my throat twice, some paranoid part of me thinking, "this is it, she's going to die". The nurses were, of course, much calmer and efficiently went about the business of correcting things, and her stats were quickly back to where they should be. I think it would be very hard to do this for your own child; I'm sure the nurses care about all the patients, but I imagine some amount of professional detachment is necessary in order to do the job well. I think I would mess with things too much, like a process engineer (my previous job) who overadjusts their equipment.

Cassandra is doing better, keeping down solid food. We learned last night that "bootie torpedo" is the nurse's medical term for a suppository. We were imagining worse. She walked around a lot yesterday inside the hospital, even going down to the ground floor and looking around. She pointed out that "Three Fountains Cafe" seemed to have only one fountain nearby. Perhaps we missed the other two. Perhaps we'll find the other two today.

Some of the Illinois friends are coming to visit today. Cassandra is starting to feel well enough to get bored. We read a bit out of a twenty-year-old travel book for Venice last night. The first paragraph said something about, "this book is someone who actually intends to visit Venice, not the armchair traveller". So I guess we're the wrong audience. But it was better than what's on TV.

Factoid: St. Louis network TV is much better at ~4 am than it is during prime time. Saw a show about a guy making a log cabin for himself in Alaska.

Cassandra might get a day pass tomorrow to allow her to visit Juliet. We'll see. Currently looking at another 1-2 days in the hospital for her, if all goes as expected.

I've gotten about f bajillion emails with well-wishes, which is great. Just 'cause you don't get an answer in person doesn't mean they weren't appreciated. Hopefully this web page will help me communicate back in a more timely manner. Feel free to share the link with anyone you think is interested.

I think the registration requirement is to allow me the option of requiring permission before viewing, if I wanted to. Or, it's all a scam to generate lots of spam for you, in which case I apologize in advance. :)

thanks,

ross