Huh. So, pregnant women in their 3rd trimesters are notorious for having strange, vivid dreams. Last night I had my most vivid and uncomfortable yet. It was one of those dreams that felt absolutely real, down to going through it in what felt exactly like real time - and, of all the things to go through in real time, I dreamed that I was going through a difficult and painful 30-hour labor. Some of the highlights included: an extremely untrustworthy midwife who was drinking heavily while making obnoxious jokes; a long span of time when I couldn't even get in touch with Patrick, so he didn't even know our baby was being born; oh, and of course the pain...

...and then I woke up, feeling absolutely traumatized and exhausted by the whole experience. But the most traumatic part, by far? Realizing, a moment after waking up: Wait a minute - I went through all that, and the baby STILL isn't out???? Sigh... Sleep isn't so restful anymore.

On the other hand, my homebirth assessment went fine (scary but fine) (those midwives are INTENSE), today's prenatal appointment was nicely reassuring, and most of all, I've been having waaaay too much fun with the old Bath Guides I found online through the Leeds University Library. I've got issues of the Bath Guide from 1798, 1799, and 1800 right now, and they're just delicious. Of course, they're really useful - not only did I find a bunch of good info about the Baths themselves, but also I managed to get lists of all the hotels in Bath (including their prices) and lists of distances from Bath to various cities around the UK, both of which were things I genuinely needed to know.

But! There's also so much more. How much it cost to hire a sedan chair from different parts of the city, how much it cost to attend the balls in the different Assembly Rooms...of course, Kat never rides a single sedan chair or attends a single Assembly Room ball in Bath, but how can I resist lapping up all that lovely information? This is exactly why research is so dangerous - it sucks me in and I can't get out! Oh, and did I mention that the 1800 version of the Bath Guide is in verse???? There's a whole lascivious poem about a guy's fantasy of watching women change for the Baths..all rhyming, of course, all astonishingly bad, and all written as a fake "letter to a friend". It's utterly horrible, and yet, somehow, also horribly compelling....

Right now Maya is sleeping on the couch beside me, and I'm listening to the Samuel Ramey recording of Kismet. It's a nice afternoon, despite the gray sky outside.