What do you do when you're stuck in your bed for days with the flu?

Knit a blanket and booties for your son while he makes your belly bounce up and down...

The view from our rooftop

OK, sometimes we find used condoms up there. OK, sometimes people who we aren't even sure live in the building vomit up there. But look at the view... Now that's amazing...

And then a few more...

I thought I'd get away with just the cough, but sinusitis and a double ear infection decided to come along for the ride, too. And from no medicine at all, my state convinced the doctor to give me this... A bit of a leap!

One night in hell

Here's how it goes:

Sore throat, splitting headache, can't take medicine, go to bed with just a hot cup of milk.

Sleep for an hour, Krusty starts snoring. Shake Krusty to change his position. "You're wrong, I'm not snoring, I can't hear anything" he says.

Sleep in 10 minute intervals until Krusty starts snoring/coughing or my thigh starts throbbing because of the vena cava (a craftily placed vein that means that pregnant women, to whom the front is already off limits in terms of sleeping positions, can also rule out sleeping on their back or their right hand side).

Wake up again, decide to move rooms (thank god for the guest bedroom). Realise my nose is bleeding (because varicose veins during pregnancy don't only occur in the legs, apparently). Prepare another hot milk.

Sleep for a few hours, until Krusty becomes his usual morning puppy-like self (albeit a little toned down by the coughing at the moment) and bursts in to ask why I am in a different bed (all memory of me shaking him awake for two hours last night completely gone).

Prepare hot lemon tea. Bring it back to bed. Spill it all over my chest. Consider leaving it for a moment, as the warmth actually soothes me a little, until the honey starts sticking my top to my skin.

Change tops. New one doesn't fit around my bump. Collapse onto the bed, depressed and tired.

Consider my life. I used to spend some nights enjoying the city with my friends, sleeping like a ton of bricks and waking up with a hangover, at worst. And that could be solved with a fry up, which due to heavy meat content is also off limits at the moment.

Not to mention the life awaiting us in three months, when there will be one extra distraction from sleep to factor in.

What have we done?!

Lion (Tiger?) Dance

I did see one cool thing today – the ifc was full of lions and dragons performing the ritual dance to welcome the new year. Here is a badly edited film from my phone camera...

Kung Hei Fat Choy

Not to sound like a lazy Tai Tai (the Cantonese equivalent of England's "ladies who lunch"), but after a week not working, I am exhausted.

Krusty's parents were here last week to celebrate the arrival of the year of the tiger with us (as well as the coldest weather we've had in two years...), but that's not what tired me. We did a few touristy things, but were kept in the flat a lot by the rain/freeze/fog, so I happened to relax a lot.

We also followed some of the "rules" of the new year celebrations, but they are hardly strenuous: no crying (or you'll be crying all year – I failed this one by watching "My Sister's Keeper", a film about a family dealing with their leucemic daughter/sister... probably not on the ideal pregnancy curriculum...); no cleaning (or you'll sweep away the good luck); and even no shampooing (although I am not sure I held out for long enough, I think you're supposed to avoid washing away the good luck for at least five days). Krusty even followed the no hair cutting rule – apparently if you cut your hair or nails during Chinese New Year, since these were inherited from your parents, you'll be cutting their life short.

Anyway, not exactly stressful tasks...

No, today, the first day actually without any activities, has been the most tiring of all. First I went to the cinema, and as I arrived late, I fumbled around in the dark to notice that someone else was in my seat. A couple of teenagers who looked like they were on a date. Fair enough, I thought, and found another empty seat instead.

But then, during the film, I heard the girl whisper to the boy, "look at the girl next to me" (that was me), "she is so gay, do you know how I know?" and then went on to explain to her boyfriend how my shoes and the way I was watching the film was a sign of my homosexuality. No comments on the fact that I am six months pregnant... So I mustered up all of my energy not to say anything, as the last thing I wanted was an argument with a couple of hormonal teenagers...

Then I went to the toilet, and proceeded to use my energy on not screaming at every person in the queue – the one chewing gum in my ear with her mouth open, the one trying to push me faster along (as if that made any difference to the speed the girls in the cabins were going at), and the one who walked past the entire queue and took first place while no one reacted. Not to mention the one who left the cabin as I noticed she hadn't flushed or even bothered to aim at the bowl...

It's my fault I guess – I had to use the toilet near the cinema because this morning, after sleepwalking to the frozen box that is our bathroom, not only did I miss the seat as I sat down (therefore falling next to the toilet... oh the embarrassment), but then, as I flushed, I actually broke the handle. I'm not sure if it's because it was too cold, or if I did something wrong, but now we are sans flush, and I am just too tired to even worry about it.

To top it all off, a quick visit to the rooftop to see if the hooligans that were screaming up there last night had tidied up after themselves has revealed a load of empty cans and two pools of vomit, which a flu-ridden is Krusty is having to hose down as I type.

Somehow going back to work on Monday is looking pretty good right now...

I heart modern technology

A 3D scan of bambino revealed a little Tiger well ensconced in his mummy's tummy. Looks comfy...

Head in the clouds

Due to a lack of interesting activity in Hong Kong, today's report comes to you from Shanghai, from where my brother (the water dog) sent this INCREDIBLE picture:


Taken from the 87th floor of a hotel near Shanghai's current tallest building, it makes me feel like I am looking at the future that I imagined when I was 10 years old. Finally we have all started living in the clouds. Or is that pollution?

Shanghai is China's most populous city, and I remember being engulfed in yellowish mist for most of the time I spent there – at least this proves that there was in fact a blue sky hidden in the clouds, you just need to rise high enough above them.

And at least Shanghai has a sense of humour about it – its Bureau of Environment Statistics has started measuring air pollution by comparing a walk in the city to its equivalent in cigarettes. Apparently the day this picture was taken, a ten-minute walk in Shanghai was equivalent to smoking a packet of Silk Cut, as opposed to the previous week's level of Marlboro Lights...

This is not in your control

Gazing out of the window of the clinic yesterday, looking directly at a building which I realised after a while was actually the one we live in, I could tell it would be an interesting check up.

I had spent the day worrying about the fact that I had suddenly put on a ton of weight in just one week, reading scary reports online about pre-eclampsia, a relatively common condition in pregnant women that can nonetheless result in major organ failure, comas and even death. I had all of the symptoms - sudden weight gain, check; dizziness, check; swollen hands and feet, check... The only things I couldn't check were the protein levels of my urine and my blood pressure. Then again, my temper has been very short recently, surely that's a sign of high blood pressure?

But as I went through the stages of the check-up, following each miniature nurse that called my name, all of the results came back as... completely normal. And as has become the norm for bambino, as soon as the Doppler machine touched my belly, there was a giant kick back, as if to say "leave me alone"! Even the stoic matron that was administering the test commented on what she called the baby's "strong personality"...

Anyway, not one to accept normal results laying down, I questioned this same lady about the sudden Michelin Man turn the scales were taking. Her answer:

"This is not in your control"

Telling a control freak things are not in her control is probably not a wise thing to do. I babbled on about how I wasn't eating much, and exercising, but the nurse kept repeating the same thing, until her voice has almost reached a scream: "This is not in your conTROL!"

And so I realise that in addition to not sleeping, not eating meat, not drinking alcohol and all of the other things I have had to change, my body is no longer in my control.

To which my mother added: "Your body? The day you became pregnant, my dear, it's your whole life which escaped your control!"