Ramshackle Glam A lifestyle blog by Jordan Reid.

Pathetic 3A.M. can’t-sleep selfie.

(Because this photo looks so very pathetic, let me start by saying: I am totally fine. Happy and excited, even. Just maybe a little less happy and excited at 3A.M. when I am wandering around our apartment trying to figure out how, exactly, to get comfortable enough to sleep.)

So have you ever heard the word “tetchy”?

It means sort of restlessly irritable, and makes me think of how my dogs behave when there’s a rainstorm on the way: scratching at walls, whining at windows, and generally acting crazy. I think I’ve read the word in books from time to time, but I have never before felt compelled to actually use it.

I am tetchy.

Except instead of scratching at walls, I am doing things like bursting into tears for very literally no reason at all, washing every single piece of clothing in the house the second it becomes dirty, making crazily detailed lists, and pacing around our apartment while yelling about the air conditioner settings.

I remember this from last time: at the end – meaning the last three or four weeks – things get a little nuts. You can’t sleep at all and make very attractive OOOOF sounds every time you roll over or have to get out of bed, your acid reflux goes into overdrive, weird crampy things start happening requiring anxious 4A.M. Google searches, and – strangest of all – you start behaving like an actual caged animal: walking in circles, moving things around for no discernible reason, stacking and unstacking and restacking whatever’s in front of you and not being able to stop yourself.

You get tetchy.

Last night, for example, we were getting into bed and Kendrick said something that made me laugh, and then the laughing turned instantly into full-on hysterical crying about – and this is a quote – being “scared to love another person as much as I love my son,” and it was all just about as lucid and non-dramatic as it sounds. And then, mid-cry, I wailed that the only thing that would make me feel better was if we installed the car seat, did a load of laundry, and washed all of the dishes. RIGHT NOW. In the dark. To Kendrick’s credit, he managed to hold off on making fun of me until I had drunk a glass of water and turned on Orange Is The New Black, which distracted me enough that I went back to being a semi-rational person.

It all makes biological sense – it’s basically frantic nesting in anticipation of bringing home a baby – but when you’re in it, you can know what’s going on and still have zero control over what your mind and body are up to. It’s funny, and crazy, and mostly means that even if you don’t feel “ready” for the baby to get here…guess what’s about to happen?

I’m ready. (By which I don’t mean “oh yeah, I got this,” but rather “let’s move on to the next part, please.”)

But ready or not: this can’t-ignore-it reminder of just how close we’re getting is pretty wild.

I’ve only been to a handful of sporting events in my life. I went to couple of Mets games and maybe a Knicks game or two when I was a kid, and had a football game date with Kendrick last fall…but that’s pretty much it. This isn’t because I don’t “like” sports - I really do, I love the atmosphere and the food enough that I don’t really care that I don’t follow much of what’s actually going on on the field. But it’s all the other stuff – the crazy expense, the packed parking lots, and the fact that you have to leave earlier than you want to leave if you don’t want to sit in traffic for two hours – that sort of turns me off.

It’s just such a hassle.

The other night, Kendrick told me he had a couple of free tickets to a minor league game and asked if we wanted to go, and I wasn’t terribly enthusiastic about the proposition of dragging a toddler through a crowded stadium at the exact moment in time that he typically goes to bed, but…

FUN.

Kendrick’s been signing the praises of minor league baseball for years, and I totally get it now. No crowds, parking that’s right there (and cheap), normally-priced food that’s just as fun as what you get at the major league stadiums (maybe even more fun; the game that we went to had stands for weird retro ice creams I’ve never heard of and local craft beers), and all sorts of fun extras – bouncy houses, batting cages, giveaways – intended to lure people to games.

Basically: all the stuff I like about going to major league games minus all of the stuff I don’t like.

If you’ve never been: seriously, give it a try. It’s about ten million times more fun than I expected. (Find a game near you here.)

…No? (Spotted on the Instagram feed for Body Electric, the place where Francesca and I went last time I was in L.A.)

(Some advice on cartilage piercings here and pretty little extra-earring suggestions here.)

Because I would love to hear your recommendations.

First, this (Jo Malone Grapefruit) is not my regular perfume. My regular perfume is Bond No. 9 Nuits de Noho, which is a kinda musky vanilla-y scent not too dissimilar from Thierry Mugler’s Angel, but less sweet and a bit sexier. I love it. I’m also feeling in the mood to try something different.

I brought the Jo Malone with me to Cali mostly because I want to leave as many personal care-type products here as possible when we make our return trip, and the shot-glass-sized bottle (1 oz) seemed like the right amount to last me the summer. And I thought the Grapefruit scent would be nice and fresh. But as it turns out…eh. I’ve heard great things about Jo Malone scents (and very much want to try out this one and this one), but the Grapefruit? I like it okay, but I don’t know that it’s really “me.”

Too fruity.

No matter, but it has gotten me thinking I’d like to try something new once I get back home.

When you’re looking for a new perfume, I think it’s nice to do a little scrolling back through your memories to locate that handful of scents that really jump out at you, from whenever and wherever. For me, there are three.

1. Carrot Water. One afternoon when I was in high school, I was wandering around the city by myself and decided to stop into Barney’s. Not a place I ordinarily “stopped into,” but I guess I was in the mood to feel fancy for whatever reason. At the fragrance counter, I picked up a bottle made by some artisanal company I’d never heard of because it was so simple and cool-looking – milky white glass with a screw-on tin top and a tiny image of a carrot on it – and because I couldn’t imagine what carrot eau d’toilette might smell like. And what it smelled like was the lightest, cleanest scent ever.

It was crazy-expensive, because it was in Barney’s…but I bought it with commercial residuals I’d just made, and took it home, and felt fabulous and grown-up and elegant whenever I put it on. I’ve hunted for that fragrance from time to time over the years, but have never been able to find it.

2. Roger & Gallet Lettuce Shower Gel. During my sophomore year of college, I stayed with a friend in Paris for a week, and while Paris was lovely, obviously, what I remember most about that trip was my friend’s huge, all-white bathroom, which she stocked with the most unbelievably fresh-smelling shower gel on the planet. It smelled like what I’d always imagined France would smell like: sun, and air, and all things beautiful. This stuff is strangely hard to find – only a couple of stores and sites that I’ve found stock it – but totally worth tracking down, trust me.

3. Hawaiian Tropic Sunscreen. This might just be the best scent ever ever ever. I’m not sure it’s what I’d like to smell like on a day-to-day basis, but I can’t list my favorite scents without including this one.

I can’t get comfortable enough to sleep through the night, not even close. I can’t take a deep breath, or eat more than a few bites of food at a time, or walk particularly long distances. I’m ready to have my body back to myself, if only so that I can pick up my son without making a huge production of it. Mostly I just can’t wait to meet this little girl. My daughter. And what all of this adds up to is that I’m ready for this part to be over, and to move onto the next.

But still.

I love that right now, at this moment, I get to carry her with me all the time. I love it so much, and I don’t want it to end.

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