Kind of dumbfounded

A girl.  We are having a girl.  At least, the doctor says he is about 97% sure that we are having a girl.  It is hard to tell since our daughter seems to be very modest and doesn't like to have any pictures taken -- just like mom and dad.  In the last round of ultrasounds she covered up her face a lot and kept her legs crossed so it took some effort to get a peek at her gender.  I would very much apprciate it if that same modesty continues for the rest of her life.

So, to be honest, I was in a little bit of a daze when I heard it was a girl.  Please be aware that I was not hoping for one sex over the other -- at least not for myself.  I think Erin and I were hoping for a boy for the sake of her father, who has never had a little boy around to show things to and experience new things with.  He has two daughters and his son-in-law (and future son-in-law) aren't really the same kind of guy he is.  I love my father-in-law to death but he and I are pretty different people.  Still, I am hoping he will take me up on my planned requests to have him show me how to do home repair and maintainance.  I think he will like having the chance to show a guy the ropes and I can have the benefit of learning things I didn't know how to do before.  True, those are things I would have loved to have learned from my own father, but I'm the one who moved several hundred miles away and that makes stopping over to help with home repairs kind of inconvenient.  So, I hope Erin's dad will enjoy helping me with the new house.  Still, I'm not a replacement for a grandson that I'm sure he would have enjoyed greatly.

Aside from that, the news that we were expecting a girl still stunned me because, frankly, I don't understand women at all.  Little boys are easy to figure out.  We are kind of like walking Id's -- we pretty much do whatever we feel like and there isn't a lot of deep thinking involved.  If we feel like putting a bucket on our heads and running into walls we do it because it seemed like a good idea at the time -- you know, before the concussion and the getting in trouble.  But no matter how long I have studied human behavior and no matter how many letters I can put behind my name to say that I have advanced degrees pertaining to knowledge of humans in general, I will never understand women.  For that reason, the idea of having a daughter frankly intimidates me.  I think I was mentally prepared for the wear-your-thoughts-on-your-sleeve behavior of a boy, but I just don't know what to expect from a girl. 

Maybe that's what I should be asking my father-in-law for help with.