How To Be Mysterious
A controlled experiment in telling friends and family.
1. Post heartfelt poem to weblog (written a couple of months earlier, some time after you first heard the news yourself) which encapsulates old hopes and new emotions, and which seems to you to give the news away completely at the end. → One person appears to have guessed.
2. Email academic friends a PDF of a “forthcoming joint-authored paper” with the title “Propagation of Human Embryos and Their Impact on Everyday Life: A Case Study” (International Journal of Thirtysomething Studies, 2007) containing two blurry greyscale photos of a blobby shape with thought bubbles saying “Mmm... toasty” and “Are we there yet?” → Three people guess, while one completely misses the point until I set him straight, figuring it’s just another wacky Rory cartoon.
3. Email various friends to let them know you’re saying goodbye to the dink lifestyle at last. → Seems to have worked, although telling them the due date may also have played a role.
4. Post a “small announcement” to your favourite community site saying that “after March next year a small person will be announcing his or her presence very loudly” in your household. → They don’t miss a trick.
5. Phone relatives and tell them they’re going to be grandparents/uncles/aunts. → Works every time.
Your Burning Questions Answered
1. Late March 2007. At first I thought Jane would have a chance of playing the best April Fool’s joke ever, but it’ll have arrived by then.
2. The first ultrasound was too early to tell, and after that the NHS only does more if they think there are complications. We would have to go to special lengths to find out, which seems a bit pointless when we’ll know soon enough. So for a few more months we get to draw up two lists of impossibly silly names.
3. Most of them revolve around the deadly initial potential of a surname that starts with E. Sorry, Arthur Philip and Polly Esther...
4. Yes, this was one reason she went to Iceland; it wasn’t just one last trip before we sent our passports off to the Home Office for six months. (It also lets us taunt the child with the knowledge that he or she has actually been to Iceland but wasn’t able to see it. Mind you, that’s still one-up on me.)
5. British/Australian/Canadian. Identity crisis ahoy!
6. Four months ago.
7. Yes, I am. :)