While procrastinating last night I wound up looking over the copy of my great grandfather's citizenship paperwork (made a while back when we were being all genealogical). He'd listed a Boston address as his residence at the time, but the location - Whitney Street - didn't ring a bell. What did look familiar was the Tremont Street address of one of his witnesses, as the house number is not all that far away from where I work.

So I did what anyone would do and typed "Whitney Street Boston MA" into Google Maps. No hits for Whitney, but I did get a South Whitney - located about a block from my office.

I then tried to look online for old maps and street indices, and while there is some good information out there (Tufts has a nice site of old Boston street maps and related information), I couldn't quite pin down if there was a relationship between the two streets.

Thankfully, at some point in the past someone at Wentworth decided to honor the history of our neighborhood and hang a series of old maps down the hall from my office. It was there, on the map for what was at the time Ward 22, that I was able to confirm that South Whitney is all that's left of Whitney Street. Most of the road was covered up by a large apartment building, which I've actually been in (there's a post office on the ground floor).

I'm a little bummed that the address is no longer available for me to visit, but I do find it sort of amazing that after more than a century I've kind of come full circle.

One unfortunate trend here over the last few months is the lack of posts that aren't college football or book related. There are a variety of reasons for this, most of which fall back on personal motivation to think of or find interesting things to write about.

I am happy to say, though, that this will not be a problem in 2009, or for many years after that, as the wife and I are expecting our first child in May. Feel free to celebrate or recoil in horror as you see fit.

Things have progressed relatively normally since we got official/medical confirmation that the oven was enbunned, as our doctor has been very positive about the various tests and examinations we've had to date. The only hiccup came in our last ultrasound, which uncovered an echogenic intracardiac foci, which can serve as a marker for Down's syndrome or other chromasomal disorders in a small number of cases.

We'd done a test in the first trimester to get an estimated risk for Down's and trisomy 18, and both were very low, so while we're likely to be among the vast majority of cases where there's no larger issue, we are getting a level II ultrasound this week just to check things out. Apparently the EIF thing is one of the ways to drive expectant parents crazy during the second trimester.

So, all things being equal, so far so good.

As far as gender goes, we expect the child will have one, but we're opting to not find out until the kid comes out. Doing this does prevent us from using our working titles - Owen for a boy, Rowan for a girl (say the potential full names out loud if you don't get why they're just working titles). So we're going with Little Coen for now, which I fear will stick as a nickname.

For actual names, we're going with Lucy Catherine if we have a girl. If it's a boy... we'll get back to you.

The wife is coping pretty well with things. She's past the nausea, thankfully, but she's traded that in for more frequent trips to the bathroom (a trade I think she'd make any day of the week). She's also achier than normal, and is finding it more difficult to find a comfortable sleeping position. She's also finding her work clothes are beginning to not fit, which she'd find more problematic if it didn't give her a reason to go shopping.

We're starting to evaluate the logistical end of things as well. We know what room we'll use as a nursery, but have yet to really get our heads around the quantity and variety of things we'll need to get to properly care for the kid. More on the joys and frustrations of buying furniture, clothing, and other miscellany as we go forward.

Part of me is still not quite realizing that this is, in fact, happening. There's another part that's more or less terrified. But then there's the third part that's looking forward to greeting a new person into our family, and I'm happy to say that's the part that's winning out.