I forget where I was when I got the text, but I can assure you the rest of it remains crystal clear in my memory.

So apparently I’m pregnant. Doctor just called.

The wife and I had just gone to see her GP for her pre-surgery consult, where they order up a bunch of tests to make sure the surgery won’t kill her. And one of the questions they ask before cutting you open is “Are you, or could you be pregnant?”

I snort/laughed and answered for her a little too loudly. “No!” (In hindsight, there were a few other off-color jokes I could have made, but the Doctor, while lovely, didn’t seem like the most jovial person, and may not have taken them in the spirit they were intended.)

But now the results were in and we were assured there was a child somewhere in her body.

This, of course, was impossible. Despite a mennonite high school education, I do know how babies are made, and there was a crucial element missing from any assembly line that would pop out a copy of us… sex.

There was none. for months. And months. And months. (Cancer, among it’s many endearing properties, can really put the brakes on a woman’s desire to have you touch her. This is not me complaining, this is how it is. Actually, I take that back, you do get to rub lotion all over her radiation burns, but that’s not exactly a overture for anything other than her saying “ouch, not so hard,” in a totally non-sexy way.)

So it had to b a false positive. Had to be. Even if the last time we had almost sort of tried had worked out, this fetus/baby thing would be five or six months along. (Again, I will spare you the details, but for those of you thinking “A ha! they did do it and spern can be super strong and and and…” no. The train did not leave the station. The rocket did not see the launch pad. The tarp stayed on the field and the game was called on account of weather.)

The only other option was she was having an affair, or we had sleep-sex, or someone Jane the Virgin’ed her while she was under the last time. And while she’s certainly smart enough to have an affair and not get caught - her libido seemed too AWOL for tis to be a likely answer. Sleep-sex? Again, seems like something from a Lifetime Movie more than our actual reality. And getting Jane the Virgin’ed? A fun term, but they were really working more on her other end, if you follow my crude allusions about the female anatomy.

Naturally, we went to the grocery store to get a second test. The kind you pee on.

And after a few not-really tense moments while it dried, the result was… blank. Not blank as in “no baby,” just blank.

As if we had run the thing under the fawcet instead of… ya know, peeing on it.

Fortunately, we had sprung for the two-pack, so after she rehydrated and we - well, she - did another one. Thankfully, this one came up “not pregnant.”

Now, the Doctor told us that the blood test she took is far more accurate than the drug store whizz-and-wipes. (The Doctor didn’t call them that, but I like to think maybe during private Doctor get-togethers they do.)

So one yes, one no, and one possibly defective pee strip. Great.

To break the tie, she’ll have to get a transvaginal ultrasound, which has got to be even less fun than it sounds.

We were supposed to be through the woods at this point. Everything was supposed to be getting easier.

Instead it’s just getting weirder.