I'm such a dedicated blogger.  Quick update on life...

1- made it through my month of no meat.  I might have cheated unknowingly a couple times.  Chicken broth style, but no real meat.  One night, rationality slightly impaired, I came in and heated up a turkey sausage Jimmy Delight to eat (yeah, they are delish).  Luckily, I fell asleep in the 1.5 minutes it was in the microwave so I dodged a bullet there.  

2-I've had 4 quizzes in the past 2.5 weeks.  2 100s, 1 i missed 1 question, and then it gets embarrassing.  FOD- Fundamentals of Doctoring- a class most people do not take seriously.  Well I really wasn't taking it seriously.  I did not read the chapter that we had a quiz or, nor do I have common sense apparently.  Here's an example of a question...

Drugs are bad. True or False.

I choose False.  Then we see the results of the question and 74 people said TRUE and 1 person said FALSE.  That was me.  On 4 of the questions, I was like the only one that got it wrong.  Or maybe there were 3-4 other people.  I made a 40 on the quiz, and afterwards SMITTY was laughing at someone for missing 1.  I'm an idiot.  

3- I have a pet named Spot. He is a sweet potato.  I discovered him in my pantry after he sat there for about a month and he has done some serious sprouting.  Like 2 feet tall probably.  I'm taking suggestions on what to do with him.  One, use him as a centerpiece.  Two, leave him be and wait for him to take over my apartment.  Three, plant him.  

4- My current food obsession (edit: NEW food obsession.  I have many) is Jello Pudding.  The sugar free mix of course.  I go through a box every 2 days, pistachio is my favorite discovery so far.  

5- just realized all the updates I came up with except 1 have to do with food.  I have a problem.  

Week 1 of my semi-vegetarian diet went well.  There was one incident... that involved lentil soup made with chicken broth, but it was an accident and it won't happen again. I've eaten good-tons of seafood and tofu and veggies and fruit... ah I love food.  And to continue with that, I leave for Kansas City today to attend a family medicine conference.  Thanks to the family med department at USA, everything is paid for.  Flight, hotel, transportation to the hotel, the actual conference, and best of all, food.  Apparently the conference provides vouchers for breakfast and lunch, and we are getting $55 from our family med department for food.  Which means allison, kacie, and I will be dining at only the best and most expensive restaurants in kansas city for dinner every night.  There's an opening social where I plan on winning either a Wii or a $30o gift certificate to apple.  During the day, I hopefully will learn things about medicine.  But now I've got to go pack and find some 80s outfit to wear to that social... good times.

say no to meat and lock your doors at night

It's been a month or so since I've blogged, bad me.  I've been traveling, and it was grand.  It would take me 10 years to write about everything so I'm going to spare you.  But I loooove puerto rico and I loooove Boston.  

In more recent news, I am currently challenging myself to a month of Pescetarianism.  Before your mind wanders too much into what that is, it's a diet that excludes birds and mammals. I am definitely not the vegan type, I need animal products such as eggs and ice cream.  Straight up vegetarianism isn't for me either, because I love fish too much.  But being a pescetarian, I can do.  I might miss my poultry, but red meat I will gladly say goodbye too.  Why am I doing this?  Maybe I'm trying to get on PETA's good side, who knows.  I'm on Day 3 now, and I must say its going quite well.  Tofu, mahi mahi, salmon, scallops... what more could I ask for?  I might soon need to learn how to cook fish though, because my 3 dinners the past 3 nights were prepared by my sister, my dad, and Bonefish Grill.  

I've been remembering my dreams a lot within the past couple weeks.  There was the one where I racing in the 200 backstroke, and I woke up to find I was actually kicking in the bed.  Then there was the one where I was pregnant, for the 2nd time, definitely not married.  I was surprisingly disappointed when I awoke to find out that one wasn't true.  I also had one where my mother, sister, and I were planning some kind of bombing, and I got caught and was on my way to jail.  My mom and sister totally got away with it.  

Last night I woke up at 3am to use the bathroom, and on the way I realized my front door was shining (I was half asleep, not on acid).  That was because I had not closed it all the way and the light from outside was coming in.  (Now I do these things sometimes.  Like when I have a lot of things that I'm carrying I sometimes walk inside and leave my keys in the lock, forgetting about them for several hours.  I usually remember to lock my door at night, and almost always remember to close it all the way, so this was kind of weird)  I went and locked it and got back in bed.  I was in the middle of trying to decide if I should make sure no one was in my apartment when I fell asleep.  That's when I had a most frightening dream.  

DREAM: I woke up to people outside my apartment making a lot of noise.  Turned out to be some creepy killers or rapists or something, I don't know.  Then I saw one look up at me and start running towards my door.  I ran to lock it and tried to dial 911, but my hands were shaking so much I kept hitting the wrong keys (something like this ALWAYS happens to me in scary dreams.  Like I try to yell and nothing comes out.  Or someone's chasing me and I can't seem to move faster than a snail's pace.  Is that just me?).  I ended up calling my mother and telling her I was really scared and they needed to come over.  Somehow, I end up at a hospital perfectly fine.  Not sure what happened with the rapists.

It was really scary and I'm always closing my door from now on at night.  And probably during the day too.  Now since it's 11PM on a Friday night, I guess I'm off to bed to see what scary/interesting thing I can dream about tonight.  

gardening

My next door neighbor (at my parent's house) asked if she could pay me to plant some flowers for her.  I woke up at 645 this morning to get over there early in attempts to avoid the heat.  While toiling around in the dirt I had an epiphany. I hate gardening.  I don't like sweating, I don't like dirt, and frankly, I don't think I'm very good at it.  But I was thinking about all the older women I know, and they LOVE to garden.  Especially my mom.  Am I the black sheep? Or is gardening something that once you turn 35 it turns into a major hobby? 

Please. Let me know.  

Also, on an unrelated note, my mellow mushroom waiter guessed I was 16 the other day.  Granted, he was weird and there's a pretty good chance he was high, but this is nothing out of the ordinary.  He guessed my 17 year old sister was in fact, 17.  Story of my life.  

VBS blues

I was teaching VBS (vacation bible school) this week and I am probably the VBS staff's worst nightmare.

First, I missed a training session I didn't know existed.  Then I left to go out of town until the night before VBS began.  Apparently, I was suppose to call all the parents before it started, but didn't know that because I missed the training session.

Flight delay in New York because of a FLAT TIRE.  C'mon Delta... This resulted in us missing our connection in ATL. This resulted in us having to spend the night there and catch the first flight in the morning at 7:45.  On the bright side, I did get a $14 voucher for food that night and I get a $100 voucher to use sometime in the next year.  But it also meant I was arriving in Mobile 10 minutes before I was suppose to be at church teaching VBS. 

Got to church, there was confusion, my kids ended up missing the opening ceremony because again, i missed the training session so I didn't know exactly what I was suppose to do.  

I call the parents that night.  One of them says she asked her daughter what she learned that day and all she could tell her was "God flies at night." awesome...

Then I felt really bad all Tuesday, convinced myself I had swine flu.  

The next morning, my sister was off at the carpool area trying to round up our kids.  She comes back and says, are you feeling better now? I said yes.. and she said ok good, because they are canceling VBS because some kid that was here earlier this week had swine flu.  (which may or may not be true at this point, still awaiting the results from CDC but it's looking like thats what it was).

So yeah, they are rescheduling the last 3 days of VBS and I'm pretty sure they checked my schedule to make sure I wouldn't be here for those 3 days.    

poll: which is scarier?

Possum really unhappy with the cat?

Madeline's cat really unhappy with my kitty? This was right after she got a bath so her hatred for Samson was especially strong.

My vote is for the cat.  Look how cute this baby possum is!

NYC: An Intro

New York is dirty and smelly.  The people are weird and everything is ridiculously expensive.  I got lost at least 10 times and the weather kinda sucked.  With that said, I freaking LOVE it.  I went to DC in March, and while the company was nice (shout out to anna and priyal what whatt), DC is lacking a certain charm that I felt in New York.  Plus, it's kind of a bore.  I plan on writing a lot more about my trip, but I didn't want to write some super long blog that everyone would be scared to read.  So, first, top 5 things I love about New York.

1.  The People.  Where else could you find a man walking down the street carrying an enormous snake (5th avenue... during a parade.  There were TONS of people around)  Or a man shouting "Obamacondoms.com, for all your hard times"?  Or a man dressed up as the statue of libert

y?  Side story to that... as I was attempting to take this picture, my

 mother behind me all of a sudden started bursting into laughter.  After some moments of confusion I realized I was standing on a grate and my dress was going all marilyn monroe on me.  This was Times Square on a Saturday night. So, my family is dysfunctional, my mother obviously thinks crowds of people staring at me and my underwear is hilarious.  

    

2.  The food.  Oh, the food.  It started with 

olive oil and roasted fennel gelato from Mario Batali's restaurant (Iron Chef anyone?) and ended with an enormous piece of divine strawberry cheesecake from Carnegie Deli.  In between that there was Bobby Flay's restaurant- Mesa Grill, high afternoon tea (to the right... yeah I ate a lot of sugar on this trip), soup dumplings, etc.  On the last day we went to Aquagrill, a restaurant in Soho where I could have picked out a $500 meal consistingof 1 ounce of caviar, an oyster sampler, and a bottle of wine.  I settled for a yellowfish tuna sandwich which was only about $12 instead. 

3.  The Subway.  So it took awhile to figure out, but once you get the hang of it, it's not so bad.  While I felt that DCs was a tad easily to decipher, it is not as practical because NYCs system goes everywhere you would need to go.  Might still have to walk several blocks, but its doable.  And there's always somebody down there playing music.  Guitar, drums, violin, you name it.  My favorite was on our last night, as we were leaving Times Square we walked down to the sound of The Meetles, a Beatles cover band.  They had a huge crowd and were really good.  We only caught the last couple of songs they did but it was really cool.  

4.  The Countries represented.  To start, there's just so many foreign people it's not even funny.  I heard accents that I couldn't even tell you where they were from.  Chinatown is just great to walk around.  Its the only place I saw cats the whole time I was there... hmm. Lots of ducks hanging up in windows, all kinds of fish and fruits and veggies to buy.  Its really legit, it looks almost identical to the small town where I lived when I was in China.  Madeline bought some bubble milk tea while we were there.  The "bubbles" are tapioca and the drink is very sweet.  A bit strange but it was good.  We also went to Little Italy which is in fact, very little, just one street.  Come to think of it though, the only time spent there was in a shop run by Chinese people... so didn't really experience that.  Sunday was the national puerto rican day parade.  We were one of the few non-puerto ricans there, but I still found it very cool.  Its just neat to watch how excited they all were and how proud they are of their culture. 

5.  It's like, famous.  I kept on thinking things like, oh here's the lobby of the Empire State Building they show on Elf when he first walks into the building.  This is where Phoebe runs like crazy through Central Park on Friends.  These are the steps (of the Met) that Kevin James sits on in the movie Hitch.  This is the statue they always show in the intro to 30 rock.  And so on and so on.  Our waiter at Mesa Grill was telling us all the movies that were being filmed in NYC then and all the celebrities that he had randomly seen.  I also went on the NBC studio tour and got to see the SNL set and Jimmy Fallon's late night studio.  

SOOO, Summary.  NYC=awesome.  If I'm not lazy, I will write some more details.  

hey.

As you all have noticed  (the 4 of you that will read this), I haven't written anything in awhile.  That's because I'm not doing much with my life and loving every minute of it.  It is quite depressing that it in June 10th since we got done with school on May 8th.  How is it even possible that its been a whole month?  Oh I remember rushing through that Physiology miniboard (because I couldn't stand one minute longer) just like it was yesterday.  Please summer don't go!  

Oh, as a last follow up to my new year's resolutions, here are their success rates. Because it is funny how much of a loser I am...

1.  4.0 for spring semester.  FAIL.  This one was kind of a joke anyways... I did want an A in physiology though, and I got a B.  B stands for barely scraped by too. 

2.  Healthy eating.  FAIL for semester.  SUCCESS for summer.  

3.  Exercising regularly.  FAIL for semester.  Didn't even train for my triathlon.  Strangely ever since then though, I've been doing grrreat.  

4.  Become more responsible with money.  FAIL.  unless you count the little organizer I bought to put my receipts in.  And I did return 2 swimsuits today that I had paid $280 for... But my reasoning behind that was, I could get 3 not as cute suits for the price of 1 of those. 

5.  Avoid boys.  EPIC FAIL. 

6.  Find something exciting to do this summer.  SUCCESS!!! YES!  This includes, but is not limited to, Disney World, NYC, Puerto Rico, ATL, and Boston.  And not planned but is a must... going to visit A LOTT in the Big Easy.   It would have been impossible for both 4 and 6 to be successful, and 6 won out. 

NEW GOALS:

*Expect nothing from myself.  Then I cannot be disappointed by missed goals.

*Drop out of school because obviously med school makes me eat everything I can find AND makes me incredibly lazy.

*Win the lottery.  

*Transfer to an all girls school.  Do they have those for medical school?

I'm leaving for NYC in the morning... at 7, which is in 5 hours.  I think I might try to go to bed! 

done with school, disney world, summma

Well well well.  Done with the first year of med school.  I hung on, thats about all i can say.  And all I care to say.  Moving on...

I gave myself little recovery time between finishing school and heading to the happiest place on Earth.  It was a great week, there didn't seem to be too many people there so we got to do all our favorites lots of times.  tower of terror 10x. And the aerosmith coaster 5 1/2 x.  Yes, that's right.  For those that haven't ridden this ride (I do pity you, it is the best. ever.), it is in the dark and you start by blasting off to 60mph in like 3 seconds. Well, on our third time to ride, it blasts off as is normal but then we enter a not dark, but fully lit room.  Cool, but not normal. When we get to the very top, we stopped.  After 5-10 minutes 2 workers show up, tell us to get out (not to the left, or i would have plummeted to my death), and walk down about 4 flights of stairs to the bottom.  Not my worst nightmare, but close.  Disney was kind enough to give us a fast pass so that we could risk our lives and ride it again.  Just kidding, I trust Disney.  Did you know no one has ever died on disney property? They haul you off to a hospital and pronounce you dead there.  Disturbing and so not surprising.  Death and Disney do not go together.  

Another priceless moment.  One day, I passed a cute little family.  Little girl, probably about 6-7 in a stroller wearing a tinkerbell costume, dad pushing the stroller, and mom following behind.  Out of nowhere, the girl looks at me and screams (seriously screamed, it was frightening) WAR EAGLE!! Took me a second to realize I had on an Auburn shirt, look up to see the dad had on an Auburn hat, and after a few seconds of shock I was able to return a war eagle.  This girl has been trained oh so well.  

Also, the morning we left, I went and took my trash out at my apartment.  On the way back, I went a different way then I usually do and took a lap around the pool to see how it looked. (Awesome by the way, I will be spending some quality time there this summer.)  Well, I get back to my apartment and while I've been gone a newspaper has shown up in front of my door, and I've gotten a second monthly newsletter from my apartment.  I had already gotten mine when I left earlier, so they had put a new one by my door in the time that I had been gone.  I try to open my door and the key will not budge.  I had forgotten to lock my apartment the night before, so my logic is that someone was and still is in my apartment and put the privacy lock on so I can't get in.  After about a minute of freaking out with the key and lock, I look up and I'm at apartment 623 and not 723.  EFF! So I run.  It all made much more sense as I was headed back to my building.  Also didn't notice that my wreath had magically disappeared... I'm so smart.  

So, its summer time.  I've got lots of goals for these next few months.  I'm going to be productive and accomplish them all.   

Physiology has failed me

med school has made me hate physiology.  not really, but it is not as fun as it used to be.  I was so excited for this class, and it is slowly but surely, wearing me down, and taking everything out of me that I have to give.  I am afraid that the hormones I love so much will become just as terrible under the teachings of Dr. Lincoln.  darn that dirty old man.  

Here, I wanted to insert stephen's video of dr. lincoln, but 1. i can't find it 2. only people in my class read this and have more than likely already seen it 3. if anyone isn't in my class and reads this, they probably would not think it is funny or understand it at all.

Right now, It is 2AM in the morning.  This would be ok IF I was actually studying.  Instead, for the last 3 hours, I've been gchatting, blogging, and doing other pointless things.  Good thing there is no pressure on this next test on Friday.  I'm pretty sure I only have to make a 42 to keep my 100 in the class (med school is so lame, my mind needs to be stimulated).

I'm just going to insert random facts for the rest of this entry:

BEN FOLDS.  amazing.  one of my favorite concerts I've ever been to.  Freaking hilarious (he sang a song about Mobile!) and he plays the piano like a fiend.  Seriously, his hands were just a blur across the keys.  

I LOVE TINA FEY.  30 rock is officially the greatest show ever. I think I've already mentioned that about a million times, but oh man, I love it.

30 DAYS til I'm done with my first year of medical school.  No way it's been that long... sike! it seems like it's been a lifetime.  If I knew what I knew now, would I still do it?  YES but I would have done some things very differently for sure.  Things that would have made my life sooo much simpler.  And I would have better grades.  

VP of AMA.  That's me.  What, what?

17 HOURS was how many hours straight I was at school today.  All of that time was spent in our classroom minus AMA meeting at lunch, dinner in the conference room, and some bathroom breaks.  

STRONGER- Kanye West is a fabulous song.  I also love Robocop.  who woulda thought... Shout out to Allison Lott for bringing these lifechangers into my life.  The words of these songs will touch you.  

THE GRAMMAR of this entry is probably awesome.  don't care.  it's too late to be doing this kind of thing.  

fitness fails me again

Just like my trusty Fitness magazine brought me the spinach smoothie, I found another article of interest in the latest issue: "Drop 10 lbs THIS month!"  The plan is threefold.  1-doing their toner exercises twice a week, 2- doing cardio 3x a week, and 3-eating 1500 calories a day.  Not so bad, eh?  

So Thursday morning (probably as a way to avoid studying) I decided to try out their toner exercises.  I open up to Part 1 where it showed a really fit girl doing all these easy looking moves.  I get started on the super leg slimmers: the arabesque, salute, and static lunge kick-back, which all end up being versions of the lunge.  Well, about 5 in I am feeling the burn.  After 10, I'm huffing and puffing.  At about 20, I realize I am sweating profusely.  And yet for some reason, I continue all the way to 60.  It didn't look pretty, but I did it.  After taking about 20 minutes to recover, I move on to the amazing ab flatteners, but they confuse me.  Next, are the best butt toners, but as soon as I realize that these are all squats (my legs are still on fire), I quit.  

Thursday was very painful, but Friday was even worse.  The little things in life, getting out of my car, walking down stairs, moving... became such a challenge.  Now, approximately 64 hours later, I still find myself involuntarily groaning every time I stand up or sit down.  New York celebrity trainer Justin Geilband did say I would "sculpt muscle fibers I've probably never reached before." Amen to that.  

So here's my take on this whole strategy.  I did the first three moves, but what if I would have kept going to do all 12?  I might have been able to make it through that first day, but that next morning when I woke up I would literally be unable to get out of the bed.  So, stuck in bed for an entire day waiting for the pain to subside, can't get to food... I'd probably lose a couple pounds right?  And when I reach the point where I'm able to move again, its almost time for the second dose of 12 toner moves followed shortly by another day of bed rest. After a month, thats at least a whole weeks worth of not eating at all.  And there's your 10 pounds.  

i love the internet.

Wow, I haven't blogged in exactly a month, but possibly the only person that has noticed is my dad.  I don't have anything to say about the time that has passed.  All I can remember about it is that I made my lowest grade ever in med school, I went to DC, and I haven't gained back my motivation to study since getting back.  Oh well, on to bigger and better things!  Since I wasn't so successful with my new year's resolutions, I have a new one.  

http://www.youshouldhaveseenthis.com

It is 99 things on the internet (mostly videos) that are hilarious/awesome and deserve to be seen.  I will see them all and feel a sense of accomplishment that medical school is unwilling to give me.  Right now I'm on #21.  

Some that I HIGHLY recommend

2)charlie bit me.  cute kids.  cute BRITISH kids.  OMG mate, I love this one.

6)charlie the unicorn. very strange, but also very funny if it's your kind of humor.  

8)numa numa.  old school, still amazing.

10)george lucas in love. this is a bit long, but the very end is hilarious.  The rest is funny too but the end makes it.  

16)dramatic chipmunk.  It's only 5 seconds, unless you watch it over and over again which I do sometimes.

19)fail blog.  Just discovered this and I had to limit myself to looking at only the first 4 pages because it was cracking me up.  Mostly idiotic things that people do.  

Maybe next time I blog it will include my favs from 21-40 (which i already know will include christian the lion and leprechauns in alabama)

ihop adventure

Today was a terrible day. While everyone else was downtown getting drunk and catching beads (not that this is what I wanted to do, just saying...), I woke up at 7:30 and immediately got to studying physiology.  At 1 o'clock I realized my productivity was waning, so I decided to break.  I transferred to Anna's where she fed me pizza, then I miserably studied (with still about half the productivity I had in the morning) until about 7:45.  Then it was IHOP time.  

Today at IHOP, everyone could get a FREE 3 stack of buttermilk pancakes.  IHOP sketches me out, but I will eat almost anything that is free.  So, with Anna driving, we went and thoroughly enjoyed those pancakes.  At the end of our meal, we discovered Anna's keys were missing.  After searching the places we would have preferred them to be (in her pockets, at the table, i even looked through my purse) we found they were locked in her car, still in the ignition.  And the car was running.  Then, she forgot her phone number and the color of her car all within the span of 5 minutes.  People, this is what med school is.  Our brains are disintegrating bit by bit (some faster than others apparently).

This has never happened to me.  Luckily, Honda makes it very difficult to do such a thing.  I cannot lock my car without my keyless entry unless I pull on the door handle while I push down on the lock. But I have done some stupid things while driving.  

1.  tried to get out of the car while it was still in drive

2. tried to put the car in park while it was still moving 

3. tried to turn on the car when it is already on (done that a lot, herbie gets angry)

4. recently I endangered 4 very nice people's lives by setting my mileage to zero while I was turning.  When the wheel straightened out, my arm got stuck and twisted around, and I ended up in the other lane.

So, conclusion of the night, we waited for about 45 minutes for AAA to show up.  In the meantime, Steven (who also happened to be partaking of the free pancakes with his fam) broke apart an umbrella and tried to use the metal piece to unlock the car.  Unsuccessful.  Lee asked almost every person leaving IHOP if they had a coat hanger in their car.  Unsuccessful. We did talk to a girl who had locked her keys in her car earlier that day, and she said the AAA guy told her more people locked their keys in their car on Fat Tuesday then any other day of the year.  I wonder why...

10pm on a friday night=bedtime!

some of my new favorite things:

- Gelato.  So much better than ice cream.  Thanks to Allison's recent betrayal, we were able to go to Serda's downtown with her $100 gift certificate.  They have gelato, and it is fabulous.  Allison and I shared 3 scoops- tahitian vanilla, bananas foster, and dark chocolate raspberry truffle.  Each is as amazing as it sounds.  

- 30 Rock.  The 2 funniest shows on TV come on back-to-back on Thursday night.  Thanks to Netflix, I've  seen almost every episode (only 3 left, then I'm switching to arrested development).  You should check it out.  Tina Fey is a genius.  

-  Netflix.  It brought me to 30 rock. 

- Statistics.  Who woulda thought?  Please don't judge me.  

- Not going to class.  It's amazing what I can get done in two hours when I'm not sitting in that classroom.  

The perfect afternoon?  I will skip class, go to Serda's, order some gelato, and watch 30 rock on Netflix.  I need some help figuring out how to work the statistics into that plan.  

  

things more important than studying

So, this morning started out like any other day.  My alarm went off at 7AM and I got out of bed about 3 minutes later.  (Correction: this is nothing like a normal day, in which I usually snooze for about 40 minutes).  As soon as I got up, I turned off my alarm, so I was a bit confused when I heard it going off again about 5 minutes later.  I went it there and it was actually someone calling me, a number I didn’t recognize.  This is what followed…

Me: Hello?

Random Dude: Is this Elizabeth? (said very energetically)

Me: (awkward silence)…. Yes?

Random Dude: GOOOOOD MORNING!!

Me: (much longer awkward silence) Thank you?

Random Dude went on to tell me that my friend Allison (LOTT not to be confused with any other Allison I know) had written an email saying I needed a wake up call because I was grouchy in the morning and always late to class.  The only words I was able to get out were awesome, thank you, yes, etc.  I won a CD and a $10 gift certificate to Serda’s.  Allison however, wins a $100 GC to Serda’s.  Does this seem unfair to anyone else?  She spends about 2 minutes writing an email full of deceit and I get embarrassed on the radio?  I’m wondering the impact this will have on my medical career.  I’m sure hundreds of thousands of people across the gulf coast were listening to 92Zew this morning at 7:15, and after hearing that Elizabeth Donahue, who is in med school, is mean and has no concept of time, they’ll probably think I am going to be a terrible doctor.  When in actuality, I am a very nice person and I am never late to class.  That is because I do not go, but that’s irrelevant. 

And apparently this is not the first time they’ve tried to call me.  One morning a couple weeks ago I was still asleep and got a call from a funny number which I did not take.  And I’m glad I didn’t because who knows what I would have said in my half-conscious state.  

quick update on life

1.  I've been on a mission along with some amigos to see all the best picture nominees for this year.  I'm still missing Milk and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.  But the 3 I have seen...

-The Reader- I wasn't a huge fan, but everyone else that I went with loved it.  Its just not my kind of movie.

-Slumdog Millionaire- absolutely amazing.

-Frost/Nixon- also not my kind of movie, but I enjoyed it.  I did fall asleep a little bit, but 

          that was only because we went at 10:30 at night.

I am super excited about seeing He's Just Not that Into You and the Shopaholic movie.  I am pretty sure the latter is going to be terrible, but those books are my favorite so I can't not see it.  

2.  I made a 94 on my physiology test.  I studied hardcore for this thing so I'm glad it paid off.  It was the first A I've made in about 5 months, and it's also been quite awhile since I've been above average.  It is exhausting being in a class with a bunch of geniuses.  The only problem is, I made a 94 on my first anatomy test... and then I ended up barely making a B in the class, so this trend will hopefully not continue.

3.  Sunday was my birthday.  I had lunch with the fam, and I went canoeing that night.  The canoeing was lots of fun, even though I saw none of the advertised "creatures of the night".  It was a good day, but also highly unexciting.  Its a bit depressing that birthdays get less important every year.

4.  I'm lacking the motivation to study right now.  I have to be in a really good mood to study, and I'm not right now.  Not entirely sure why... I probably should go for a run and work up some endorphins.  

 

January 2009

Now that it's the end of January, I decided to look back on my "new year's resolutions" and see how things were going.  

1.  4.0 for spring semester.  Well, in histology I have made 40, 60, and 60 on our 3 quizzes, and an 82 on the first test.  This is not conducive to making an A.  I would have to make A's on all the rest of the tests and bring my quiz average up to an A.  But luckily, I don't really care.  (is that bad?)  A B sounds just fine to me.  If halfway through school I decide I want to be an orthopedic surgeon or a dermatologist, I may regret this nonchalant outlook (that's one of my favorite smart sounding words to use by the way). What I do care about is Physiology, which I just had a test in on Friday.  I will have to report back on its outcome, but I feel pretty good about it.  OH!  And the way I hoped to achieve this goal? By paying attention in class? Not happening.  I think I have decided to just not go to histology anymore, and then I actually do make an effort to pay attention in phys.  But gchat is just too hard to pass up when a teacher is droning on about mitochondria and endothelial cells.  BOOOR-ING.   

2.  Healthy eating.  There have been good days and bad days.  Probably more bad then good.  I'm gonna get back on that TODAY.  Yeah... I'm going to Cracker Barrel for lunch and having duck a l'orange for dinner.  maybe tomorrow then.  

3.  Exercising regularly, even worse.  I'm not entirely sure I've exercised at all.  Unless walking up the stairs at school counts, because it takes about 2 minutes for my heart rate to subside after that.  Good cardio workout.  BUT today I am going to print off the entry form for the triathlon I want to do and send it in.  Then I am forced to exercise, lest I want to die halfway through the swim part of the race.   

4.  I just realized there wasn't a #4 in my previous list.  YEY, I've been successful in sticking with #4.

5.  More responsible with money?  Well, I've bought a lot of food.  Too much food.  Just checked my statement for Panera transactions for the month of January... 7.  Ridiculous.  But I have branched out too- mexican, seafood, greek, british? (a pizza named for the Beatles from mellow mushroom) New plan, when I go get groceries today I am going to take out $100.  That is what I will use for food for the month of February.  Once I run out, I can no longer eat!  It's shorter, I should be able to do that right?  

6.  Avoiding boys... well this one is just difficult.  They are too plentiful.  I am going to med school prom solo, when I could have had a date, so maybe I'm halfway successful here.   

7.  Find something exciting to do this summer, nothing new here.  The thought of lying around doing nothing, taking occasional road trips and other mini vacation things sounds quite enjoyable though.  

A bit of inspiration for your day

Is it Christmas yet?

So I have made it through close to 2 weeks of my 2nd semester of med school, and so far, I am only failing one class!  Technically, I have 100s in everything except Histology, because I've made a 6/10 on our only quiz so far. [UPDATE: I just took another quiz and made a 4/10 bringing my average to a 50%]  I despise this class.  If someone has some inspirational thoughts as to why the cell and all its organelles are worth sitting in class for 2 hours and learning about, please let me know.  

But these 2 weeks have not been all bad.  

Creepy moment of the week:

A group of us went to a Mexican restaurant on Saturday night.  Not that memorable, the food wasn't amazzing.  But the moment that sticks out in my mind was when this old lady (when I say old, she was probably 50 but looked about 92 because she's probably been smoking 5 packs a day for the past 35 years) came over and asked Jenny is she was Kate's mom.  When Jenny said yes, the lady replied "You better be glad I'm not a thief because that baby is precious!" Check, please?  Luckily, we made it out all right, with everyone accounted for.   

Depressing moment of the week:

About 11 o'clock Thursday night, Florida (and TIM TEBOW) become national champions (not depressing at all),but this marked the end of college football.  Until September.  There's still several weeks of pro football left, but that doesn't fill the hole in my heart that is present in the months from January-August when I'm awaiting the start of college football.  

"This is so amazing I want to cry" moment of the week:

This Sunday I went to "From the Top" which is an NPR show that happened to be filming in Mobile.  They bring on kids that play classical music, interview them, and they play a song.  The first guy that walks out was a sight: 18 years old, dreads down to his waist, and he played the.... drums? electric guitar? maybe even the saxophone? No, he played the flute.  Next was a 12 year old who played Clare de Lune on the piano which was easily one of the most beautiful things I have heard in my life.  And she was so incredibly graceful doing it.  I did tune out for about 30 seconds trying to figure out the movie that they play this song in.  Ocean's 11.  At the end when they are are standing by the fountain.  Next was a guy that played the bassoon and then a 13 year old that played the violin.  

Inspiring moment of the week:

Last night I went to a pediatric interest group, which is always great because they always have amazing food.  A pediatric cardiologist came and talked to us, and she was just really cool to hear from because she LOVES her job.  Gets me excited going to things like this, because a lot of the times I forget why I'm here, focusing on the troubles of the day whether than looking ahead to the end result.  School sucks but I am here for a reason.  

Reality check moment of the week:

I want to go to Europe this summer.  But I also want to go to Honduras, Puerto Rico, and New York.  I realize I cannot do all these things.  Europe would be great, but I don't have plans, I don't have anyone to go with, and I would cost a lot.  I could theoretically do all three of the other things, probably for the same cost as going to Europe.  Honduras is a medical mission trips, hopefully can raise money for that.  Puerto Rico only involves buying a plane ticket.  New York, well Madeline wants to look at schools so thats a good excuse to take a major road trip and visit lots of places. 

"I judge myself and my whole family" moment of the week:

I'm not sure this even deserves words.  Promise this is the first time this has happened... at least I hope.  

a new year

Last night I was honored enough to be present for a first annual Mobile tradition.  Much like the Times Square Ball drop of NYC or the Peach drop in Atlanta, Mobile wanted such an event to bring in the new year.  So Mobilians began to think, what are we most proud of?  What do we want to be remembered by?  That's when City Councilman Fred Richardson came up with it- the moonpie. 

"It cuts across

 economic status.  It cuts across race. 

 The Moon Pie brings people together.  If I had picked some other object, it could have divided the community.  But the Moon Pie, nobody has anything against the Moon Pie... They [the critics] see it, and many of them don't like it, but they can't stop it.  It's coming whether they like it or not!"

Fred Richardson

 So the planning was underway.  Richardson contributed $9,000 from the city's discretionary fund for the construction of a 12-ft tall, 600-lb electric pie.  Makes sense.  Why not spend taxpayer's money on something completely pointless when our economy is in the hole and our kids don't get to go to music class because there's no funding for our public schools?

 And not that that wouldn't have been PLENTY, but Chattanooga Bakery, the inventor of the Moon Pie in 1917, concocted the world's largest, 55-lb, 45,000 calorie pie for the event.  Look at the beauty.  

So how was my experience?

We got there around 11:30, and unfortunately the edible moonpie was gone.  We did scrape some remains from the bottom, but determined it wasn't safe to eat.  

 See that itty bitty yellow dot in the background? That would be our grand electronic moonpie high in the sky.  And its not that small because I was at the back of a huge crowd, or because my camera can't zoom.  They had it so far away, it just looked that tiny.  You couldn't even read what it said, and it did NOT look like a moonpie.

I'm so proud to call Mobile my home.