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9th December 2008

butterfly

I don’t hug my patients.

I shake hands, hold hands, touch shoulders, caress knees, hand over kleenex. But I rarely hug, which is unusual for me, as I love to hug. I swear, I have “HUG ME” tattooed across my forehead, which is especially discerned by all the boys that I wish to date. One hug from me, and I’ve suddenly become the sister. But it is a level of intimacy that I just don’t cross with patients, just as I never call them by their first names either.

Today, there was a patient on my clinic schedule who I had been dreading to see. A few months ago, I gave her a diagnosis that is one of those nebulous, “is it really real” diseases, a diagnosis that requires more emotional and psychiatric rather than neurologic treatment. She was very unhappy at that time, but agreed to the treatment plan that my attending and I outlined. I hadn’t hear anything more from her since then. When I saw her on my schedule, I braced myself for a very long clinic with lots of counselling and tears.

You can imagine my surprise and delight when I walked in the room and met a transformation. She had followed up on the treatment plan, gotten the assistance and help that she needed and she had not had any further symptoms since she saw me. She was virtually a new woman, with a smile that lit her face and I could not keep the same from my face.

When she left, she asked if she could hug me. We hugged tightly before she left.

I felt healed by the encouner, a little pessimism washed away. It was a good day.

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24th November 2008

Catching the bouquet

Some friends of mine got married a month or so ago. Lindsay (the bride) is a romantic and planned the wedding to have a Jane Austen theme. All of the guests were seated at places named after Jane Austen locations: Bath, Mansfield Park, Lyme (which was actually where we were seated), Northanger Abbey, and of course, Pemberley, the table where the bridal party sat. There were horse-drawn carriage rides and silhouette portraits and of course, dancing (although not English line dancing to my disappointment). The gentlemen from my church in attendance were, as I should have expected, dolts and lacking any sort of a romantic sentiment:

Me, teasingly: How long do you presume to reside in Lyme, Mr. B? Are you here for the season? Will I have the opportunity to make the acquaintance of your sisters?

Mr B: What are you talking about, woman? I can’t understand anything you’re saying.

Excited about the prospect of dancing and a formal wedding reception, I had dressed up for the evening, wearing my bridesmaid’s dress from Sam’s wedding with the long flowing skirt that I love so much. Lindsay and Tracy (the groom) were good on their word, there was dancing. Live, big band dancing playing Glenn Miller and Louis Armstrong. And I couldn’t get anyone to dance with me. I finally did manage to drag out every one of the boys from my church out there to the dance floor, away from the food where they lingered and insisted that they escort me off the floor (I’ll save my appalled rant on the lack of common decency and manners later) and had a fabulous time anyway. I caught the bouquet, did I mention that? The pictures make it look like I had staked out the front row position, when in reality, I had just come in from the side. The bride threw the bouquet over the chandelier where it hit the ceiling, bounced off another girl’s chest and landed in my arms.

I thought I had recognized the photographer as the guy who had done the pictures for Liz’s wedding. What do you know, he was a friend of the bride’s sister. I started whistling “It’s a small world” and my friend Sarah remarked that she recognized the guy who followed him around with the flash as the photographer for her friend’s wedding once upon a time.

In any case, the wedding photos were posted online today. There weren’t any pictures of me dancing and I don’t like the pictures of me catching the bouquet (I look manic), but there is a sweet one of the groom and me.

Click for pictures

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4th October 2008

Capital T that rhymes with P

Dear Boy,

It’s a super good thing that you are moving in a month, because you are trouble. Those laughing brown eyes and dimples are doing me in. Not to mention the fact that you sat next to me and laughed with me though all the performances, catching my eye, leaning over so I could hear you over the performers.

“What was your favorite part of the night?”

“You.” Heart stops. “Running up to the stage dancing.” *wink, broad smile* Heart sorta starts again.

Gah. Don’t. Need. This. You’re too good looking and have never paid any attention to me before two months ago and I know with certainty I am so not your type.

Probably didn’t help that Friend, who I adore but is somewhat crass and loud, leaned over to me and said (in tones I’m certain you didn’t even have to strain to hear) “How old is that hottie next to you?” If you could hear a blush, I’m sure that it would have drowned out a freight train.

Flirting with you was the most fun I’ve had in a long time. Promise me we’ll do it again on Sunday.

Julia

The other surreal experience tonight? Having one girl coming up to me, “do you know my brother Mike? He’s a nerd, well, I mean, he’s into computer I guess, I don’t really know. Anyway, he just wants to hang out. So can I give him your phone number?”

Me, staring at her: “Do you even know my phone number?”

“Your friend Sarah gave it to me.”

Sarah waves. “I thought you should have a good time.”

So apparently, Mike, whom I’ve never met before, is going to be giving me a call next week.

Next year, I’m taking to the stage. I think a little interpretive dance may be in order.

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2nd June 2008

More decisions

Hypothetical question (really, truly):

If you were trying to impress a young lad with your homemade cooking, what would you use as a side dish to complement my signature salmon recipe? (I was going to make it into a real poll, but I got lazy.)

1. Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes. What better way to get a man’s affection than through the staple of life? Plus, the author promises that I can expect to be worshipped and kissed for at least 38 hours.

2. Crushed Hot Potatoes. It’s got the potato factor in its favor, but it’s simple, so it doesn’t make me look too desperate.

3. Lemon Flavored Saffron Rice. I brought the saffron in Africa and carried it all the way back with me and haven’t used it yet. I love lemony saffron rice and it would really complement the fish. Plus, Cleopatra reportedly had great success with her use of saffron um, probably not the kind of success that I’m really seeking at this time :D.

4. Other! I am obviously an inexperienced Kitchen Goddess and need to be taught immediately that the perfect side dish would be:______________

Your input would be invaluable. And needed before Wednesday so that I can go shopping. Hypothetically, of course.

(As an aside: I LOVE the Pioneer Woman blog. I discovered it a couple of days ago and have spent most of the day browsing through her site. The pictures are goregous and it makes me long for the small town life that I’ve left behind; I miss those times of absolute solitude. Another part of me is overwhelmingly grateful that Kris Hullinger and I never hit it off, because whoa, I am glad that ranching is not my life.)

***
This is my last month as a second year resident, can you believe that? It just incredible how time can fly and still seem so slow. I’m not halfway done with my residency yet… that endpoint still seems a long way away. I certainly down feel ready to be released on the unsuspecting world, but I find myself chomping to get done with this all.

I’m rotating on the epilepsy monitoring unit, which is a different experience. Basically we admit people and provoke them into having seizures and I’m learning how to read EEGs, which is really like learning how to read petroglyphs done in a 3-year-old’s squiggly scrawl. I have no idea what I’m doing. The worst is that it really comes down to physics and electricity and currents and vectors, and man, that was my weakest point in all of physics. I could never understand it. I read and read this afternoon and I’m still confuzzled. But I’m excited about a new challenge, and the hours will be a little easier than a regular wards month (still have to do call, bleh)

***
I got my DEA license! And promptly had to renew a prescription for a patient, so I’m already being tracked. We won’t talk about how much money this little “privilege” cost me, but all I can say is that the little bonus that they give me at the end of the year to cover licensing and exams(while supposedly leaving enough to fund a gym membership as well), didn’t even cover half of what I’ve paid this past year for the honor of becoming a Real Doctor (like Pinocchio, but still with strings). But it’s all done now.

***
I’ve had “There are no cats in America/and the streets are filled with cheese” running through my head all day today. I have no idea where that came from, as I probably haven’t seen the movie (An American Tail, for those who are less Disney informed (and yes, yes, I know it’s not a Disney movie, work with me here)) since I was 10. Weird, especially since I did give in and buy myself a copy of Mulan since I’ve had an inexplicable urge to watch that movie for the last month, so I should be having “I’ll make a man out of you” there in my noggin instead. I did resist on buying the copy of Escape to Witch Mountain which is another one of my childhood favorites; luckily the store didn’t have The Three Lives of Thomasina or Toby Tyler –those I could not have said no to.

***
I think I’m going for the hammock in the back yard, it would fit the space better. One of these days, I’ll redo the front and make a real porch where I can install the swing. I’ve just gotta make sure that the side of my garage could handle the weight if I hook it there. I wasn’t able to find a fire pit yet either, so my backyard beautification project is on-going.

***
And I think that’s it. It’s all I can think to talk about, unless you want to hear that I have dishes to wash and clothes to fold and my hair to cut and CuteIntern friended me on Facebook (mostly shaved now. Definitely cuter) and I’ve got a date on Thursday that might almost be called a second date and there’s still about 5 clinic notes that I haven’t finished. Yeah, you definitely don’t want to hear about those tedious details about my life. 😀

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12th April 2008

I swear I did not fudge the results


In a Past Life…


You Were: A Redhead Warrior.

Where You Lived: Central Africa.

How You Died: Consumption.

I like this meme. It only asks one question. I can do those. 🙂

(The song was a random iTunes choice as well)

I went out to dinner with my friend Erika, who is having a much worse time (and for more legitimate issues) than I, which helped getting me out of my funk. We had Indian food, which I swear, makes everything better. I, of course, had the chicken tikka masala, which is the perfect comfort food, creamy and savory. Afterwards, we came back and watched Enchanted which was almost enough to get me out of my cynical mood. I am supremely jealous of Amy Adams’ long, gorgeous, vibrant red hair. *frowns at hair that’s becoming more strawberry blond every day* I loved all of her dresses, except for her ball gown, which was a lovely shade of purple, but the bodice was all kinds of ugh.

I then finished my day by watching Doctor Who that featured another gorgeous red head (I didn’t like Donna’s hair the past episode, the bangs and style made her face seem square; today’s was perfect), and she was wearing a toga in that same shade of purple! I loved this episode. cut for mild spoilers

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12th April 2008

yesterday i died tomorrow’s bleeding and i’ve lost who i am

In the midst of the gigantic pity party and sobfest that I held yesterday (being post-call really sucks when you’re trying to control your emotions), I opened my front door to find a big box with a quilt inside, sewn and quilted by my mom, my aunts and my grandma.

I love you too. Thank you. *hugs*

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11th April 2008

done with this

Dear life

Message received loud and clear. I get it. I do. I’m a slow learner, but believe me,you have reinforce the message sufficiently. Boys don’t see me as the dateable type, the marriageable type. I do know my billion of physical flaws, social ineptitudes, genetic imperfections, spiritual weaknesses that keep boys away. I keep thinking that someone going to prove that wrong, but over 15 years of waiting and watching and hoping, well it’s pretty foolish to keep holding on to that pipe dream.

But next time, I respectfully ask that you not prove me with opportunities to foster hope. It’s cruel and unneeded. I thought for a moment… Some things were different, you know. And as you have so helpfully demonstrated, I’ve not the time to nurse a broken heart and broken dreams. Plus tears post-call tend to be more headache inducing than cathartic. So let’s just call it a truce.

Thanks

Oh haha.

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28th March 2008

well earned hubris

A few months ago, when Milwaukee weather had performed its usual trick of warming up to 35 degree thereby melting and then snowing 6-10 inches that evening, I came home from work and … slid into my garage doorway, knocking off my side-view mirror (me and my garage do not get along very well, as the scrape along my front headlines will attest). *sigh*

Anyway, having learned from previous experience (*ahem*) that the mirror can be replaced by taking apart the car door, rather than going to an auto shop, I purchased the part and today, in a misguided effort to flirt (um, I don’t seem to be learning from those past experiences), persuaded my friend to assist me in installing it. I went over to his apartment and we took apart the car door in his parking lot (where I discovered that it’s a freaking small world after all). He had to pick up a friend, I got into my car, attempted to roll the window back up… and it wouldn’t move more than halfway. I fussed with it a bit but couldn’t figure out my screwdriver (it’s one of those that ratchets around and switches directions and I couldn’t figure it out how). By then my friend had long left, so I drove home, found other screwdriver and took apart my door, took off the mirror, found the problem and fixed it and then reassembled the door, after figuring out how the screwdriver works as well. Yay for me!

I had to get it fixed today because tomorrow, I’m driving down to Urbana Illinois to spend a couple of days with Susan and her family. I’m so excited! It’s a long drive, however, and I’m already exhausted today from being post call and not getting a chance to nap (laundry and dishes and chatting on the phone), so I’m headed to bed soon. I live such an exciting life.

I finished another month of rotations this morning. It was a busy call, we capped (admitted the maximum # of patients) by 4:30 yesterday, so the rest of the day was spent tucking everybody in and checking on my interns. I got to “talk” to the Pleth during our monthly book club meeting, which was lovely. And then I got sleep. I like sleep.

Overall, it was good month. I learned to trust my instincts and training. I learned how to be a “hands off” resident, which after my month in February where I fretted over my interns all of the time was something that I needed to perfect. I gave a kickbutt presentation on examining comatose patients and didn’t even let the fact that my pictures didn’t load stop me (I just pointed at the blue screen and said “here you would have seen a picture of me and my giraffe friend, Daisy. We were so close, that here in this next picture, you would have seen me make out with Daisy”, etc. I amuse myself). I had fun complaining about our lack of responsibility (which was frustrating at the same time as being enjoyable) with the other residents, who are some of my favoritest people ever. I liked my interns and medical students and more importantly, I liked working with them because they were competent and diligent and made my life easier. I enjoy every afternoon that I had off, basking in the sun (and snow) and catching up on some little things that I needed to do (haven’t gotten to the taxes yet. Must do taxes on Monday!!).

I’m always a little sad at the end of a month, even during the hardest and most exhausting, because I hate leaving the people behind. And it is harder when I’m changing from the internal medicine department to neurology as I am this month… not just because I’ll be going from being the senior and being semi-in-charge to the “junior” resident (intern-in-everything-but-name) and taking orders and writing daily notes and long H&Ps and all of the scut work, but also because neurology is ten times harder than medicine and I’ve gotten used to sleeping on call, having only one pager that I have to answer, etc. *sigh* It’ll be a long 3-6 months, but it’ll be good for me. I hope.

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10th March 2008

Tonight….

I had my friend Erika over for dinner and to watch “Bride and Prejudice” (which was her first Bollywood experience) as she’s had some rough times recently and I’ve been so bad at socializing for the last few months. I made my world famous grilled salmon with northern african marinade (yes, yes, I’ll post the recipe later) and, because I have been craving it so much, frog-eyed salad. It was yummy. Unfortunately, it made enough to feed a parlor of funeral guests, and I have so much left over, I don’t know how I’m going to get through it. Plus, she brought a mint chocolate cakeherself (I was very, very good and only had a sliver), so that also needs to leave my house immediately. There is a guy at work that I’ve been attempting to flirt with. Maybe some home cooking will do the trick….

Speaking of flirting, CuteIntern paged me today, a “call me when you get the chance” type of page. Of course, I called him back immediately, heart pounding. Could it be….

“Hey, kiddo, what’s up?” he greeted me, “I’ve got one of your patients here in the E.R.”

*sigh* I think that “kiddo” just killed any lingering wisp of hope for romance between he and I.

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16th January 2008

Reason me this

Multiple choice question for you.

Select the most correct answer:

The reason that Julia is not switching her call night from Saturday to Sunday night, thereby allowing co-resident to be on call on Saturday instead of Sunday so he can watch the Packers game), is:

A: She wants to watch the Packers game herself! Go Green Bay!
B: She wants to church on Sunday, post-call and exhausted, but still able to spiritually recharge herself.
C: She has Monday off of work already, and being on call means that she’d be sleeping through her day of vacation.
D: She’s just a mean grouch who never does anything nice for anyone.
E: CuteIntern happens to be on call on Saturday as well, and she can’t resist the chance to flirt and look ridiculous.

Ahem. Never let it be denied that I am anything but shallow.

I finished with work a little early today and celebrated by chopping my hair. I hadn’t cut my hair at all since August. August. So it was looking nappy. It’s now too short (just below my chin) and my “hairstylist” must have spent a total of 15 minutes cutting it so it’s slightly chunky, but at least my still-growing-them-out-a-year-later bags got blended in and even though it’s not perfect, I look ever so better than I did an hour ago. We’ll see how it looks once it loses the “new hair” look.

I need to go to the gym. But I have a headache and I’m beyond exhausted (not exactly sure why) and I’m covering the cardiology service for 4 days while my friend Prem goes on “vacation” to Tucson, Arizona (he says it’s for a meeting. Whatever. I don’t believe him). We’re rounding with the attending at 7:30. In the morning. Meaning that I need to be there by at least 6:30 so I can have some idea about what’s wrong with my new patients. So I think I might go to bed. Like right now.

Oh, I did finally make Chicken TIkka Masala last night. Which was really good and yummy, only it tasted nothing like the restaurant dish. I’ll be sharing the recipe in the next couple of days, but as I did a google search on a better, more authentic recipe, I discovered taht it really isn’t authentic Indian in the first place! It was apparently invented in the 1970s by some Indian restaurant owners in Scotland who had all of these British customers complaining because their Tandoori chicken didn’t have any gravy on it. Who knew?

Night all!

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12th November 2007

flirt flirt flirt

Highlights of my weekend:

  • Getting lost in a town of about 2000 people. Three times. (Even funnier is the fact that I got lost in the same town two months ago when I went to the medicine retreat).
  • Arriving (finally) at the cabin, and realizing that David (aka DateBoy) was there who I hadn’t seen/talked to since the date. He jumped up to talk to me very shortly afterwards. Very cute. I think there were some pretty intense eye connections during the weekend. *squashes optimism*
  • Jared (in the middle of a conversation with two other people): “You look really cute today. That outfit, your hair, the glasses… yeah.”
    Me (staring and blushing, because yes, this is the same Jared: Um, thanks *am lame*

  • The first five minutes of Transformers. Which as a movie, is almost as lame as me. 🙂 *pounds down optimism*
  • Aaron has the prettiest teeth.
  • Tramping out into the woods to star gaze with Tracy and Jonathan.
  • Pajamas and gossip while lying in sleeping bags. Haven’t done that since girls camp.
  • Early morning walk, kicking the leaves and enjoying the sunshine as it filtered through the trees. It may have only been 100 yards from the freeway, surrounded by summer homes, but at least I could pretend that I was in “nature.”
  • The best breakfast I’ve ever had. The eggs! *mouth waters*
  • A rambling but short walk in the woods with David who referred to our date a total of three different times. Because of that, I asked him over for Thanksgiving dinner, which may or may not happen. *stomps on optimism*
  • Giggling, laughing bonding with some of the most wonderful people around. I love my ward!

(For a glimpse of the weekend, see here. There may or may not be photographic evidence of my date.)

****
The other highlights of my weekend included being on call. With a migraine so severe that I almost started vomiting during a physical exam. Luckily, I managed to get some tylenol, ibuprofen and aleve AND take a short nap at 9 pm (until one of the patients decided to develop a heart attack and demand my attention). The night was busier and I only got another hour of sleep, but at least I wasn’t overwhelmed. It was manageable. I like manageable.

Oh, and I bought new curtains for my living room, a dark red that is thin enough to allow the summer light through, but thick enough for privacy. Once the room gets painted on Saturday, I think it’s going to be gorgeous. I’m so excited.

And I got new pants. That too is very exciting.

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8th November 2007

seriously

Life has been super busy and super boring. I think it’s all because super cute intern has moved on to greener pastures and I’m mourning. 🙁 While it may not have been true love, it was definitely TrueLust and made the entire month survivable and entertaining. The intern who replaced him is a girl and therefore not interesting.

CuteIntern’s facebook profile reads this: “Custom has made dancing sometimes necessary for a young man; therefore mind it while you learn it, that you may learn to do it well, and not be ridiculous, though in a ridiculous act.” Soulmates. Srsly. (Or not).

In more news, I have not talked to DateBoy since said date. I’m thinking about calling DateBoy and inviting him to my house for Thanksgiving dinner, which may be the most forward thing I’ve ever done. Or not, because I keep changing my mind.

I’ve put on weight this month because of all of the stress. And the easily available candy at the nurses station. I haven’t worked out in a month. So much for the plan to be down ten pounds for Christmas, so I could finally, finally have a vacation without my mother mentioning how unhealthy I look.

I’ve had some very difficult patients that I’ve had to deal with that have sucked compassion out of me. I’ve realized that I hate treating migraines. But to make up for it, I’ve had 3 of the loveliest patients, including two who have made a romantic out of me again, because they (and their spouses) have proved that true love really exists.

My next day off is Thanksgiving, which happens to be my birthday. I haven’t had a day off since the 28th of last month. I get four days off in a row to make up for it. I’m not sure I’m going to be able to come back.

I’ve been on call every Tuesday except one since the last week in September. Tuesday is clinic day, which means I have to see all of my patients before 8. Since I really shouldn’t be in before 7 (therefore, having enough time to go to noon conference the next day and not break the ACGME 30 hour rules), it makes the morning incredibly hectic. What makes them even more fun: all of those Tuesdays, except for one, my team has been post call. So I have to hurry through clinic (where I always get behind), race through lunch, so that I can go upstairs and admit the 3 ER patients, learn about the NICU transfers, follow up on the stuff that the other intern wasn’t able to complete, write my own patient notes that I didn’t get to do in the morning, discharge the half dozen patients of the intern’s (because my patients are all rocks which I collect) and then start getting pages every 30 seconds on 3 different pagers. Yeah, I loathe Tuesdays. Only a year left of clinic!

The best part: I’m still on call every Tuesday until the middle of December. And every weekend except Thanksgiving.

I’m still trying to remember why I loved neurology. I think I need to see David Renner when I go home so that I can be reminded. It’s probably pathetic that when prospective interns come and interview here, I end up gushing about Utah more than the program here.

Susan and Bobby and Allison are coming for Thanksgiving. I’ll be cooking something delicious, I hope. Should I ask DateBoy or is that really weird? I think I need more furniture if I do.

I spent the evening reading old Gilmore Girls fanfiction. Mostly general stuff, featuring townies, and it made me realize once again what a brilliant, wonderful show it once was.

I’m going to the opera next week with two of my girlfriends, Kristen and Erika. The Merry Widow. I was very excited when I first heard about it, because from the radio ads, it sounded like it was the translation that I fell in love with in high school. Alas, my sleuthing has proven that it is not so (although I think it’ll be better than the San Francisco version), but I’m still ecstatic about it. I’m dressing up. I can’t wait.

I’m also having a painting party involving my living room next week as well right before the opera. Need to clean the place before before then, I think. And I need to buy paint. And moth balls.

I’m totally addicted to this blog and have wasted away more of my evening reading her archives and laughing so hard I almost started vomiting.

I’m going to be 29 in 2 weeks. And I think that’s enough to stop any more random musings.

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21st October 2007

date

So I just got asked out on a double date. For this Wednesday, when I’ll be post-call, smelly, and sleepy. I think it’s going to be a winner!

The best part: it’s with the one guy in this town that Chris knew from college and he loathed him. I haven’t found him to be so bad yet, but I don’t know him super well. But still, what are the chances?

I went to a neurology conference this weekend. Can’t remember what one of the talks was about (probably because I dozed through a good portion. Right in front of the neurology chair, not the best idea I’ve ever had), but the rest were good – pertinent and somewhat helpful (although, right now, I’m just feeling so overwhelmed with neuro in general, that I think the only thing that would help me feel better is a remedial course). And of course, I sold a little more of my soul to the drug companies and got free textbooks and pens and little airline pillows, so it was profitable. All of the residents and their spouses and the few kids got together for dinner, which was so much fun and probably the best part of the evening. The residents are really what keep me from deciding to quit neurology, because for the most part, they’re fantastic people and I just love being with them.

And I think that’s all that’s going on in my life. You probably don’t want to hear about me walking into church today, finding out that there was no Sunday School teacher and winging it (and “The Gathering of Israel” is not an easy topic to wing) or the constant struggle with the thistles in my raspberry bushes (I am going to conquer!). Life in general is a heck of a lot better than it was two weeks ago–a good portion of the improvement came after the louse of an attending left the service and I worked with a very friendly and efficient (which is a trait worth gold) attending who by the end of the week was offering me dating advice in the middle of rounds. Between her and one of the patients, I’m pretty sure I had bright cheeks for many mornings. But, oh, I love laughing and teasing so much better than scowls and tears.

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10th October 2007

can’t take anymore

Please somebody remind me why I’m doing neurology.

I had thought my experiences last December were due to my wonderful resident. Now, I’m realizing that the attending probably contributed to it as well, as he has certainly made these last few days less than tolerable. He yelled at everybody yesterday, which I missed because of clinic (never have I been so grateful for clinic), so we all arrived extra early to have the precious notes finished just the way he liked them, only to find myself the target today. I gave up counting the snide remarks because I was pretty much fighting back tears for most of rounds.

I have a patient to staff who I refused to admit the other night on call, who actually did have a stroke. It’s been eating me for the last two days, when I discovered the confirmatory scan, and tomorrow I get to present why I didn’t feel like I should admit an obviously ill patient (however, in retrospect, I still maintain that I was right in my decision, I just don’t know if I’m going to be able to defend it).

I’m clinging to the nice moments, of meeting up with Sonja and Satya, who reminded me that they loved working with me (and oh, I miss them and the MICU and the laughter and call nights…) and I’m not a horrible doctor (just a rather horrible neurologist). Running into Aaron who greeted me with a large, toothy grin that warmed me to the bottom of my toes and made it seem like November again.

The crush is fading. Maybe sleep deprivation. Maybe because I look/am ridiculous and Stephanie Meyer books aside, nobody finds the klutzy behavior cute (I’ve dropped my knife, my fork, all of my papers, my pager, tripped on my own feet, knocked over a tray trying to squeeze by someone, all in front of him. I’m really not usually this bad). Maybe the fact we’re all so battered that we’ve lost any fun loving spirit and we’re all grouchy and ugly to each other. Right now, I don’t even care.

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9th October 2007

Guess I should keep my day job

Facebook makes it way too easy to stalk. It’s no fun when I can find out his alma mater, birthdate, AND see photos of his family in one fell swoop.

*pout*

No girlfriend pictures there, that’s promising. And he fits into my “two years younger” category of every guy who caught my attention of the last 6 years (another lingering effect of the horrible crush/humilitation of the Oliver saga, I wonder? Or am I just refusing to grow up myself?). So many answers, so little effort.

I guess I’d better put my detective skills to work in locating my credit card that has disappeared again (and I’m just about out of gas. I don’t think I could make it to work and back).

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8th October 2007

Random things

I decided to make a list. I don’t know why.

– Crush news (which right now, is ever so much more interesting than patients and their neuroanatomy): He has a freckle on his right ear lobe, and a faint, thin scar down his right middle finger. His hair curls across his forehead (it’s such a good thing that these many many years have trained restraint!) and he’s had his beard for as long as he’s been a resident here (as evidenced by his name badge) which manages to hide a very small dimple and I can’t find adjectives to describe his blue eyes. And he has really bad breath post call. Oh, and he owes me big time for doing his discharge summary for him. Am I wonderful or what?

– I had a wonderful weekend. Saturday night, when I woke up from the post call coma, I went to the symphony with one of the neurosurgery residents. Mahler. My dad used to love Mahler, but until Sat. night, I never understood why. I’m now addicted. Absolutely lovely.

– Sunday I went to watch conference at my bishop’s house, which is always a spiritually uplifting time. Pres. Hinckley is still looking amazing for his 95+ years. One of the guys there hugged me and reminded me that it was exactly one year since we had met. I had forgotten. I thought that was sweet.

– It was the first day off that Chris and I have had off together in 2 months, so I drove up to Madison and spent the afternoon and evening with him, fixing his bike, eating Vietnamese food, and digging through all of his music collection. I came home with 300+ new songs and all of his pictures from Ireland and Scotland. Scotland was incredibly gorgeous from his pics… I guess I’d better add that back to the list of Must-Go places.

– Chris broke up with his girlfriend. And didn’t tell me until I pressed. Okay, I think I overlooked a big dropped hint earlier in the evening, when we were putting together pictures for a framed collage, but still. *sigh* Anyway, we had a great talk sitting on a park bench overlooking the lake. I told him about the many dating woes of the past two months. He thinks I’m missing clues (I think that no reciprocation and avoidance of conversation afterwards speaks volumes). He’s thinking about taking up Match.com dating, which I can’t wait to see how that goes. 🙂

– I’m still really bad at music guessing games. Apparently I need to listen to more Phish and Eagle Eyed Cherry(ies?).

-He beat me on the word games as well. The Word of the Day emails are not helping.

-I’m not on call again until Saturday. !!!

The Seeker has gotten terrible reviews and didn’t do so well at the box office. Maybe that will stop any sequels.

-Still can’t figure out exactly what you do on Facebook, but at least it lacks the ads and spam of Myspace. Am trying to collect friends like mad over there. Perhaps I will make a trophy wall with all of my friends. I guess I need to add more photos, or so a little bird told me.

-I’m reading New Moon right now, as I finished Twilight a few weeks ago on call (man, I miss the ICU call). Liked Twilight, although spent a majority of the book irritated at the heroine and her love interest. I’m really looking forward to reading this, after mulling over valancy_s‘s recent posts about why we go for vampires.

-Congrats to Michelle and Kelly! Maybe, hopefully, I’ll be able to see this little one before he/she’s 40 (are you going home for Christmas?)

-I love Matchbox Twenty. This new album is just gorgeous as always.

You all are watching Friday Night Lights, right? You’d better be. Best show on TV right now. I’m watching it online, so what’s your excuse?

-Clinic tomorrow. Only 3 patients. Maybe I’ll actually finish on time (and possibly get my notes done, that would be amazing).

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5th October 2007

thud

I really love early crushes. The crush way before any emotional attachment or heartache–no thank you, have had enough of that for a lifetime! No, the crush when you barely know the person but he’s cute and funny and smells really nice and you just wanna be next to him and contemplate grabbing his hand during rounds…

Er. Yes. In other words, I’m just smitten with my coworker. No idea if he has a girlfriend. Don’t really care. All I know is he’s not married and he’s cute (still a sucker for blue eyes. And I’m so infatuated with his beard. Very weird) and it’s going to make a rather tough month that much more lovely.

What’s not so lovely is being on call, and getting 2 patients admitted directly that I know nothing about. Bah.

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3rd September 2007

itunes love

My iTunes is in a sappy mood. Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Phantom of the Opera, Vienna Teng, Eva Cassidy, Josh Groban all have rotated on in the last hour. Hmm. I don’t know what it’s trying to tell me.

All I know is that I’ve been reading about some of the discussion in reducing resident work hours from 80 hours to 72, and limiting it to 24 hours straight, rather than 30. Half the posts are about how all it does is train physicians to be sloppy and less dedicated and less educated. And that’s enough to make me cry. There’s a nice post here about Labor Day and resident physicians. England is going to a 48 hour week for its residents. 48 hours. I can’t even imagine.

More blogs:
http://fatdoctor.org/2007/09/03/doctors-labor-day/
http://www.hourswatch.org/
http://pandabearmd.com/blog/2007/08/23/in-which-your-uncle-panda-rips-off-the-lid-rolls-it-in-a-tube-and-places-it-politely-where-the-sun-doesnt-shine/

My program is quite good about getting us out within the 30 hours. I usually am out in 29 hours. And I usually only feel exhausted and overworked when I’m on call and unable to claim more than 15 minutes of sleep with my head on the table. Those are the hard nights and it depends on the rotation of how frequent they are. My last two calls have been unbelievably sweet. No new admissions. I went to bed by 11 pm and didn’t leave my room until after 6 am. Saturday night, I didn’t get a single page all night, until 4:30 am. But I sleep with a light on and I wake up every 20 minutes or so, worried that I am missing something. I still go home in the morning absolutely exhausted.

I worked today. In the hospital by 7:30, didn’t finsih until after 3. And it was a holiday, but I didn’t get paid extra. I don’t get time and half. My paycheck states that I work 46 hours a week, isn’t that nice.

*sigh* Sorry for the negativity. I came home from the hospital after spending over an hour trying to get a foley catheter into a man with prostate cancer, with a bad migraine and my smoke detector beeping every 3 minutes because the battery was dying. So I’ve never gotten rid of the headache. And sometimes, it really depresses me that this is what my life is like and it won’t ever get better.

I’ve got a date tomorrow night. I’m a dating machine, I guess. Either that or a masochist. Different guy, one that I find conversation with to be somewhat stilted and painful, really. But he was the medical student on the neuro wards and my friends were raving about how great he was (which he is a very nice guy) and they all seemed to enjoy talking to him, so I decided to give him another chance.

We’re going to a baseball game. I apparently don’t learn my lesson. Luckily, it’s with about 40 other people, so there will be a chance to engage others, if we decide there’s nothing to talk about and the game goes into extra innings.

And I’ve got clinic tomorrow morning and have to round on my patients before rounds. Oh, and did I mention that it’ll be another 14 days before my next day off (16 days total)?

Okay, iTunes is now playing Enrique Inglesis’ “Hero”. It is definitely time to go to bed.

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13th August 2007

end of the story

I am doing so much better. 🙂

I regaled some of my friends with the date story… seriously, had a crowd who were interested in every detail, which launched me into full storyteller in my finest element. Apparently, a date is a rare and special occasion and needs to be details so everybody can live vicariously through the event. All agreed that the outfit was horrible (in the original story, it should have read that he was wearing khaki shorts, not pants. Khaki pants are perfectly acceptable. Shorts on the other hand, are not), but that the guys in our church are lame and don’t know how to date, so not to take it personally. In fact, they all seemed pretty impressed that he had accepted the invitation in the first place, as he has a reputation of never dating anyone. Huh. Well, I guess that explains the shorts.

So thus ends the saga. I promise I won’t be spamming your flist with any more of my gloom and doom. 🙂 Thanks for the support, in any case.

I’m really making progress in the transferring of this blog to WordPress. It’s a lot of fun going over my old entries. I pruned most months down to just a entry or two; when you get rid of all of my Lord of the Rings squeals, my fanfiction and random memes, I really didn’t say much the first years.

The fact that I can edit comments is almost enough to convince me to head over there entirely. I love that I can go through and fix all of my annoying misspellings. But it doesn’t have userpics, and it doesn’t have threaded replies and it doesn’t have *you*. 🙂

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13th August 2007

motto: no pity parties for the sleep deprived

“However, I feel much better now than when I began this entry. I’ve got quite a bit of resentment and rebellion and discouragement out of my system. That’s the chief use of a diary, I believe.”

Like everybody, in daylight Emily found things much less tragic and more endurable than in the darkness.

“Night is beautiful when you are happy–comforting when you are in grief–terrible when you are lonely and unhappy. And to-night I have been horribly lonely. Misery overwhelmed me. I seem never to be able to stop half-way in any emotion and when loneliness does seize hold on me it takes possession of me body and soul and wrings me in its blank pain until all strength and courage go out of me. To-night I am lonely–lonely. Love will not come to me–friendship is lost to me…”

~ *Emily’s Quest, *LM Montgomery

From the beginning, I promised myself that I’d treat my blog like a real paper journal… what I write, I keep, even though I cringe afterwards. So that means no filtering or privatizing those entries which, in the morning, are particularly whiny and self pitying.

That last one was really emo, wasn’t it? Good thing I’m at the VA where I can’t access LJ or I *would* be tempted to delete.

I’m better now. Really. If I wrote early in the morning, this blog would be drastically different. Bunnies and sunshine different. Things are always so much more positive in the sunshine than they are at midnight.

You know what. I had a great time, even though it didn’t fit with my expectations. I did. I’ve certainly experienced worse. At least it wasn’t ten innings at a baseball game with nothing to talk about. *shudders at memory* So, Jared’s a subpar date. Fine. I can accept that and I’ll move on. Maybe I will consider approaching the cute (but oh so young! 7 years younger!) guy at church. For one, he knows how to dress. 🙂

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