Come on, Irene

I think the hurricane has left NC.

It was quite anti-climactic here in the Triangle.

I'm exhausted, because I was on at New State Hospital last night and totally overcaffeineated myself and so now haven't slept since 6:30 yesterday morning. So, I'm going to go to bed. But we are all doing just fine here. Maggie's totally chilled out. Even the motorcycle made it through without blowing over.

I will leave you with this, one final act of rebellion against my "no people on the blog" rule before I go medicate myself into Morpheus' realm - My coffee shop buddy Chris put this together today after watching several hours of totally ludicrous weather-related coverage. I think it sums up the aftermath of the hurricane (here, two and a half hours inland) quite well....

Wordlessly melting

(And, okay, there are words involved.)

Fair air

The AC is back on.

This morning it was 85 when I got up. Maggie was like a dishrag (until the leash came out) and poor Gulan was melted across the bathroom floor. All three of us are feeling much better, now, however.

One thing I do love about renting, though, is having a maintenance guy...

Hot in Durham

It's hot in my house.

84 degrees, to be precise. Our air conditioner must've gone out today.

Bleh. Hopefully they'll fix it tomorrow. I called and left a "we're so hot!" voicemail on the maintenance line.

Bleh.

In less "bleh" news, I had a great weekend. My uncle and my cousin came in for graduation. Graduation itself was a pretty fun thing. Long, but fun. One of these days I'll write an actual post about the graduation ceremony, but I'm hot and I want to go to bed.

My uncle left Saturday and was definitely not here long enough. It was really good to see him - it's been over a year. I think he was a little anxious about seeing my mom sick, but I think he was pleased with her progress and all and all it was a very positive visit. My cousin stuck around until today. We had a great Sunday - breakfast out, coffee with the Villagers (including Misty's new puppy, who is so cute it might overload your brain), a jaunt around Raleigh, a visit to the State Hospital campus, a trip to the Harley Davidson store, and a stroll around the State Farmer's Market. We hung out with my parents a bit, and then had dinner at a place I'd not tried before, but with which I was really pretty impressed. She came to coffee again this morning to meet the AM crew. It was great to see her. She's been such a huge support for me.

Today was super productive. I got a lot done at work, including 53 minutes of actual psychiatry. But I also replaced my ID badge, did all my little hospital educational crap, got my motorcycle parking pass, re-joined the APA (my membership lapsed), filled out two separate applications for moonlighting, ate a little lunch, did a little therapy....

Not bad for a Monday.

Here's hoping I don't melt before Tuesday....

Now I have no excuse

(PS - Happy birthday, Robin! And a belated happy birthday to Brad.)

I fell asleep last night, way too early.

I have to start sleeping better, because sleeping more isn't helping. I still suck as a sleeper...

So we had a ice storm last night. I got up this morning and my entire apartment complex was coated with a sheet of glass. The driving was miserable getting out of my neighborhood, and I spent most of the drive wishing I had a job where I could call out. But I made it. Peng made it. Our intern made it. Our attending even made it (although he was two hours late).

My clinic this afternoon was fun - only one of my four patients showed up. She was one of two that came to the entire child clinic. And she was pretty entertaining (in a good way, not in that holy-wow-is-this-one-crazy kind of way).

It never ceases to amaze me down here - every year I've lived here there's been snow and ice. And yet we have no idea how to deal with snow and ice. It's a perpetual catastrophe. We have no equipment for it. Every year, people! Get a clue!!

Grump, grump, grump...

Scene for a winter's night

Snowy, snowy day.

Brr.

I'll keep drinkin', and you'll keep gettin' skinnier..

The song stuck in my head today.



My favorite line? "I don't have to be hateful, I can just say 'Bless your heart.'"

Which may be an indication I've been living in the South too long...

Week's end

Hey, look! I have my internet back!

It's been quite a weekend. Maggie proved her prowess as a mouser (I think we caught the mama mouse the other day, because there were five juveniles who came out all of a sudden. Maggie - who's never so much as nipped at anyone - did a great job breaking their little necks. Meanwhile, I keep trying to stop telling myself little stories about the mousy family and the subsequent massacre that happened in my apartment Friday...). I finally figured out just how far my car will go after it hits "E". I did some actual work, spent some time with friends, hung out with the folks, played some Wii.

And now the weekend is drawing to a close, and there's a rumbly summer storm rolling through. Maggie is none too pleased about this. I, on the other hand, love it.

Often makes me thing of this song...

I hope he likes extra chunky

So I've got dinner on the stove tonight and I'm boxing on the Wii while it cooks....

....when I see this brown streak run by out of the corner of my eye...

There is a MOUSE. In. My. HOUSE.

He kept poking out of his little hiding place and running back in when he saw me and Maggie (who, incidentally, was totally oblivious to the whole situation). I tried to lure him into a parmesan cheese container. It didn't work. I gave him a speech about how I'd really appreciate it if he left. I don't think it swayed him. So, concluding that my only viable option is muricide, Maggie and I went off to the Rite Aid down the street to buy traps.

There are two "hygienic" traps downstairs laced with JIF extra-chunky peanut butter. And I bought a package of those sonic repellent thingies.

Ick. Ick, ick, ick, ick. This is almost as bad as cockroaches, but I'm letting it slide, since there's only one right now, and I think he might have come in through the door that wasn't quite closed. Poor thing was also as scared of us as I was of him (Maggie, again, oblivious).

Turtles. Can we go back to the turtle infestation?


(PS....look at that picture. Is that mouse driving a car???)

Fiasco

It was a long day. I saw some patients. I did some stuff. And I started moving into my new office.

Yep, that's right. I'm moving into Chiefs' Office South with Cleo. Today was the last official day of the Pink Office.

It's the end of an era, people. I'm pretty sad.

So then, I went and got my head shrunk after work, and I got stuck in this.

While I was sitting on the I-40, a "motorized robot" (as opposed to, what other kind of robot?) was spraying the alleged bomb with water. Really? Really? THAT's your solution? A pressure washer. But my favorite line in the article is this: "The device turned out to not be an explosive device.  It appears to be some foam that was wrapped up together, possibly something that fell off of a vehicle or something."

You know. Or something.

Something that turned my 10 minute commute into a 70 minute fiasco involving me (and several other cars) exiting the highway via an on ramp and driving the wrong way on the shoulder of NC 54. Which, I can't really complain about. I'd rather they take this stuff seriously and it be nothing than someone manage to detonate a dirty bomb because no one was paying attention.

Meanwhile, look what else they found on a different road in Durham.

Yeef.

Oh for Pete's sake

Apparently I'm now officially a day behind in my posting of things. Which is not because anything is going wrong - just that I keep coming home exhausted. I'd actually started a post yesterday that got interrupted, but I came home last night at midnight (from meeting Claudia for dinner, not from the hospital) and promptly fell the hell asleep.

I also haven't been sleeping super well. I sense some espresso in my future today.

I'm also on the phone with some pharmacy tech at Walgreen's, because of course I've extended my tour of duty and have now run out of my asthma meds. She's really being snarky and condescending. I forgot how rude Midwesterners can be, relative to the South. I mean, Southerners might be sweet as pie and then talk about you behind your back, but who cares if the pharmacy girl does that. I'll take pie, thanks.

I'll write something actual and meaningful today, I promise.

More weekend, please.

I had such a lovely day.

It's the first day of spring, of course.

Mags and I had a nice lie-in, enjoying the sweet spring breeze coming through the window. We snuggled, read email, eventually I dragged myself out of bed. And then we went to Jen's for brunch, which was wonderful. Jenny has this remarkable group of people with whom she surrounds herself, and I'm really honored to be a part of it. There were almost 40 of us there this am, and I stayed a lot later than I'd planned. I always get kind of anxious in groups of people I don't know very well; there's a core group of her friends that I know, but being me I generally forget people's names (I remember stories, ideas, faces; I suck with names). And then there's always a bunch of different, if fabulous, people who I don't know, and that always makes me a little nervous. But it was lovely, of course. I met some great new people, had good conversations with ones I'm coming to know, and had a generally very good time.

So did Mags! She got to come with me today. She met Jen's puppy, Crazy Eddie, or as he is sometimes also known, Eddie the Neurotic Dawg. They were instant BFF. Like, seriously.

Picture it: Durham, North Carolina. A glorious spring day in 2010.

Eddie: Let me in!!!! Let me innnnnnnnnnn!!!!!!!! I'm trapped outsiiiiiide!!! I can't see you if I'm outside!!!!
Maggie: What's with him? 
Eddie (clamors through the opened door): Helllllooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! You smell like a dog, strange new redheaded woman I've maybe met before. Wait! Wait! You smell like THAT dog!! Hi, Dog!!
Maggie: Hi. I...wow. You smell fun. 
Eddie: You're my new best friend, okay? 
Maggie: Okay!! 
Eddie: Let's play! Let's play! Let's play!!!
Maggie: Tag! You're it!! 


And then much wrestling and wagging and joyful tap-dancing ensued.

Jenny's ex-husband's new girlfriend came over later, with their three big dogs. There was a lot of sniffing and marking and jubilant giddy play, until everyone got a little overstimulated. New girlfriend and I distracted them for a while and wore them out a bit more. We went in, and poor Maggie was at the back door being all "save meeeeeee!!!! They're crazy!!!" so she got to come in and hang out with the humans, being that she is all calm and dainty and respectful of small people who are scared of her but end up making friends with her before too long.

I so very love my dog.

She was totally worn out by the time we got home. She's slept like a big furry log pretty much ever since we got home.

I had an agenda for the afternoon - work out, shower, blow dry, go to Starbucks and do some work until it was time to meet the crew for dinner. The residents have been going out monthly for whomever's birthdays are that month, which is mostly an excuse to go out to dinner. We had a really good turnout, and a heck of a lot of fun. There was a good mix of folks, good conversation, and a lot of tomfoolery.

Tomorrow will have to be more productive. But today was really quite lovely.

Happy spring, everyone!!

You look tasty...

From the Windy City, South

(It's windy, windy, windy in NC today.)

Rainy Saturday

Today was not super productive...I'm cool with that.

This is our Second Look weekend. Now, see, in the cluster of ridiculousness that is the Match, you interview at a program, and you get the interview day experience, so often people go back for a second look to get a more informal view of what the program is like. We here at Baby Blue started my intern year trying to consolidate that experience, so that the kids that did come back could get the best bang for their buck. So we have this weekend when we try to get everyone to come back at the same time, and try to organize things like tours of the state hospital, a real estate tour, case conference, and lots of face time with the residents and faculty. This year, it started Thursday night with a dessert for the applicants and some members of the PGY1-3 classes (not including me, because I have class on Thursday nights now).

Yesterday was, like, holy cow. I started the day...well, I started the day by realizing it was 57 degrees in the apartment and that the heat was out. It took some fussing, but I figured out it was the circuit breaker and fixed it, but needless to say between the getting home ridiculously late Thursday and the cold apartment, I didn't sleep so well. So there was a triple-shot mocha involved in my morning as well. I co-led one of the small groups ("small" being something of a relative term here, I'm noticing. They're, like, 30 students. Mine were 10. But there were still pterodactyls around when I went to med school, so...) for the second year medical students, ran back to the unit, got to rounds late (which was planned), did a discharge, scarfed some lunch, saw my therapy kid, and then went and was part of the panel discussion for the applicants. I had another patient at 3 who took until about 4:30 (I anticipate this about her), then I tried to get as much of my shit together and paperwork done, etc, as I could tolerate before heading off to the dinner party at the chair's house.

At which point it was a monsoon. I mean, really, the standing water was amazing. And of course the chair lives out in a more rural area where "only part of our road is paved" (we estimated about 10 feet of it). So Scott rode over with me, preferring to let me and Joe the Jeep traverse the rivers of mud instead of his decidedly non-4WD car with bald tires. Shortly after we got there, Annie's husband showed up and got his car very stuck in the mud in front of the house. I offered to make an attempt, but, no, no, we've got it, burly men, blah blah blah. So, okay. I wandered off, talked to people, schmoozed a bit. And when they came back in, having failed with all of their manly brute force, I offered again. You know, before they called AAA.

I? Am from Chicago. Where we get stuck in the snow all the time. I got behind the wheel and had their car out in under two minutes.

The party itself was a very good time. I had a lot of fun, both with some of the applicants as well as with my friends. It was a nice excuse for us to hang out in a fairly informal way on the department's dime. Scott and I cut out around 10, which was of course some 16 hours or so after I'd left my house that morning.

Today was much more laid back. We had a brunch for the applicants at one of the fancy hotels near the hospital (so, you know, 30 miles from where I live) and it was really quite lovely. After that I ran a couple of errands and wandered over to Starbucks, where I met up with Matt and we were so very productive that I'm not sure he ever opened the textbook he brought with him. I did manage to get a little bit of work done after he left to go hang out with another friend of his, but decided my table by the door of the 'Bucks was too cold and I left and wandered back to my house.

After that...hmm...I know Maggie and I must've done *something*...in fact, I did accomplish a couple of things, although not as much as I would've liked and nothing work related, but got some important stuff done nonetheless.

Tomorrow is all mine. I have no particular Super Bowl plans (I'm not much of a football fan, but, I do sometimes go to these things and socialize). I'm foreseeing some grocery shopping, a little note writing at Starbucks, and some reading for my class....

...probably along with a nap and some catching up on my DVR, because next week's going to be chaos again.

Still snowed in

Well....-ish.

We stayed in the hotel one more night. It's not really snowed in, but apparently the ice is going to be brutal tonight. So, we're here again.

I'm almost finished with the knitting project I've been working on. There's nothing good on TV. I'm going to have to wear scrubs to work again tomorrow b/c I didn't bring actual work clothes.

Yeah, I'm ready to go home. But, we'll do the best we can with this giant king sized bed with the down comforter and fifty million pillows. It's rough, but we'll get through.

Chilly dog

Mags and I are hanging out at the hotel. I got up wicked early and went in to work, did speed rounds, and then checked in with my boss and left. I came back here and wrote notes...until I dozed off... So after I woke up a few minutes later, I finished them for real (and prepped all of tomorrow's), and then took a wonderful, fabulous, rockstar, 4-hour nap. It was awesome. Woke up when radiology paged me with a not-so-awesome finding on one of my patient's images, but, the nap was still fantastic.

I had some of the oddest dreams. And one where I woke up convinced I'd had this conversation with my co-worker in real life for about five minutes or so, until I figured out, no, no, that was part of that dream I had...

May and her wife, it turns out, life right across the street from here. So they invited me over for dinner. I was trending towards being seclusive and just ordering room service, but decided to make the concerted effort to go be social. They invited Maggie, too. We had a wonderful time. Good conversation, good food, lots of fun watching Ricky the cat try to decide if he wanted to be friends with Maggie (he did. He really, really did. Except then he wasn't sure...)

Typical ambivalent male.

But now we're back, and cozied in for the night. I'm hoping to get some actual sleep tonight despite the marathon nap.

Gratitude

It's Thanksgiving.

AND it's Thursday. (I know, I know, Thanksgiving always is.)

So in the spirit of both, here are ten things I'm very grateful for.

1. The amazing and awesome people in my life. Some are near, some are close only in spirit but I really do count a lot of very, very wonderful people among my friends and family.

2. Although I've spent holidays with Maggie before and find that to be generally fine, I'm incredibly grateful for the good company I had tonight. Eva and her family welcomed me into their home today, along with Sparrow, Bernie, and Liam (who were also orphans today). We had a wonderful time. And look, there were favors:

Cute, huh?

3. As annoying as working the holiday weekend may be, I'm glad I got this one, because I'm going to be able to go home for both Christmas and New Year's, I think.

4. White chocolate peppermint mochas, and the best friend who introduced me to them.

5. The amazingness and wonder of children. I'm really looking forward to seeing my assorted nieces and nephews in a month.

6. Being a third year resident. Because you know I never thought I'd make it to second year.

7. Warm sun. Brisk fall days and rustling leaves. Softly falling snow. The smell of spring.

8. That there are things in the south that bloom this time of year. It's very cool.

9. The world's most adorable, most wonderful, smartest, cutest dog.

10. This crazy, messed-up, hilarious, dysfunctional, totally amazing life that I lead.

Turred.

(Apparently that means "tired" in Southern)

I'm so freakin' tired. It's been a long effing day, and I can't even thing straight enough to come up with something clever to say.

(Except I do find it notable that I originally wrote that as "strait". As in, jacket....clearly a sign that I need one...)

So, here's something to amuse you, care of Barb. A little gross, kind of juvenile, and really, really freakin' funny.