Slacker

It's 1:30 PM, and I'm still in my pajamas. I worked in the ER til 2:30 this morning, so I don't feel so bad about my choice of clothing at the moment especially since I'll be back in the ER at 6 tonight. I know I need to update my blog, but I have been a slacker. I don't have a really great excuse; it just seems that every time I try to put my thoughts down lately, the words don't convey the depth of the experience.

To sum up the last 2 weeks in tidbits:

• I really love my husband. We drive each other nuts sometimes, but I love that man so much!!
• My experiments in the kitchen have been exceptionally tasty recently. I've made a ton of chocolate chip cookies, one delicious pot roast (thank you, Barefoot Contessa!), several yummy spaghetti dishes with extra veggies, a yummy butter cake, two batches of java-streusel banana muffins, mango sorbet for the hubby, and a batch of vanilla bean ice cream. I've given most of the food away which is why I haven't gained 50 pounds.
• Swine flu is not my friend right now. Neither are the 300 parents crowding the ER wanting their perfectly healthy kids tested for the swine flu.
• I think we've figured out where we want to move. As soon as our house sells, we'll re-examine the area to see what houses are available, but it's nice to have an idea of where we want to end up.
• On the other hand, I really dread packing this house and finding a moving company!
• Speaking of other hands, I already bought my birthday present even though my birthday is six weeks away. Hubby is taking me to see Fiddler on the Roof when the production comes through Dallas in May. I am SO excited!! I loved that movie when I was little and can still sing all the songs from the musical.

EEEEEEEEEEEK!!!

I didn't feel like cooking tonight, so Hubby and I decided to make a fast food run. We're trying to keep Sebastian adjusted to riding in the car, so I carried the little guy out to the car with Hubby following behind us. As he opened the garage door, I let out what was apparently a blood-curdling scream -- there was a dead mouse lying in the center of the garage right next to my side of the car!! I touch disgusting things at work all the time, but seeing the mouse really caught me off guard. Hubby thinks the mouse died from the heat; I don't care why he died, but I am glad he wasn't alive to scurry up onto me!

I don't think I'll be going out to the garage in the dark anytime soon.

Happy 4th of July!

I've only been off nights for five days, so I'm still not fully adjusted to living normal hours. Hubby and Sebastian are both fast asleep next to me, but I'm wide awake; at least What Not to Wear is on. :)

I'm about to enter my longest stretch of time off in weeks; I had today off, won't work Saturday or Sunday, and don't have to go to work until Monday afternoon. This is phenomenal!! Hubby and I spent the day scrubbing the house from top to bottom; we are exhausted, but the place looks amazing. Tonight he grilled fajitas while I made guacamole from scratch ... soooo yummy with lime tortilla chips. We also enjoyed a lime curd tart that I made yesterday. After dark, we attempted to walk to the end of our street to watch a local fireworks display about two miles away, but some local geniuses decided that popping fireworks over parked cars and small children was a bright idea, so we left. Poor Sebastian couldn't take it outside; he did just fine once we got him away from the madness.

Tomorrow we're going to run errands, and I may try my hand at another new dessert if I can make a selection among several great recipes I've been wanting to try. All I know is that we are going to relax!

On a different note, I doubt that anyone from the military reads this, but on the off chance that someone does, I want to say thank you to all the brave men and women who are serving our country and to their families for supporting them as they serve. We appreciate your sacrifices and are grateful for all that you do.

Catching up

Today is my 2nd day off this 4 week block -- yay! Unfortunately Hubby had to leave for Philly this morning, but I was so out of it that I barely remember him saying goodbye. I slept for eleven hours straight!! I still can't believe it. At least I feel well rested now; tomorrow night I'll be back for yet another no-sleep call in the NICU, so feeling not tired for now is a great feeling.

My parents came into town on Thursday so that my dad could speak at our church; it was so awesome both seeing them and getting to hear again the message of all Christ has done for us. I think this was my 4th time hearing the talk, so I got teased that pretty soon I'll be able to give it since I've got the medical background as well. If only I didn't have my extreme dislike of speaking in public! To make Easter even better, I was able to finish my work up early that morning and make it to church only 5 minutes late. I had gotten to work at 5:30 so that I might be able to finish early, and praise God, I was able to wrap up quickly and get out! I've had to miss a decent amount of church recently because of work, so being there at all is a blessing, but being there with my church family on Easter Sunday was a special treat.

After sleeping half the day away, I'm working on getting the house cleaned up and back in order. It's not too bad since my parents were just here, but there's always laundry to be done or something to be cleaned. Then I'm running to one of the best and most fun stores in the world, Target, later today to clean up on post-Easter candy, and then I'm going to come home and bake! My mom brought me this AMAZING cookbook, and I'm eager to try out some new recipes. It's going to be a very relaxing day off!!

I am thankful ...

... that I'm incapable ... of doin' any good on my own.

Seriously, the tragedy I have been watching around me makes me stop and reflect how many things for which I have to be thankful. Let me give an abbreviated list:

• My beloved husband
• My family
• The best dog in the world
• My home
• Indoor plumbing :)
• Delicious food that is readily and easily accessible (and often somewhat nutritious)
• Clean, drinkable water
• My overall good health
• A supportive work environment
• Freedom of speech and of worship
• Easy access to medicine
• Laughter
• My new Barista and the delicious coffee that Hubby makes for me before I go to work
• Christmas CDs that arrive early (yay Amazon.com!)
• A baby's laugh
• Seeing miracles everyday with my own eyes
• Most of all ... my Savior

Change of heart

I need a better attitude; I know this. I am getting really tired of being an intern. An intern is (rightfully so) the nurse's first contact when anything goes amiss (or potentially amiss) with a patient. High blood pressure? Call the intern. Mom wants an update at 2 AM? Call the intern. Need an order for diaper cream? Call the intern. Somebody else messed up the discharge papers and the patient is going home? You guessed it ... call the intern. The med students look to us with all sorts of probing questions such as, "What are the 50 top causes of a low hemoglobin? Can we discuss them in then 10 minutes before rounds since you must know all of them by heart?" (They mean well; they just forget that we're only 2 years ahead of them and still need to look things up too!) Medical Records loves us when we get behind on our dictations or have 50 charts with orders that need to be signed, so occasionally we have to get lovely reminder emails to take a trip to their office.

Being an intern isn't ALL bad. There are some really great things about it, but it still is physically and mentally exhausting in a completely different way from medical school. When I was in med school, I studied subjects regardless of whether I was interested in them because my grade depended on it. Now it's for my own personal edification (and eventually the care of my patients) that I need to read and learn how to be a good doctor.

I don't like the attitude that I have seen develop in me. I'm tired of being the one who gets called for things, knows what to do, and still has to check in with someone. I am tired of having to deal with the nit-picky details of things that aren't necessarily my fault but still need to be taken care of. I've been back on service for 2 weeks, and the floor I'm on is run slightly differently from previous floors, so it can be frustrating at times trying to figure out a new system this far into my year. I've pretty much felt physically tired for the last 2 weeks adjusting to being back on call. I recognize that I need to stop making that internal groan every time my pager goes off and when I get a page (even if it's unnecessary at 3 AM), I need to smile and thank the person who paged me.

My team is great and I love working with them, so that has made this month a little better than I expected. I have this Saturday off, and our new dining room furniture and couches are supposed to arrive! I can't wait. We're going to hang up our framed pictures, something that I know will make the house feel more like a home. We may even make a run to one of the best stores ever, Home Depot, for ceiling fans and chicken wire (which we have to put at the bottom of the fence before Sebastian gets here). Just two more days of waking up early before I can sleep in past six!! :)

I forgot

I haven't taken call in almost 2 months. I forgot how tired it makes me. I'm sitting up again waiting on a chest x-ray (or CXR) to come back so that I can make a decision on a patient and then go lie down. Of course, as soon as I lie down, it'll be time for me to get up to do an admission, so I don't know what's worse: getting up after a short rest/possible nap or not lying down at all? Questions I ponder at 1 AM ...

The hubby is out of town this week. It's the first time I've slept alone in a house (not an apartment or condo) since I was in college. It's WEIRD!! There's something wrong with our plumbing system right now, so the toilets randomly gurgle, and I can occasionally hear water in the pipes near the laundry room. Those noises don't normally bother me, but they have caught me off guard when I'm expecting silence in the house. I feel relatively safe, but since I haven't done it in so long, I asked the hubby to get me the phone numbers of our pastor and music pastor since they each live 1/2 a mile away from us. I need male back-up in case something happens!

Whoo hoo ... x-ray is finally back. All is well. Think I'll go lie down ... 10 minutes is better than nothing!

We're here!!!

Countless hours, 1 scratched wood floor, 3 gashed pieces of adored mahogany bedroom furniture, 2 non-working toilets, 2 broken electrical outlets, and 1 defective refrigerator later ... WE ARE MOVED IN!!! :) We have no blinds yet (those come Friday), so we have some old curtains hung up over the windows towards the street and towards the neighbor's kitchen. We got a working, non-damaged refrigerator today, and the hubby used his new tools to hang up a pot rack tonight so that our pots we got for our wedding will FINALLY be used on a regular basis. We have internet and cable now (obviously), and while we are only about 1/3 of the way unpacked and our house looks like a tornado hit it, I don't know if I could be happier. I love our house, imperfections and all.

In other news, I had my 3rd migraine in 12 days today. Ugh. I went a year without one, and now 3 in less than 2 weeks? Double ugh. At least I can finally think straight without feeling like a sledgehammer is pounding the right side of my head.

My puppy is 5 weeks old! It should only be about a month or so til we pick him up. That means 1 more month til everything in the house gets chewed to shreds. Yes, I know we are insane for getting the little guy, but I'm just a sucker for canines.

Okay, I know this post is totally incoherent, but I still have a small residual headache and can't think fully straight yet. More to come when the house gets cleaned up and we take pictures!

Best Laid Plans

We were supposed to be landing in Dallas right about now. Instead, we're sitting in a Holiday Inn Express while the hubby watches The Dukes of Hazzard on TV and I upload pictures, blog, and listen to Babe on my laptop (it's a guilty pleasure -- I love this movie).

We just spent 5 days in Sonoma with daily trips to Napa. We obtained the start of a decent wine collection; I joked that some of the bottles we bought will be opened at our first child's graduation from high school! We had a great time and really got to reconnect during this trip. While we were there, we celebrated our one year anniversary! It's hard to believe that it's already been one year. So much has happened since then! It's been the hardest but also the best year of my life.

With this weather delay, we've had to shift plans around quite a bit already. Our original flight was to leave at 5:20 PM Wednesday. We tried to book seats on the 12:55 AM flight, but by the time we got through to the helpdesk, that flight was booked. We were then put on an 8 AM flight with a layover that put us into Dallas at 4:35 PM, and we weren't even going to be able to sit together. After getting to the hotel, I found a direct flight leaving around 11:15 AM and landing at 4:45 PM. Thankfully we were able to get 2 seats together on the direct flight! We were supposed to have our final walk at our house at 9 AM tomorrow and close at 11 AM. Now our builder is staying late so that we can have our walk after we land (hopefully around 5:30 PM), and we plan to close at 9 AM Thursday morning. If all goes well, we will rush back to the apartment to meet the movers between 12 and 2 PM. Then I go back to work on Friday and work over the weekend as well (at least no call!). At dinner tonight, the hubby reminded me that all things work together for good and that even though we can't see it now, we know God has a purpose for this.

Here are a few pictures from the trip:

The view from Silverado Winery

The courtyard at Silverado

We stayed on the second floor of this cottage.

The dessert from our anniversary dinner

Our new favorite winery -- here we received an hour long one-on-one tour for less than the price of a single tasting at some of the other vineyards. Best of all, the wine was phenomenal!

Frog's Leap, the winery that made the wine we drank the night we got engaged

True love

It's here!

We're closing on the house WAY sooner than we planned! We leave for Napa next Friday and get back on Tuesday. If everything goes as planned, we close on the house on Wednesday and move in Thursday. CRAZINESS!! The hubby and I started packing today. I forgot how much I dislike moving! It's worth it though.

Oh yeah, and we put a deposit down on a Yorkie puppy last week. He's 3 weeks old today. Last Saturday he was so little that he fit in one hand! Sebastian is on his way.

I am so exhausted. I haven't had a week off since last July. Last month I worked 19 days in a row. I cannot wait to sit on my bootie and sip some vina rosa while enjoying the fresh air in California. It's going to be such good times.

ARGH!!!!

It's 11:45 PM, and I'm still up. Why? I went to bed shortly after 10 and fell asleep around 10:30 only to be woken moments later by my neighbors stomping around. Then either a child or a woman started to cry, and 50 minutes later, this was still going on. In exasperation, I called our courtesy patrol, something I've actually (shockingly) never done before. I just didn't feel like playing the bang-on-the-ceiling-with-a-broom game tonight. Now I have less than six hours to sleep, and I'm so tired. They are still making a lot of noise though, so it's not looking promising for me to get some sleep.

I can't wait til we have a closing date. I'm ready to go sleep in a sleeping bag in the new house. I just need some sleep!!

Already?!?

The hubby got a call on Saturday. It looks like the house may be a reality by the end of APRIL. Wow. Looks like our Houston visitors will actually have a place to stay sooner than we anticipated! If only I can get the details worked out to find some movers, I would be able to start a countdown til I can sleep without the sound of vacuuming or loud monkey-lovin waking me up. I need to take new pictures of the house; we have walls, cabinets, and doors up now. Craziness.

I'm watching Dancing With the Stars right now. I DVRed it like I do with most shows so that I can fast forward through all the boring parts. I've never watched this show before; the sad truth is that I really just wanted to see how Heather Mills-McCartney would dance. She only has 1 real leg, and I have a weird curiosity to see how it's gonna work! HA HA HA ... Billy Ray Cyrus just came on!! No lie -- his female partner has a mullet!! Too funny. NO THEY DID NOT -- he is dancing to a song that says, "I want my mullet back." The irony!

I made the most delicious roast chicken tonight. I've actually never cooked a whole chicken in my life; I'd always just used the boneless skinless breasts before. I have to admit that it was quite tasty. I'm practicing different meals so that once we actually have room to have people over, I will be able to cook for people. I used to cook dinner for my friends in college at least weekly, but I haven't really done much cooking other than for 2 since the middle of med school. I need to get back into practice!

Wow

It's becoming a reality ...

Here's the best part ... the port-o-potty in our front lawn!