Update

Update for my womens in India:
(also: A -- please note numbers 4 & 6)

1) Rxy is engaged!! ...yeah, that's what Amanda and I said, too...
2) R-- I went to visit Sonja and you can hear crickets chirping in clinic. She said they are soooo slooooooow. You and I must be nephro-magnets!
3) ...so ummm... :)
4) S's bachelorette party is gonna be in Austin (hooray!)...more details later.
5) Link is nekkid
6) There is a shopping cart race in Austin in May (i think). I think we should be a team. So start thinking of a theme, ladies, cuz we have to dress up!
7) Currently, I still miss you.

backtowork

I started ENT Monday (above-your-shoulders surgery, except brains 'n' eyes)...they found out i'm going into pediatrics, and by Tuesday, they'd tailored my whole rotation toward pediatrics!! They moved me from UH (Ungodly Hellhole) to Santa Rosa (= free parking, free food, nice people, great hospital, all kiddos), and I work only with one resident and one attending. Yesterday, the resident and I did a surgery while the attending was in the corner fiddling with his camera. Hooray!! I still love love love surgery, but I am so glad I picked pedi. Today, we were done at 9am (right?!?) , but did I go home? haha, noooo, I went and hung out in the PICU for 3 hours, cuz I'm a nerrrrrd and I luuuuuv it. I ran into lots of pedi docs I've gotten to work with over the past few years *joyful*, and it made me so excited about next year, no matter where I go. I saw the neurosurgery team; they're always together and they strollll when they walk and they're awesome. The kidney doctor, soft-spoken and twinkley-eyed smiling as he does impossibly long math calculations in his head while everyone else clamors for a calculator, only to confirm his genius. Super-energetic ICU doc, she's intimidating in a fantastic sorta way (I want her job!) The dialysis guy who told me last year he was glad I was going into peds (compliments from nursing, very meaningful to me, because they totally don't have to). The Irish nun (social worker? just-a-nun-doing-nun-stuff?) who greets you like she's known you forever. *sigh* It's nice to be back at work...
...but I miss the ladies in India *sigh*. apparently amanda's been hanging out with them without me, hooker. Well, I guess I was there, but maybe had too much to drink??

he stumbled
and i turned around, walked away
it was supposed to be easy
and safe
and fun
and who cares
a temporary cardboard cutout
the exit door in sight and propped open
but i turned around, walked away
without a plan or a map or a clue
deep breath, close your eyes, jump
i don't know where i'm going
but oddly i don't feel lost
and i really don't know what i'm doing
but it's nice to breathe out
even though this, too, is temporary
as the calendar pages beat a path to somewhere
and i'm forced to turn around, walk away

nervous and awkward
and stupid and mute
and responsible
like i should fix it
and i should
and i try
like if you know you're a disaster
and so you surround yourself with orange cones
but they want to step over the orange cones
and you have to say, no no wait, i'm a disaster
don't you see the orange cones?!
but of course they don't see any orange cones
and so now they really think you're nuts

Alabama

Whoo! Drivin back to Alabama for my last interview...
Mostly excited to see my brother, meet his wife and kid (he has a kid! crazy...)

These are the Talladega mountains

This is the Talladega speedway
Home of Ricky Bobby...yes, of course I stopped to take pictures, Home of Ricky Bobby!!


...in Birmingham
they must've known I was comin'
perty colors
this is me
reading A's post about how she didn't see me wearing my gloves...
(it's been friggin cold everywhere I've been, those gloves have been awwwwesome, I keep 'em in the pockets of my floofy blue jacket.)
Hoorayyyy!! They live in a smaller town outside B-ham (that's how the locals spell Birmingham, and that's like way cool...and short...so I will too). I let myself in the house and took a giant nap until he got home, then we met his new additions at a fannntastic BBQ place. Isn't she pretty?? She looks like a prettier, shorter Britney Spears...

I quickly got used to Logan's radius. If you set ANYthing down within his reach, it was either in his mouth or launched across the room...
my brother is wearing a suit and tie
willingly
I still think he's 12 years old

Brett plays guitar, Logan plays drums on the guitar




no more autographs please...


he...is...sooo...cute


this is my new Braves hat!!!

cartoon behind us?...wayyy more important than that damn flashy thingy


and last but not least...
the perfect photo to whip out when he brings girls home!!

South Carolina

nowww we're gettin down into some lowww country
this is the good stuff
southeast swamp-before-the-sea
think storky-lookin' birds
still water
thick swampy woods
and snakes




this sorrrta looks like central florida
except maybe not so many skinny trees that close together
but swampy, thick, palmettos
add some cypress, oaks, and moss






anybody need rabbits? worms? anyone? y'all good?


this is the view from my hotel room in Charleston
'sniiize
The lady I stayed with is an old hippie. Looong strawberry blonde, graying hair, smoker voice, hunched a little with a limp. She greeted me with a big hippie hug, walked me to the visitor's center, got me a map, and X'ed out all the 'cracktown' neighborhoods, as she called them, then she sent me on my way to explore Charleston.







This dude's name is Calhoun. I don't know why he has his own statue.
pretty colors...

some citadel boys, running through a giant park, several pick-up soccer games


odd couple?
this is my SunDrop
I asked my hippie hostess to recommend a good place to eat.
She said, Go down King Street and stop in the first place that smells good to you
...so this is me in a Greek diner on King Street.

This lady I will never forget. She lives in part of an old church building right in the middle of
Charleston. Olllld skinny, two-story wood houses with peeling white paint, people leaning against buildings, stray dogs. Her place had old, sloping wood & linoleum floors, painted shut windows, no overhead lights just lamps, the shower was in a free standing tub and the ceiling was so low in the bathroom I couldn't stand up straight. She marches on Market Street to protest the war every Saturday. She carries signs and cards with the names of all the deceased soldiers. She'd lived all over the US, mostly in communes on little farms. She used to own a cloth diaper business. She was a school teacher in the Netherlands. She has two sons and 4 grandsons. She had ill-fitting dentures traced in the black rot that lay underneath. She is an active member of a kabillion internet peace sites. She plays bass. She felt comfortable enough to tell me a lot of personal things. She doesn't really have it all together, but she has a good heart. She talked about leaving Charleston, moving closer to her sons, and I think she should. I trusted her, but not her affiliations. I took a knife from her kitchen and slept with it that night, jussst in case they stopped by.


this was my room and my bed. The bags are the cloth diapers she's trying to sell on E-bay. Local kids from all the Charleston elementary schools had designed 'peace doves' that were then strung together by ribbon. My hostess was in charge putting up the doves for the MLK parade that was to be held the Monday after I left. By the time these boxes of ribbon-connected doves reached her, they were horribly tangled. She'd mentioned her arthritis earlier (while crossing out 'cracktowns'), and so I offered to untangle them for her.

These are some of my favorites...





I don't know why this bird reminds me of Capone...Later, I asked if she wanted to go see some live music with me. She was sooo excited, saying she hadn't had a 'girls' night in a while. She put on some bright red lipstick, and we were off in her sputtering little truck. Guy playing guitar is a third year pediatric resident...