2010: Year in Review

Time for my third annual "Year in Review" Post. Get your popcorn and diet soda and settle in for some nostalgia...

For those who like swimming in summaries, here lie 2008's and 2009's reviews. 2010 was indeed a memorable year. I started out in indentured servitude and am ending it in a very different, much more enjoyable place. (Aside from three obvious photos, pictures here are from the eventful month of December.)

Now, on to the very serious business of my annual month by month review, divided into the tidy categories of Uppers and Downers.

January: Rotation: ER, and the usual burden of "back-up". Downers: Slave labor in it's truest form. Scheduled to the max 6-7 days a week with little time to breathe, sleep, eat, care for myself. Uppers: A freak flooding rainstorm in the Southwest led to a canceled flight, a glorious weekend off (the only one for approx 12 weeks) and an engagement! Three cheers for happily ever after!

February: Rotation was NICU with q4 call. A meh rotation with lots of time sitting fully scrubbed and waiting for babies to get sick. Not the best time. Downers: My one golden weekend was a required residency retreat where I ended up getting food poisoning. Uppers: After recovering from said food poisoning my class won the TFM Talent show performing a song I wrote about a lost pager - it was a huge hit and lots of fun! Also, I enjoyed a post-call stuporous Valentine's Day dance with my fiance.

March: Rotation: Cardiology. Supposedly a break from all the call. Supposedly a break from working so many weekends (by March, aside from the freak storm and the work-related retreat, I had worked every weekend in 2010. Yes, I'm still bitter). Downers: due to coverage for other residents, official back-up duty, and my own laboring patients, I was still sleep-deprived and dearly missing my sweetie in Seattle. Uppers: I got to perform the 1812 overture with RCB, complete with [electronic] cannon fire! I managed a short escape to present at the AMSA conference. Passover Seder family reunion in San Fransisco! The Countdown Clock continued...

April: That was my "No Happy Bunnies" post, as you may recall. Rotation was in-patient family medicine. Downers: We were short-staffed and thanks to work, Karin and I missed out on our first anniversary and Honkfest, and I missed out on just about everything that makes Seattle Spring superawesome. I was still horseless and barely able to find time to play my trumpet. However there were Uppers: I groggily made one post-call Renegayde gig for the Roller Derby, and the month eventually ended. But the best upper was that it was the last month like that. Ever! The thrill of my last call was dampened by the fact that I was called in to cover more calls, but at the time I thought it was my last and I celebrated in style: Rounding on roller skates (as above).

May was a breath of fresh air! I finally had less back up and could use that vacation time! Downers: Not much. Just the surprise black weekend call after my much needed vacation, more residents down for the count and more chaos at TFM. Uppers: Band Camp! Vacation in buttery Minnesota! Sleep! Tick tick tick on the countdown calendar...

June was the last month of residency. It flew by. Rotation: Bastyr elective in Seattle. Downers: everything happened at once which was seriously stressful. But, all those things were overall pretty good (moving, the visits from my family, finishing residency). Uppers: Did I mention I finished residency? Moving in with Karin, Pride, Summer solstice festival, family. Oh, yeah, and as of midnight on 6/30 I finished residency! Woot! Countdown clock zero'ed out (I had two countdown clocks, one online and one on my iPod - the zeroed out one from my iPod is pictured at left)!

July: First month without an associated rotation since the month I had off between medschool and residency! Holy moly! Call it my rebound month. Downers: Board exams - ick. Some drama around RCB. Merging two households was way more stressful than I anticipated. At the end of the month the biggest downer was the death of a close family friend, as well. Uppers: OMG I got to do laundry! OMG! I got to do dishes! OMG I got to sleep in! OMG! I got to watch TV! Traveled to Boston for for a week for a GLMA Board Meeting. Rocked some parades with RCB. OMG I finished residency last month!

August: Oy. The biggest Downer occurred Sunday, August 1st: ripped my left gastrocs in two pieces, rolling it up like a window shade and rendering me useless for a large portion of the month. Uppers: Seeing some Aussie pals, Lisa and her mother. Camping with Karin's Neice. Storm games. And BLUE HAIR! Plus, all those rippling upper body muscles from those crutches!

September: It was full of so much adventure that I posted my entry late. Downers: what are those? Oh, right, I was still pretty injured but getting around a lot better and Uppers: No more cane! Seattle Storm Mania. GLMA Conference in San Diego. Another great Lullaby Moon gig.

October: The real recuperation month. As I reflect back, it wasn't until the end of October that I really felt I was starting to heal. I had more energy and dug into life. I looked for horses, barns where I could ride. I did some serious wedding planning and I went through a lot of old boxes and papers and finally finished unpacking. My blog posts were full of nostalgia about medical school and rotations. I was starting to get ready to get back into the workforce. Downers: More band drama. Karin took the Pysch GRE's (ick for her). Uppers: Huge headway made on wedding planning! Plus all the aforementioned healing! Freedom feels so good!

November was eventful. Downers: Snow put Seattle on hold Uppers: Snow put Seattle on hold just before Thanksgiving (making for a loooong weekend!) and Karin and I hosted a Little Gay Thanksgiving at our house. I made some headway on the job and horse search!

Bringing us to this month, December, HanuBirtMas time! Downers: After 34 years I still get bitter that my birthday is lumped with Jesus'. Is that selfish? Uppers: RCB Christmas concert! Birthday sushi (yum at left) with friends and family and ice skating. And, of course, the much anticipated Trip to Minnesota.

In the Tundra of Middle River, MN, among other things, I helped make a traditional Norwegian flatbread called lefse and drove a snowmobile. Ah the snowmobile lesson... it went something like this, "Here's the throttle, here's the brake, here's the emergency shut-off. Follow me." And with snowsuit, helmet and an 11 year old sitting in the seat behind me, I took off in the dark winter night, following faint tail lights and a cloud of snow. That first ride I can't say with total honesty that I had a lot of fun. Terrifying would be more accurate. But the following day was another story. Off we went, in the blazing sunshine across field and dale, through woods and trails. Glorious adventures were had. I smiled so hard my face hurt. And while I missed my family and my usual family traditions, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with the in-laws and actually look forward to another snowy Christmas in northern rural Minnesota - snowsuit and all (see photo above near February's summary)!

So, dear readers, 2010 was great, but I trust 2011 will be even better! It will be a big year - a real job, a wedding, and a horse! Yes, a horse. I know I keep promising more word on the topic... s0 stay tuned for more word on work and horses...

Happy New Year!

Sagittarian FTW (Happy HanuBirtMas)

Thanksgiving, a horse swap, seasonal festivities and the Snowpocolypse... it's been quite a busy month since my last update. I sit here shortly after my ophthalmologist visit on our new Couch of Amazingness with my ginormous pupils and belly full of left over spinach dip contemplating where to start.

I suppose tossing a term like "snowpocolypse" in my intro may elicit some questions so I will start there. The snowstorm we had around Thanksgiving was a doozy. It's wasn't so much the fluffy stuff that caused the issues, it was the frozen wet stuff underneath. When one lives in Rain City, temperatures below freezing leads directly to total chaos. Especially in my neighborhood, where the hills are steep, and the salt trucks non-existent. In sum, the white stuff was lovely coating for the carcasses of abandoned vehicles and closed up shops while the city had their dry run for The End of the World and shut down the week of Thanksgiving. Commuters spent up to 8 hours in gridlock on the icy freeways and after running out of gas left their poor cars where they died. Click here for a recap of the madness (follow links therein for more video and photo fun) and note below an entertaining video of a street not far from my house. Oh Seattle, you amuse indeed. (Also amusing, Seattle men and their all-season shorts apparel as my photo above).



By the time Thanksgiving rolled around Karin and I had managed to create a cozy little space of our home and as the snow continued to fall, our guests arrived to partake in a true feast! We had incredible homemade pies (pumpkin and apple - crusts from scratch of course - see left), turkey for the carnivores with gravy, gluten free stuffing of awesomeness, cranberry sauce of glory, scrumptious mashed potatoes, the required yams with marshmallowy sweetness, crunchiferous green bean casserole, olfactory bliss home baked bread, and more! Five of us sat around the table and gave thanks for the food, each other, and leftovers. The the next few days involved finishing the foodstuffs (that Karin pretty much made on her very own with minimal help from yours truly - I was the clean-up crew) and preparing ourselves for the next Big Three: Hanukkah, Birthday and Christmas... which in this blog entry I am now naming as HanuBirtMas (strategic capitalization optional).

This year, for HanuBirtMas I want a horse. No... not a pony, a horse (although I do love ponies and if one should happen upon my doorstep with a note saying "free pony" I would surely take it in and love it and cherish it forever. Especially THIS pony!) Everyone should know by now horses have been a critical need of mine since my brain was developed enough to understand wants and desires. My first word may have been interpreted as "cookie" but what I meant to say was "double clear" - an obviously big mouthful for a baby but certainly reflective of my equestrian intentions. So to follow up from last months' horse report: King, the great big push-button gray gelding with "Grand Prix" written all over his massive head, was sold. I'm sure I'll see him on CBC someday, rocking the international jumper scene and will be able to say with pride, "I almost got to ride that horse." However, my consolation prize promises to be quite fantastic. ...And you fine readers will have to wait to hear all about it! I fear talking about it here may again tempt the fates, and out of pure superstition I will withhold full details in cyberprint until everything is settled. (Plus, I don't have any cool pictures to share yet!) Hopefully by my next blog post or two I can shed the superstitious malarkey and fill everyone in on the horse saga. In the meantime, appreciate my relaxed riding style, circa 1988, above.

Albeit still (momentarily) horseless, I have been busying myself these past few weeks with more job searching, present-buying, Christmas caroling with my band, preparing for our upcoming concert and enjoying in the birthday cheer of my many fellow Sagittarians in my social circle. I've been lighting Hanukkah candles and bought a little Christmas tree from the nearby Seattle AIDS Support Group annual fundraiser tree sale. Later this month, after a concert and some birthday sushi, Karin, LucyDog (who just turned 8 yesterday) and I will be getting the TSA-pat-down and boarding a plane to Minnesota (via Grand Forks, ND) to understand the true meaning of winter wonderland and to have a Midwest feast courtesy of the in-laws-to-be that will surely rival our turkey-optional, pie-fest, snowpocolypse Seattle Thanksgiving!

Happy HanuBirtMas everyone (photo: me + cake + fellow Sag = yum!)

Like a speeding bullet

Hello readers!

Winding down to the end of residency now. Hard to believe, no? If I keep to my once monthly posts this may be my second to last blog entry of residency. *Gasp!

Part of me (the biggest part) is unbelievably thrilled!
And part of me (that little noodley part) thinks: "ohmygodihavetotakeboards
andrecertifymyACLS
andpackandmoveand
beforeilosehealthinsureance
seeadoctoranddentist
andpreparemyhumongouspowerpoint
andpublishmypaperandholycraphowmanydays?"

But, like I said, most of me is just tickled pink!

So, panic attacks aside, shall we review the month of May?
It began at breakneck speed, starting with a post-call party at Swing Fever, the band charity auction where I stayed up way too late and bought way too many auction items. My wins included interesting items such as an off-peak week-day stay at some resort somewhere on the Washington Coast (exciting, yes?). I also won a gift basket from the Jet City Roller Girls and a few other small items. The coolest item was a drumhead from my own inauguration parade experience. The winning of this was somewhat incestuous as I donated the item with a few of my bandmates. But I wanted it, and wanted it something fierce! Fierce enough to outbid, so there!

Immediately after the event, or more specifically, after 4 hours of sleep, we head off to Minnesota so spend some QT with Karin's family (as I described at the end of April). We flew into Fargo, endured a nearly 4 hour delay, drove about 3 hours to that little place called Middle River and, after I was awake nearly 3 full days, I ate and slept the whole week away. One highlights of the trip was a D.A.R.E. graduation at the local middle school. The end of the ceremony was punctuated by a rousing version of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" but with the lyrics altered to reflect the middle schoolers promise to not drink or do drugs. Then we had cake and fruit punch in the cafeteria. Another highlight was on a literally freezing cold rainy (and in some places, snowy) May day we planted 50 lilac bushes. We stayed in Fargo the last weekend an played in the swimming pool and perused the mall. Mostly, we ate. By the end of the week, we were butter soaked, lard-laden little roly poly's barely able to waddle on the the plane thanks to the Land of Lakes predilection for all things dairy. (Note lovely MN rainbow above!)

I was welcomed back by total TFM chaos. We were still two residents down, and with pores still oozing Minnesota sugar and butter, I took an extra black weekend call, spending my first Saturday night back again on the wards being paged all night with admissions I was admittedly uncharacteristically remiss in admitting. (say that 10 times fast!) It was as if I had never left.



See, my "last call," ending May 1st, was evidently not truly my last. In fact, this coming last weekend in May, the "holiday weekend," will hopefully mark my last weekend at the hospital (note the quotation marks to emphasize annoyance). I already know I will be working both Saturday and Sunday as back up. Regardless, back in the pre-vacation blissful ignorance of May 1st, I treated my (supposed) last call as such and celebrated its end by roller skating around the wards (See above). I'd been fantasizing about this since they installed laminate floors and since I noticed a gently sloping hill from the 5J patient wing to the resident call rooms that just screamed "roller skate on me!" Filming is not allowed in patient care areas so I got some footage of me testing out the skates on this part of the wards, the nice slopey part! Most of my bloggy fans are on Facebook (and may even be reading this blog on FB, even though it is far superior and actually formatted on its original host, Blogger). So, they've probably already seen the video. But... for the three of you who haven't, there you go.

[Insert seamless transition from evils of residency to joys of band camp here. Or not.]

Band Camp! Last experienced in the summers of 1991, 1992, 1993 and 1994 as a high school student, I remembered band camp as a time of sore arms, worn out chops (chops: trumpet-speak for lips) and sun burn. Grown up gay band camp has much the same, but is waaaay more fun! I got to hang out with my 60 closest friends and partake in a talent show, play games, and play my instrument, dance and get some vitamin D and be near the ocean! It was really spectacular. And exhausting. And, did I mention fun?

Coming down off of a weekend like that was hard. Getting back in the swing of things, I took a look at my to do lists and, BAM!, was hit by reality. Not only is residency over and done with in just about 30 days, but I also will be moving, and lose my health insurance and no longer have a salary. But, hey, freedom does come at a price, n'est pas? I have so much to do, I thought about making lists of my lists. Instead, I thought it would be more fun (and debatably less productive) to make a list of reasons I am grateful about moving and finishing residency. E.g.: #8: I won't have to mouth-breathe between exits 134 and 137 anymore on I-5 (the aroma part of Tacoma). #11: less left lane driver rage, etc. I do love Seattle dearly and am excited to officially be a resident. Karin and I, as an homage to our favorite city, wrote a little song we performed last weekend. Left lane drivers are featured in the middle of the song. See below:

So, this brings me to the end of this here blog entry... So much to blog about all of a sudden but so little time. Perhaps June will bring multiple blog entries? That's probably an empty threat however. I would like to tell everyone about the video I'm working on for graduation with my classmates. I would love to vent about all the job offers I'm getting in "random small town only 40 miles from a great golf course in somewhere USA. Call now to sell us your soul and we'll call you every five minutes to harass you until you explode." But for now I must take care of patients, do this pesky big TFM Day presentation and publication thingy (worthy of its own blog entry but annoying enough to avoid the topic altogether), and try to maintain as much of a normal life as possible in the next 30 days while accomplishing the great feats of my endless to do lists. Next on the list: world peace. ...wait... wrong list.... right! Correction: forward my mail.

Warning: No happy bunnies this April

April hurt this year. Hurt like a month-long flogging. A combination of Chinese Water Torture and a constant spanking with a ventilated paddle. To put it simply, FP-inpatient is rough. Last April, while it was also rough on Pediatrics, I still managed flowers and Honkfest. The April before that, intern year, I made the Daffodil Parade and escaped to Seattle and managed a few adventures. This April was about struggling to stay under the 80-hour work week restrictions (did so-so), trying to eat more than the crap in the doctor's lounge (fail!) and sleeping when I can (also so-so). I would sometimes inadvertently check my countdown calendar twice a day, amazed at how slow it seemed to creep along (me celebrating 80 days, post-call, in picture). The patients were challenging (socially and medically), often manipulative, looking for secondary gain and the schedule was awful (5 weekends in a 30-day month is just plain cruel), all q4 call. Call days go as follows: arrive between 6 and 630 AM (as an intern it was never later than 6 AM so this may be a bit of an improvement), round, admit a patient during rounds, finish rounds, discharge patients, admit more patients, do your floor work, teach the medical students, manage ICU cross-cover, take calls from consulting nurses, etc, etc, so on and so forth until roughly 9 PM. Then back early the next day for more fun. Unless it's a Friday or Saturday, then the call goes on as previously described until 12 or 1 PM the following day (that 30-hour shift I often refer to). This is q4, or in plainspeak, every 4th day. But, these days aren't necessarily the hardest ones, it's all the other days that are starting to suck me dry. The non-call days go as such: Arrive between 6 and 630 AM, round, admit, discharge, admit, teach medical students -- so far similar to call days with the exception it all has to be done before 1:30 PM, a non-stop action-packed stress-filled 7 hours or so. A full day at work, for some people. But that's just the warm-up because after that chaos there's clinic. Twenty-minute visit slots filled with complicated and sick patients, most too poor for the services they need, and many too unmotivated and beaten down by their hard lives to seek out the alternatives that may make them less sick. All looking me to fix it. And, of course, never forget the drug-seekers that so adore residency clinics. After ten of these patients, not surprisingly taking more than the allotted 20 minutes each, I then check on the patients I left in the hospital about 6 hours earlier, my intern sometimes gone home for the day, making sure the discharges went home and the new admits got what they needed. I go home, eat something, call the fiance for a haggard "good-night", manage some sleep, lather, rinse, repeat the next day, and viola! we have burn out.

So, really, call days are quite refreshing in a sense, since my duty is predominately to the patients in the hospital (never mind the labs, studies, results, phone calls and refills from the clinic patients that keep rolling in all the while).

And I forgot to mention that I had the joy of having four OB patients deliver this month plus a surprise set of twins that our clinic assigned to me to round on in the hospital. OB really, truly is joyful. Delivering babies a pleasant part of the job. Even with shoulder dystocias and methamphetamine addiction and teen moms with two possible baby daddies, it's still a real highlight to my practice. But when already being eaten alive by the FP inpatient service it's hard to really revel in the joy of delivering a baby after being awake for 40 hours straight and then adding the moms and babies to the chaos of morning rounds and admissions.

I missed Honkfest thanks to a killer, internless black weekend. I missed the tulips blooming (I did end up driving to the Skagit Valley with Karin to see them but they had all died by the time I had the time off). I missed the Daffodil Parade and (cue sad violins) even had to miss Karin and my anniversary. I did manage a night in a lovely hotel in beautiful Bellingham, WA (a belated anniversary treat) and a post-call, fume-fueled gig at the Jet City Roller Girls (photo of Renegayde above), but despite those small glimmers of the non-work life, I'm burnt. To say I'm in need of a vacation is like saying humans need an atmosphere composed of 21% O2, 78% N2 and a dash of Argon, H2O vapor and CO2. I will suffocate without it.

And that said... my last day on this rotation is also my last call. Friday night. A 30 hour shift. Last call ever of residency! And after it's over (and I take a brief nap) I head to Swing Fever, our RCB Fundraiser/Auction! There, I'll party with my 80 closest friends, blow some money for a good cause, and, if I can stand upright, dance! But Wait! There's more! After Swing Fever, I hop on a plane for rural Minnesota, Middle River to be exact, population 319, to meet the in-laws (eek!), get some much needed R&R, and recover from this mad, mad April. Sixty-five days and counting...

Day three - still driving

All this driving is wearing me out. But it's been pretty smooth sailing. One casualty on the way out here - I think it was either late Wisconsin or early Minnesota when Pat Benatar came on my iPod. Just as she was singing "hit me with your best shot" a starling dive-bombed right into my front fender. Or, at least, so it appeared. After impact, in my rear view mirror, all I could see was a tuft of feathers floating. We inspected the car at a DQ in a small farming town (Chatfield, MN) and saw no evidence of bird parts. I'm optimistic that the bird miraculously flew under my car and survived to tell the tale... maybe via its own little birdie blog.

At the aforementioned DQ I got the chance to eat some fried cheese curds. Kinda yummy, kinda gross (see cheesy goodness at left). We also, in Blue Earth, Minnesota, got to hang out with the Jolly Green Giant! HO HO HO! (check out his giant booty!)


Aside from the JG Giant and the kamikaze bird WI and MN were without much incident. South Dakota, on the other hand, was pretty fun. A long, long state, there was plenty of opportunity for adventure.

The second night we stayed in Chamberlain, SD, population 880, right on the gorgeous Missouri River. It was an adorable town and I got to explore it when I went for a little jog in the morning.

There's a store in Wall, SD. Some of you may have heard of it. Those of you who have ever driven down I-90 in SD surely couldn't have missed it. It's called Wall Drugs. Every mile or so along the entire length of I-90 is a sign for this store! "Coffee 5 cents" "Free Ice Water" "See our backyard, bring your camera!" etc etc etc. So much of the state was spent in anticipation of Wall Drugs. Not sure if Wall drug lived up to our expectations. I think it may have. I did get to ride a jackalope (see left!)... and see an animated t-rex, and western art, and ice water, and homemade ice cream,stuffed game of all types, old photos of Calamity Jane...

SD has kitsch. I thought the trip to the UP was kitschy. I thought rural PA could be kitschy, or Platt, Nebraska. I was so wrong. Giant prairie dogs, giant steer heads, steel reenactments of "Cowboy and Indian" fights. The thunderstorms we drove through were also spectacular!

Today we finally traversed SD and are in Wyoming. We saw Mount Rushmore, the badlands, the black hills... it was a lot of tourism and less mileage but still more than 11 hours in the car. I'm exhausted, so 4 states and yet another time zone later I must sign off and hit the hay!