Productivity Break

The new Vampire Weekend album is online and streaming in its entirety (and it is pretty darn good). Just thought I'd let you know.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, everyone! I'm alive. I'm on call in the NICU and I have lost all concept of time. I'm not allowed to wear a watch because it may bring in all sorts of nasty bacteria from the outside world. I'm in a call room that doesn't have a clock. It has been dark for a while now so it could be 6pm or 10pm. I'm not really sure.

It's this or Zelda. I wish I could say Zelda was winning.

Spring This...

Illinois can be so annoying sometimes... the weather, especially.

Update

Happy holidays! I know I have been MIA of late, but things in Peoria are going well. I had a very busy, but enjoyable month working with the Trauma service and am back in the Emergency Department again. I was just doing some research about local dining in Peoria and came across this webpage about the Peoria Riverfront. The juxtaposition and mild irony was too good not to share.

delightfully tacky, yet feeding your sense of good taste and adventure

Today's Chuck Norris FACT:
Rather than being birthed like a normal child, Chuck Norris instead decided to punch his way out of his mother's womb. Shortly thereafter he grew a beard and slept with 3 nurses.

just something I came across on my day off.

house broken

Wow. After six months, I finally am getting around to putting up some updates in my life. Since March, I have traveled across the country in nearly every direction before ultimately settling in Peoria, Illinois. Spending April and May in Hawaii was such a great way to end medical school. It capped four years of hard work and I was able to celebrate the milestone with my roommates and closest friends. After graduation, it was a mad dash to find a house in Peoria and rapidly pack and move everything Eastward. I was fortunate to find a nice house that has more space than I know what to do with.

I moved in a couple weeks before orientation for residency and was able to settle in a little bit. When I was looking to buy this house, there were only a few things that I knew I would need to fix up. The most significant of them was to update the walls as nearly all of them are covered in a stucco material. Every resource I consulted suggested that I first try to sand off the texture. Much to my dismay, I discovered quickly that even my newly purchased orbital sander would not make this job go any faster. So, I consigned myself to troweling layer after layer of joint compound over the walls until there was a smooth, even finish. After almost 200lbs of joint compound, the guest bedroom and office are finally finished.
After finishing the office, the rooms remained fairly barren until I spent one weekend staring at the numerous paint swatches that covered my floor. At some point, I just grew tired and possibly dizzy from all the choices. In some amount of serendipity, I landed on a color palette when I went to buy furniture. The set of living room furniture only came in one color - a light forest green. With this as a starting point, I quickly narrowed down the field of choices. The guest bedroom is shaded by a tree in the backyard and gets a bit of warm morning light so I chose a lighter, cooler color. The office gets a lot of bright, afternoon light, so I decided on a richer color. So, the before and afters are above and below. I still have to finish the walls with some pictures and shelves, but I am pretty happy with the results so far.As stated above, the living room was probably the first room to take shape. I think this was mostly out of necessity as I initially nested here as I could gently fall asleep to the warm glow of the TV. When I ran down to St. Louis to reclaim my belongings, I reassembled my bed in the living room as the other two rooms were under construction. As nice as that was, I thought it would be rather awkward to have guests over and chat on or around my bed. So, the bed was relocated after I bought some tables and things online and through craigslist. Among other new tools and appliances, I bought a brand new (delicious) Dyson vacuum to take care of all the carpet in my house. I wasn't until I finally forced myself to purchase a lawn mower that I truly began feeling domestic.

And, in the ultimate journey into making this place a permanent home, I have one last addition to my repertoire of domestications. I am very happy to announce that I have started a family! Well, thank goodness there will be no college plans for my new addition, but there will certainly be another mouth to feed, medical expenses, and perhaps a few months worth of obedience classes. I have been on the hunt for a dog for several weeks now and I finally matched with the perfect dog! It was like residency applications all over again. A surprisingly involved process, I adopted my new beagle, Marty, and went to sign the paperwork yesterday. He is a shy, but very charming 1.5 year old beagle mix and tips the scales at 50lbs. It seems like he is adjusting well, but I am bracing myself for the unfortunate reality that one day I may smell the fragrant odor of excrement and urine emanating from his kennel.

tomorrow smells of a lester cade...

So it was brought to my attention that I haven't written anything here for quite some time now. In fact, it has been almost half a year since I have had the time to put any of my thoughts down in e-writing. It is hard to believe that the last time I sat down to organize myself here, I had just finished taking my board exams and was starting to think about interviews. All that seems like ages ago and so much has happened since.

Interview season has come and gone. Although I am now very thankful that it wasn't particularly busy for me, I remember being extremely worried and preoccupied with thoughts that all of my friends and classmates were being offered interviews left and right while my application seemed to gather dust. In retrospect, I am very lucky to have interviewed with the programs that extended me the opportunity and I felt that the programs were genuinely interested in having me work in their hospitals.

Amidst all the chaos of traveling and interviews, I became deliriously unfocused and managed to completely wreck my car. It was such an unsettling feeling - finding out that my car was "totalled" and in the end I could blame no one but myself. It really struck me as a case of "why do bad things happen to me?" Regardless, I was fortunate that my parents are extremely understanding and very prepared for such situations. With their help, I was able to work through and find a new car and am currently very happy with the purchase.

So, following that incident, the new year has been fairly uneventful. I finished an emergency medicine rotation at Maricopa Medical Center in January. Although I was initially very overwhelmed by the reputation of the program, I believe that I quickly met the challenge and was as competitive of a rotator as they have had previously. So imagine my disappointment when I realized that their interview season would be over halfway through my rotation. I spoke with a few residents and attendings and while it sounded like there would be hope of a late interview or special consideration for the match, I was always uneasy about their perception of me as a candidate for internship. Knowing this, I worked even harder and fortunately it seemed to impress some attendings but the result seemed to yield very little as I finished my rotation without an interview. Again, continuing the trend of how sad my life had become.

Now, fast forward a few months to today. The match was this week and we finally received our residency matches today. When I received my notice, there was a brief moment where I was disappointed. I had hoped that despite all improbabilities, I would be able to match with Maricopa. Unfortunately, that was not the case. Thoughts of packing, moving, snow, cold, and giving up all the luxuries I have been afforded immediately stormed through my mind. To move back to Illinois - what a terrible fate. Then I heard from several others. People who had not matched or were matched to areas that were even less favorable for them. Immediately, my problems were far pettier and I was almost ashamed to be so resentful of what I had been given.

It was at this moment that I realized that my entire journey to this point has been truly remarkable. Though brief moments have been filled with hardship, the outcomes have always been favorable. Yet, during those moments I always find myself wondering why I am forced to face such difficult obstacles. It seems so easy to magnify the hardships I encounter and minimize the blessings I have been given. Throughout my rather brief adult life, I have already lost count of the number of times we casually refer to "Murphy's Law." However, it is always funny that we become so oppositional when things "go wrong" to us. It seems so easy to forget that unfortunate events are occurring all around us so why is it so surprising when it happens to us? Although I didn't match to my first choice, how lucky am I that I didn't have to scramble for an internship? There are far worse things that fate could have dealt me and I should recognize how fortunate I am to be given such opportunities.

In truth, this applies to much more than just residency. The past weeks have been hectic and stress-filled for everyone and I often felt lost in the rush of the days. Struggling to be noticed, I often sat stewing in the sense of being unappreciated and taken for granted. Yet, thinking hard - is that truly bad? Isn't it the ultimate complement that you are expected to be responsible, helpful, or forgiving? Sometimes I forget that these feelings of entitlement and worth are simply ancillary to the truly important concepts such as respect and trust. I become so focused on things I "deserve" that I neglect the many blessings I have been given.

Lately, I feel that I have neglected the needs of my friends and for that I ask forgiveness. Over the past years, I have noticed a startling trend of dissolving relationships and friendships that have faded away - people I should have fought to hold on to and friends with whom I should have kept in better touch. I, myself, will strive to appreciate all that I am given and not take the friends I have been blessed with for granted.