So this is the New Year...

So another year, and more specifically another winter break, has come and gone. As the end of December grew closer, things started getting more hectic and it was nice to be able to get away from it all to spend time with my family. This was the first year that the entire family wasn't together as my brother was busy with orientation at the Urbana Police Department.

I can't deny that things were very different at the house this Christmas. I had a couple items I needed to do for school so I spent a lot of time in my room on the computer. I tried to pop out every now and then, but I barely finished everything I needed to do before Christmas and the arrival of my cousin and his wife from Boston and his mom from Taiwan. Things pretty much were standard family happenings after that. It was good to see all the third generation family and so interesting to see how fast they grow! I saw Megan just after she was born when I was still at Georgetown and she is already walking and developing quite the vocabulary. Nickolas and Jason are as energetic as ever and seem to be growing up faster and faster.

I did learn a fun little bit of culture while out in California. It is a worldwide phenomenon called Geocaching. We went to a park where my cousin Sam had located a cache and opened it up. I guess its kind of like a high-tech scavenger hunt. The premise is that there are these "caches" hidden at certain locations that are given by latitude and longitude only. That way, people can locate them using GPS. They are hidden in public places, usually parks or trails and you find the container and sign the log located within. Some caches are large enough that people can leave small trinkets for future geocachers. There are also little Travel Bug Dog Tags that are meant to be transferred from cache to cache and the mileage is logged on their website. Its a pretty neat concept and I was surprised to see that this phenomenon even exists in Kirksville. I actually spent today roaming around Kirksville and saw a couple areas that I hadn't seen despite living here for over a year. Its a neat program and something I intend on looking into a bit more in my last few months here.

In other news, after getting back into Kirksville, I made my standard call home to let my parents know that I had returned to my apartment unscathed. It was during that call that I had one of those "so... what does it mean when" moments. My mom asked about "a person" who had trouble moving one side of their mouth and had problems closing their eyes. Immediately, the paramedic in me flipped my brain to "stroke." The question continued with what to do about it and if it could possibly mean anything else. I started to get the uneasy sense that this hypothetical person wasn't too hypothetical at all. In fact, it wound up that my mom describing the acute onset of symptoms my father experienced shortly after I left - almost 48 entire hours prior at that point in time. I will have to admit that this was probably one of the scariest moments of my life. The mere thought that my dad was having a stroke and I wasn't there turned my stomach. I obviously suggested that he either make an appointment with his primary care doctor or go to the ER to get checked out and he reassured me that he already called his doc and was going to be seen that afternoon. From Kirksville, that was all I could do and I hesitantly said good-bye and demanded that he call me the minute he found the cause of his symptoms. So, after two hours or so, I got a return phone call from my mother and she assured me that the doctor was not convinced my father was suffering from a stroke. Now that a stroke was out of the picture, my mind immediately swung to Bell's Palsy, which was shortly confirmed by my father. Upon hearing that news, I was much relieved and astounded by how emotionally exhausting that entire ordeal was.

So, that pretty much brings me to today. It is Sunday and I'm having the typical post-vacation denial that school will be back in session in less than 48 hours. I've been lounging around for the last seven days and I have to start thinking about getting back to a life of rigorous studying. Even more so, adding on the daunting task of studying for Boards and some miscellaneous other tasks that I need to finish before March. Well, that's it for now. Oh, except for the obligatory New Year's Resolution(s). So here they are in no particular order:

1.) I need to exercise more and eat less crap.
2.) I want to try and call at least one person I've lost touch with every weekend.
3.) I guess I really ought to study more. (If there is one that will be broken, this is it.)