My Thoughtful Spot

big times are back

• While on my usual 4 hour drive to my hometown, I got a message from my assistant that I needed to call a patient. She was bitching and moaning about getting pre-op labs, chest x-ray and EKG. I spent half an hour on the phone with her, which happened to be when we were on a pit stop. And I hadn't peed yet, so we couldn't even get back on the road. "I've never had to get those before and I've had scopes and other anesthesia before." I tried to patiently explain to her that those procedures that occurred when she was under the age of 50, but now that she's 52, she has to get it done. Or I'm not operating. Period. Then I mentioned to her that I didn't know the name of the radiology facility where she had her mammogram done. She said that she wasn't sure if she should have me as her surgeon because I "obviously don't know who she is." At which point I got royally pissed and said that I was on my way out of town and did not have her chart sitting in front of me. I was on the road and she was lucky that I called her back then instead of making her wait until Monday. I knew who she was, what her diagnosis was, and what the planned procedure is. But remembering the radiology facility? No. And if she expects that of her surgeon, then she's probably right -- she should get another one. She apologized. I get to operate on her tomorrow. But I'm still pissed. She really damaged our relationship for no good reason. I will do an appropriate surgery, of course, but my empathy for her? A lot less.

• The county fair was awesome, as usual. Saw pig races, giant vegetables, bees in a hive, horse races, prize winning cakes, pies, place settings, and quilts, and all the fried food you could handle! I was a wuss food-wise... had a Greek salad. But I made up for it with margaritas and beer. I was also lucky enough to get my very own Sham Wow, which I have been wanting for the last three years or so. The As Seen on TV areas at the fair are the BEST.

• On Sunday, Papelbon single-handedly killed all postseason baseball. All season long I've been saying that his arrogance will eventually cost us more than a game. Here's one time where I wish he would have proved me wrong. He gets to ruminate over it all winter long. And I don't feel bad for him at all. It's going to be hard to route for the Angels, but I'll have to get over it; we have tickets for some of the ALCS games. Once I see the Yankees, I'm sure my hatred for them will make things much easier.

• Everyone really liked the baked goods. As I expected, the kids' favorites were the pumpkin chocolate chip cookies (with frosting), but they even liked the scones. But with all the food we ate at the fair and the giant breakfast my dad made us the following day, I had leftovers. Which mom made me take home! Must... resist...

• I'm struggling a bit with a new family dynamic. I hesitate to put too much here (because my family occasionally reads this blog), but my dad and adopted sister recently moved back to my hometown. Yes, I realize that makes me her sister, but I never really lived in the same house, or even the same state, with her. She's 13, which means that I'm old enough to be her mother. And she's got a whole slew of behavioral problems (which my family already knows) and I have very little patience for them; I've been told I can be a little... mean. (I have a lot of practice being a big sister, what can I say?) My whole line of thinking is that she's smart enough to know how to be respectful to others around her and to "cotton on" to the way things are now. I refuse to lower my standards, which is a luxury I am afforded by distance. I hope things work out for everyone's sakes. I won't diminish my trips up there because of it, though. I love my family and still want to see them and do cool things that I can only do with them in my hometown.

• My sister is going through a lot right now at home; I didn't get to see her much at all. If you're the praying kind, please say a few for her. She's not, but that doesn't mean that she can't be helped by some. As a matter of fact, prayers for my whole family up there would be good (see above). Thanks much.

what i did this summer

Labor Day marks the end of summer and for many, a re-organization of their lives. Back to life as usual. In this spirit, I thought it was a good time for me to start blogging again. And what better way to do it than with a tribute to those annual essays we all wrote when we returned to school entitled "What I Did This Summer." A lot has happened. I'll do my best to summarize. It might take several entries!

WORK

This is, by far, the biggest category. To recap, I was working as an employee for an older surgeon who was supposed to retire. But things weren't quite working out at his office and he knew that if he retired, I would be making a lot of changes. He didn't want that, so he decided not to retire and wanted me to pay him $10,000/mo as a share of his expenses to stay there. As a young surgeon, I can't afford that, so I needed to find a different place to work.

I wasn't the older surgeon's first attempt at finding someone who would run his office for him after he retired. There was another young male surgeon and things similarly didn't work out with him. After young surgeon had to leave, he was able to share space with another established surgeon for two years while he built up his practice and saved enough money to get his own office.

When this younger surgeon heard that I needed to move out, he was kind enough to offer me refuge at a rent I could afford. I still had a lot of start up costs... phone, computers, desk, not to mention the personalized materials like business cards, letterhead, envelopes, and prescription pads. Even though we had to dip into our savings in order for me to land there, I was happy to be leaving the older surgeon's office. It got progressively weirder as the summer progressed and my last day (August 31st) came closer.

I moved all my things, told my main referring doctors that I was moving offices and was thrilled to have a fresh start.

Four business days after I landed in my new office (which, by the way is actually the break room, but I don't care), the younger surgeon calls me into his office.

"Have a seat."

"Um, ok." I think, "Oh, brother, what kind of drama is about to ensue NOW?"

"I think I made a mistake. See, I thought I could tolerate another person being in the office. I wanted to help you out and I thought the extra cash would help me, too. But I just can't handle it. I like my solitude. I can't relax here any more and I'm all figdety.

"Alright. It's your office. So I have six months? Til the end of our agreement?"

"No, actually, either of us can terminate the agreement with sixty days written notice. So here is your notice." And he hands me a three sentence paragraph telling me to get out.

He doesn't want to share. Fine. It's his office. He can do what he wants. But that was information that would have been useful BEFORE I MOVED ALL MY SHIT OVER AND SPENT $400 ON OFFICE STATIONARY. What a remarkable lack of self-insight. To put it another way? Complete selfish dickhead move.

Part II to come.

TRAVELS

Daniel and I usually take one significant week vacation every year. But this year, things just worked out such that we did a lot of extended weekend trips. We went to Vegas in May and kicked it in a suite at the Wynn, to Napa and stayed in a house on a vineyard with some friends, to Boston to catch a Red Sox game with Dawn, and to Disneyland and stayed in hotels there instead of driving back home. (No, it's not that far, but it's nice to be able to head back to your room in the heat of the afternoon.) I also went up north and visited my family more than usual.

All in all, we had things going on almost every weekend during the summer. Between traveling and Angels baseball, we were plenty busy! I'm glad we had the opportunity to go lots of places, but long weekends are tiring and do much less to re-charge my battery than a whole week all at once. So towards the end of summer, I decided to go north to hang out at my mom's. Because if I stayed home, I would do work instead of relaxing. Distance forced the issue.

EXERCISE

All these weekends away and baseball games haven't done me any favors with my eating and exercise routine. I haven't lost any weight and am actually a few pounds heavier than I was on Memorial Day. I can still run six miles, but I haven't run 10 miles in a long time. And I'm no where near as fast as I used to be. Which makes sense because I'm carrying extra weight, but I'm still not happy about it.

As a matter of fact, I had to go buy new clothes for my fat ass because most of my current clothes are just a bit too small. And I can't wear scrubs all the time at work.

Not only did the long weekends sabotage me, but I'm more socially active and have more evening meetings. We all know that we can't control what restaurants put in food; even if you order steamed vegetables they are often full of fat.

I'm working on it.

first vegas trip

I can't believe it's been two weeks since I've posted! I've been quite preoccupied with work.

It's pretty embarrassing that Daniel and I have never been to Vegas. I mean, we live really close: four hours driving or one hour by plane. But whenever we get the itch to play blackjack, we drive an hour and are sitting at a table in one of the Indian casinos. So why go to all the hassle of Vegas, right?

It was going to take an occasion to make us go to Vegas. The occasion was one of our friend's 30th birthday celebrations! She adores the Dave Matthews Band and she wanted to see them play there and invited a bunch of us to go. I am in sore need of a vacation (last one was in August), so I jumped at the chance.

Another friend we have has some serious connections in Vegas. She's just one of those people who, no matter where she goes, meets the right people to know and she has an immediate "in" with them. She scored us a spectacular, AMAZING suite at the Wynn at a discounted price. Go ahead. Look at the photos on the website. It was sick. The main bathroom (yes, there were two bathrooms) is bigger than my kitchen. The shower had a "rain" setting. There was a separate jacuzzi tub.

We had our first night's dinner in the adjoining Encore Hotel at a restaurant called Switch. Great French inspired seafood and the walls/ceiling changed while you ate!

As we were walking past the craps tables, we tried to see what the minimum bets were. (Craps has always fascinated me, but I'm too chicken to try it.) $25. $50. $25. $1,000. Wait. Did that really say $1,000? We stopped to watch. My friend (who is hotter than all get out, by the way,) was watching the sole craps player bet upwards of $14,000 with each roll of the dice. They start talking, she starts shooting. This guy has about $10,000 on the pass line, $3,000 on each number, and about $300 on each of the hard ways. Up $26,000, down $14,000. Back and forth. He tosses my friend a $500 chip. She's talking me up and he gives me $100 chip. I felt really weird about keeping it, so when he asked me if I wanted him to bet it, I said yes. (Easy come, easy go, I guess.) He finally gets wiped out and leaves, but not before telling us that he won $150,000 the night before and trying to get up to some kind of room. Gross.

Saturday night we had dinner with the birthday girl at Nine Fine Irishmen. Excellent Irish food and half and halfs. She goes off to her concert and we head to the old strip... the Golden Nugget. I heard that the slots had really good odds and wanted to see what old Vegas looks like, even if it's not the cool place to be.

Now I know why it's not the cool place. Ugh. Dirty. Smoky. Questionable crowd. Maybe I didn't like it because the Russian blackjack dealer by the pool took me for $100. Or perhaps it was because I lost my cell phone there.

But I didn't know I had lost my cell phone until after we took another cab ride back to the strip and was almost back at the Wynn. We retraced our steps after dinner, since I clearly remembered having it there. Meanwhile, Daniel and my friend were calling and texting my phone, offering rewards and giving the number where to call if found. About two hours later, someone calls my friend. It was security at the Golden Nugget. Back in a $40 cab right to downtown and get my phone. He didn't accept the reward I offered him and he actually apologized for taking so long to call, but he had to log it into his record book downstairs.

He was nice, but I still don't like the Golden Nugget.

When we got back to the Wynn, my friend managed to walk past the huge line to get into Tryst, which is arguably one of the hottest clubs in Vegas right now. Of course, never having been to Vegas before and not being much of a club-goer in general, I wasn't showing nearly enough skin and looked matronly in the club. Oh, well. It was cool to check it out, even if I did get slobbered on by some fat guy who had a table with bottle service and was trying to offer me a drink. Again. Gross. Leave me just outside at the bottom of the stairs after you get through the line. There they have a separate lounge with couches where I can sit, drink, and talk in peace. We'll have to arrange that for next time.

Sunday was pretty low key and we had to drive back. Daniel and I did a lot of exploring and I have definite ideas of what I want to try next time. ShadowBox at Ceasars. Maybe a show. Shopping at the premium outlets. But one thing is certain, we will go back.

county fair goodness

It was so great to go see my family this past weekend and go to the county fair. It is so much better than our local fair, which I would expect because our region isn't exactly agricultural like it was 50 years ago. But the Fresno Fair is pretty much the same every year. They have a few different exhibits, but there are always the old standbys: the youth art hall, the Ag exhibits, the farm animals and auctions, horse racing, home arts, and, of course, the as-seen-on-tv halls. Here are some highlights, view the entire album here.

Here's my brother succumbing to the silver-tongued devils at the as-seen-on-tv halls.

Kate, me, Steven, Jason (he's only 13!), and Zoe at the racetrack. We didn't bet on any horses; we spent our money on margaritas. With extra shots. ;-)

This is in the Home Arts building. Look at that popcorn. That's a cake! How did that not get a prize?

These were in the "ugly cakes" category. In the upper right hand corner, you'll see the edge of a cake that literally looked like a pile of shit. There was another cake in the shape of a nose with a zit and boogers coming out. I think both of those were grosser than the brain one, which won first prize.

Here's Zoe sitting in front of a giant, ribbon-winning pumpkin. She's there for cuteness as well as perspective.

These beans were in the Ag hall. Not sure why these are here instead of in the Home Arts hall. In fact, there are several things that I wish I knew the rules for judging. Like the place setting competitions. Why did one setting get a first prize when a better appearing setting didn't get anything? Kate and I really wanted to see the rules for the place settings. We were so busy trying to figure out the rules that I forgot to take pictures.

For example: what makes a second place box of garlic different from a first place box of garlic??

This says all you need to know at the fair: on display that the funnel cake vendor.

weekend trip!

This weekend my brother are driving up to Fresno so we can go to the Big Fresno Fair! It only spans about 12 days in the beginning of October. As-seen-on-tv exhibits, giant vegetables, table setting competitions, and farm animal auctions. Not to mention the food! I wasn't able to go last year and am totally stoked to be able to go this year. Unfortunately Daniel can't go because he has to work. But I'll take enough pictures to go around!

still recovering

The exam was pretty much what I expected. It was very similar to our yearly in-training exams we were given as residents. But this time, I came out of it feeling much better about my answers; knowing that I new some of them cold. I had plenty of time to deliberate over the ones I wasn't sure about and was very comfortable throughout the entire testing day. I did start to get worried here and there, especially towards the end of the day, but I was able to quickly calm myself before a full-blown freakout occurred. During these moments I was thinking about all the supportive words that people had given me, both on and off the internet. Again, to those of you here, I say thank you.

The day following the exam was spent by me running around, trying to take care of the many things I had postponed til after the test. There were lots of things for me to do. Not the least of which was going to my new job and filling out paperwork with the hospital. Oh, there have already been mounds of it, but there seems to be more every time I turn around. I'll have my badge, though, and all the nurses at each station I visited were very nice and welcoming. More on my new job later.

Tomorrow morning we will begin our much needed vacation. Until last night, the details remained shrouded in mystery. Daniel loves surprising me and has taken it on as a personal challenge to do it as often as he can. Early in our relationship, he learned that even the tiniest of hints would lead me down the path to correctly guess the present or trip or whatever he was planning. It's a knack I think I inherited from my dad; we were never able to keep any surprises from him! I did manage to get one detail out of him, though. I was looking at my passport because I thought it was going to expire in October of this year. Well, it expires in September. I needed it for paperwork at the hospital, told him it was expiring, and that I would send it off for renewal after my exam. He said ok -- we were not leaving the country.

So we have the Vacation of Opposites. First we will be camping in the High Sierra, at exactly the same place I went with my mom, brother, sister, and her family. Unfortunately, Daniel had to stay behind to work on some very important briefs and couldn't go. Steven and I raved so much about it that he decided he wanted to see it for himself! He has never camped in the West; his camping experience has been limited to the Appalachians in New York. As you can see, the area where we'll be camping is gorgeous. And it is as rustic as it gets. No running water and an outhouse for any necessary duties (doodies?). This is easily offset by the peace and still of a star-filled sky and fields of wild flowers. I must admit, I did suspect camping was going to be a part of our vacation somehow. Whenever I guess something, though, I usually keep it to myself. He gets so disappointed if I get it right!

After that, we'll be heading to the Grand Californian Resort and Spa at Disneyland. Yes, we have Annual Passes. And yes, some of you may think it's silly to stay in hotel when we live so close. But ever since I was a kid, I wanted to stay on Disneyland property. So we are, and we're not coming home til we check out. We have reservations for all of our favorite fine dining restaurants and have massages scheduled for the day of our arrival. It should be great as long as it doesn't get too hot in Anaheim. But if it does, we'll get to use their pool! Ha! A Disneyland pool!

I didn't have my act together enough to arrange for guest posting, so I'll be back live on Monday the 25th. There will be no cell phone reception in the mountains, but I may do some remote posting when we get back to Southern California. Be good!

la brea tar pits

The next neat thing I did with my sister and her kids was to take a day off from studying and go to the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles. Believe it or not, I had never been there. I've been to the nearby LA County Museum of Art... once... briefly. But residency really doesn't lend itself to exploring the city around you, ya know?

I remember LaVar Burton telling us about the tar pits on an episode of Reading Rainbow and both Kate and I wanted to go ever since then. So these animals would wander into the tar, get stuck, attract other animals who would get stuck, and they would all die and be preserved by the tar. How cool was that?

We thought we'd be seeing a lot of dinosaurs. But no, the tar pits were formed in the Ice Age, 65 million years after the extinction of the dinosaurs. So we saw primitive horses, camels, wolves, saber-toothed cats (not tigers), and mammoths. Plus they have a pit where excavations occur during the summer months and you can acutally see ribs and hip bones sticking up out of the tar. Not only are the big fossils in there, but there are microfossils -- bugs and bacteria -- that give major clues to the ecosystem of the Ice Age. They hope to find clues that will help answer the mystery of what ended the Ice Age. Was it a major geologic event... or man?

 a tar pit outside the museum

 bison

 giant mammoth with Kate, Jason, and Zoe just behind it.

 saber toothed cat

Later that night, when I was sleeping, I had a nightmare. All I can remember is that Will Smith was yelling at me. If I didn't get off my butt and start studying, I was going to fail my exam. It was a combination of his characters: the jerkiness of Hancock and the wardrobe of Men in Black. So I'd better get to it... so he doesn't yell at me again.

the L

When I was in Chicago last week, I had occasion to ride the L, which is Chicago's version of a subway system. It's called that, I think, because at some points the cars are "el"evated above the streets. Of course, they also go underground, but it's their train; they can call it whatever they want.

My last experience on public transportation was five years ago in Boston's T (T for train). When we first moved to the area, we lived in Sommerville and I worked at the airport. Even with a bus ride and two train changes, taking public transportation was much easier. I quickly got used to weird people and took for granted the street... er... subway musicians. A few years later, we moved out to West Newton and I took the train less. If I did have to go into the city, I would drive or take the commuter rail.

I've never lived long enough in New York to even begin to understand the complexities of their subway system. I've heard horror stories about certain trains not working on the weekends, trains never coming, and people getting completely lost in that underground maze. There are even rumors of people and alligators living under there!

So when I was faced with riding a new public transportation system, I was, I'm not ashamed to say, a bit apprehensive. Chicago's map was much bigger than Boston's. But was it as big as New York's? California is known for it's lack of public transportation and I was quite out of my element.

I decided to brave it anyway. I walk up to the entrance gates and don't see a thing to dispense L tokens. Ok, they're on a card. I can feed two dollars into a machine. It's like a copy card at the library. (I just compared riding the L to the library. Nerd!) I went to the gate, thank goodness there was no one behind me, and tried in vain to get it to read my card. After about 10 seconds which seemed like an eternity, a nice L employee walked over and wordlessly adjusted my card and shoved it into the slot. A sign that read "Tourist" and was attached to my back would have completed my outfit nicely. I uttered an embarrassed "thanks" and went up to the platform.

When the train that was heading my way approached, I boarded and was immediately transported back to Boston. The interior design was like the Red line that goes through Harvard Square. We passed station after station as I headed toward the city. Then I began to wonder things I hadn't when I rode the T. What do all those people who ride the L think about when they're staring off into space?

I was reminded of a funny show that used to be on Comedy Central called Upright Citizens Brigade. It was sketch comedy that took place in New York. There was a sketch on the subway that explored this very idea. I tried to find this clip on YouTube, but it's not there. So I'll put the quotes.

• "If I had more money then, I'd have more money now. Money."
• "I could kick his ass, I could kick her ass... hmm... better leave that guy alone." 

I saw a musician. And was approached by a weird lady. As far as I could tell the L is in the middle; not as simple as the T, but not as confusing as New York. Which turns out to be just right.

back in the saddle again

Oh my. I just read the post Dawn did for me in my absence and I'm speechless. So all I can do is to thank her profusely and be grateful that I have such a great friend -- all by virtue of a blog.

My week away from home was quite an adventure. In addition to the board review course and the new friends I made there, I also solidified a blossoming friendship with Nilsa and Mega, and met Princess Pointful for the first time. Nilsa and Mega live in the area, but PP was actually in from out of town for business like me. Completely random that we were both there at the same time and knew the same bloggers... Anyway, we met up last Tuesday at a Cuban restaurant and had some great discussions. I didn't get to see much of Chicago because the course was so time consuming and not downtown, so I have decided that I'm going to go back for a more touristy trip at some point.

Onto the course, which is where I spent nearly all of my time. I was concerned about meeting people. Not because I'm shy about that sort of thing, but because, by and large, surgeons are weird. They tend to be a bit aggressive and don't trust each other. Plus, most of them come to the table with a half empty toolbox of social skills; a natural outgrowth of having to do so much studying just to get where they are.

Usually the "odd" personalities in a seminar like this come out pretty early. They're the frequent question-askers, the people who talk during class, the terd who feels he has to pimp the lecturer just to prove how smart he his.

After the first day of lectures ended at 6pm, all I could think of doing was getting back to my room and possibly stopping by the hotel bar for a beer. My brain was full, I was tired of sitting, and needed to decompress. As I was making a bee-line for the door, the freqent question-asker came up to me. In his hand was a gold toe ring with the Celtic claddagh design on it.

"Excuse me, I found this on the ground near where you were standing on a break. I notice you're wearing sandals and was just wondering if this was yours."

I looked blankly at the toe ring without an owner, squinched up my face and said, "EW! No!"

At that point, he, too, realized that his hand was touching someone else's toe germs, said he had to go off to scrub his hands. "What should I do with it?" he asked as he walked toward the elevator to his room.

"I don't know, but I would try to touch it as little as possible."

The next morning, he was conspicuously sitting next to the spot I had occupied the day before. Ok. Sure. This could be amusing. I sat down, and he introduced himself a little more formally. Then he continued the saga of the toe ring. He couldn't bring himself to throw it away; what if it had senimental value to someone? So he scooped it into an envelope, washed his hands again, and turned it into lost and found at the front desk. Turns out someone had been asking for it... several times, in fact.

Two or three hours later, he continues, there was a knock at his hotel room door. He opened it to a young French girl. She is the owner of the toe ring and came to thank him. She was a foot model, here for a photo shoot. She was given the toe ring to "practice" with and was terrifed what would happen when her superiors found out she lost it. She was so relieved to have gotten it back that she began to offer him money... as a reward. He couldn't accept money, he explains, he was just happy to have been able to help.

But she insists. And they have a long conversation. Does he know anyone who would like to get into the foot or hand modeling business? She would hook them up with the necessary paperwork and connections. After all, it's good money -- $1,000/hr. Actually, he says, my girlfriend might be interested and there is this girl with nice feet at the conference I'm attending...

I was briefly amused at the Seinfeldian course his story had taken. But my amusement quickly turned to annoyance when he consistently talked to me during lectures, passed me notes on subject matter that they were neglecting to cover, and kept subconsciously scooting his chair closer and closer towards mine. He was a space invader. I would have moved, but I felt bad for him; his surgical career ended before it started because he developed a neurological problem that prevented him from operating. He kept asking me if his questions were too many, if what he was wearing was ok, and that he usually has his sisters to keep him in line. It was plain to see that he had poor self esteem. Sure, I could have moved, but there were no open seats. And by the time the third day came around, it would have been obvious that I was moving to get away from him. So I stuck it out. And put my bag in the space between us as a border. During the course of our conversations, I mentioned that I have patrolled the border between the US and Mexico and that my bag represented the broken fence that exists in real life. That helped.

hair tie will be in tow

Tomorrow morning I'll be taking off for the Windy City! I'm taking a board review course and they assure me that I'll pass. They even put their money where their mouths are: if I fail the boards, I'll get my course fee refunded plus an additional $500! If it were not a successful program, they wouldn't still be around with that kind of guarantee, right?

I don't know if I'll have access to a computer and I don't currently have a laptop (something that will be remedied with my signing bonus), so I've asked a few people to sub for me. Dawn is a prolific blogger and I've asked here to come over here and chime in. We met through blogging back in 2006 and since then we have spent holidays and vacations together and she has become one of my best friends. Daniel (my husband) is one of the smartest people I know. I thought for a long time that he should have a blog, but he's too busy taking care of me to devote time to a whole blog. A one or two post commitment is something he has agreed to do!

So I hope you have a good week! Who knows, maybe I'll post from my "dumb" phone! You'll know I've txted from my phone when you see some stupid tag that Verizon puts on all it's messages. :-P

Ciao!