Getting outside

Last weekend, I eagerly stepped out of the flourescent lights of the hospital and into the bright sun. My friend, C, organized an outing to Point Reyes, to hike the Alamere Falls trail. I have to admit that at first, I wasn't very eager because I knew it would be my only day off in over 2 weeks and all that I really wanted to do was sit at home and veg. However, given my new resolution, I jumped right at it.

As a side note, as I looked at this description of the trail, I realized that it was a trail that I had been searching for since college. Back story is that when I was going out with this one guy, we went hiking with some friends to this beautiful trail. I had no idea where it was other than in Marin County. I had no idea what the name was. All I knew was that it had a waterfall on the beach at the end. And alas, I found it!

Post-call bliss

Yesterday, I gave up the opportunity to sleep all day for a day at the beach. Can you blame me?

Road trip

On Friday, I took a half day road trip down to Monterey/Carmel and had a blast. We ate wonderful sandwiches at a place in Carmel. We took lots of funny photos. It was a beautiful, sun-shiny day. Who knew I could enjoy intern year so much?

Exploring

Today is my only day off for the week, so I decided to go run some errands and do some exploring.  First, I went to Michael's to get some art supplies (as though I have time to do that!).  Then, went to the Guadalupe River Park - it's really not that cool and the fact that it was a beautiful Saturday afternoon and I only saw a dozen people in the span of an hour makes it seem very sketchy.  Maybe I went to the wrong section (the one closest to the airport - which provided the cool views of planes flying into SJC), but I'm willing to give it another go.  Next time, I think I will go to the southern section, where there may be more people?

On the other hand, I drove through the Rosegarden neighborhood and drove right by its namesake.  I didn't have time to stop by, but now it's definitely on my to-do list (in addition to visiting the San Jose Public Library branch there). Of course, I found the neighborhood grocery store and had to make a stop, where I got some Parmesan cheese to make a quick pasta dinner (to be posted later). 

Overall, a good day.  I still need to study and it feels like a Sunday because I have to work tomorrow.  Booo. 

Ode to California

I love California. That is my proclamation for the day. I went down to the Monterey Bay Aquarium today and had so so so much fun. I took highway 1 down to Monterey and the drive was beautiful. Beautiful beaches. Farms by the shore. Sand dunes, trees, and fields. What else could a girl ask for?

Of course, I went down to Monterey for the aquarium and it definitely did not disappoint. I've been wanting to go there for months, just so that I can feel like a kid again and be mesmerized by the crazy jellyfish (my favorite exhibit!).

Sea anemones!

Jellyfish!

Anemones, looking like trees from another planet!

Birds through a peephole!

Sunset!
(If you can't tell, I was very excited about my day.)

Of course, like always, you can find more pictures at my flickr page.

Bishop Ranch Regional Open Space

Finally, pictures from my hike with my dogs.

Can you spot all 3 little doggies?
This is my fatty Lucy, who would stop and lie down at every shady spot along the way. She really believed that I was torturing her for something she did wrong.

The cows! Well, this is only one cow, but I just like the picture.
That's it. It wasn't a particularly pretty hike, just lots of dry grass, a big hill, a couple of dogs, and a few cows. All in a Saturday morning.

Pictures of the city by the bay

My dad and I, on our way down from the Cliff House, San Francisco: (notice, I'm still smiling through the burning I felt in my thighs on the way up)
My cousins, who are no longer as little as I remembered (but just as cute):

Riding along in my automobile... er, I mean bike

I went to San Francisco to go bike riding with my dad this afternoon. It was a great afternoon with great weather and some unbearable, but still somewhat doable, famous San Francisco hills. We started out at the conversatory of flowers and ended up at the beach, and rode up to the Cliff House restaurant and to see the baths. Really great stuff. Will put up pictures tomorrow. Til then, I will rest my aching bones.

Brrr

I have to learn that I need to be more careful about what I wish for. It's darn cold here in California! It's only been in the 60's lately - and windy! And because I've acclimated to the 90's with humidity, I'm close to freezing like a popsicle.

And just to make it more fun, I get to go to Boston all next week - where it barely reaches 60 - with rain!

Again?

Enough said.

The mighty have fallen

Why, oh why, does it always have to happen like this?

It feels good

California feels good. Granted, it's raining here and rather gloomy, but it feels good. It feels like home.

What doesn't feel good is my knee. I found out after I took my boards that I have a torn medial meniscus that needs surgical removal. Yeah, fun. What's even better is that I'm trying to navigate insurance to get my surgery done in California while I'm here because I will be on crutches for 5 days and limping for 3 weeks - time I cannot afford to take off of my 3rd year rotations.

So, I need to come up with $5,000 or convince my evil HMO (I'm convinced all HMOs are evil) to pay for it.

Oh, how I miss you, California

Another reminder of why San Francisco is one of the best places to live is the fact that they have Madeleine Peyroux performing not once, not twice, but three times in one year! Gosh, I miss SFJazz and all it had to offer (I got to see one of Rosemary Clooney's last performances and see Dave Brubeck and his sons perform). For those of you still there, go! (Anyone want to go to Joshua Redman with me?)

It's been awhile

So, I've been a bit of a slacker in my posting, but I've also been very busy. But the truth is, that there's not a lot to write about. My life during finals was just that... finals. I did not go out. I did not sleep. I did not cook. I did not eat. It was loads of fun.

But I went back to California and then up to Seattle for some down time, which was very nice. I'm back in Boston now... and I think it's making me sick. Literally. My neighbor smokes up a storm, especially when entertaining guests (at 4 am on a Sunday night/Monday morning). So, for the second time since moving into my apartment 4 months ago, I have had to sleep on my couch. Now, this is a bit tougher than one would think, as I just bought a giant down comforter and my couch is rather small. It was a battle between me being on the couch and my blanket. In addition to that, my room smells like someone has been smoking a pack of cigarettes in it. Now, you may ask why my neighbor's smoke and noise gets to me. It's because my wall does not reach all the way up to my ceiling - there is a itty bitty little gap, but just enough to make it seem as though my neighbor is my roommate.

So, now I'm sick in my own apartment.

Ouch

So, the last 24 hours has been painful. Here's a rundown of what's been going on in the sphere of me.

1. Cal lost the bid to go to the Rose Bowl. Damn Texas. They already have the presidency. Give us something here.

2. My neighbor, whose living room wall is my bedroom wall and whose conversations I can hear clearly thanks to the gap between the wall and the ceiling, decided to have a party at 3 am. After an hour of trying to convince myself that I could go back to bed, and after hearing Michael Jackson's "I wanna rock with you," I moved myself to my living room couch. Yes, I slept on the couch.

3. I did not eat anything except a bagel and a cup of coffee before 4 PM today.

4. Had a stressful scheduling thing due.

5. Went to the bank to ask them what my statement, from August, said (I hate bank statements). Then, was subjected to a lecture about how I need to be more up-to-date on my financial records. Idiot! Sorry, I was in Vietnam for two months and started my second year of medical school a week after returning!

6. Played basketball, which I thought would be good for my bad day - but subsequently jammed THREE of my fingers.

7. Spent the last three hours making banana bread and lemon bars, only to have them come out just ok, not great.

8. Do you see any kind of academics in that day at all?! Neither do I.

So yes, now all I want to do is sleep. Rest my fingers and my body. And maybe tomorrow will be better. I can hope, can't I?

I smell Roses

So, my Golden Bears whooped some booty yesterday. I watched it from Boston, but it was great nonetheless. Granted, I nearly fell asleep during the second quarter, but watching them beat Stanford so definitively and continue their run for the Rose Bowl is amazing.

Now, I only wish I was able to go to the Rose Bowl. Unfortunately, on New Year's Day, I will be in the midst of my tour of America, aka my flight back to Boston with two stopovers.

something you may not have noticed

i added some sort of site counter on this web site, stealthily and without anyone's knowledge. why i didn't mention it before, i have no idea. it's accessible to anyone, if you are curious. just go down to the way way way bottom of this page and click on the rainbow box. there, you can see how many (or how little) people few this site.

oh, so the reason why i bring this up is because i just noticed that they have a time zone thingy on there. i decided to click on it and there are some odd things happening. first the expected is that a lot of people from the west coast (presumably berkeley and my family) are viewing this blog. however, what's not so expected is that some people, besides myself, view the blog from the east coast. what is even more unexpected is that there are some people who belong to neither one of those coasts that view. even somewhere in the pacific and somewhere in alaska! how amazing. please, if you're one of those people, i'd love to hear from you. i'd like to consider myself intercontinental, like the airline, but with an "inter" in front. totally random, my apologies. or, if you're amused, thank you and i will take a bow.

i'm in california now. enjoying the sun, somewhat because i haven't been outside all day. i've been working on grnat and scholarship applications. if anyone knows how i can get some money for a medical student doing a public health project i'm doing in vietnam this summer in regards to hiv/aids, please please please tell me. short of becoming a subway musician (for which i would somehow manage lose money), i am open to ideas.

off i go. to ride my bike to the high school to drop off my brother's lunch (how wonderful of a sister i am!) and to go to the "village" - a tiny little shopping area in my hometown for those unfamiliar with the wonderful ups and downs of castro valley.

mass chaos

i had a great conversation with my dad tonight about politics and such. i'm an official massachusetts resident now. my justification for changing my residency status was so that i could vote without doing absentee. also, i want to feel more comfortable here in boston and part of that, for me, is voting. also, i have this totally odd delusion that one day when i'm before congress for confirmation (see, i plan on being appointed to some high level cabinet position someday and that requires being confirmed by the senate), they will look at my voting record and ask me, "how could you have voted in california if you lived in massachusetts for four years?" yeah, totally delusional, but that's my thought process. but, see, i did not think of the possibility that i would have to do my taxes in massachusetts and could no longer depend on my parents' tax preparer. also, i did not consider that maybe residency programs will look at my state of resident. so, i think i will change it back to california. i'm such a dork. this whole paragraph is one, long, convoluted way of sharing something that no one but myself had any interest in knowing!

oh, but again, talking to my dad. we were talking about california politics. boxer is up for re-election and several republicans are running against her. i haven't been keeping up with california politics much (other than realizing that every policy that's been publicized by Schwarzennager is beyond absurd), so i feel as though i'm disconnected from california.

it's odd that my connection to a certain state or location is through politics. in california, i knew the city council members, mayors, attorney general, etc etc. here, i know nothing. i don't even know my city council member. so, i'm in this current state of limbo, whereby i don't feel personally attached to boston or massachusetts, yet i'm slowly feeling myself becoming disconnected from san francisco and california. i guess it's not a huge personal crisis (unlike anatomy), but it's still an odd feeling. i guess i'm just bringing it up now because super tuesday, when many big states (mass and california included) hold their presidential primaries, is this upcoming tuesday. i plan on casting my first vote as an official massachusetts-ian (i don't even know what they refer to themselves as) that day. as for who that vote will be, i'm unsure. i'm still undecided. i think i agree more with kerry on the issues, but edwards does have an arguably better chance against bush.

i'll try to inform myself between now and then, while trying to study for an anatomy exam. i can do it. i'm a medical student. i have super powers.

we have the axe!

dude, i love berkeley. i love the fans, i love the game, and best of all, i love winning!!!

so i went to a bar today in boston where the cal and stanfurd alumni clubs were holding a game viewing party. after paying my dues, i sat down and expected a nice little rivalry. we'll just say that the stanfurd fans are definitely bad fans. they don't cheer loudly, they don't know what's going on in the game, and seem rather uninterested. when they got a turnover (one of many to come), they didn't cheer loudly. i heard one girl scream, "go stanfurd!" what a disappointment. add to that the few stanfurd people in my class didn't even bother coming. whatever.

oh, so we won!!! i love this game. i lost a little bit of my voice screaming and yelling and singing songs, but i love it. i love the game. i love being around stanfurd people. oh, and i saw someone that i knew from high school who's at mit now! small world, i swear.

but that's it for now. i have to go to bed and sometime this weekend, i still start studying for hematology!

oh, one bad thing: no cute guys today. none. now that's a disappointment!

BIG GAME!

tomorrow (or more correctly, today) is the big game! for those of you who did not go to uc berkeley, that means that it's time for cal to kick some stanfurd butt! i miss being in berkeley for this weekend, and it's so exciting and seeing everyone wear blue and gold everywhere. i never knew that i could like two colors so much until i went to cal.

lots of the students here at the med school went to private schools or schools that had no huge sports teams or any outlet for school spirit and unity. now, don't get me wrong: i'm no cheerleader and by no means am i the obnoxious person who screams at the top of their lungs while you stand right in front of them. i'm just a proud alumnus. and i've been telling my classmates who never got to gather around for a college sports game that it's something to witness.

good things about tomorrow:
cal students outnumber stanfurd students
get to meet other alumni
we're going to kick butt

bad things about tomorrow:
we have to pay $20 to watch it on a TV (stupid satellite fee)
there's a slight chance that cal's going to totally screw up and lose the game (but i'm truly an optimist!)

ok, that's enough. bed time. oh, i got three tests back today, all at once. passed all my exams and for the first time, got higher than the average on biochem! yipee! jump for joy!