I'm back!

I feel that I say that every 2 months or so. Maybe this time it is for good? Maybe? Hopefully. The fall has FLOWN by. Between November and...well...now, I have been traveling at least once a week for interviews. I did a stretch of 13 days with 7 interviews. Ri. Dic. U. Lous. I have been to: SUNY Upstate, U of Rochester, UMass, UConn, Yale, Penn St, Maine Medical, U of MN, Mayo, Nebraska, Oregon, Virginia Mason, and U Chicago. Oh my goodness. I have seen a lot of places. A lot of airports. A lot of hotels...both the good and the bad. And the sketchy...

(side note, I started this post 2 weeks ago...then my computer broke on me. I finally will finish it)

I leave for my last interview on Thursday. Up to UW. Where mom and dad will join me so that we can have some family bonding time with addressing wedding invites. Woohoo?! Actually, all the wedding stuff is going great. My mom has been awesomely helpful. We have decided quite a few things, but I, being the indecisive person that I am, am always seconding guessing myself. Thank goodness Matt was there to do the tuxes with me. He just went: bam, bam, bam. And now I am going to go change it all ;) Okay, not all of it. Just some of it. He is also growing his beard out just to spite me.

Over Christmas we got a lot of wedding things done. And by done, I mean we did things without actually making decisions. Best part was the cake tasting. OMG I love cake. I just want to eat all the cake at my wedding. Still haven't actually decided on flavors. At all. But I love the flavors that I am thinking of. MMMMMMMMM cake.

Since updating last I have done the following rotations: CT surgery, pulmonary medicine at the VA, and prenatal diagnosis. Today I started my pain rotation. Pain is a sub-specialty that can be entered through anesthesia (as well as PM&R...and maybe something else). Hopefully I will get a better understanding of all those pain meds out there. Here's to hoping. 4th year does an awful thing to your motivation.

I swear I will update again. Woohoo!

oops

double post

GUSTER!!!

They are my favorite band of all time, and I finally got to see them in concert!! They came to Denver a few times while I was there, but I never had anyone with whom to go. This time, however, I made Matt come. And he actually liked it!! Usually he makes fun of my music selection (even though it is in the same genre of his own choices), but he admitted to enjoying the show. The venue is smaller - so nice and personal. They played a great mix of new (CD released Oct 5) and old stuff. They played a cover, which is pretty usual for them. They played their one encore song acoustically. Completely unplugged. No mics or anything. It. Was. Great. No, they aren't big and flashy, but they play great music and interact with the crowd. Loved it.

Today, after making a peach cobbler because we bought too many peaches, I leave for LA to take a very expensive test. This is Step 2 CS (clinical skills). The other one I took was a standardized computer based paper. This is a fake day of clinic. 12 or so patients. Interviews with them. Notes on them. There are only 5 sites across the states, and I chose LA as to see Annie!!! They also have sites in Houston, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Atlanta. Not really looking forward to it, but at least I am getting it over with. Some of my classmates aren't doing it til January. Icky.

Surgery is going well. I get to close almost every case, which is fun. I do really love working with my hands. My surgeon is great though and understands that surgery is not my field of choice. I am enjoying myself though. And I get to wear scrubs. Always great.

I'm a bad person

Turns out I would rather watch football/take a nap than update. Meh. Things happen. Including...the entire month of September. It involved a GREAT Labor Day weekend trip to Chicago, marriage/wedding prep, and a cousin wedding up in Seattle. Also, the weather in Omaha was absolutely great. It was a month that may trick you in to wanting to live here forever. Then you remember the winters...and the humidity.

I forgot..September also involved applying for residency!!!!! Anesthesia is technically requires 3 years of training with a clinical base year prior to starting the 3 devoted years of anesthesia. That clinical base year can come in 3 main forms: a transitional year, a preliminary year, and a base year built in to an anesthesia program (making it 4 years at that one program in total). While many programs are starting to go the way of offering all 4 years, a good number of them still offer both 3 year and 4 year programs. A preliminary year is basically the intern year of an internal medicine residency. Lastly, a transitional year is much like a preliminary, but it is not part of a larger internal med residency. Or at least this is how I understand it.

I have applied to a limited number of 4 year programs trying to make it a little easier on Matt in attempts to find a job. It turns out learning where you are going to go in mid March doesn't give that much time to find a teaching job in a tight market. All the other programs I have applied to attend for 3 years and would remain in Omaha for that clinical base year. This will give Matt more time to find a job. I luckily have received a couple of interviews but am looking forward to getting more. All of this is requiring a bit of organization, which has been pretty easy seeing as how my current rotation is pretty laid back.

Also....passed step 2!!! woohoo

I back, I back!

Tadaa! Took Step 2 yesterday, so I am now back among the internet living! Unlike Step 1, I had quite a bit more of a social life while studying for this one. I got there right when they opened and was the 2nd one sitting down to test. When looking at the layout for the test, I see there are 8 blocks. I go "crap." For some weird reason, I had thought there were only 7 sections. Huh. Oops. Still though, I felt like a flew through that test. And then you start to worry if you went so fast because you don't know anything. Ugh. I don't know. Ugh. We will see when scores come.

There is a show on Discovery called "The Colony," which is about these people pretending as if the world had a devastating thing, and they are survivors in these buildings and have to work together to remake society? Or something like that. I have 2 points here. Firstly, how do these participants take it seriously? You know the worlds hasn't actually ended. You know the producers won't let you starve to death. You know that they will ship you to a real hospital if you get hurt. I dunno. Secondly, after watching an episode of this and Modern Marvels on History Channel, I am now confident you don't want me around to restart society. I mean, I've got good birthing hips, and I am relatively smart, but I am by no means capable of figuring out (again) how to do irrigation. Or build weapons. Heck, even starting a fire without matches is beyond me. I can learn to do these things if someone showed me, but I am just not skilled in this way. I can be artistically creative but for the life of me cannot be practically creative. And that, my friends, is my excuse for watching dorky shows and survival shows. So you will ask me to be in your colony. K thanks

Of Course

I go from a rotation that I really want to do (and so I study and read) to studying for Step 2. Ergo...posts will be few and far between. Again. For anyone who still reads this.

Matt and I moved this past weekend. Bloody hell was it hot. Thank goodness Matt's friend Matt helped. If he hadn't, we may have broken up. 2 boys though means Becky doesn't have to carry furniture. Yay! The place is coming together nicely. I will post pics. I swear. Otherwise Omaha is hot and icky. Matt and I are going to Chicago for Labor Day weekend to catch a Cubs game and the Vampire Weekend concert. Yay! Should be tons of fun. Okay. Study time!

Gas time

How y'all been? It's been a while. I've been somewhat busy but not all that busy. Hoopfest went well. We claimed 2nd place to a team of 4 college basketball players who just graduated from college and all played together. You can't fault us for that. I then went over to "New Beach" (the cabin my extended family purchased on Camano Island.) It was awesome. This cabin is way bigger than the one we rented and way nicer. My family made a good choice. The weather was okay but I still managed to get funny tan lines. Back to Spokane for my cousin Christy's wedding. A good time was had by all, and the after-party (which seems to be a new standard with the Kuder family) was at our place. I love hanging out with my extended family. 4th of July was mellow. Then on the 5th I flew back to Omaha!

Holy balls is this land humid. This past Wednesday, I woke up at 530 and the news said it was 80 but felt like 92. Really?!?!?!? 530am and it is 92 out there?!?!?! Last night at 1130pm it was still 88 and humid. The main reason I want to get out of Omaha is the weather. The city isn't bad at all, but the weather ruins everything. The second you step outside you are sweating. I just can't look cute in this weather. One bonus though is that anesthesia doesn't require dress clothes; ergo, I don't have to sweat on my dress clothes. I go in basketball shorts and leave in them. Scrubs in between there. Awesome!

Speaking of which....I love anesthesia! Which is very good, because it is what I had decided I wanted to do. It is tough with a field you don't get much exposure to during your first 3 years. I really enjoy it though. One thing I wasn't expecting was how much power you feel with all those medication. You can give a med, and 10 seconds later you can see the effects. It is crazy. And awesome. My knowledge is still coming. The procedures you do are great. I've gotten the chance to intubate about 8 or 9 times. I only got the esophagus once. I've tried to put in an arterial line, but I only tried. No success there yet. It turns out that ventilating a patient with a mask (once they are asleep but before you intubate) is harder than intubating by far.

Matt's teaching of summer school has wrapped up meaning he left for home yesterday. There are 2 benefits of him leaving: I can get a lot of studying in and I can eat salads for dinner without complaints. Yay! Okay, time to get Sunday rolling.