Vacation so far

Here we are in Utah.  We've been here for almost 2 weeks now, and we'll be leaving in a few more days.  Although our time here is not up, I do not think there will be much (any) time for blogging when we get home since we fly back into Philly on Sunday and then I start school right away on Monday.  So I will tell some about our trip thus far here and update you later on any other exciting happenings.

Once school got out, I had almost a week at home before we flew to Utah.  I honestly am not very sure what I did all that time.  Probably nothing.  And it was great.  Zack continued to work on papers pretty much up until we left.  We flew out on separate flights early in the morning. Since we had to be at the airport so early, and in hopes that we would be able to sleep on the plane, we stayed up all night the night before packing.

Zack hard at work packing.

ShaNae hard at work packing....

My flight was a direct flight from Philly to Salt Lake, and I was in 1st class, which was pretty fun.  Haven't ever sat there before.  I don't much enjoy flying, and the flight was extra long due to some pretty strong winds, so I was so very happy when we finally touched down in Salt Lake. Zack didn't get to fly in luxury like me, and he had a layover in Phoenix, so he got there a couple of hours behind me.  What a good sport.  I got to meet my brother's fiancee for the 1st time when they picked me up from the airport, which was so fun.

The day after we arrived, there was a gigantic snow storm here, which left us wondering why we came.  There was another really huge storm a few days after that too.  Seems as if Philly has been enjoying a little bit better weather than Salt Lake, but we're over it.  We traded good weather for good times with family.  I think it was worth it.

I love Christmas.  It is definitely one of my favorite holidays.  I especially like how it turns into an excuse to visit family.  We had a delightful one this year.  Christmas Eve morning, we got to go to breakfast with some friends and catch up.  I met my friend Maria's second little boy for the 1st time and boy oh boy was he a cutie.  

I spent most of Christmas Eve evening being way sick in bed, but Zack and family had a fun time decorating ginger bread houses.

On Christmas morning, we opened gifts with my family first.  Here is mom and dad opening their 2nd annual photo album chronicling the year.  It was so enjoyable.

After our time with my fam, we traipsed on over to the Noyces for a gift opening with them. Also fabulous.  We made such a haul that we have no idea how we will get it all home in our suitcases.

I can't even tell all the other fun things we've done while we've been here.  We went to a party with some buddies.  We went bowling with my family 

and then went to see my little brother Matthew play hockey.  It was a great game.  His team won, and he even got a penalty.  You go little bro!  

We went to see a movie (I win Christmas and get to pick which movie if we come around next year) with my fam and with Z's fam.  We watched some great movies at home.  I got to see the adorable Poopy again.  

We've eaten WAY too much.  We have shopped our hearts out.  We've spent time with immediate and extended family.  The time has gone way too fast, and I am sure it will continue to do so until we find ourselves in Philly again.  We sure love it there, but it will be sad to leave our families here.

Hope everyone else had a Merry Christmas too.

Love,

and

It's Christmas Eve so I just wanted to shout out to all those that we don't get to see today, especially our Philly friends.  Merry Christmas.  We love you and wish there were some way we could be with ALL our family and friends today.  Since we can't, just know that we're thinking of you.

Las Vegas Bowl

How 'bout them Cougars?

(devious laughter)

A change of heart

Today marks the end of an era.

When I left young womens and entered the land of young single adulthood in the church, I expected to be called to Primary.  That's basically what happened in my ward, especially the ward we moved to in South Jordan just after I turned 19.  You became a YSA, and you became a Primary teacher.  So I awaited that fate- and it never came.  I became ultra involved in the LDS sororities up at the U, and ended up serving in a variety of callings there, eventually becoming president of my chapter.  I think that played a huge role in keeping me out of Primary.  The bishop of my ward was very aware that I had the ultra time-consuming calling up at the U, and I was pretty much left to myself at church.  When I was released as chapter president, I just stayed under the radar.  If anyone had asked, I would've been honest that I wasn't really serving in any calling, but I wasn't going to just surrender that information, solely because I didn't want to get put in Primary.  I felt like I was ready to become an adult, and the interactions with the older and wiser ladies of my ward was very enriching.

So I made it past young single adulthood without ever serving in Primary.  I got married and we moved here to Philadelphia.  Not too long after we moved into the ward, we were cornered by the Primary president, who asked us to substitute in Primary.  We agreed, and ended up in this rowdy class of 5 year old boys.  It was crazy, and further reinforced my opinion that Primary was the last place I could want to be.  So we avoided the Primary president after that, hoping she wouldn't spring another substitute job on us.  After a few months in the ward, I finally got my 1st calling.  I was in charge of the practice hymns in Relief Society.  I usually just taught a quick little 2 minute lesson about the song, and then we sang it.  It was a cushy calling, and I was living it up.  But it couldn't last forever, and my time came.  Yeah, I know you saw this coming-- they decided to call me to Primary.  I wasn't the happiest person about that, but I was called to be secretary and when I learned that the calling entailed no teaching, no sharing times, etc, I felt a lot better about it.  But I still felt as if I had been banished away to the black hole of the ward where people disappear and are never seen again.  I dealt with this attitude for months. "I don't like kids, I like old people," I would grumble to myself each week.  I saw snot noses and crying and papers left all over the floor, and I did not want to be there.  But as time went on, it started to grow on me.  I sang songs that I remembered from my Primary days, and learned some new ones, and enjoyed listening to the children sing.  They learned an entire song in sign language, and were just the most darling little things when they were singing that. I started to realize that only a couple of kids actually had a runny nose at any given time.  Most of their noses are quite clean most of the time.  Instead of just seeing crying, I started to notice smiles.  Instead of just seeing misbehaving children, I started to notice well behaved children.  I got to know more and more children's names.  I quit grumbling.  I quit disliking it.  And then, finally, 2 weeks ago, on Saturday night, I said my prayers, and I thanked the Lord for my calling.  As I finished, I sort of chuckled to myself, "Yeah, now that I've learned to like my calling, I guess it must be time to get released," and I went to bed.

The next day, a member of the bishopric asked to see my husband and I, and since I know Zack is sticking to his calling until we move, I knew it was about me.  And it was.  And they informed me that they were releasing me.  How ironic.  

So today I want to say goodbye to the Primary.  I have learned to adore those children.  I love when they come up to me and hug me for no good reason.  I love when they sing and give darling little talks.  I love how they get so caught up in having fun with life that they forget to clean up after themselves.  Children don't worry about stupid stuff they way I do.  They have their priorities straight.  And so, I hereby proclaim that I no longer don't like children.  I'm still never going to work in pediatrics.  I still like old people better.  But the little ones of the Philadelphia 1st ward have sure found a place in my heart.  So even though none of them read this blog, thanks guys, for putting up with me brooding in the back for all those months. Thanks for being so darn cute.  Thanks for changing my attitude about children and about Primary.  I spent years of my life dreading an experience that has turned out to be so incredibly positive and rewarding.  I will miss you guys.

The results....drumroll....

Well, that was an extremely stressful couple of days, especially yesterday.  The latest update is that I passed my Pharm final (the one I was venting about yesterday) and so I passed the class.  I haven't been so stressed out as I was this morning in quite some time, but now I can bask in the relief.  2 more exams to go, and I still need to hear back on some scores, but it looks like I just might be moving onto the next term after all. Yay!

PS- Natalie is the best.  She came over last night and brought me ice cream just to make me feel better.  Love you.

Venting

Please forgive me while I whine for a bit.

Ok, I admit it... I've hit the wall.  I have been studying for days and days with few breaks except to eat and take tests, and I am ready to be done.  Also, my body decided to contract a horrible cold on Saturday, which exploded on Sunday, just in time for finals week.  I had to bag the studying early that night because I had the worst headache of my life, and I wasn't sure I would be able to drag myself out of my bed long enough to take my final on Monday, let alone pass it. With a little luck and some extra blessings from above (thanks again Robert and my husband), I made it, and I even know that I did fine on that first exam since we reviewed it right afterwards. So then there was today.  Apparently, our class average on the midterm was just a little too high, so the professor decided to write a nasty little final.  Wow, it was hard.  I studied so much. I thought I was at least sorta prepared.  Nope.  And 50% of my grade for that class rests on the final and HESI* that I took today.  She didn't review the test afterwards, so now it's just a hold your breath and hope you passed game.

Unfortunately, even after all that, it really all rides on tomorrow.  I have previously mentioned, and will probably mention again, that I have done somewhat less than mediocre in one of my classes this term.  Tomorrow is the final.  Oh, and it's comprehensive.  Oh, and that includes all the material from this term and last term (it's a 2 part class).  So I am laying here in literally a sea of papers covered in medication prototypes and side effects and interactions, and I just feel overwhelmed.  Did I really learn this stuff before?  Feels like I've never heard of any of it.  Did I really do awesome in this class last term?  I can't imagine why.  I don't know a darn thing about the material.  I guess I must've at some point.  But now it really, really matters, and I don't know it.  And if I don't pass, it'll cost me 6 more months (which will really complicate things since we're supposed to be moving next summer), and a load of cash to retake the course (which I definitely don't have).  I've never been this close to failing before. I've never wanted a C so much in my entire life.

Ahhhh, sometimes it just feels good to vent.  Now I'll hit the books again, probably all night, and come 8 AM tomorrow morning (and then again at 1 PM when I take my HESI) my fate will be decided.  I hope it's a good one.

*Note: A HESI is a standardized exam which is used in many nursing schools across the country.  It's supposed to be modeled after NCLEX, which is the licensing exam for nurses.  We take a HESI in each course throughout the program, and it covers material from that course only.  It's kind of like a comprehensive final for each course.  At the end of the program, we take a big comprehensive HESI that covers anything we learned (or should've learned) in nursing school, and if we pass, we can take the NCLEX and become licensed nurses.

Hit the books

One more clinical, 8 finals, and then I get a break.  Zack has like 60 pages of papers to write, or something like that, and then he gets a break.  I hope we make it.  

Another fun weekend

We have enjoyed fun weekends aplenty, this year, and we just had another.  

Thanksgiving was pretty quiet.  Definitely no complaints about that.  We brunched at Philly diner, which was delicious as always.  We took a little drive to some of our favorite Philly haunts. We had our dinner with the Gardners, a cute couple in our ward.  They provided most of the delicious food (with potatoes and drinks on us), and some good company.  After dinner, they had the marvelous idea that we should watch Home Alone, which is, of course, a Christmas classic, so we really enjoyed that.  Thanks guys.  I'm glad we didn't have to spend Thanksgiving alone.

Friday was Black Friday of course.  We didn't get up early and camp outside of Walmart (hiss) or anything like that.  We did roll out of bed at a semi-decent time though, and made our way to the big mall downtown.  We got there in time to see Santa arrive, and we got some of our Christmas shopping done, so it was a nice, festive little outing.  After a little lunch, we jumped in the car for the drive up to our adorable little bed and breakfast in Lancaster County. That's a beautiful county full of small towns and farms and, as I previously mentioned, is home to a large population of Amish/Mennonites.  We went out on the countryside a little to the small (and unfortunately named) town of Intercourse (and yes, there are t-shirts a plenty there proclaiming things like "I Love Intercourse"), where we walked through a bunch of shops selling candles, fudge, quilts, jams, and a variety of other Amish-made goods.  Delightful little place.  Then we made our way closer to Lancaster (the city) to enjoy some more shopping at the outlets there.  We didn't stay horribly long since we were worn out from our morning excursion to the mall and from the car ride to Lancaster (who woulda thought that sitting on your behind could be so tiring).  So we traipsed back to our cute little bed and breakfast.  We stayed in a really great room with a soft, cushy bed, and a jacuzzi tub right in the room. 

 

Breakfast was yummy too, so we were glad we decided to stay there instead of in some random motel 6 or something. 

On Saturday, on our way out, we hit another set of outlet shops for a little bit, and then we drove up the Hershey, Pennsylvania, home of Hershey's chocolate.  We took the little tour on how they make chocolate, which was a little creepy with the giant singing cows, but pretty cute.

Then we went to Hershey Park.  All the rollercoasters were closed for the season of course, but they put on a little thing called Christmas Candylane, where many of the smaller rides are still open, and they have shows and Christmas characters roaming around.  

We rode a few rides. We really enjoyed walking through their zoo area, where we got really close to some pretty cool animals including bears and wolves.  

And we got our picture taken by the Kiss-mas tree, which is the new picture at the top of the blog.  It was pretty fun, but we agreed that we have to go back when it's warm outside and the rollercoasters are open.  That's more our kind of scene.

So all in all, it was a delightful, relaxing weekend.  Unfortunately, I should have spent it sitting at home doing homework, but oh well.  This was a lot funner.

Yay for Christmas time!

I am thankful

I am thrilled to have a break for the remainder of this week.  I am burnt out, and although there's only 1 week of class/clinical left before finals, I am so grateful for this little breather.

I am also thankful for Thanksgiving.  When things get crazy in life, I sometimes get to focusing on the negative stuff- my to do list is a million miles long, my dishes are piling up, I haven't vacuumed today, I am running out of clean clothes, the couch cover isn't straight, I am not doing very well in some classes, I will never be ready for the comprehensive Pharm HESI that covers the material from last term and this one- stuff like that.  Sometimes, it becomes relentless.  It starts from the moment I wake up in the morning and trip over some dirty clothes I left on the floor.  It continues while I'm in the shower and instead of relaxing and enjoying the warm water, I am noticing that the shower really could use a good cleaning and the shower curtain is starting to grow mold.  Maybe I walk into the kitchen to get my bowl of cereal, and there are no clean bowls. Another time, it might be that we had popcorn the night before and I left that bowl sitting in the living room.  Meanwhile, I am reviewing my schedule for the day and for the week, and I know that despite lots of time and effort, I will probably only put a dent in the school work that needs to be done.  And that's the priority.  So the filthy shower and the dirty dishes and the clothes on the floor will probably stay right where they are while I focus (or try to) on school.  That makes me feel incompetent.  I feel like I should be able to attend school and still keep a house at least relatively clean.  It doesn't need to be the kind of clean where all is spotless, but we should at least have dishes to eat off of and clothes to wear, and we should be able to walk around the apartment without risking a broken neck.  I know other people do it.  They have families with kids running all over the place and somehow they still knock out gigantic to do lists, keep their houses presentable, and come out of it all in a pretty good mood.  All I do is go to school.  I'm not working.  I'm not raising kids.  Heck, I hardly ever even have to cook.  I just go to school and keep an apartment.  So it frustrates me that I am not doing very well at either.

I went on about that longer than I had planned.  The point was that sometimes it is so easy for me to get caught up in all that, and I forget to appreciate what I do have.  So I am glad that there are holidays like Thanksgiving to bring people like me back to reality- I am blessed.  So, not to be cliche or anything, but in honor of the holiday, here are a few of the things I am thankful for:

In no particular order

Zack, Oreo cookies, my public health class, water, our car, Lucky Charms, that gas prices have dropped so much, my family, heating systems, scented candles, cute shoes, my church calling, naps, parking validations, my friends, prayer, Symphony Bar with toffee and almonds, the internet, the location of our apartment, batteries, the color black, nursing school (because eventually I'll come out a nurse...hopefully), telephones, turkey, running water, my birthday, Jesus, sunglasses, ibuprofen, lipgloss, Philadelphia, the gospel, my name, Pad Thai, coin rolls, temples, hot chocolate, summer, blankets, diamonds, nail polish, sunshine, water treatment facilities, umbrellas, recipes, bug poison, liver metabolism, socks, pictures, punctuation, Disney movies, Poopy, sledding, flowers, windshield wipers, backyards, scriptures, chairs (a little kid in primary said this on Sunday when asked what they were thankful for.  It's a good answer), quarters, gelato, Target, baseball, marriage, knees, salsa, large parking spaces, cleanliness, love.

If you haven't checked out superobamaworld.com yet, you really ought to.  It's great.  If you love Sarah Palin and can't stomach a little humor at her expense, avoid it.

Oopsies, looks like I stepped on some toes with that last post.  I don't like it when that happens very much, so I thought I might just post again and have something more lighthearted at the top of the blog for a bit.

I know there's still a month and a half left in this year, but as the year draws to a close, I always like to reflect on what I did in the past year.  I have already begun thinking about this, and it sorta surprised me.  This has been an event filled year.  And although this is somewhat just a summary of previous blog posts, here's a run down of some of our most memorable moments...

After months of fruitless searching and one very short lived job during our first few months in Philly, I finally found a job, which I started in January after we got back from spending the holidays with our families in Utah.

In February, we went to Washington, DC, and enjoyed many of the sites there.

In March, we went to Disneyworld with my wonderful family-in-law, which was an absolute blast.  I have been longing to go back ever since.  Just after that, I started this nursing program. 

Sometimes I forget how much free time I really had during that first term of school.  Somehow we managed to move into this fabulous apartment here on Baltimore.  We were so happy to be out of the student housing, happy for the change of scene, happy to find such a great location, and happy that it had a dishwasher (note: said dishwasher is currently broken and I have to wait an entire week for the part needed to repair it to come in).  We also squeezed (squoze?) in a fabulous trip to Gettysburg when the flowers were in bloom and the grass was all green... beautiful.  Also, my handsome husband turned 23.

In the week I had off between the 1st and 2nd term, we went to Atlantic City and chilled on the beach one day.  After that, we jetted off to upstate NY with Zack's parents and there we enjoyed such religious sites as the Sacred Grove, Hill Cumorah, and the Baseball Hall of Fame.  On the way back from our trip, we went to Valley Forge, and then enjoyed our 2nd Phillies game of the season (oops, I forgot to mention the 1st one).  It was quite the week.

The second term took up a little more of my time than the first one had, so we didn't squeeze in quite as much, but we did manage to enjoy that fabulous August weekend in Boston, and we celebrated our 1 year anniversary in August also.  I can't remember exactly when it was and I'm too lazy to go back and look, but we saw Les Miserables at the Walnut Street Theatre sometime too.

September brought a 2 week vacation from school for me, just in time for Zack to go back to school.  We still managed to get away to NYC for my birthday, and we saw Wicked, which was, well... wicked.  We also got away to Atlantic City again, this time with some amazing friends in tow, and even though it wasn't really beach weather, we had a delicious time stuffing our faces with all manner of junk foods.

This third term has been a major challenge for me.  I have a professor that I really struggle with, and she teaches 2 of our courses (the 2 that are arguably the most important to boot).  I was assigned far away clinical sites, and spent hours each week commuting as we tried to work out things so that we could get our car.  We finally got it, which has made the commuting easier, but the lack of a 2 day weekend, the still pretty long commutes, and the terrible professor are wearing on me.  I don't mean to complain though.  This belongs on the list of things I accomplished this year... ok, maybe I am a couple of weeks premature, but I only have 2 more weeks of classes and 2 more of each of my clinical rotations for this time around, and I get a week off of clinicals right in the middle of those 2 weeks for Thanksgiving.  There is a light at the end of the tunnel.  It is still unclear whether I will pass and move on to the next term, but for now, I am going to enjoy that the end is near.

For Thanksgiving weekend, we are gonna jet up to Lancaster county (where a bunch of Amish people live... really beautiful), and enjoy a relaxing getaway at a nice little bed a breakfast. We'll be around for them to kick off some of the holiday (meaning Christmas) festivities up there, and it should be a nice little recharge before I make my last little run for it this term.

And then we get to fly to Utah and see our families.  It will be almost a year since I saw my mom and sibs, which is by far the longest I've gone without seeing them in my life (with the exception of my older brother's mission).  So what a year!  And still a month and a half left to enjoy of it.

PS- Natalie reminded me that I should add that Obama won, which then reminded me that the Phillies won the World Series.  How did I forget those?

My opinion

Thanks to everyone who commented on the last post. Like I said, I wasn't looking for a "right" answer. I was just curious what others thought. As for those who asked about my opinion, I would sign the form. I think looking out for a patient's health comes first. If I don't think the system is working very well, I could work to change that also, but in the mean time, it's not my job to decide how best to manage the patient's finances. I could expand more, but I think I'll just stop there since you guys really hashed this issue out, and I think all had some great points.
As for the comment that nursing schools are wasting time discussing issues like these, I respectfully but enthusiastically disagree. I am not a nurse. I am not chalk full of experience. I can only speak to what I've seen. But I have been on hospital floors all over the place, and I have seen many nurses that are the result of that kind of education where all you talk about is lab values, assessment, etc. I think the result is an extremely task oriented nurse. Patients become lab values and assessment findings. I feel that this kind of attitude and nursing approach lead to burnout, sloppy assessments, and poorer patient outcomes in the end. I have found that nurses who have been taught to think about the patient as a person and to think about the ethical issues that will inevitably arise in the healthcare setting (the situation I presented in that last post was an actual situation, presented to me by a nurse who encountered it) keep their eyes on the ball a little better. They can analyze lab values and perform assessments and administer medications safely, but they think about what they are doing in terms of the impact it will have on a real, living, breathing person. I agree that most of our time at nursing school should focus on the learning of those very important technical skills but I don't think it's a waste of time if someone actually presents us with real life ethical situations and asks us to think about them.
Of course, I would like to just throw in that I don't mean to generalize. Some nurses who talk about ethical issues in school will still turn out to be crappy nurses while some who never talked about that are still patient-oriented and make great nurses. I have just found a more general trend in the opposite direction. That's just my experience.

A scenario

We had an interesting pre-clinical conference today.  Here's the scenario:

Imagine you are a nurse (probably a nurse practitioner, but I don't think that's horribly relevant) working in a family practice (in case you're unaware, this is an outpatient clinic- the kind of place you would go for your routine doctor visits, for a physical, if you had a cold, etc). One of your patients is a 60-something woman on disability with chronic health conditions, including diabetes.  In your city (and my city actually does do this), there is a form that the healthcare provider (you) can sign.  If you sign it, your patient can get assistance with their electric bill (which would pay for heat, AC, lights, etc). Although this program is designed to help those who cannot afford to pay their electric bill, there is no income requirement that the patient has to fall below to qualify for this assistance.  You just have to sign the form.  The form must be signed on a monthly basis.  The form states that you believe that turning off the electricity in the patient's residence would be detrimental to her health.

Do you sign the form?

A little more information... the patient has a daughter, son-in-law, and grandchild living with her.  Both the daughter and the son-in-law work.  The residence and electric bill are in the patient's name only.

Now do you sign the form?

One more thing- your patient drops off the form on her way out to Atlantic City (or Las Vegas, or whatever) to spend the weekend gambling in the casinos.

How about now?  Would you sign the form?

I have a few thoughts of my own about this scenario, but I am interested to know what others think.  It would be interesting to get the point of view of those educated as nurses (if there are any reading) as well as any others.  I'm not looking for a right or wrong answer, just opinions. What did you think after the first part of the scenario?  Did your opinion change as you learned more about the situation?  

Amazing!

We paused the Tivo to laugh for like three minutes and watched this part of 30 Rock three or four times.

Everyone NEEDS to watch this show

Poverty

I think most people in my cohort at school aren't particularly fond of our public health class, and I can understand why to some extent. This is a rigorous program, and really the entire focus becomes about passing the school's exit exam and then the national licensing exam. Under these circumstances, a lot of what we are learning in this class can seem somewhat frivolous, especially from a standardized testing point of view. In this program, people aren't about learning enthusiasm for these kinds of issues- they are about book smarts and exam passing. I understand. I am one of them. I gotta be honest- I really want to pass those exams too, and that is where my focus is. But I also wanna come out of here and find a way to make a difference. That's something I love about nursing- nurses are supposed to act as advocates for others. For whatever reason, I feel drawn to public health nursing. I actually quite enjoy the class, and feel that it's almost a break of sorts from the constant drilling and fact memorization of the other classes.

Today's discussion was particularly engaging in my opinion. We talked about vulnerable populations, which ended up basically turning into a discussion of poverty. We got these clickers near the beginning of this term that allow the teacher to put a multiple choice or T/F question up on the powerpoint presentation. Each student can answer the question using their clicker, and then the powerpoint will show what percentage of the class put which answers. I like it. It's a nice way to interact with the teachers and other students in the class. Today we had a series of T/F question about poverty. Some examples were "Poverty comes from a lack of responsibility" and "The majority of welfare recipients are black women". I was thinking about how a lot of people consider these kinds of questions (maybe not the black women one so much since the answer can be proven statistically) to be a matter of opinion. I really liked how my professor did not present them as such. She just laid out the facts, using well-respected sources and statistical data to back herself up. Poverty does not stem from a lack of responsibility in many cases. She acknowledged that there are the few out there who make poor choices, are lazy, etc, but that is the exception to the rule and ends up stagmatizing those who work hard every day of their lives and still live in poverty. The main cause of poverty is low wages. The majority of welfare recipients in this country are children, and most of the women on welfare and white. Welfare only accounts for 1% of the federal budget. (so that attitude that all those good-for-nothing lazy people out there milking the system are taking all my hard-earned money is pretty much a joke). Welfare families have the same average family size as non-welfare families (dispelling the myth that welfare leads the more children), and the vast majority of welfare recipients do not use their welfare to fund extravagant lifestyles. We've all heard the story of the poor person living in the crappy house with no food to eat, but they have a really nice TV. These kinds of things may happen, but that facts are that most people who are on welfare still live far below the federal poverty line, which is already ridiculously low.

Finally, the professor threw out a question just for thought. Am I more worthy of a lifestyle where I do not live in poverty than many of those people who are living in poverty? And I sure do know what I think about that. NO WAY! I look back on my life and look at my life right now and realize that a major reason I am where I am is because I was born in that situation I was born in. Right now, I am living quite a bit below the federal poverty line. There is no way we could make ends meet with the income we make right now. It would be impossible. We would not be living where we live. We would be a lot hungrier than we are. We would not have had the option to get a car to save me a lot of time and inconvenience. The thing that makes our lifestyle possible is our parents, who have supported us so much, definitely financially, but also in other ways. We were able to obtain an education. We were able to focus on our studies in high school instead of working a job every single day after school. That helped us get good grades, which helped Zack get into Penn and get a scholarship here, and which helped me get a scholarship to the U which paid my tuition for my entire bachelors degree. I don't pretend to believe that all that happened just because I worked hard. I do believe that hard work is important, and it leads to rewards, but sometimes, it can't be the solution to the problem. I think I may have mentioned this before on here, but previously in my public health class, we watched a movie on Camden, NJ, which is right across the river from Philly, and really is one of the poorest, most run down places in the U.S. One of the stories in particular really drove this point home in my heart. There was a teenage boy attending high school. No one else in his family had ever graduated high school and that was his goal. He wanted it bad, and he worked for it. But he lived in a very unfortunate situation. He had to go to work every single day after school, and he worked into the night. When he got home, he still had to do all his homework. I know there are those of you who are thinking that's no big deal because you never did homework in high school, but not all people on the planet are blessed with the brains you were, especially when that person is coming from a family where no one has completed high school. I studied my butt off in high school, and it was time-consuming. So this boy worked hard every single day, and worked into the night, and got up early the next day to do it all again. Happily, he did graduate from high school, but barely, and he may or may not have the opportunity to go to college. How will he pay for it? With the money from working his job? His family is depending on his wage to help them survive. Scholarship? Probably not since his grades weren't awesome. There are probably grants and loans and such he can qualify for, which is fabulous, but has anyone educated him on how to access those types of resources? My point is that I worked a lot less hard than that guy, and somehow, I ended up having it a lot easier.

I have a friend who got married. She didn't have a college degree at the time. She has since gotten her associates, which is great. If I remember correctly, her husband still does not have a degree. It wasn't for lack of hard work. It was just that the opportunity didn't seem to be there. So he goes to work everyday and works hard for a low wage. She got pregnant. She was working at the time, but they could not afford to pay all the bills for her prenatal care and childbirth and so forth. They were making too much to qualify for much by way of government aid but not enough to cover their expenses. So she quit her job. She did not work during her pregnancy so that they could qualify for the aid to pay her medical bills. A lot of people would look down on that, would call it milking the system, would say they were dumb for deciding to have a baby when they could not afford it. I hate that. Do I have more right to choose to have a child early on in my marriage than they do because I have had more opportunities in my life that have put me in a better financial situation than them? I don't think so. Don't get me wrong. I've said it before. I am all for hard work, and finding ways to improve your life and situation, and I know there are a lot of resources out there for people who have been left in unfortunate situations, but it saddens me to see that attitude that all poor people are that way because they just aren't willing to pull themselves out of it, it's a lack of responsibility, etc. I hope that I never forget that I got where I am with a lot of help from others, and that the situation has been in my favor since the day that I was born. I hope that in my nursing practice, I can find ways to foster a more tolerant attitude about those who are less fortunate than I am. I am glad that I have this class that helps me examine my own biases and feelings about these sorts of topics.

I'm sorry for being so terribly long winded, but I feel strongly about this.

As promised

Here is that picture of the mouse that I promised... and one other.

Here are the adorable World Series cupcakes that my oh-so-talented husband made.  Go Phillies!

A Nice Week

I had midterms week last week, which means no classes and no clinicals.  Just midterms.  I knocked out my 4 midterms on Monday through Thursday, which left me with a long weekend, including a Saturday, with no clinicals.  After I finished my last midterm, I had a couple of the darling ladies I know over for lunch, and we took a delightful little walk through the cemetery nearby, where we enjoyed oodles of gravestones, and visited a couple of my favorites.  It was sweet of them to humor me and my love of graveyards.  Friday, word came in that all car kinks had been worked out and that we were all set to go pick it up.  Unfortunately, the car we chose was up in Limerick, about 25 miles away, and not horribly accessible via public transportation. So we rode a train out to Norristown where the car salesperson picked us up and drove us to the dealership (I guess he wanted to sell a car bad enough that he was willing to do that) and we drove off in our brand new (to us) car.  So exciting!  Finally!  The drive home from Limerick was pretty with some fall colors.  It was just a good day.  Since we had our new car, and I had no clinical, we decided to make a trip up to the Franklin Mills Mall on Saturday.  First we slept ridiculously late, then we brunched at IHOP (yay stuffed french toast!), and we went to the mall, which is huge.  We were there for hours.  I think we walked through very nearly the whole thing.  By the end of that, I was exhausted, so we drove home and then we had a Phillies party with some of the peeps.  Go Phils!  They won that game (and the one yesterday.  One more to go), and we enjoyed some delicious hot dogs and hamburgers and soda and chips and chocolate covered pretzels, and other delicious eats, which is the best part of any party.

In other random events of the week, we had a mouse in our apartment, which we caught on one of those sticky traps.  It was so cute, but I did not want it in my apartment, so it went out with the trash.  Poor little thing.  Never fear, I took a picture, but I am too lazy right now to load it on my computer, so I'll get around to that later.

Now it's back to the normal school schedule until Thanksgiving week.  But at least I have a car to ease the pain of the commutes from here out.

One more thing- I love Halloween.  I am so happy it's in just a few days.  Woo hoo!

The Most Important Question of All Time

I would like to declare the polling on this question closed.  Sorry if you didn't get your chance to weigh in.  For the record, the winners are those who said hour has 2 syllables and our has 1.  In a close second were those who thought each word only has 1 syllable.  3 place goes to the people who thought both words have 2 syllables.  If you wanna get all official, the dictionary says that each word only has one, but who cares what the dictionary says.  That's not how we really talk.

In case you can't tell, I'm in the hour-2, our-1 camp.  Go team! 

1 Down

My wife assures me that she wouldn't leave me to marry a Major League Baseball player.

I definitely love her more, but Cole Hamels is getting a really special place in my heart these days......

The most important question of all time.

Two words:

The first: hour

The second: our

Say each word out loud. Report how many syllables are in each word. Ask everyone you know to do the same. Post your results.

The fate of the universe rests in your hands. Don't let us down.

Whoever said patience is a virtue didn't have to commute to Abington

We decided several weeks ago that it was time for us to get a car.  We really wanted to get it as soon as possible, since the reason we decided to get it was that I have far away clinicals.  Wow, it has been a crazy few weeks.  We spent a bunch of time car shopping, and finally found just what we wanted for a good price, so we put a little money down so they'd hold onto it for us, and waited for our loan money to come in... and waited, and waited.  Finally, I decided something must be wrong, so I called the bank, who told me they'd sent the papers to my school for certification but hadn't gotten them back.  So I went into the office at school (had to miss some class for this even) and they claimed they hadn't gotten the papers.  So I called the bank back and had them send the papers again, and the school finally got them certified and sent back to the bank.  The bank took its sweet time disbursing the funds to the school, and the school took its sweet time disbursing the funds to me.  Additionally, I was misinformed about the amount to be disbursed, which really screwed up everything.  Do you think it's the state of the economy that's making everyone hold onto their money like it's super glued to their hands? So for weeks, we've been telling ourselves that we'll be able to get the car in just a few more days.  Every long, long commute to my clinical sites on public transportation, I tell myself that I won't have to do it next week because we'll have the car by then.  And it doesn't happen.  So here we are still, carless as ever.  We're working out all the kinks, slowly, but I refuse to plan on having it by this time next week, as I have every week since the beginning.  Sometimes wishful thinking doesn't make things go faster, or work better.  So this week, I'll make the commute the long way, and next week, I'll be off for midterms (yay for no clinicals).  Maybe, just maybe, when I return to clinicals the week after midterms, I'll be able to get there in our car.  I owe my sweet husband many thanks for the hours he has spent on the phone working out various issues.  I know it has been frustrating to him, and it has taken up a lot of his time.  I know this is a little messed up but I gotta say it- sometimes it's a little nice when things don't work out as easily as we'd like them to, because it makes the times when everything comes together easily seem all the better.  Maybe that's just me.  

Here's hoping that this'll all come together sometime in my lifetime. :)

Will it ever be ours?

Mwah ha ha

I was just looking at the forecast for South Jordan, Utah, where my family lives.  I have it set up on my computer so that when I push F12, it will show me the weather here and the weather there. I like to compare.  Some days I'm sorta upset I did, like days when it's 20 degrees warmer there than here, but today I feel all snooty about it because it's almost 40 degrees warmer here.  40! Take that Utahns.  Still love you guys though.

Twice in 1 day

Yeah, I don't really have time to post today at all, but here I am again, for the second time.  There was actually something else I wanted to write about earlier, but I wanted to do that tag, so I'm back.

This afternoon, during my 1 hour lunch break, I walked out the doors of the New College Building (in the same building as Hahnemann Hospital, for those familiar with Philly), over 1 block to Broad Street, and then up the few short blocks to Broad and Spring Garden- the future location of the Philadelphia temple (or so I've heard).  On my way up, I took in the sights around me.  I walked past medical students rushing to get some lunch before moving on to the next thing.  I watched the traffic pass on Broad Street, which street name is actually quite appropriate.  I examined the buildings I passed on the way up there- the Philadelphia School District Building, the Philadelphia Inquirer Building. When I reached the intersection at Broad and Spring Garden, it was bustling.  Food trucks were lined up along the southwest corner of the street and the lunch crowd was lined up to get a delicious bite.  On the southeast corner, on the ground floor of a building was a rehab center, and the higher floors probably residential. On the southwest corner with all the food trucks was a tall-ish (I'm not talking skyscraper or anything, but decently tall) building, dated in its style.  In the northwest corner was a parking lot, stuffed with cars, advertising all day parking for only $10.  And there, on the northeast corner, was an empty lot.  It was fenced in.  No cars were parked there.  None of the lunch crowd was lounging there.  It was just an empty lot, with a few weeds, and a large mural on the building next to it.  Now I don't know for sure if that's where the temple is going to go, but it sure seemed like a good candidate to me.  So I walked over to the lot and stood outside the gate and just looked.  As I turned to make my way back down Broad Street, I again walked past the lunch crowd, and the people on street corners taking a smoking break, and the students rushing from one thing to another, and I thought about how life was going on in this city I love so much, and how so many people have no idea what special things are going to take place just blocks from where they stood.  I rejoiced in the thought that an inconspicuous street corner, unremarkable and probably unnoticed by so many who pass it, is going to become sacred ground.  I thought how it is going to be amazing that our temple will be in such a location, with a straight-on view of City Hall a 15 minute walk down the road.  I walked by the subway station at Broad and Spring Garden, the very same coordinates as the future temple, and knew that such a location could bless many lives.  I went back to school feeling different.  I know the people of Philadelphia will be so blessed because of this temple.  I know many who have made great sacrifices to get to the temples in Manhattan and Washington DC, who would go more often if they only had the opportunity.  In Utah, I have lived the kind of life where, in the time it takes the members here to get to the temple, I could drive by at least 5 or 6 temples.  I had no idea what kind of sacrifices people make to worship in that sacred place.  So, this comes as an answer to prayer.  God has been and continues to be mindful of the people of Philadelphia. Although we will probably not be here when the temple is completed, we will return to visit this temple- our temple.  I know my words on this topic are not as beautiful or articulate as my husband's but I wanted to express some of the feelings I've been having about it also.  What a happy announcement that was.

Tag

I got tagged, and since I completely dropped the ball last time someone tagged me, I thought I'd play along this time.

8 TV Shows I Love to Watch:

In no particular order, and yes, I know I watch way too much TV.
1. House
2. The Office
3. Monk
4. Bones 
5. Psych
6. 30 Rock 
7. Prison Break
8. Pushing Daisies

8 Favorite Restaurants:

This is a tough one for me.  I can be a wimp.  It's not that I don't like to try new things.  I just figure that if I'm going to spend money on a plate of food, I darn well better know that I'm going to like it.  So I end up going back to the same places over and over.  Again, in no particular order.

1. PF Chang's- the honey chicken is divine
2. Outback Steak House- we actually just went there for the 1st time a bit ago, and we stuffed our faces.  Yum!
3. Chili's- We go there a lot because it's close and I'm boring.
4. IHOP- no joke, I could live on their stuffed french toast
5. Sconecutter- This may or may not actually belong in this list, but I have been craving it so bad for the last little bit, and since there aren't any here, I'm outta luck until we visit Utah in December.
6. Allegro's- a little pizza (and pretty much any other food you can imagine) place around the corner from us.
7. Philly diner- another cute little place sorta nearby.  It's the kind of place you go to at 11 at night to fulfill that craving for delicious breakfast foods.
8. Naked Chocolate Cafe- does that count as a restaurant?


8 Things That Happened Yesterday:
1. Slept in ridiculously late (I had to get up at 4 AM on Saturday so I felt amply justified.)
2. Took a shower but put pjs back on when I was done
3. Watched conference morning session (except that it started at noon, so not really morning).
4. Went and ate lunch with our cute married couples group.
5. Watched conference afternoon session with said group.
6. Sang Happy Birthday to Natalie (Yay!)
7. Studied for my 2 quizzes today.
8. Went to bed.

8 Things I'm Looking Forward To:

1. Finishing this nursing program!!!
2. Symphony concert this Saturday
3. Getting our car (any time now...)
4. Halloween.  It's a great holiday.  One of the best, really.
5. Visiting Utah for Christmas time
6. Getting a grown up job 
7. Seeing my husband tonight
8. Eating- I'm starved.

8 Things On My Wish List:

Ok, so I'm superficial.
1. A haircut.  I pretty much hate my hair.  Which is why I'm always chopping it off.  And why I want to again.
2. I wish I were done with this nursing program (ha ha)
3. To be loan free now instead of maybe 50 years from now or something
4. I wish I had more Halloween decorations besides just the little candle holders my mom sent me and the completely adorable ghost pot holder thingy.  Those are cute, but I want more!  (Wow, I sound like a nasty, greedy little thing)
5. I wish I could lose the 20 pounds I put on when I went on my medication.  I've been carrying the weight around for a while now, and I've sorta given up hope.  Maybe once I'm done with this nursing program (anyone detecting a theme here?)
6. I wish I could sleep in on Saturdays
7. I wish all my cute little friends here could know how much I adore them, and, in conjunction with that, I wish we could hang out more.  Everyone is so busy.
8. I wish I could be as good in my calling as all the people I see around me.  They are all so sweet, and so genuinely care about those Primary children.  I'm still kinda grumbling to myself about being "exiled" to Primary.  I know very well that it's a bad attitude, but I'm having a hard time shaking it.  Guess that's why I am where I am.  I definitely have a thing or 2 to learn.

I'm gonna be a party pooper and not tag anyone else.  Feel free to feel tagged if you'd like.  I wouldn't complain.

The good Lord giveth and the good Lord taketh away

Philadelphia is getting a temple, but the Cubs got swept out of the playoffs. I will be mourning and hoping that 101 is the magic number.

My Lord, my God... my city

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is true.

I have a love-hate relationship with general conference. I love the all the talks and I think it's hilarious that President Monson always reads the stage directions when he conducts ("Singing by the choir"). But, as anyone who knows me and also knows some more valiant members of the church can attest, I'm not the most spiritual person in the world. Sometimes my friends at school think I must be incredibly spiritual since I actually go to church and they know I pray and read my scriptures and such. But anyone who knows my wife or some of my other friends knows that I am a complete weakling where things of the soul are concerned. So ten hours of church services tends to be a little much for me, especially since it's so spread out.

I've had incredible experiences, revelations, and epiphanies while watching conference in the past and I was sort of hoping for something kind of similar. In short, I was determined to get something out of conference. And not twenty minutes in, I did get something out of conference.

But I didn't wake up this morning expecting it to would be something so tangible.

I got all ready for conference. I update the video plug-in on my computer, I attached the speakers to my computer and sat down in front of the computer to watch. I enjoyed the opening songs and then I got ready for the good stuff as President Monson stood up. I always get a little excited every conference that there will be some kind of exciting announcement -- whether made on Saturday morning or (if it's secret Priesthood stuff) in the evening Priesthood Session. I still remember vividly when President Hinckley announced the Perpetual Education Fund and how excited that made me.

Well, this news topped it all. And I think I got the news a little early. As President Monson started to speak about dedicating some new temples, I had the distinct impression that Philadelphia would be getting a temple. I was getting excited and sitting on the very edge of my seat for the next several minutes as he talked more about the programs that church members put on and so forth. All the while, I was trying to kick against the pricks: "Well, that would be nice but we'll see." "Maybe they'll announce one in a couple years." "Is this even the way I would find out if they were going to build a temple here? Would they just say it in Conference or would there be a letter or a fireside or a meeting? Certainly there would have to be some kind of meeting. The Church loves meetings." But then, President Monson said that the Church was announcing five more temple sites and the Holy Ghost said to me, "See, I told you so. Philadelphia will be on this list." When President Monson read "Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,"  I think that maybe I raised both my hands in the air and cheered. The Spirit and gratitude rushed over me. I sent a message to ShaNae letting her know since she was at a clinical assignment.

But I got out of my chair and started pacing back and forth as I poured out my heart in gratitude to the Lord. (A good indication of my level of spirituality: I tend to pace while I pray.) I thought of all the wonderful members of the church I have come to know and love and what a blessing a local temple could be to them. I thought of how much more often the Philadelphia First Ward would be able to attend the temple and the incredible work it could do. I thought about the incredible impact that a temple would have on missionary work and how many wonderful Philadelphians would come to know of the truthfulness of the gospel because the temple piqued their interest.

I thought about the amazing things that had transpired. Of course the Lord would bless Philadelphia with a temple. The Church has been growing incredibly fast. Last year and the year before, I know that our ward baptized incredible amounts of people and that many of them are active, faithful members to this day. I never cease to be blown away by the real sacrifices made by members of our ward. If anyone in the world deserves a temple, the sweet members of our ward do.

In short, I "remember[ed] of how merciful the Lord hath been unto the children of men, from the creation of Adam even down until the time that" President Monson announced the construction of a temple in Philadelphia. I thought of the incredible blessings that have come into my life because of the restored gospel. I thought about the blessing of priesthood ordinances and I thought about the remarkable grace of Jesus Christ. 

Gratitude invites the Spirit in a very unique and very powerful way. I noticed after a few minutes that I hadn't really payed attention to much of conference because my mind was entirely elsewhere. Eventually I made it back to my chair and sat through the rest of conference with a huge smile on my face. I paid a lot of attention to the talks and all, but mostly I just got more and more excited. I dinked around on the internet hoping against hope for more information -- first, and foremost, where it will go.

"Please let it be accessible by public transportation," I kept thinking to myself. I want everyone to have the ability to access it easily. I want the temple to be site. Put it on the parkway. Put it on Broad Street. Put it in Old City. I kept thinking about all the possibilities.

I started thinking about what a blessing the temple would be to the city as a whole. Performing vicarious saving ordinances for the dead would mean an added measure of the Spirit on Philadelphia. The Spirit of the Lord is already so strong in this remarkable city where people are so wonderfully kind and tolerant. I started thinking about how amazing it would be to add more of the Spirit of Elijah on top of that. If you're planning on moving to Philly any time soon, you'd better come fast because I think this place just might be heaven-bound pretty soon. ;-)

Obviously, I'm exaggerating a tiny bit with the translation part of that, but I really love Philadelphia. People ask where my wife and I want to end up and I always let my wife say "back West somewhere since that's where our families are" but a part of me is always screaming, "right here!" The longer I live in Philadelphia, the more painful it gets to imagine leaving this magical city. I really would love to live here for the rest of my life. (Don't tell my wife. She's not going to read this, is she?) In my mind, the proximity to a temple was one of the greatest marks against Philadelphia as a place to live and raise a family, but soon that will be out the window.

Honey, let's come back to Philadelphia and live here forever after I finish school.

Anyone who thinks that Philadelphia is no place to make a home has been proven wrong today. If Philadelphia is good enough for God to call home, certainly it's good enough for any one of us to call home.

My heaping mess reminded me

As I have written about before, I do not like Wednesdays.  I consider it to be the worst day of the week in general.  This term may be a bit of an exception.  I have an afternoon clinical on Wednesdays for all except 2 weeks this term, which equals sleep in.  Yay!  It's especially nice since I gotta be up at 4:30 AM on Thursdays and around 5 AM on Saturdays.  I am NOT a morning person.  4:30 shouldn't even count as morning.  It's still the dead of the night if you ask me. Anyway, that was an overly long preface for my little story.  In my time home before clinical this morning, I was getting caught up on some things that needed to be done around the house.  As I was vacuuming, I was thinking (again.  I have thought about this a lot) about how it's funny how easy it is for everything to fall to shambles.  What I mean is that a week and a half ago, I was on break from school, and at that time, my clothes were clean, my dishes were clean, my fridge was stocked, my apartment was nearly spotless, and I wasn't really behind on much of anything, unless you count my scrapbook, which is sorely neglected.  And here I was, a week and a half later- I only had clean underwear because my husband stayed up until all  hours washing them.  Our kitchen was (is) a pig pen.  Our fridge pretty much contains a few slices left of our bread loaf, 2 bags of mozzarella cheese, and my 40-bzillion water bottles.  We have no food, our stuff was strewn everywhere, and it was (and still is to some extent) just a big, chaotic mess.  What a change- all in a week and a half.

So I got to doing one of those cheesy analogies in my head.  I think that's the way it is with many aspects of our lives.  If we don't do constant maintenance, things can fall apart really quickly.  Certainly groceries run out and laundry piles up if those things are neglected.  But spirituality can really suffer too, if we neglect it.  If I were to go a week and a half without reading my scriptures, I know I would feel the difference.  If I choose not to repent, my sins pile up to a heap that is intimidating, and takes much longer to clean up.  If I take the time to take care of these things every day, I hold it together a lot better than I do when I neglect them.  I am a better person.  I know everyone already knows and understands this principle, but it really hit me again this morning as I cleaned up my physical messes that had piled up.  And I'm glad it did because now I feel a resolve to do better.

Thanks. Dirty underwear. And more thanks

This past week has been crazy... but it could've been much crazier without all the generosity and support I have received.  This is a shout out to all those who offered to help when you found out that my clinical sites are ridiculous to get to without a car.  I owe a very special public thanks to Becca and Tyler.  Unfortunately, this blog isn't horribly public, but it's the best I can do.  Anyway, they let me use their car several times over this past week.  I used it to get to the 2 far away clinicals last week and also to get to 2 far away car dealerships (which were in opposite directions), logging probably nearly 200 miles in that time.  I do not know what I would have done without that help, and because of their generosity, we were able to find the car that we hope to purchase.  We may never have found such an incredible deal without the ability to drive to where the deal was.  So thanks guys.  I was in a real bind without you, and I really can't thank you enough.

We're not quite out of the woods yet in the whole ordeal.  I am surprised how calm I feel in light of that fact that I started the term on a shaky foot, trying to figure out what we were going to do about a car, and spending time with my dad while he was in town.  I got hardly any studying done.  I guess I feel so calm because I had my priorities straight, and I know that things work out when priorities are preserved.  So here I am with about a bzillion chapters left to read, clinical preparation to do, 3 quizzes this week (2 already down, thank goodness), 3 quizzes next week, a bunch of things going wrong with my financial aid, and no clean underwear to wear tomorrow (I'm sure you wanted to know that)- but I feel good.  Ask me tomorrow and the story may be different, but I feel very thankful this moment.  I'm thankful for good friends. I'm thankful that I got to spend time with my dad.  It's the first time I've seen any of my family since last Christmas time.  I'm thankful that my husband has been sweet and supportive, and took a bunch of time out of his activities to help make my week (and future weeks) a little easier and more pleasant.  And I'm thankful that it's almost October- I LOVE Halloween!

Old

Someone made a comment in class today during which she said that "All of us in this room are well into our 20's."  "Everyone but me," I thought, remembering how I have only found 1 girl in this program so far that is younger then me.  Then it hit me- I'm 23.  That's pretty solidly into the 20's.  I don't know about well into the 20's, but solidly.  How did I get so old so fast?

Back To School

Yes oh yes, my 2 weeks of freedom are over and it is time to go back to school again.  Week 2 of my vacation was a lot more low key than week 1.  I had a fabulous day watching the 5 hour Pride and Prejudice with a couple of the girls (thanks for humoring me ladies), and another day we trekked to Atlantic City with some other awesome friends (we love you guys). Another night we went out to dinner downtown then walked home, adoring the fabulous weather and the gorgeous sunset.  Other than that, I read a little, worked on my scrapbook some, and completely ignored the fact that school was starting again soon.  It was very enjoyable.

Interestingly, I have to admit that I am happy to be back.  While boredom is a rare feeling these days, it's definitely not my favorite, and I knew that the sooner I started this program back up, the sooner I can be done all together and actually be a nurse.  Additionally, I have one class in particular this term that I am very excited about- Community and Public Health Nursing.  This is an area that I think I may be interested in.  It's so hard to decide exactly where I want to end up working after graduation.  One great thing about nursing is that I can change my mind if I don't find the right fit right away.  But it would be nice to have some idea about what I want to do.  I have thought for a while that this may be a good option for me.  I am excited to have to chance to do the clinical rotation and see if it really is a good fit.  

Unfortunately, I used up all my luck in the 1st 2 terms.  I got generally very close and accessible clinical sites (3 of the 4), and the 4th one ended up being okay with the help of my sweet husband and a little luck in the scheduling.  So this term I was due for some terrible ones- not terrible in terms of what they are but in terms of accessibility for me.  And I got them.  I can't complain completely.  One is completely accessible.  But the other two are really creating a pain in my neck.  In fact, the day I got my clinical assignments, I balled my eyes out like a baby for a few hours, then wrote a fuming post on here about how I hate Drexel.  I ended up deleting it because I was just being silly and letting anger dictate everything I wrote.  I know that things have a way of working themselves out, even if it makes for some inconvenience.  For now, we have settled on the idea that it's time for us to buy a car.  We had been planning on doing so in a few months anyway, after I was done with school, but with the situation being what it is, it looks like that time has come earlier than expected.  So now we're car shopping, which is kind of fun even though it's completely overwhelming and we don't really even know where to start. Yay. I know this post has been all over the place.  I'll try to write something more coherent soon, but I hadn't written in a while and figured I might as well update my blog as not.

Picture-tacular

So I've finally gotten around to posting some pictures of our little getaway.

The first day in New York was a wet one.  It rained the entire day, and into the night.

Zack outside the theatre where they film David Letterman.  We stopped by the Hello Deli around the corner and saw Rupert, but Zack decided he was too shy to go for a picture there.
I got to see WICKED!

After Wicked, it had finally stopped raining, and someone offered to take a picture of the 2 of us with the lights of Times Square.

For all you fans of The Office, here's a shot of me with my favorite New York pizza place. :)

Day 2 (my birthday!) brought much nicer weather.  Here is me with the New York stock exchange... not the happiest place on earth right now.

My handsome husband with the beautiful Lady Liberty.

Isn't this Brooklyn Library just awesome?  We really liked Brooklyn.

Here's one of those New York waterfalls I mentioned in the previous post.

What a fun trip we had.

Week 1

I seriously don't think I have enjoyed vacation from school so much in my life.  This has been a fantastic 1st week off.

When we moved into this apartment, it was in the middle of a school term.  It's a wonder that we actually got in and got all the furniture squared away and got the apartment to a livable state under those circumstances.  When I got my first break, we spent pretty much the whole time partying in upstate New York, so the apartment wasn't really a priority.  Needless to say that it hadn't been cleaned since we moved here.  I don't mean cleaned like vacuumed and dusted and all that.  I've done that stuff multiple times.  I mean CLEANED- the kind where you wash all the windows and clean the bugs out of the light fixtures, and scrub the baseboards, and finally get around to cleaning out under the radiators, which I imagine haven't been cleaned under in several decades.  I know that's maybe not the way everyone might enjoy spending a break, but I have been absolutely longing to do these things so I got to work and, over the course of several days, I got it all done.  I take that back- I haven't deep cleaned the bathroom yet, but that is the one room that has already been deep cleaned since we moved in because it is the bathroom, and I couldn't bear to wait on a room like that.  I'll do it this week, but it seemed to be the bottom of the priority list since it has been cleaned really well before.  I did clean the bugs out of the light fixtures in there, which is very pleasing to me as they had been bugging (ha ha) me for months.  I even scrubbed my wood floors with a delicious smelling soap recommended by Zack's mom.  I had a blast.  I moved around all the furniture to make sure that even under the bed and the couch and so forth would be spick and span.  I took Lysol to the entire kitchen, cupboards included.  Mmmm, I love the smell of clean.  Basically, I just had fun. I think pretty much anyone, including those who have been here before, would walk in and notice little/no difference, but I know, and I am one happy camper about it. This week, I also went to lunch with some darling ward girls at Reading (pronounced Red-ing) Terminal Market (think National Treasure- the part where the woman ducks behind the counter of a little meat shop to hide from the scary bald man that's chasing her).  We went to a Phillies game with our friends newly returned from a 6 week tromp through Argentina and Brazil.  And then, of course, there was our weekend trip to NEW YORK!

We left Friday and took the bus to New York City, which is about a 2 hour ride.  It turned out to be a rainy day in New York, but we made the best of it and saw the sites anyway.  Friday, we mostly explored uptown.  We saw Grant's Tomb, went past about a million really really ritzy apartment buildings, and decided that we must return another time to go the the Met.  We beat around Times Square for a while in the evening, and had some dinner, and then we went to Wicked!  One day, several months ago, out of the blue, I just decided that I had to see it.  I don't know where that came from, but it came, so I read the book, and I bought the music (I wanna say CD but I just bought it on itunes), and I was all about it.  For a while, it looked like there was just no chance because, let's face it, it's just not cheap to go see it, and we are poor, but I eventually found sorta decently priced tickets (still expensive, but about as good as it gets) online, so we splurged and bought them, and Friday night, we finally saw it.  Woo hoo!  Loved it.  Very well done.  Happy ending (very unlike the book).

Saturday was also just amazing, except without the rain.  We started out in Times Square again and made our way downtown to City Hall, world trade center site, and, of course, the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island.  Due to lack of time, we didn't get to spend nearly as much time as we would've liked on Ellis Island, but still enjoyed it thoroughly.  Next we explored Brooklyn (love it!  I would consider living in Brooklyn... Manhattan, not so much).  After Brooklyn, we took a little cruise out on the water where we saw this "art" display that is currently taking place called the NY Waterfalls- it was basically just 4 huge scaffold looking structures in various locations that pumped out water- not horribly exciting, but we enjoyed the rest of the cruise, with fabulous views of the Manhattan, Brooklyn, and New Jersey skylines.  We wrapped up our evening with a nighttime tour of Manhattan and Brooklyn, and, at 11 PM, we hopped a bus back to our dear Philly.  I have to say that it was about the best birthday I have ever had.  No presents to unwrap, no cake to eat, but that's ok, because who wouldn't trade that for a fabulous NY trip, broadway play included.  I was exhausted when I got up this morning but 1 ridiculously long nap later, I am wide awake, and I am one happy girl.  We had one of our fun married couples dinners tonight with the peeps, and I have another week off sitting gloriously in front of me.  Sheer bliss.

Pictures to come a little later.  I am too lazy this second.