and i'm out!

i'm headed to san diego early saturday morning! yippee! i'm so ready for a break from work....only one more day. i'm meeting angie there and we are going to have a blast. we haven't seen each other since february. that is way too long!

i officially completed my triathlon season last sunday with a very respectable third place finish in my age group. it was a competative top three (just seconds apart). i also finished in the top 8th of the entire field....men and women included. someday i'll be good at triathlons...or my knees will be shot! : )

anyhow, angie and i plan on road biking this week. it is going to be great! i am just excited to get out of here!

stories

there are so many stories that come up at work. i wish that i knew all my patient's stories, but it just isn't practical. i love the days when things are a little less hectic and i can just sit back and chat.....find out what is important to them...what makes them happy...anxious...their support system....how they met their spouse.

last week i spoke with a patient for about 20 minutes about the real estate business. what do i know about real estate? i guess i should learn a lot though. he thinks everyone should have a second career "in their back pocket". it sounds like his is a lucrative one!

so today i spent time talking to an elderly gentleman that is having difficulty with his treatment. without giving details, he has an advanced cancer and is on his last chemotherapy option. i had noticed a german accent and his name. i inquired about when he came to the states. to shorten things up a little bit, he came over as an orphan in 1946. he was in multiple concentration camps and lost his parents and seven siblings. his wife pulled up his sleeve and showed me the number tattooed on his arm. it was just an incredible interaction---the fact that he would share that with me. it transitioned into a conversation about the unpredictability of life.

this reminded me of a patient i met in michigan as a tech. the woman was from germany and was a little girl during the war. she told me about her parents hiding jews during wwII.

the depth, courage, and determination of people amazes me.

5 years

my 5 year reunion for Taylor is this weekend. i didn't intentionally not go....not making a decision and being busy made the decision for me. i can't believe it has been 5 years though! i can't believe how fast time went, but i guess grad school and a challenging new career filled it (with some travelling intermingled!)

i'm so thankful for my time at Taylor...things that stick out, just off the top of my head:

- the fruit fly unit in genetics...a testiment to what you sacrifice when you become a bio major

- wonderful relationships (with their normal bumps and peaks)

- intense flag football

- professors that wanted you to think, not just memorize

- some great trips with angie (europe, washington d.c......les miserables!)

- personal growth

- singing with the music department and all that goes along with that

i win....kind of

so, i had my first visit to the houston muncipal building today. i got a ridiculous parking ticket on saturday. i'll make it a shorter story...i went to the library and their was the international festival going on downtown. i couldn't park in the normal location so i found a meter that was available. there were 2 signs on the same pole talking about commercial and standard parking. i fed the meter a ridiculous fee for 15 minutes and ran to the library to return my books and when i got back there was time left on the meter. i got in the car and then saw the little green papet that was my parking ticket. boo! i opened it and.....

it was 250 dollars!!!! Two hundred and fifty dollars...what in the world!?!? (of course my thought immediately goes to the fact that this equals an airline ticket). I talked to the Houston Police Department (who did not write the ticket) and joked about the horrific economy that Houston must have to charge these rates.

long and short of it is that i mistakenly parked in a commercial spot which equals big fine. i went the municipal building after work and waited....eventually saw a lady and pleaded my ignorance. since this was my first offense, she ended up cutting it to $75. i don't really like paying that money either, but it is better than $250!

nobel peace prize

there has been a lot of talk about the nobel peace prize this week. whatever you think of the award this year, it has become a good history lesson for me. i went ahead and looked up all the past nobel peace prize winners. it is an impressive list. let me point out a few for you:

- 1919 Thomas Woodrow Wilson, President, formed the League of Nations (which would eventually become the UN)
- 1931 Jane Addams, sociologist (this one was just impressive for a woman to get it at this time)
- Nothing was given during WWII
- 1950 Ralph Bunche, mediated between Palestine and Israel
- 1964 Martin Luther King Jr.
- 1965 UNICEF
- 1973 Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho (he declined the prize after negotiating the peace accord....i'll have to look into why he turned it down)
- 1979 Mother Theresa
- 1984 Desmond Tutu, worked on South African apartheid
- 1986 Elie Wiesel, author, Holocaust activist (this is an unabashed plug for his writings)
- 1990 Mikhail Gorbachev, President of USSR, brought Cold War to end
- 1991 Aung San Suu Kyi, human rights advocate in Burma
- 1993 Nelson Mandela
- 1994 Yasser Arafat, Yitzak Rabin, Shimon Peres, working toward Middle East Peace
- 2006 Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank, promoting economic and social development for the lower class (again, another plug for a book...check this one out!)

so that is just a quick overview. lots of other great people that have gotten the award as well. all i know is that when i get the nobel prize, i don't want a good chunk of people questioning why i got it....lots of neat things to aspire to though...it is making me think about more good non-fiction books i can get from the library!

update

i don't have a whole lot to say tonight....so tired from an emotionally draining week. some weeks are just tougher than others in the cancer world!

in brief, i went to charlotte last weekend for a conference and didn't take any pictures....stupid of me! it was gorgeous weather and i learned quite a bit. i also got to see a friend from college, Devan. she is newly engaged and it was great to catch up a little bit.

i spent this evening trying not to think about work....i stayed a little late to finish my homework. i haven't even done the reading yet, but it is quite logical to me. i love not studying too much and getting good grades!

angie and i will be on vacation soon....so needed for both of us! i bought a ticket home for christmas today too. that will be exciting...our whole family in one location---how traditional!

i'm looking at some races for next year. i'm going to have to work around merideth's wedding which is exciting. i think i'm going to try for 2-3 more halfs next year with a couple more sprints thrown in. i'm thinking about trying a travelling one....we'll see. i guess if i'm going to do another race i need to go bike shopping!

all in all, so glad it is the weekend. i'm hoping to go for a long bike ride tomorrow (pending the rain status). i need my yearly car inspection. i also plan on hitting the library and likely renting a movie. it will be grand!