Secret Identity: B & B owner

This has been the week of visitors. Which is absolutely exciting, but also utterly exhausting. Let's start with the beginning of the week and take a quick visit to the Château Jenny.

Monday evening brought my first set of visitors. Laura and Mike came up from Hastings to see a game for the College World Series. Now, I don't really love baseball--in fact, I really dislike it and find it to be incredibly boring--but I do really like seeing my friends. So I went to the game with them. Amazingly, I didn't start getting bored until the bottom of the 6th. If you know me very well, you'll know that that is incredible for me because usually I'm bored shortly after the national anthem.

This bear hat is seriously awesome!
Go Bruins!

CWS Day One: survived

Tuesday was quite the exciting day. My good friend Alexia from a summer program I did in Cambridge, England came to Omaha to see UCLA in the CWS. It's been 6 whole years since I saw her last, but we've kept in touch through letters at first and Facebook more recently. She's the first of my CamTrad friends to come visit me (oddly enough people from large cities around the world, aren't super excited to come visit the-middle-of-nowhere Nebraska), although I have seen several of them over the years when I've been traveling.

It has been absolutely nuts seeing her and catching up with her. One of her friends/roommates/classmates from UCLA came with her, so I even get to meet someone else! Hooray. There's something about CamTrad-ers that it doesn't matter how long of a time frame has passed, but we just pick up with each other's lives like it's just been a week since the last time we saw each other.

Only separated by a single
state line after 6 long years!

They drove all the way from LA to watch their team in the CWS, so off to the games we went. I actually made it through most of the game without getting bored...maybe because we were sitting in the UCLA section and the game got more intense. But it's still baseball, so...

CWS Day Two: survived

UCLA didn't play on Wednesday, so I sent the ladies to the Omaha Zoo for the day and then we headed out for sushi at Blue and then walked to the state line...who doesn't love being in two places at once?! Alexia had never seen Pitch Perfect, so we had a quiet night in.

Thursday. Well I had another set of awesome visitors! My Uncle flew in from DC so half of my family could go on a quick trip to St. Louis this weekend. So we went to lunch while he and my grandma were in town. He saw an Omaha restaurant on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives, so clearly we had to visit it!

Big Mama's Kitchen is on the North side of Omaha in an old school. And it is delicious. It definitely deserved the #33 (or was it #34?) spot on the top 100 Diners, Drive-ins and Dives! I had fried catfish, macaroni and cheese, slaw and SWEET TEA. Sweet tea is practically crack to me; I don't allow myself to have it very frequently--unless I'm in the south or eating soul food, because what Southern meal is complete without sweet tea?

On Friday, I didn't have any new visitors, but I did take the SMDEP students to Lincoln, so I did visit with some people that I haven't seen in a while. I saw my friend Lizzie for a bit at the dental school and then had lunch/ice cream with my roommate and her boyfriend. Megan has been on her rural rotation for school lately, so I haven't seen her in a few weeks. It was nice to catch up!

Friday evening was another UCLA CWS game, but I was too pooped to go. Miss Alexia and Miss Alex went to it though and seemed to have a wonderful time!

I was sad to say goodbye to my friends on Saturday morning, but there was no rest for the weary! I had a quick trip to the jail to educate and test for STDs, then a trip to the zoo with the SMDEP students and then mi madre came up for a quick visit! 

Carousel ride!

Squirt from Finding Nemo all growed up!

We got some churching, brunching, and shopping in on Sunday before she headed back to Hastings for work on Monday. What a lovely quick-trip from my mama!

As soon as I said goodbye to my mom, I headed out for Shakespeare on the Green in one of the parks in midtown Omaha. The performance was the Twelfth Night. It was a musical rendition, complete with modern hits such as "Call Me Maybe," "Hey Ho," "Some Night," and "All the Single Ladies." There was also an Arrested Development reference to Gob's chicken. 

We brought some blankets and some picnic food and enjoyed the sights, until the mosquitos started eating me alive. Some of the SMDEP students even came for a bit! Titus Andronicus will be the show next week, so we're heading back then!

Do you need new shoes?

It's the middle of May and I've only written one blog post for the month. I really am slacking on this thing. Sorry about that. Even though I'm not in school (and neither are my friends...yay summer break!) I have been keeping extremely busy lately.

I've started collecting data for the second research study I'm working on. This study is a longitudinal study about Parkinson's disease and how a person's emotional well-being affects the progression of the disease. The third study will likely start data collection next week. It's about whether or not the dizzy clinic survey that the office is using is an effective tool to screen for patients who could benefit from further testing for balance issues (whether they are muscular, neurologic, inner ear, etc).

Getting things in order for data collection has been hectic and a bit stressful, but also really fun. I'm definitely enjoying seeing patients and talking with them though!

Outside of work/research, I've been keeping busy now that my friends are out of classes for the summer. We've gone to the zoo, had some BBQs and recently toured the Lauritzen Gardens to see the traveling Lego exhibit. Below are just a few pictures of the adventures.

I was struggling to get on the gorilla.
My poor legs weren't long enough!

He was trying to impress me. 

Baby African lion cubs!

Sharks!
Gooooo Dad

Lego hummingbird and flower.

Lego frog and lily pad

real tulips!

Lego rose

I'm really thankful for the beautiful weather that we've been experiencing! I'm hopeful that July and August won't me too miserable on the humidity front (wishful thinking, at best). 

I was lucky enough to see one of my favorite (not so little anymore) little girls in her dance recital last weekend. Miss Sophia has truly become a gorgeous little ballerina. I'm looking forward to causing shenanigans with Miss Sophia and Miss Olivia this weekend when we get to hang out again (no parents allowed!). I can't even imagine what adventures we will have (although I'm hoping for some running through sprinklers and a dance party)!!

Oh and an update from the last post...the 140th anniversary celebration last Sunday at First Lutheran Church, ELCA here in Omaha was awesome! Our small, but mighty choir produced some incredibly beautiful sounds! I'm so happy I was able to be part of it. 

That's probably enough of a random update. I'm hoping to get something more of a medicine-related post up sometime this week. Until then, I bid you g'day!

I'll leave you with this gem. It describes my life to a "t".

Miscellaneous

There have been so many things going on lately that don't really fall into a specific category. I'm not really sure they fall into my journey of becoming a healthcare professional either, but they are still things that I want to write about. So here's a post about the miscellaneous things in my life.

Taize. I've written about Taize before (cliff notes version: Taize is a ecumenical monastic community in the Burgundy region of France. The worship style popularized there is filled with silence and meditative musical chanting). I adore that place so stinkin' much. Among plenty of awesome things, you get chocolate sandwiches for breakfast. So. Awesome! I was hoping to make it back to France this summer, but alas, I am too sick to travel abroad. Well anyway, Brother Emile from Taize is in the US for a few months to prepare for a retreat of sorts that will be over Memorial Day weekend.

And now I finally am getting to my point...my good friends at the UNL Lutheran Center had a Taize worship service last week and invited Brother Emile to join them. It was really nice to have a mid-week reminder to slow down and be present in the moment. Taize is always refreshing and renewing to my spirit!

Brother Emile gave a little homily during the service and brought up an incredible point. He talked about another brother, Brother Roger, who was the founder of the Taize community. Brother Roger loved statements that were incomplete; statements that ended with ellipses. The one he talked about in particular, which I am continuing to consider was, "If you begin with a trusting heart, then...". If I began my decision-making process about medical leave with a trusting heart, how would it have been different? If we begin with a trusting heart when we approach those that are different from ourselves, how would our interactions be different? If we began with a trusting heart, maybe we wouldn't stereotype people as terrorists. If we began with a trusting heart...

I challenge each of you to begin each of your future encounters and decisions with a trusting heart. It may seem naïve, but in reality it's radically wise. And it's so hard to do.

Choir. Well I haven't officially sung for any reason in several years, but the church I'm currently attending is having a big celebration this month in honor of their 140th year as a congregation (holy moley, 140 years is a LONG time!). And so they've asked me to join them in the choir to sing a cantata. It's been fun to be in rehearsal again and it's nice to meet different people in the church.

Alice in Wonderland. This past weekend I went to an incredible ballet performance of "Alice in Wonderland" with a few of my friends from my med school class. My dance teacher was actually the lead, so it was fun to see her really dance in a context outside of the studio. Watching everyone on stage got me really amped up about my recital. It's been over a year since the last time I performed anywhere.

AIDS Walk. Megan, her boyfriend, and I went to the Omaha Nebraska AIDS Project AIDS Walk this weekend. It was a MUCH longer walk than any of us expected...we actually walked all the way to Iowa! I've been involved with the walk in some context since my sophomore year in high school--many of those years helping to plan it--so it was a little bit weird to just show up and walk with no other responsibilities  The weather was GORGEOUS, which made it all the more enjoyable.

Research. I've finished the first rough draft of the introduction and methods section of one of the papers I'm working on. As it turns out, I still am excellent at procrastinating writing when I feel like it. But I think that what I have is actually pretty good. I'm not looking to publish this study, but at the very least, it's good practice for the ones we're hoping to publish!

SMDEP. I can't actually remember if I've written about this yet, but I will be a TA for a summer program for undergraduate students that are hoping to get into med school. We had an organizational meeting for all of the TAs and RAs this week. I'm getting excited for the students to get here! It means spending my summer in Sorrell (I may grow to resent this place someday...), but it should still be plenty of fun!

Celebrate Sound Walk. My parents are coming up to Omaha this weekend and we will all be walking in the "Celebrate Sound"walk. For those of you who don't know, my dad is well on his way towards being deaf (what did you say...I couldn't hear you?). We've been involved as a family in a service organization that specifically caters to those who are deaf and/or hard of hearing since before I was born (my first actual meeting was when I was like a week old!), so we'll be walking to raise awareness and some dollars for the cause. I haven't seen many of the Sertoma gang in several years, so it'll be good to see some of them again!

Wow, there have been quite a few things going on lately. Sorry for the randomness of the post, but I suppose that's how life goes. I'm looking forward to next week when all of my classmates are done with classes and can actually be fun people again (as opposed to book worms)! There may even be a zoo trip in my future as long as the weather cooperates!