Calm Before The Storm

After Sean and Ashley's wedding, Cami went to go work at the West Coast Junior Olympics while I drove home to spend a week and a half at my parent's house. All of my sisters, their husbands and kids, came to Merced for a family reunion of sorts. There were 11 adults and 7 kids all running around and having a good time. I spent a lot of time in the pool with a 4 year old clinging to my back. For any of you who haven't experienced it yet, swimming with a 4 year old has to be one of the funnest things on planet earth. Fortunately, Cami was able to sneak away from the Olympics for a day and a half. It was fun having the whole family around, even if it was only for a couple of days.

Since Cami wasn't around, I was able to focus 100% of my attention on attaining that coveted title of "favorite uncle." After hours in the pool, an overnight camp-out, trips to the giant redwoods and the Monterrey Bay Aquarium and countless hours of video games, my quest was largely successful. Granted, I didn't have a lot of competition, but that is besides the point.

My sister Cindy's youngest kid, Bryce, was pretty much my shadow for the whole week. I may never know what it's like to have a fan club, but having Bryce around had to be pretty close. I have already informed Cindy that if anything happens to her and Mark, I will be happy to take the little guy.

I now enjoy my last day of freedom, starting Monday I begin my pediatrics rotation at UCDMC in the hematology/oncology department. I imagine this is going to be a pretty tough two weeks for a number of reasons. Hopefully, I'll be able to survive.

Here Comes The Bride

One day after finishing the boards, Cami and I hopped into our car and drove to beautiful Carmel, California for Sean and Ashley's wedding. Ashley's parents held the wedding at their house and, no kidding, everything was pretty amazing. Unfortunately, the 100 degree weather we've been having in Sacramento didn't quite make it over to the coast. It was pretty cold. It seemed like all the clouds and fog got trapped in Carmel Valley and when the wind picked up... well, let's just say they had to break out the heat lamps for all of their freezing guests. At least it didn't rain...

The wedding was on Saturday and we arrived a day early to enjoy all that Carmel had to offer. Cami's sister gave us some money as a Christmas present to enjoy a little weekend getaway. We put that money to use getting us a room at the Green Lantern. It was a cozy little bed & breakfast. By cozy, I mean it was a quaint little establishment. I also mean our room was tiny. Our room was sort of in the attic, which didn't give you a lot of space above your head. Even Cami had to duck a couple of times.

We went over to the beach twice. It definitely wasn't your typical SoCal beach experience: it was overcast and windy. However, it wasn't unbearably cold and we had a good time taking naps on the sand and trying to avoid the dozens of dogs that people decided to bring to the beach. Seriously, it was like "Bring Your Dog To The Beach Day" at Carmel by-the-sea.

Saturday morning, Cami and I went over to the beach for a little morning stroll and we saw a bottle wash up on the shore. Cami quickly ran towards it and said "Maybe there's a message in it!" Before she could finish singing "Message in a Bottle," she said, "Hey, there really is a message in it!" We fetched the bottle from the sea and worked for a few minutes on the water-logged cork to extricate the note that was probably written by the survivors of a plane crash somewhere in the South Pacific.

Much to our dismay, the bottle was dated 06-13-07 and did not contain an SOS, but rather the phone number of a girl named Cassandra and her address in Ohio. Now, either the currents that connect Lake Erie to the Atlantic Ocean around Cape Horn into the Pacific Ocean are super speedy, or Cassandra cheated and threw a bottle in the ocean on vacation and put her home address inside. Either way, I decided I'd give her a second shot at getting a pen pal in China by throwing the bottle back in the ocean and letting the tide figure out what to do with it.

After spending the morning at the beach we got changed up and headed over to the wedding. Sean asked me to be one of his groomsmen, which meant I had to get all tuxed out and be in the wedding party. I knew he really wanted to ask me to be the Best Man, but I didn't want his brother to feel bad, so I told Sean to just make me the understudy to the best man, also known as a Groomsman First Class, and if anything happened I'd be willing to step up to the plate. He thought that was a pretty good idea. Cami wasn't the Best Woman, so she didn't have to put on a tux, but she still was my trophy wife so she had to get all pretty too. Honestly, I think she did a pretty good job because she was smoking hot.


All in all, the trip was a lot of fun and it was good to see Sean and Ashley finally get hitched. We look forward to having them around. After all, we aren't losing a Sean... we're gaining an Ashley.

Done! Done! Done! Done!

I woke up this morning and, for the first time in two months, I didn't start studying. I didn't try to memorize the differences between chlamydia and gonorrhea. I didn't try to list all the different drugs that cause orthostatic hypotension. I didn't review the differences between Padget's disease and osteopetrosis or Alzheimer's and Pick's disease. No, this morning, I just woke up. I gotta admit, it felt pretty good, kinda like having a huge weight lifted off my shoulders. Yes, friends, the boards are over.

The exam yesterday was pretty intense. It's an eight hour exam, with seven blocks of 50 questions, 45 minutes of break and some before and after stuff. I got to the exam at about 8:15, didn't start testing until 9:00 and finished up a little after 5:00. It was a long day. It was also a hot day. Sacramento hit the 100's yesterday and it got a little uncomfy in the testing center a couple times, but that might have just been me and my nerves.

The exam was pretty tough. Some of the sections we pretty good, I only had to guess about 5 questions. Other sections were crazy hard and I had to guess on about 15 or 20 of them. I mean they were educated guesses, but they were still guesses. I walked out of the exam, happy to be done but pretty unsure of my performance. That can be a good or a bad thing. I've walked out of exams convinced that I crushed them, only to discover that I barely passed. Conversely, I've finished exams and was pretty sure I failed, and then found out I did really well. I figure, this way, my expectations are a little lower and I'll be more likely to be pleasantly surprised when the score arrives. Unless, of course, I am anticipating being pleasantly surprised and then I increase my chances of being unpleasantly disappointed. We'll find out which it is in mid-July.

But as for now, Cami and I are headed out to Carmel for Sean and Ashley's wedding. That should be a lot of fun and a nice little vacation for Cami and me.

By the way, thanks to everyone for the good luck wishes and phone calls and messages. It's nice to know you've got friends...

So Board!

Alright, so I've been pretty busy lately, which is why there hasn't been anything posted here recently. Sean and I have been studying all day every day for Step I of the USMLE Board Examination. There has been some pretty intense studying going on and, at the end of the day, there just isn't enough time or energy for good quality blogging. I decided to take 10 minutes for a quick update.

My official Boards countdown is now officially T minus 6 days. I take the exam on June 14th. It's an 8 hour, 350 question examination with some pretty large implications. I have put in hundreds (and I mean that in the literal sense, not the figurative "I've been studying a lot" sense) of hours of studying and still feel like this is going to be a pretty big challenge. I've taken a number of practice exams published by the NBME, who writes the USMLE exams and it wasn't until recently that my scores stopped sucking. Not that they're amazing now, but at least I feel like my performance is a better indicator of the time and effort I have put into learning this stuff. It's amazingly frustrating to exert so much effort without seeing any legitimate results.

I am discovering that medicine is a lot like a foreign language. I have picked up a few vocabulary words and I understand some of the basic grammar, but I am nowhere near speaking fluently. In fact, my communications are pretty awkward and I just don't have the "feel" for it yet. Anyone who has learned a second language probably knows what I'm talking about. I am sure I'll get there eventually, I am just a little impatient.

So, I have one more week of intense study and then it's D-Day for me. I probably won't post any updates until after the test, but maybe you guys can convince Cami to write about something...