Vacation

Wow, it has been quite a month. After surviving the swine flu I went back to work for just 4 days before heading to the Southwest for a week. It was awesome--a totally needed change of scenery. We got to chill out, eat good Mexican food, and to see some old friends. It was interesting to catch up with several people that I had met while doing my premed post-bac work. Most of my friends at that point were on the path to medical school or a related healthcare path. Now 5+ years after finishing, I am a resident. One other friend is a 4th year medical student after starting a PhD program and realizing it was not right. Another friend is now a PA. Someone else works in a lab. Two others have done some combination of high school science teaching/travel/other random jobs and are still thinking about going to graduate school, though not medical school. Granted, we are all a pretty non-traditional bunch, but it is pretty interesting to see where everyone ended up in the end.

I got back to work and have been enjoying my elective time. Elective months are nice because they give you time to catch up on everything else that has been lagging. I have been pretty focused on a research project and am wrapping up a manuscript and a couple of abstracts. At the same time it is hard because we are supposed to be learning important material on electives. In a couple of days I go back to my 80-hour weeks on surgicals, so I will definitely miss this time. Time to go to dinner with the family, but I will post some cool vacation pictures later.