stranger tides

Lately I've been updating my nails a little more often than I used to. I'm trying to break the old pattern of wearing a color past its prime: when it starts chipping, I start picking at it until it looks truly terrible.

Better to just wipe the slate clean, even if I don't replace it with anything. This time I did! Sunday afternoon I put on a new arrival: OPI Stranger Tides.

And this photo is from 3 days later. Not bad, eh? I love this color, and 3 coats in exchange for this kind of finish and perfect wear is a-ok by me.

I feel a little silly doing a nail post when Lindsay has started an entire blog with posts about color and fancy layering (so fancy!!). Do you do guest posts?

And other news:

• Going to the NC state fair in Raleigh this weekend!
• Applying to grad school
• First trip back to NJ is 10/20-10/23. I don't know that I'll be able to see many people on such a short trip, unfortunately.

Chapel Hill

Pete's mom came to visit us. It was pretty great.

We went hiking:

We ate barbecue and drank sweet tea:

 

It was fun. It's fun here.

swim

I find it incredibly annoying that most swimsuit models have tiny breasts, so you can't tell how supportive their damn product is.

And if they are more substantially endowed, they're (intentionally?) falling out of their triangles.

Bleh.

highbrow

I may never have to bake again.

I always thought store-bought cookies were a ripoff, since homemade were so much better, even if you just baked them from ready-made dough. I always thought thick and chewy chocolate chip cookies were the way to go. These cookies have absolutely turned that upside-down.

$3.99, Trader Joe's

colleagues

I'm in Austin right now, visiting UT. Never thought I'd be back in TX so soon...if ever.

Somehow on this trip I've been getting to know my fellow recruits a lot better, maybe because we all have a few of these under our belts and we're all pretty much admitted anyway. We talked about past trips and people on those, and someone on this trip pointed out that this is the beginning of our networking. Those people we interviewed alongside are our future colleagues.

I've never really had colleagues. Classmates, coworkers, peers, sure. Colleagues is another thing.

Anyway, colleagues seems like it'll be similar to friends, just like those other words are. Academia, man.

PS am wearing funkey dunkey today.

save

The guy from yesterday is still alive, and since he's been admitted and survived for 24 hours, that's chalked up as a save for me, Brian, and Tara.

what a day

1. Three calls, the first at 6am--actually 5:56, and I wasn't on duty for another 4 minutes. I went anyway and, as the newest EMT, took primary care for the practice.

2. The third call was chest pain, again with me as primary. That changed enroute when dispatch updated us with CPR in progress. I was calm and clear the whole time, and there was a ton to get done.
For the first time ever on a person: I set up the AED, saw my first compressions (it was driven home that people are mostly water...and compressions on this guy looked like jumping on a waterbed), created my first seal with a mask, put in my first OPA (twice), watched for my first chest rise, heard my first snoring respirations, saw my first shock (and second, and third), saw my first intubation and my first sight of a live trachea. Ventilated one one thousand two one thousand three one thousand four one thousand five one thousand. Ventilated. Ventilated. Ventilated. The guy is still alive, as far as I've heard.

3. All these firsts combined to make me nauseous and faint as soon as I didn't have anything to do. I was allowed to stand down, Pete came to my rescue, and I watched Kung Fu Panda, slept, fielded concerned phone calls, and ate delicious sesame noodles.

4. I went to the Bent Spoon for ice cream at 9:30 tonight and had to get cash. Bank of America's ATMs on Nassau St are in their vestibule that's card-locked from the outside after hours. Turns out they also lock from the inside, except there IS NO KEY TO GET OUT. I was locked in for a few minutes, waving frantically at passerby, until someone from across the street saw me and got me out.

productivity

I'm busier than ever.

Grad school update:

• Interviews at three schools: NYU, UT, and Rutgers, not in that order.
• Waiting on three schools: Penn (given up), Cornell, BC
• Possibly applying to one more: U of Washington

Rescue squad update:

• Waiting on EMT certification to arrive in the mail. This might take awhile, since I took the test on the 27th of Jan and the government-run site still says "Not Attempted" as my status for that.
• Recording secretary and being on the e-board in general is taking more time than I thought it would
• LOSAP is taking less time, but only because nobody is responding to me
• I want to put in more time picking up shifts once I'm an EMT
• Driver training...

I also try to fit in:

• Work, like running participants, learning the IRB, and training on the new scanner
• Social life, like going to Zaffron and girls' night and triple birthday party
• Family life, like seeing Michelle!
• Other commitments, like the DCoP and the class I'm auditing
• Daily activities, like enough sleep and well-prepared not-takeout food

This is all great, but it's a problem, and not only for me, when I get nothing done.