Curtain call

I am still basking in the Match Day glow... Woohoo Texas! But this invariably leads to a wave of anxiety about all the changes the next 12 months and beyond will bring, starting with selling our house. Which by the way, is a very, very, very fine house. Irony #1 of house-selling: You have to finish decorating your house so other people will want to buy it so you can move out. Therefore I feel compelled to finish decorating the guest bedroom at least to some degree. I decided to do this with curtains.

I was at Joann Fabric for unrelated reasons, when I spied with my little eye some gorgeous blue and green patterned fabric that would make smashing curtains for my blue-walled, green-bedded guest room. It was on clearance, too, so the price was right. Predicament: Limited quantity was insufficient. Solution: Buy solid coordinating fabrics and make fancy banded curtains. They even had rods on sale, too!

I busted out the sewing machine, poor rusty thing, and got to work. It's not like straight seams are that hard after all. Next thing you know, abra cadabra, bibidy bobidy boo, shazam! Custom curtains a la Beth.

Behold my relative craftiness. And come visit me to sleep in the newly curtained guest room before I move.

Sugar and spice and everything nice

I got jeopardized again Monday night, this time to the inpatient cardiology service. Instead of playing with joint injections and handing out prednisone like candy in rheum clinic, I spent the day reading EKGs and pondering that most ancient of questions... cath or no cath? The answer is invariably yes, cath. We also admitted a doozie of a crotchety old man in the middle of the night.

Intern enters patient's room in the ER.
GOM (grumpy old man): Where's my doctor?!
Intern: You're lookin' at her.
GOM: What?! I came here to see Dr. S*! I'm tired of this! Every time I come to see Dr. S I end up with all these ?#($ *&@# little girls!
Intern: You are free to leave.

That's Dr. Little Girl to you, mister.



*Dr. S is of the silver-haired gentleman variety of doctors.

Splish, splash

Nick and I went to the pool this afternoon. We hopped in to cool off before laying down to read. Picture Nick in the deep end, still head and shoulders above the water. There are lots of children, in particular a 4ish year old girl standing over us on the ladder at the pool's edge.

Little girl: Are your mom and dad here?
Nick: No.
Little girl: What?!
Nick: I have a mom and dad, but they aren't here.
Little girl: Well then are you brother and sister? (pointing to me)
Nick: No. That is my wife!
Little girl: Oh... But you're so short!

Drumroll, please...

Today is a big day. Match Day.
Big deep breaths. Close my eyes. Calm my trembling hand.
Here goes.

I am going to be
a rheumatology fellow
after next year
in
Houston!



Delighted squeals. Subtle in-my-chair dancing. A silent thank-you prayer.
And that's it. Back to work, people. Nothing to see here.
I'll call you all later.

Guh - rooooosssss!!!

I am an odd, paradoxical combination of uber-prissy girly girl and up-to-my-elbows-in-blood-and-guts doctor. Since you might be snacking right now, I'll spare you stories of gore today. Instead I'll fess up to my prissy side. Here goes.
Nick and I have a big ol' yard around our awesome house, and I want it packed with flowers. I therefore took a free afternoon in April to get down and dirty with my flowerbeds. Spade, check. Gloves, check. Petunias, check. On the outside, I'm all confidence. Fake it 'til you make it. But on the inside, even as I plop onto the ground, I have a very real, very petrifying fear.
Worms.
Ick, ick, ick. Ick, ick, ick again. I hate them. Ick, ick, ick. I think it has something to do with the lack of eyes, arms, or really any appendage of any sort. Last year Nick teased me to no end because I screamed (high-pitched, slasher movie style) every time I scooped out dirt and unearthed a wriggly, slimy little booger. No joke. Every time, and there's a LOT of worms in Tennessee. And if I should unwittingly sever one to create two wriggling worm-halves, the scream would be accompanied by me catapulting from the ground into a crazed jumping, writhing dance that looks ironically like the creature that inspired my terrorized frolic.
But this year I was determined to be brave. If I saw a worm, I simply whimpered and averted my eyes from the hole in the ground, giving him a chance to crawl back into his underground haven. I only screamed once. Now that's progress. But still, I think I'll stick to blood and bodily fluids. And maybe potted plants.

Tick, tock

No one has ever accused me of being too calm. If you're tactful, I'm "high energy." If you're blunt, I'm strung out. Deadlines and milestones are particularly bad. Monumental life-changing events get me worked up in a royal sort of way. Like every test in high school. Or college graduation. My wedding day. First day of med school. Last day of med school. First day of intern year. Get the drift? Each event carries me a little closer to the "real life" I picture in my head and spirals me into another cascade of general agitation.
This time it's Match Day, which incidentally occurs in 4d, 13h, and 11min from right now. Not that I'm counting.
Fellowship interviews led me through all the usual phases. Starting off being so sure of what I want. Monumental panic after each interview that oh my gosh is THIS what I really want instead?! Heated tears because even if I know what I want, there is no way I'll ever get it because I'm not smart enough. (Yes, even I'm starting to realize that one is just not true.) More recently I've had to factor in anxiety over what my husband wants and that if I pick the wrong thing not only will I be miserable, but I'll make him my misery-loving company. Then of course there's the obligatory melt-down right before a decision due-date from redundant self-doubt. Sprinkle in lots of prayer with a few moments of clarity rapidly superceded by aforementioned anxiety, and you have the basic ebb and flow of my neurotic mind. It's like Dawson's Creek in here!
Rank lists went in June 2, and I'd been pretty much right on my obsessive, angst-addicted internal schedule. But then the funniest thing happened. June 3 comes, and I'm not worried. I'm just not. This in and of itself is almost worrisome because without this crucial ritual anxiety dance my upcoming big life transition just won't work out properly. But still, I have this quiet calm, this state of just plain being OK with whatever NRMP posts Wednesday morning. But no, it couldn't be. Could it?
The all-encompassing, knowledge-surpassing, panic-quelching peace of the Lord. Why yes, I think it is. Pleased to meet you.
So now I hold my breath and wait.

Just another day in paradise

I see a lot of wild stuff in my everyday life, stuff you just can't make up. My favorite med student showed me this video, which you just plain need to watch. Doctor's orders.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_m64cy1MMPg


Glossary and pertinent factoids:
Vicodin: narcotic (opiate) pain medication; pretty low potency in the grand scheme of narcs but also pretty easy to come by

Xanax: benzodiazapene (sedative) used to treat anxiety but not seizures due to its short duration of effect; highly addictive, widely abused, therefore high street value; aka "bars"

Seizures are not painful. Like ever.

I tried to do the cool video posting Blogger thing, but I am technically insufficient. Please humor me and click the link.