Finally!!!

Hmm, after feeling guilty for 6 months, I've finally decided to do a whirlwind review.

December - a very cold month in Edmonton (aka "the Frozen North", "Outer Darkness", "why do I live here") and a very cold month to move but Dana, my new roommate, and I managed it and are now established in our new house. It's lots of fun and old and drafty but there are little apples on the wallpaper in the kitchen - cool. AND it has a washer and dryer and a dishwasher HURRAY - I'm moving up in the world.

I also got to take a weekend trip to Montreal for a vaccine course. I had only about 3 hours off the whole time I was there and walked around for a little while - unfortunately it was -20 degrees celsius (-4 degree farenheit for you American luddites) and so I had to curtail my adventures somewhat and go back to study more about vaccines.


A cold view of Montreal


Yep, didn't see much of Montreal this trip - this summer I'm going back


Holiday party for work - these are the other Infectious Diseases Residents I work with

I had arranged to work over Christmas as I wanted to be home over New Year's for the big Salmon She-bang so didn't really do much for Christmas (aside from see patients in the ICU - actually it wasn't that bad). I did spend Christmas Eve with one friend and then had Christmas Dinner with some other friends the next day.

Most exciting was when I got to go home to Calgary to see everyone. I was the last of my siblings to arrive home for my 5 days of mandatory leave and I was super excited to see them and all their kids. It was great to be with all of them and the amounts of gifts exchanged were ludicrous really. So many birthdays and Christmas made for a gift marathon.


All the gift openings etc. gave great photo ops to the paparazzi


A bunch of my absolute favorite people

New Year's Eve wasn't my favorite holiday ever this year, I won't elaborate but let's just say that my theory of obsessive compulsive handwashing being adequate infection control around numerous barfy toddlers was shot to bits. I recovered in perfect time to go back to work. (Fortunately I only had to work 2 days because then I got to go on vacation HURRAY!!)

January: My friend Nancy and I went on a Florida vacation - it's kind of non-original but hey, it was warm and we had a good time!! The first week was actually spent on a cruise and then the second week on a road trip - down to the Florida Keys and then up to the Fort Lauderdale area. Some highlights:

"kissing" the Rays in Grand Caymen (apparently it's good luck!?!)



Ahh, the cruise lifestyle - Joanne style



Honduras - (I fell in love with this monkey, despite knowing how many weird viruses I could catch from it)



Nancy's new Honduran friend


Mayan ruins of Tulum in the Yucatan



The real reason the Mayans built in the Yucatan Peninsula

Waiting for the bus in Belize

Part of the old road through the Florida Keys - has anyone seen that rather terrible Schwartzenegger movie "True Lies"? - filmed close to here (keep in mind though, that the new road, from which this picture is taken, doesn't have large gaps in it)





YAY, back in Madagascar for a moment - ringtailed lemurs at Busch Gardens in Tampa, Florida

Whew, what a trip!!

February:

The beginning of the studying.  I did get to go to Vancouver for the annual Canadian Infectious Diseases Conference.  It was lovely to get away from the cold for a little while and I presented a short paper on an odd parasite infection I'd seen in clinic.   (Mansonella ozzardi for anyone interested)

Here's a picture of Alanoud and me going for a walk in Stanley Park (Alanoud is the other Infectious Diseases fellow in my year - her native language is Arabic and she's currently trying to teach me...it's not really going that well to be honest).  Alanoud is quite petite and I am very tall so we sort of look a bit like a circus act unfortunately.

March:  

Studying (written portion of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Exam)

April:  

Studying (oral portion of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Exam)

I am not joking, that's quite honestly all I did, except for when I was working.

May:

I took a little trip to Ottawa to take the oral portion of my exam on May 9th.  When I came out of it I was almost positive that I'd failed it - I felt like I completely bailed on one of the stations but I think in the end I did OK (despite saying HYPERreflexic when I meant HYPOreflexic and forgetting the name of the drug treatment of SIADH and a million other little things).  In any case, they passed me so I'm now, after 9 years, finally able to practice medicine in Canada without supervision.  I'm going to take the U.S. Board exam in August as well so we'll see how that goes.


Flowers to celebrate passing the exam - from the people in my division of ID - at least someone buys me flowers!!

Since then I've been trying to catch up with everything I've let slide (eg this blog) and connecting with a few friends.  I planted the garden this weekend for my funny little house and I'll probably update on the blog.  I have no cute children or pets to post pictures of on my blog so it'll have to be my tomato plants I guess.