Last Day at Akita

Hello Everyone, My last day. I'm a bit sad since I've been coming to work here for 6 years but at the same time, yep, it's time to go. I did my last exams on Wednesday. They turned out really well and I am quite happy with my marks. I get to wear honour roll regalia to graduation at the end of May. My practicum starts on May 6 and I'm quite excited. I have a meeting with them on Monday so I'll know what to expect. It's the big comic expo this weekend and they're sold out. 56,000 tickets sold. I picked ours up early and so far I'm impressed with the big changes they've made. Almost double the size of the venue, signage, and lots of volunteers. It should be a lot of fun. Not really in the mood to type today. Have a good day!

Almost Through the Week

Hello Everyone, Ah Thursday afternoons. The work week is almost done. Although I can't really complain. I've only worked this afternoon and I have a few hours tomorrow morning. But since I consider school to be work, all is good. Yep, definitely things are wrapping up. I had my last computer class on Tuesday and I'm just waiting for the final exam to be released online. I should be able to do it on the weekend and that's finished. In pathology, I have classes Monday, Wednesday, Friday of next week and then one class on Wednesday of the following week followed by the exam the Wednesday after. All that's really continuing on is transcription and I'm glad to have the extra time for that and for working. I found out about my practicum spot. It's a physiotherapy clinic just on the other side of SAIT. So, a 35 minute walk. And it's located in a mall that has yummy Korean bbq. It's actually the mall I used to shop at when I lived in the NW so I know the area pretty well. Had a good weekend. We spent the night in the hostel and when we woke up, we didn't feel much like skiing since it wouldn't be good conditions until at least 11am. The temperature dropping at night causes ice to form on top of the snow, which makes it unpleasant to ski in. We got hungry and decided to go on a car ride. Ended up in the Crowsnest Pass and had breakfast. Slowly meandered over to Lethbridge that afternoon. Did Easter dinner (full turkey and all at 2pm) on Saturday and watched the new Wizard of Oz movie. I thought it was very well done. Drove back on Sunday and spent Monday relaxing. We started back into True Blood and that stupid soap opera has us addicted again. There is a limit of 1 episode/night. Luckily we're still 1.5 series behind so we can watch it in groups. Have a great day!

Las Vegas Photos

Here are some photos from our fun weekend in Las Vegas back in February.

Happy Easter!

Hello Everyone, I’m preparing for an extra-long weekend. Both of us have Friday & Monday off. We head down to Castle Mountain tonight and we’re going skiing/snowboarding tomorrow. Then, we’re heading over to Lethbridge for family dinner on Saturday, return Sunday night, and then have Monday as a home day. It will be nice to have some relax time as it’s been a stressful few weeks. I had 2 exams yesterday. One went much better than I thought, and I’m not sure about the other. There is light at the end of the tunnel though. I did my graduation photo shoot and have registered for the ceremony. It’ll be the last day in May, which coincidently is also my last day of practicum. We were given our choices this week and we had to rank them from 1-17. It would have been easier if we only had to pick our top 10. From there, our instructor will look at our selection and try to match everyone up as close to their choices as possible. And, we have 1 more transcription course (it’s 1/month this semester) and it’s an advanced course (i.e. heavy accents, fast speakers, muffled recordings) My last in-school exam is April 25 and then I have 1 week off. Practicum starts May 6. My last day of work will be April 26. It’s scary, since I won’t have an income for at least a month, but I’m ready for the change. My work is pretty well wrapped up and the payroll administrators have things under control. Last weekend, I played the prelude in church for Palm Sunday. I had picked up a few, “modern” pieces and although the practising was stressful, I enjoyed playing. The previous weekend we travelled to Saskatchewan for a funeral for one of Jerry’s friends. And the weekend before was Jerry’s birthday so we went to Banff and skied/snowboarded at Sunshine. My great Banff find of the weekend was a pair of used ski boots for $50. I’ll get our Las Vegas photos up hopefully this afternoon. There won’t be much commentary as I’m having issues with Blogger and photos. I’ll put a few more notes on the ones I load to Facebook. It was a fun, surreal time, and I can see how easy it is for people to get sucked into it. You end up winding through the casinos to get anywhere, the scale of things is overwhelming, and everyone smokes inside. It’s easy to get tired and stop at a slot machine for a rest. But, during our entire time there, we didn’t spend even a penny gambling. Instead, we had amazing food and lots of people watching. Have a great day!

Wedding Anniversary

Hello Everyone, Yesterday Jerry and I celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary. It was a lovely day. I managed to make him speechless lol. So, we're not big into presents (we tend to do "experiences") but I still wanted to surpirse him with something. I found someone on Etsy to make bicycle print hankerchiefs (cotton is the 2nd anniversary traditional present) and got a groupon to name a star after him. It was the star that threw him, which made me happy since he's really hard to buy for. It's a symbolic purchase but he likes stargazing and I though it would be nice. Yippee for groupons! That's what most of our anniversary was all about. For dinner, we used one to try a new restaurant. It was a tasting menu with wine. We chose 4 plates and had 2 oz of wine with each to sample. There was crab cakes (much better than I thought they'd taste), baked brie with cranberries and crostinis, smoked duck with carmelized onions on crostinis, and bacon wrapped steak on a skewer. Dessert was an oreo mousse in a shot glass with a truffle and a sample of port. It was a lovely time and a great anniversary treat. To celebrate, we're using another groupon for a trip to Las Vegas. We're headed to Treasure Island tomorrow and will see Mystere (Cirque du Soleil) on Saturday. We have groupons for a sightseeing bus and dinner. Jerry also has one for a shooting range, while I have to pay full price to be pampered at the spa. All in all, I would say I like groupons but you need to know your prices and I find they have to be things you would normally do/buy anyways for them to be worthwhile. This is reading week for me and I've really enjoyed the time off. I'm working, which is good for the budget, but it's been nice not to have homework in the evening. Although, I do need to do a bit tonight in preparation for next week. I have about 2 months left of class and then my practicum for May. It's pretty neat listening to the recordings as there are so many things I can here now that I couldn't in the fall. But still so much to learn. Have a great day!

Word of the Day

Enucleation - Removal of an entire structure without rupture. For example, at Christmas many people will have mixed nuts. Walnuts can be tricky to get out in one piece. If you do it, you have achieved enucleation.

The Weekend

Hello Everyone, It's hard to believe it's the last weekend of January. The time has flown by! I started classes again on the 8th and I'm only now getting back into the swing of things. Thank goodness for my phone - the calendar has my schedule programmed into it. Otherwise, I'd have no idea where my classes are. This semsester I have 2 courses that run until the end of April and the rest of my classes are one month each. They're my transcription classes and they're in 4 hour blocks, 4 days a week. They've been slowly building up our stamina. But it means I have a final on Wednesday. We're looking at medical specialities so this course was respiratory, cardiovascular and HEENT (head, eyes, ears, nose, throat). Very interesting stuff! We've had a roommate since Christmas and he goes home next weekend. Rusty is Jerry's mom's cat and it's been quite tiring having him around. We are definitely a 2-pet household. The extra cat fur has been really rough on Jerry (he's allergic to cats plus he's asthmatic). We've also had battles between him and Mike (which they seem to have settled this week), and he's picky about the litter box and likes to use freshly cleaned rugs instead. He's cute and cuddly, makes chirping noises, and plays fetch, but he's too much for us. Oh, and he's 7 months and unneutered. On another pet note, Mike has some kind of illness. We took him in for a check-up and they did some bloodwork. There is an enzyme that is released when the body is consuming muscle (rather than fat) and his results were positive. The vet wanted to do a MRI but we said no. Mike hid for a day after his bloodwork, he's 12, and it's $500. So, we're going to work with the vet to keep him comfortable. He's doing better than at the beginning of the month (he slept a lot, has been losing weight, and his fur wasn't as glossy as normal) and he's eating again. But he's finally worked out that he is alpha kitty in the household (with Whiskers being the all-supreme leader) For New Years, I bought myself to panniers for Mary. One is a shopping bag style and there is a flap that zips over the hooks (they hook onto the back rack). The other is more a brief case style (courtesy of the knock-off folks in China). Both are great for light grocery shopping. It is definitely more comfortable that having a swing bag. And to think I resisted for so many years... Read a good book recently called the time keeper by Mitch Albom. But make sure you have some chocolate and tissues nearby though. Very interesting ideas though... It's about the first person who wanted to measure time and the consequences. I'm doing the children's story at church tomorrow. I'm going to teach the song about the wise man building his house. And I even have a demo. Lol - it should be fun. Saw Les Miserable on Christmas. It was ok. I was a bit disappointed and I thought it was way over-hyped. Beautiful costumes and it was pretty but I thought there would be more dialogue to flesh out the musical. And I loved The Hobbit. I read the book years ago so although the characters were somewhat familiar, there was definitely enough action to keep me rivetted to the screen. Anyways, that's all for now, have a good day!