prepare to die of cuteness

Just a brief entry, to provide you with a link to one of the blogs I read. Click and then scroll down to see the most adorable child who ever lived, before you collapse from the overload of sheer cuteness.

Link

oh brother

Once upon a time, there was a little girl who had (besides two older sisters) a baby brother, who was not-quite-two years younger than she was. And he was pretty cute.


He liked to do things like ride his bike, play Super Mario Brothers, eat dill pickles, watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, beat all his siblings at chess, and play soccer.

(Sometimes he also liked to be annoying and yell "TORNADO" and then knock all his sister's Barbies over and destroy their Barbie houses, and then laugh. Mostly he didn't, though.)

Then, as we all do, he started to grow up and turn from "cute" to "awkward."

(That's as awkward as we'll go. We'll skip high school. See what I do for you? See what a good sister I am?)

Anyway, after the awkward bit, he was grown up. He still liked to play video games and eat pickles and play chess. He also developed a penchant for medieval trivia, playing saxophone in school bands, weight-lifting, and wearing funny t-shirts.

(This shirt says, if I remember right, "I used to be schizophrenic, but we're okay now.")

He danced in his sister's wedding (actually, all three sisters' weddings, but this is the one I have pictures of, unsurprisingly).


And he was a great favorite among his many nieces and nephews, who (depending on age) enjoyed being wrestled, chased, tickled, or tossed into the air, among other things.


Anyway.

Happy 24th birthday, Sam! Love you, little brother!

a tale of danger!

Imagine this:

You're riding in the passenger seat as your husband drives down the highway on a DC evening. He merges onto another highway, and the driver already in the right lane on that highway takes issue with the fact that your car is now in her lane.


Aaaaand pretty soon she's so close behind you that you can't even see her headlights when you turn around and look. Don'tcha love a tailgater?

a PSA from Florida! woohoo!

Unfortunately, you soon learn the reason tailgating is illegal. A second car pulls in front of you, and proceeds to suddenly decrease in speed. Your husband slams on his brakes and manages to avoid hitting the car in front of you. However, the driver behind you (being approximately two inches from your rear bumper) is not so successful.

(In case you haven't figured it out, this story is not so much a hypothetical "imagine this" as something that actually happened to Jack and me a few days ago. Had you figured it out, smart ones that you are, hmm?)

Miraculously, despite being involved in an accident ON THE FREEWAY, we weren't hurt, didn't lose control of the car, and (it turns out) escaped with only a slight displacement of one bumper panel.

But! The story is not over!

Now, seeing as we were in a not-so-good part of a large and unfamiliar city, at night, we didn't feel particularly safe pulling over. We were only a mile or two from the navy base where we were staying, so we decided to just head there, figuring that the driver behind us would cut her losses, flee the scene, and never be heard from again.

However, incredibly, she followed us onto the base. To make a long story short, it turned out she apparently had some idea that she could:

• show up on a military base after rear-ending another vehicle (belonging to an officer in said military, no less) on the highway
• have no proof of insurance to show the police who showed up
• have no plausible story other than "I just know something hit me, I don't know what"
• point out only front-end damage on her car
• and think she could get some money out of us to repair what actually seemed to be previous damage.

Needless to say, it did not work out well for her, and she not only received several tickets, but will no doubt be a major character in humorous anecdotes told by the gate guards for weeks to come.

interview season

Because of Jack being in the military, and thus already knowing where he matched, I limited my interviews to programs in the same geographical area. That means I only have five, and they're all in the same two-week span... which is good, because even just five is still enough to get sick and tired of them.

The basic outline for an interview day in pediatrics, I have learned, is generally as follows:

7:45 AM- Show up. Start consuming free bagels and coffee.
8-9 AM- Observe morning report.
9-10 AM- Hear a presentation (likely PowerPoint) about the program, designed to intrigue applicants and/or answer potential questions, likely repeating information given on the website.
10-11 AM- Two 30-minute interviews, where the most popular question seems to be, "So where do you see yourself, career-wise, in 10 years?"
11AM-12PM- Go on a tour of the hospital. Ignore growling stomach.
12-1 PM- Lunch. (Most common? Sandwiches. Most interesting? Indian food. Yum.) Talk to the current residents.
1-1:30 PM- Wrap-up talk, then leave.

Now, I am not stupid enough to actually type out my opinions of said programs and post them on the internet before Match Day. But I do have a favorite, yes. And I actually have a second-favorite, too.

After the interviews, the rest of the residency-application process is pretty easy. Make a rank list in February, get your answer in March. Can't wait until it's all over and I can relax (aka, freak out about something new).

whoops

Wow, I am a blogging slacker.

To make up for it, here are some cute videos of my adorable two-(almost three!)-year-old niece.

Lucy speaks Spanish:



Lucy sings the Beatles:



Lucy shows us how to get down: