Ari's Birthday Surprise!

The weekend before Ari's birthday, I surprised him by inviting all of his college friends to Milwaukee. Those of you who know him best will realize what a feat that is... he is NEVER surprised. So you can imagine how exciting it was to get 7 of his friends together without him suspecting. We started off with a tour of Miller Brewing Company (no worries, I am still a tried and true Budweiser fan). Andi never quite made it there but instead got a self-guided tour of Milwaukee. After sampling the stock and writing a few postcards to our loved ones, we headed back to our house. My friend Sarah was gracious enough to be my sous chef as I made dinner for Ari, Tom, Jason, Jenny, Karen, Grant, Andi, Dan, and ourselves. We had all of Ari's favorites including artichoke lasagna and Moscato di Asti. We then ended the evening in college form with a lot of beer and a game of a-hole (sorry, I am a pediatrician now). We crashed a lot earlier than we used to in the old days except for Tom who decided to run home... good thing he only lives a couple of miles away. The next morning I cooked brunch and our friends had to say goodbye. Thanks everyone for coming, we hope to see you again soon!!

Aunt Ellen and Uncle Kenny Visit

Yesterday, we were delighted to have Aunt Ellen and Uncle Kenny come up to Milwaukee for a visit! We met at the Potowatomi Casino (pictured here) for a little gambling fun. Aunt Ellen surprised me with a hand stitched little purse to keep my casino cards in... how did she know I have more than one?! Then we were off to the tables. Ari and I played some craps, not a good day for that! I don't think any shooter rolled more than 4 times. Disheartened we went to find Aunt Ellen winning big, I mean having fun on the slots. Ari and I tried to get a seat at the poker tables, my personal favorite, but there were 39 people waiting!! So we headed back for some roullette were we started out pretty hot but ended up even. After all that excitement, we were starving.

We took our guests to Carini's, a superb Sicilian restaurant. We had a wonderful time catching up and filling up on wonderful bread. Our main dishes were delicious but the dessert was my favorite. Aunt Ellen and I split a chocolate cannoli... it may very well have been the best cannoli I have ever tasted (and I have tasted my fair share). We then took Aunt Ellen and Uncle Kenny back to our house to show them our updates. I didn't realize that they hadn't seen our house since it was a bachelor pad when I was still in Springfield. I think they liked what a woman's touch had done. We watched a few innings of the World Series and then they had to leave us to return to Highland Park.

And the Cardinals won game 1... Go Cards!!

PICU Madness

Long time, no blog! I am sorry for the long delay, but I have a good excuse. For the last three weeks I have been working harder than ever in the pediatric ICU. I thought I worked hard before, but taking care of the sickest babies in the hospital has been the most challenging experience of my young career. I have only had 1 day off in the last three weeks and every fourth night on call I am lucky if I get to blink let alone lay down. I used to think that I may want to be a critical care doc but now I am quite sure that I don't. Things change rapidly in the ICU and I personally do not require an adrenaline rush as part of my day. What I do find that I require is a pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks on my way in to the hospital at 5 am. Mmmm... Thank goodness I have the most supportive husband a girl could ask for. It helps tremendously to come home and vent for a bit. Ari is starting to feel a little neglected, though with me on call and then going to bed at 8:30pm because I am so exhausted. He has been busy too interviewing for jobs for July when he will be an attending! In the midst of this I am applying for my fellowship in hematology-oncology and promise to keep you posted on how that goes. The choices are Milwaukee, Children's Hospital of Denver, St. Jude in Memphis, Vanderbilt Children's and Duke. Ari and I wax and wane about where we would like to end up but I am sure it will all become much clearer after interviews. Also looming in the future is Step 3... last test to pass before I can become a fully licensed physician. I would appreciate everyone thinking happy thoughts on November 13-14 for me. The test covers all of medicine so I am going to have to review adult medicine, yuck! So I am off to enjoy my first weekend off, just one more week of stress until two call free months. Until then...