This year the holidays came very quickly since I was out in Hawaii and then bam! holy moly! it’s Christmas! Normally I like to go shopping and sing along to the carols and embarrass my mom. ;) She knows I can act like an idiot anywhere. But anyways, things just kind of went super fast into Christmas and then it very painful with missing my Dad. Then whoosh, Christmas over. And now new years is over - whoa!! Lots going on behind the scenes so to speak, lots of decisions to be made that need to be considered carefully. Anyways, so gestating all such things and looking forward to being finished with residency interviews - two more weeks!

Happy New Year! This year is one I’ve been looking forward to for a long, long time since I graduate from medical school ! Yea! Lots of potential changes as well since residency wise I won’t know where I’m going yet! I hope everyone has a healthy, happy 2009!

What is the biggest mistake you made in 2008 and will not make again in 2009?
I think when you know people aren’t right for your life and whatever reason you let them be a part of it. It’s not really their fault for doing the things they do - it’s your fault for letting them be a part of it. You know, first time shame on them, second time shame on me.

Do you make New Year’s resolutions? Why or why not?
No, I think that we are all an unfinished canvas (cheesy!) and we should always be working to be better people and working to handle life the best we can. Holding ourselves to a higher standard is something one should do everyday.

Who do you nominate as “Man or Woman of the Year” for 2008?
Obama, I think what he did this year was pretty amazing. He overcame a lot of challenges along the trail with a lot of grace and really ran an amazing campaign.

What was your greatest accomplishment in 2008?
I think helping usher new life in the world. :) But also, helping usher my father’s life out of this world in the way he wanted it and the time we spent together where I went out of my comfort zone to talk about his end of life and his thoughts about life.

For Christmas and my birthday (feb) my mom got me a new computer. It’s been this debate of what to do because of my main laptop hard drive issue. I won’t go through my deep and thoughtful ;) debate on what to do, but I decided to get a macbook. Nothing fancy, and yay for an educational discount (not really that much tho!). I named it Fuji - this is nerdy - because it’s an apple, and I like fuji apples. :)

I have used a mac before so it’s not a huge transition but there are things that I’m thinking hrmmm… luckily the internet has lots of answers for me. But there are other things that it has that are just this little extra touch that’s really cool. For example, it tell you how much longer it needs to charge - or as the icon is downloading something it itself shows the progress. I also like the spaces feature since I’m a person who opens up every single program. Another thing that makes the transition easy is firefox - works the same one either machine since I spend a lot of time browsing the web. I have foxmarks (it syncs your bookmarks), and then other add-ons for design (aardvark is my favorite!) that help make it the same kind of experience no matter what. So overall, I like it a lot. Different of course, but overall I think an improvement from before!! Thanks Mom!

I haven’t done the photohunt in a great long while, but here’s a shot of Wolfie’s favorite toy. For a long time it was the frisbee, but the soccer ball is now the favorite. He’s actually gone through like 10 of em since he squeaks them so much the squeaker breaks.

I went and visited some friends today and their adorable little puppy Sammy :)

He is just too cute. It made me remember a lot about Wolfie’s puppyhood and training him… all the fun that came along with that, with also learning how to take care of him and loving this little doggie who came into my life. Wolfie and Sammy got along ok, Wolfie is kind of a cranky old man since he’s used to just me and he is possessive over this one toy that he has at home (my friends got the same one for Sammy). They played a little bit though - very cute.

Wolfie did have a jealousy problem, no surprise there though. It kind of reminded me of kids and the little game they play when there’s a new little one - the ignoring, the being a little too rough, the walking infront of things… Then of course, Wolfie knew what I was doing but didn’t want to be a part of the pictures so he often wouldn’t look at the camera. Sammy isn’t trained for pictures the way Wolfie is, so it was a little bit harder with Wolfie doing what he was doing - aka what’s in this shot ;) It’s hard though, Wolfie’s used to being the prince - and he’s been babysat by my friends before so he comes in expecting the royal treatment but instead this new little guy is there who gets all the attention!! Obviously Wolfie did not understand my explanation beforehand. ;) The two of them exhausted each other though and now Wolfie’s fast asleep on the couch - but he did bring his ball with him to bed, you know just in case Sammy stopped by.

So this is the first round of holidays after losing my Dad earlier this year to pancreatic cancer. I thought it would be easier than it was - Christmas was a lot harder than Thanksgiving was. I tried to make things a little different this year so it would perhaps be easier, but it just wasn’t. I just really, really missed my Dad. There’s just something about death and it’s finality that my heart was so heavy with longing. My mom is also sad, and it’s hard to watch her suffer and miss my Dad in a way I can’t even begin to understand. We both did the best we could, and we had a fun time together but there’s just this unspoken sadness in the air of just my Dad not being there anymore. Life will go on, and things like this will get easier, but wow - painful.

Happy Holidays everyone :) I hope you have a very happy one whatever you chose to celebrate! I have Christmas and the day after off so I’m particularly lucky :D

I took a bunch of these shots in Hawaii with all the Christmas trees around the the balls on them. Kind of fun to see the tropical landscape behind, especially now that I’m in winter brrrr weather! New week, anything exciting? Half week for most people?

So I thought that maybe I would be able to escape getting jet lagged but that doesn’t quite seem to be the case. Argh! Oh well. Not sure how I’m going to get back to normal since I can get to bed at a normal time but just can’t stay asleep. Someday :)

So I was up early and needed something to do, so I went to Acme which was closed despite it said online it was 24 hr and then went to Wawa (a local to this area convenience store far superior to 7 eleven) There I witnessed the fun of people up too late, probably with a bit too much alcohol = fight! Ha yikes. People don’t always act their best. :) It also was freezing rain a little bit on the way home, but since I wasn’t in much of a hurry… oh well!

I went to this cute place tonight for dinner in my hometown, Avalon. They had a pumpkin butternut squash ravoli with a sage brown butter sauce which is one of my favorite things in the world. The pasta was good, it was a little on the heavy side like it needed to be rolled out a little more to make it more thin and delicate - but otherwise really good. :) We also got a Misto Del Giorno cause they had this cheese table and I was totally intrigued by it, but hate cheese. It was this perfect little sampler of things - yum! I like going to places that are a little more upscale than just chain places recently because I feel like the chain places although yum- you end up with a massive quantity of mediocre food. And then you eat it all! I like being able to have smaller bits and then not feeling so stuffed but the actual tastes and flavors are much more vivid, rich, and inspiring. The problem is they are more expensive of course, so don’t go as often but it’s always a fun experience.