Mustang Sally

Mabel received a D- on the puppy meter yesterday for her unwarranted, unprovoked, and embarrassing response to the friendly doggies on Church St. I mean, pulling like a chariot horse in heat and bucking like a bronco does not earn her many human-friendly points, as well as scoring her very low on the doggie safety meter. We've got to work this Satan out of her system.

seasalt

I have forgotten how much I love the smell of the Maine coast until walking the bay this afternoon with my dear friend Amy, her husband and daughter. I try to remember days like this when I wake up unhappy to be so far away from Chris and Mabel.
Work is FINE, the unit is interesting and of course the first day off orientation I had the most unstable patient. Didn't this happen before somewhere else, and I thought this hospital was going to be "easy"? The 7 bed ICU employs maybe a dozen employees and staffs only 3 nurses a night with no secretary. My orientation consists of 8 hours of hospital paperwork and 2 nights on the unit! Throughout the night I ask myself why I bother to travel, I have no rapport with any of the physicians, never get the hang of the damn computers until at least a month into the assignment, and not to mention having to learn how each hospital does things differently from line placements to medical interventions is a true pain in the ass. Then the paycheck comes and all these worries disappear briefly while I spend each dollar I make.
This Friday I will be heading home to VT, so come visit.

Carry Me

More months than I'd like to speak of have passed since I've touched real rock. Until this past weekend.

On Saturday I made a very rare (and probably once in a lifetime!) decision to day trip down to the Gunks in southern NY. Mind you, one way is 3 hours 45 minutes...with no traffic and minimal pee breaks. Needless to say, Jake (who is forever psyched even at 5:30 in the morning) kept me awake and amped the whole ride down talking a lot of game about climbing, his bad choices in arena rock bands from the '80s, and some general teenage angst thrown in for good measure. We got there before most locals had arisen for the day, which leaves me--in hindsight--feeling a bit knackered just thinking about what we packed into one day. Barrelling down the NY Thruway, our trip was punctuated by the sweet sight of snow quickly dissipating into nothingness along the shoulder of the road, and the choral swell of spring song birds jubilantly welcoming the longer and warmer days ahead.

We finally found Dave in the parking lot below the dreaded "stairmaster" and managed to dispatch of 6 routes in just a few short hours. Amidst this I heard a man yelp like an injured puppy, (apparently the result of a massive leader fall), and Dave finally ticked a route that had left a very sharp thorn in his side from the previous year. Fast work for a couple of guys who hadn't placed gear in the past couple months.

To boot, on our way out of town, we almost scored a free salmon burrito from some irritated shop employees at a local Mexicali joint in New Paltz, and we were cheered by the local crunchies for bullying our way into a parking spot that was rightfully ours.

Not much to report for Sunday, although, in talking with Lindsay, I realized how much a simple, happy inflection in her voice can carry me all day long...I love that girl.

--C

Creationism vs. Carb-ationism

Flying Spaghetti Monster or ravenous crustacean?--you be the judge. Were we all spawn from the same bowl of spaghetti?

(A co-worker enlightened me of this crazy movement today while we planned our weekly school lunch menu.)

Alliteration

Tomorrow is the first day of Spring, so shouldn't we be seeing signs of warmer weather? Earlier this week, I DID hear some new birds singing their sweet little songs outside my classroom window, but I am still scraping the frost and ice off the windows of my car in the morning.

As of late it just doesn't seem like we can escape this cold and snow. The extended forecast has dealt yet another blow to the collective psyche of our climbing community. If this distasteful weather doesn't disengage soon, the Vermont climbing community may just vanish.

In all honesty, though, March can be a very dark and dismal month. We're lured into believing otherwise, and when the crunchy folks peel off their 4 month-old wool socks to wear their Birks barefoot we're played like fools and old man winter dumps snow and temps that have no business being in March on us.

Skiing and snowboarding has lost its fluffy appeal by now (mashed potato snow is grossly overrated), ice climbing has become a little too dangerous this late in the season, and the trails aren't dry, nor snow-packed enough anymore to run on. Early Spring in New England can certainly be a therapeutic trial in transitional torment.

loose ends

It's like each fleck of snow frozen to the ground outside my door adheres to stacked days on a numbered calendar growing larger and seeming further and further away--June seems like an eternity from now.



Lindsay and I have begun the tedious process of trip preparation. You know, making lists of essentials we'll tote along indefinitably, tying up loose ends with our home so they don't break down on our tenants, and working vigilantly with our puppy, Mabel, to ensure she's ready to travel. The prospect of travelling, especially one that entails mutliple places over the course of a year is a funny one. It conjures up many emotions. Anxiety and excitement, stress and sadness all well up inside and make us pine for the familiar places we have yet to leave.

This is just an introductory post, but more will come as the day of departure approaches.