ASCRS 2017

So I had the awesome opportunity to present some of my research at the annual meeting for the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgery. The meeting was in Seattle so I had some quality time on planes. Time for knitting!

I made friends with one of the flight attendants who pet my scarf. We talked shop for a little bit and he asked for my pattern (Baci by Anne Hansen). 

When I finally made it to Seattle I was pleasantly surprised by how pretty everything was even along the highway. I even have a nice view from my hotel room. 

I got the opportunity to catch up with some of my mentors from residency which is always nice. My poster was well received too. 

I went at noon and talked about our research into quality of life and cost-effectiveness after surgery for locally advanced rectal cancer. 

Getting home was an adventure. There was weather over Chicago so we circled Midway for a while before we got diverted to Des Moines. Once there I found out that my original flight to Omaha had been cancelled and they were going to add a stop in St. Louis. So I got off the plane and ended up sharing the last rental car at the airport with an elementary school teacher from Alaska. 

It's definitely good to be home!

Spinning

One of my life-long dreams has been to get a spinning wheel. One of my attendings brought me out to her farm and taught me how to spin on her wheel a few months ago. I've been itching to get a wheel ever since. 

Fast forward to a couple weeks ago, I was poking around on Facebook Marketplace and I found a wheel for $45!!  A little bit of poking around on Ravelry and the internet and I determined the wheel was worth a lot more than that. So I bought it!!

It's a Joe Jorgensen wheel, he's a guy that used to live up in Grant's Pass, Oregon and made about 450 spinning wheels. Each wheel is slightly different. There are some aspects that make me think that not all of this wheel is original but I love it all the same. 

I spent a lot of this weekend cleaning it up and trying to get it running. The main thing I'm waiting for now is a spring for my Scotch tension. I drove all over Omaha this weekend trying to find one with no success, but I ordered one and it will be here tomorrow. 

I'm really eager to start spinning, but I only have one bobbin and I'm going to have to send it off to get more bobbins made. Since each JJ wheel is different I can't just go online somewhere and buy some...so custom-made it is. 

Either way I'm super excited to finally start on this part of my fiber crafts journey!!

Hello?

A lot has happened in the almost 8 years since I last posted on this blog.  I highly doubt that anyone is still reading this thing.  That said, I feel like this is something that I'd like to pick up again.

Since the last time that I posted, I've started and completed surgical residency and I've moved halfway across the country to work as a Research Fellow in Colorectal surgery.  Someday (maybe) I'll finish my training and get a real job.

Recently, I've been longing to get back to crafting and start finishing some of my lingering projects.  For example, the baby blanket for my friend's baby that is now 14 months old (oops!).

Here's to more adventures!

I recently received this lovely little award from Alicia. That combined with the fact that I actually finished an object for the first time in...a really long time has prompted me to post.

In order to accept this award I have to answer the following questions with only 1 word answers…

1. Where is your cell phone? Floor
2.Your hair? Brown
3. Your mother? Home
4. Your father? *love*
5. Your favorite food? Peanut Butter
6. Your dream last night? Interview
7. Your favorite drink? Grape
8. Your dream/goal? Surgeon!
9. What room are you in? Office
10. Your hobby? Knitting
11. Your fear? Scrambling
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Fellow
13. Where were you last night? Home
14. Something you aren’t? MD (yet)
15. Muffins? fattening
16. Wish list item? iPodTouch (I almost said iTouch but that just sounds dirty)
17. Where did you grow up? Massachusetts
18. Last thing you did? Study
19. What are you wearing? Jeans
20. Your TV? on
21. Your pets? none
22. Your friends? Rock
23. Your life? Crazzy
24. Your mood? Prickly
25. Missing someone? Yes
26. Vehicle? Wagon
27. Something you’re not wearing? Glasses
28. Your favorite store? Payless (Shoes of course)
29. Your favorite color? Eeyore (the blue part of him)
30. When was the last time you laughed? Today
31. Last time you cried? Thursday (pre-interview drama)
32. Your best friend? AEES (combos rock)
33. One place that I go over and over? Hospital
34. One person who emails me regularly? Nobody (I'm a crappy correspondent)
35. Favorite place to eat? Conrad's

I will not tag people due to a lack of motivation...consider yourself tagged if you want to do the meme.

Knitting:

So, I finally finished my Dark Cowl. I started it at the end of May for some mindless knitting while studying...and now many months later I have finally finished it.

I initially planned to knit until I ran out of yarn...but I decided that it was already getting awful tall and thought better of it. I haven't decided if this means that I'm going to cast on for another project or whether I'm going to just work on my WIPs for a while. I'm leaning toward WIPs but I'll be checking out the Ravelry Queue.

Med School:

I have just started the interview process for residency. I'm applying for General Surgery with the plan to do a fellowship in something at the other end. One interview down...14 more to go! The knitting should be allowed to pick up again soon...I have another big test (Step 2) on 12/31 and then after that I should be home free! This is going to be a long year...but totally worth it. Which reminds me...I'm gonna have to change the name of the blog soon :P

Cute:

This was just too cute not to share with all of you...my mom picked it up at Hallmark a while ago. Perfect for when my hands are freezing...which is pretty much all the time :P

2

Today is my second blogoversary...
Here's to more frequent posts and many more years...

Where Does the Time Go?

Hey! Is anyone still reading this thing? Sorry about falling off the face of the earth there! The combination of crazy rotation schedule and busy personal life has conspired to make me really bad at posting...but I didn't die or anything...I swear...

The knitting front hasn't been too exciting. I've been plugging away on my Denise Scarf and Dark Cowl. The Show-off Socks have not been reclaimed from the frog pond...and the yarn may be coming back to life as a different pair of socks, I haven't decided yet. I haven't touched my Dorky Socks...but thinking about working on them a bit tonight while I try to convince myself that it's time to go to sleep. I have no pictures to show you because I'm impossibly lazy...or at least that's the best explanation to come up with right now. I've been thinking a lot about what I want to knit lately too...I find myself simultaneously wanting to knit lace and use heavier yarns so that I feel like I'm making more progress. I think I may strike a sort of balance by have two projects at either end of the spectrum going once I finish up the current contenders. I've been looking at a couple scarves...I feel like a triangle shawl is a bit too much for me to tackle at this point in time. I've struggled with lace patterns in the past so I feel like I should work my way up slowly and not make it into something that makes me want to cry... I also have a bunch of projects in my queue for worsted weight yarn etc, I just need to pick things that aren't scarves for a little while...especially not cabled scarves...

As far as school...I start my next rotation, a sub-internship in General Surgery tomorrow. I'm a bit nervous since I'm basically auditioning for the program and I really loved it there...but I think it'll all be fine once I get a better feeling for what's actually expected of me. I wish I knew who my housestaff was going to be...that would make me feel a lot better...but I'll find out soon enough.

I'd say that I'll try to be better about posting...but I think we all know that I don't have too much control over that. Happy knitting all!!!

On a happier note...

I got an award! The lovely Dorothy gave me this:


RULES you must resend this to 5 bloggers and you must tell 5 things about your crafts you like the most...what inspires you to make home made gifts...

What inspires me?

1) I take great joy in finding gifts that are well-matched to a person. Making gifts for people gives me so many more ways to accomplish that. I have been known to see something that is *perfect* for someone in March and pick it up for them for Christmas because I know that they'll love it.

2) Knitting is soothing. If I'm too jittery to sit still or have too many things going on in my head, a little bit of knitting goes a long way to making me feel better.

3) Making beautiful things makes me feel proud of myself. Sadly med school is generally not conducive to pride/confidence...it's just the nature of the beast.

4) Knitting is productive. I start with a pile of string and I end up with something that will keep someone warm...pretty awesome if you ask me.

5) Knitters are awesome. The people I have met through knitting are some of the kindest, most generous people I have ever met.

I nominate:
1) Alicia
2) Bea
3) Cosmicpluto
4) Anne
5) Wendy

PS: I'm feeling much better now that I got all that off my chest earlier.

Stress and Frustration

There are quite a few things that are either stressing me out or frustrating me right now. Let's go down the list shall we?

1) My grandfather is dying. He has been in some form or other for years now...but he's now in hospice, unable to swallow and therefore unable to eat, and he has a DNR order that includes no tube feeds and no IV nutrition. My Dad called me earlier today and told me that there was an estimate that he had 12 hours to live (who said this or when it was said I don't know) and that I should stay in Springfield and study etc. and wait to come home until the funeral. I know I need to study, and I know that my grandfather was incredibly proud of my going to medical school and would want me to focus on that...but it doesn't make it any easier.

2) I had my mid-rotation evaluation Friday. I'm doing well for the most part with a current grade of High-Pass. But apparently someone made a comment about my needing to cover up my chest more. I'm bothered by this on a few levels. The way I was given this feedback was rather hurtful, basically implying that I am a faithless, godless hussy who walks around all but topless. I am very self-conscious about my weight and my figure and generally don't show that much in the line of skin because I don't feel very confident about myself and generally have the feeling that no one wants to see that nastiness...so being told that I'm not covering up enough is frustrating. And then there's the part where I have a hard enough time finding clothes that fit, finding out that I am failing to look professional really bothers me. So this feedback has basically left me in the place where I just want to crawl into a hole and cry for a few hours. The ironic part here is that just about all of my friends when I had gotten similar feedback before (from a woman who felt that mini-skirts with fish-nets and 5-inch stilettos were work appropriate) were very emphatic that I dress very professionally and that they couldn't believe I had gotten than feedback.

3) My weight. I started on an OCP (the pill) in January or so...one of the ones where you don't get your period for 3 months. This seemed like a great idea since I tend to get pretty anemic and tired with my period and getting it less frequently would therefore be inherently awesome. Now we all know (well maybe not all of us but it's a well known side-effect) that the pill can cause weight-gain. I've been fighting my weight for years, admittedly unsuccessfully, so it really shouldn't have surprised me that I've gained 15 lbs over the last 5 months...but it's upsetting me nonetheless. This also ties into #2 since my boobs would be smaller if I lost the weight and therefore would not be the issue that they are turning out to be. So I've taken a page out of Alicia's book and joined SparkPeople. I'm hoping the combination of food journalling and quick daily work-out videos will help me have some more success. And then there's the part where I'm gonna come off the pill...because I'd rather get my period than keep getting fatter...and I don't think that's unreasonable.

4) My sock. I started my Show-off socks according to the pattern by CO 65 stitches and just knit happily along...I was just about to the end of the arch-shaping and decided to try them on...I can barely get them on. So they made a visit to the frog pond and I'm going to try again CO 75 stitches and see where that takes me. In the meantime I think I'm going to make a cowl with some nice thick worsted weight yarn...because that's a lot of stitches to rip out.

So yeah...I'm beyond stressed right now...kinda tearful...and struggling to concentrate on studying. I really just need this week/month to be over. Hope you're all doing better that I am! Happy knitting!

Labor and Delivery

So the two weeks of vacation are over...one week of OB/Gyn clinic done and now I'm starting my week of Labor and Delivery. Saw my first delivery today...simultaneously the coolest and most disgusting thing I have every seen. The baby's face as the rest of her body was coming out was about to crack me up. As for the rest of the day...kinda boring...but that had more to do with the fact that there was an ER resident there today to make up his deficit in deliveries so he got all five deliveries on the low-risk service for the day.

As for knitting...there's been some!! Shocking I know. Mind you what I've been doing has been mostly in the realm of simple stockinette...but still. I finished my mom's mitts...which is good because it means she'll have them for when it gets cold again in like November. I also started on a new sock...I'm calling them Show-off socks because I basically picked the pattern to show off the yarn. Yes I am aware that I haven't finished the last pair of socks yet...but I needed something that was simple so that I could knit and read at the same time in the library and the Dorky socks were just way too fiddly for me.

Five weeks left of being a third year...kinda scary...then two weeks off before beginning a string of sub-internships and audition rotations...w00t. On the plus side I don't have to wear anything but scrubs for like the next three weeks! Alright...off to read about fetal heart monitoring so I don't feel like a total idiot tomorrow. Happy knitting folks!

Spring Cleaning

Today I took out my stash. Quite an undertaking. I used my trusty ball winder to compact things a bit so that my yarn and notions all fit inside my two plastic bins and baskets. I donated some stuff that I will never use to the local trash can...mostly because I've never heard of any yarn-donation-type programs around here. In other news: I may actually have a sweater's worth of yarn in Cascade 220! I doubt I have it all in one color...but I might be able to do some yoke detail or something to make it all work.

Innywho...been doing some knitting too. My mom wanted some flip-top mittens after seeing the ones I made for my aunt (her sister).My mom has taken some pity on me as you can see...no fingers. The yarn is very very soft...I'll have to root around for the ball band but I'm pretty sure it's Patons Decor. I've started the second mitt, finished the cuff while watching Prisoner of Azkaban on TV last night. Once I'm done with that I'll take care of the tops...good stuff.Tomorrow afternoon I have two meetings...both of which make me slightly nervous. The first is with the Dean of Students to talk about how realistic my goals are and see if she has any advice for me as I get ready for next year. The second is with the Chairman of the Department of Surgery at Tufts...he's the man who'll write my "Chairman's Letter" for my application next year so I kinda need to get to know him a little bit. There is a small part of me that is terrified that I'm going to be told that I have no chance of getting into a General Surgery residency...I'm trying very hard to ignore that part. Alright...time to go to sleep...untangling hanks of yarn is hard work!! Happy knitting all!!!

Staycation

What is a "staycation," you ask? Well...it's kinda like a vacation...but instead of going anywhere you just stay home and relax. Staycation's are great for a variety of reasons: they're essentially free, you have time to do all the little things you've been ignoring, and you have access to your entire stash! No more worrying about what yarn/needles to bring! I am currently enjoying the start of my two week break that comes with my elective block. So far I've finished a pair of mittens and started on a scarf, and started reading House of God (everyone's been telling me I have to read it...I got it for Christmas and I'm finally getting the time to read...so far I love it). Another added bonus is that I have time to write a real blog post!

So now that I'm back home I really have no excuse to not give you some FO and WIP shots...well...except for the part where the rechargeable battery on my camera lasts about 30 seconds...but I plan to rectify that by buying a new battery when I'm out later today for my doctor's appointment. In the meantime I will take one picture of each thing...which is more than I've given you in a long long time.

First I give you my first BSJ. I finished this about a month ago (feels like much longer than that sadly) and sent it off to Dorothy for her newest little one. She posted about it here but it's high I time I give you pictures.
Dorothy of course sent me a lovely thank-you-note...which of course made my day when I got it like a week later (hooray for living an hour and a half from home!)
Next up is the hat I made for my aunt. I was looking for something simple enough to be wearable by a non-knitter but still complicated enough that it was still knitterly. I found this pattern (rav link) and went for it. So far I've opted to not make the little band...we'll see when I finish up with everything else for this lovely winter set.
Then there are the mittens. Flip-top mittens with cables and fingers. They are very loosely based on this pattern (rav link)...I think I used it mostly for finger placement and some clues on making the flap more-so than anything else. I still hate fingers...I might hate them less if I had shorter DPNs...if I find myself making lots more of these I may break down and buy some.
And finally there's the scarf. I'm using this pattern (rav link), I think it goes with the hat and the mittens rather well.
So what else am I up to? Well...on the weight loss front I have not been a very good girl. Lots of bad eating choices that resulted mostly from the fact that I was tired and wanted fast and tasty more than healthy. Then the part where I wasn't keeping track of my weight led to a special kind of snowballing that only I am capable of.

While I'm home on staycation there's going to be a lot of working-out and exercising going on...I hope to be back in the negative by the time I start up again.

On the school front things are going well. I've pretty much finalized my schedule for next year. I did manage to get the Radiology rotation I wanted, but still not luck with surgical intensive care. What is my schedule?

• July - General Surgery at Lahey Clinic
• August - Transplant Surgery at Tufts Medical Center
• September - Honors General Surgery at Newton-Wellesley
• October - Family Medicine in Wrentham
• November - Radiology at Caritas Good Samaritan
• December - VACATION!! aka studying for boards and going on interviews
• January - Anesthesia at VA Medical Center
• February - Pediatric Surgery at Tufts Medical Center
• March - Gastroenterology at VA Medical Center
• April - Emergency Med at Caritas Good Samaritan
• May - VACATION!! aka prepping for graduation and getting ready to move to where I matched

I'm going to miss my Neurosurgery rotation. Good people that were lots of fun. They've invited me out to dinner with them when I get back for my OB/Gyn rotation in a couple weeks. Hopefully I won't be on call so I can go. Alright...this post is plenty long. Happy knitting all!!