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One of these days, I'll update you...my precioussssssss. 11*22*06 I'm just about to go to bed in preparation for what I'm anticipating to be a donor-laden on-call shift. We've been kinda swamped with donors this month, which is a good thing I suppose. But we're very short-staffed, so we're all a bit overworked. Plus our eye bank has a bunch of Long Island hospitals we only have on the odd months, so a lot of these donations require hours of driving which definitely sucks. So, as I said, San Francisco was awesome. The weather was beautiful except for one drizzly, foggy day. I was told it's pretty much always jacket weather there. I went down to the waterfront quite a bit because the view was breathtaking; I couldn't get over it. Walking around the city itself though was kind of a nightmare because of the monstrous hills. After walking up one or two of them, I would be completely spent. Plus the public transportation system there really sucks. I visited Alcatraz on Wednesday, which was really neat. My friend Amy, who used to work for the eye bank, moved to San Francisco a few months ago, so we had drinks and dinner Thursday night. Friday night I met up with my co-worker Deserie who had been attending the conference where I took my certification test. We had dinner, then walked around the waterfront for a bit before taking a tourist-packed trolley back through the city. Amy drove me to the Golden Gate Bridge on Saturday and showed me a bit more of the city before dropping me off on Haight Street. Aside from a few decent thrift shops, Haight-Ashbury kind of reminded me of St. Mark's Place, crust punks included. So I wasn't terribly impressed with that. I think I did okay on the certification test. There were a few more questions I didn't know the answers to than I had hoped, but I still think I passed at least. I won't get the results back for another 6 weeks though, so in the meantime I'm not stressing about it anymore. I saw Patrick for a little bit Sunday and Monday night, but now he's off in Pittsburgh visiting family. I was pretty sad saying goodbye to him Tuesday morning, but thankfully this week seems to be going by pretty quickly, so we'll see each other in no time at all. Speaking of time, I have to go to bed now. Happy Tofurkey Day. 11*21*06 I am so very tired, so I'm just going to post my pictures from the trip and hopefully I'll have time to write up a recap at some point tomorrow before I go to bed early for my on-call shift. But for now, I'll just say that I loved San Francisco.
11*14*06 I just got back from bidding Patrick farewell at my subway station. Now I have to start packing for San Francisco. I love taking an afternoon flight. And I love not having to go to work for the rest of the week! I'll be back on Sunday with pictures I'm hoping I'll be able to upload (unlike my pictures from Montreal). Look out Alcatraz, here I come! 11*12*06 I'm taking a little study break. I don't feel like I'm 100% prepared for my certification test, but I'm probably about 75% prepared. I guess that's not so bad. Prepared or not though, I'm taking the test on Wednesday morning in San Francisco. I bought a book on San Francisco, but I don't think I'll have time to look through it until I'm done with the test. My job is paying for my Tuesday night hotel stay in some swanky $200-a-night room. The rest of the time I'm staying in Chinatown at some shit hole I'm paying for. The important thing is it's cheap and I get a room to myself. I had a good weekend. I spent most of it with Patrick, which is mostly why it was good. We won't see each other much these next few weeks because of my trip, and soon after I return, he's going to visit family in Pittsburgh for most of the week. I'm sure I'll survive, but right now thinking of the whole ordeal makes me a bit sad. I know I'm being silly; it won't be that long. But still.... Ok, I suppose I'll go back to studying. Meh. 11*06*06 Last year when Deirdre ran the marathon, Kristy and I agreed that she'd hold the poster we made for Deirdre if I took Deirdre's picture when she ran by. But when we finally saw her, she was all the way on the other side of the route and didn't hear us calling her name. Kristy asked me if I got the shot afterwards, and I just stared at the unused camera sitting in my hands realizing I had really dropped the ball. But yesterday I made up for that. I spotted Deirdre and screamed her name at the top of my lungs. She heard me and turned around, but she couldn't run back to us--so we ran full speed after her. She crossed the street when we reached her and started taking pictures of us freaking out. When she took the camera away, we could see that she was crying. We both gave her a big hug, and, most importantly, I finally got her picture.
We met up with her and her friends at a bar afterwards to celebrate. Kristy and I talked of running the marathon together next year and said we'd try to help each other stay motivated. We said the same thing last year, but it's still something I really want to do. Just because I've slacked in the past doesn't mean I can't change now and still do it. We'll see. Deirdre is leaving to travel around South America tomorrow and is then moving to Australia for good. I'm sad I didn't hang out with her more because she's such a great person. But she told me to come visit her in Australia, so as soon as I save up an extra $2000 for a plane ticket, I'm totally there. My old study habit of procrastination is rearing its ugly head big time and my certification test is in almost a week. I hate studying. I had a donor Saturday around 3 in the morning at a medical examiner's office. The guy who let me in the building left about 20 minutes after I got there, so I was completely alone. After I was done with my procedure, I wheeled the body into the freezer and spotted another donor I had had the day before. I walked over to them to see what skin donation looks like, and then turned around to see the freezer door shut behind me. My heart momentarily stopped at the thought of being stuck in a freezer full of dead people for the whole night. Luckily the freezer opened from the inside, but that was one of the scariest 5 seconds of my life prior to that. 11*05*06 Patrick just left my place to go to class. We went to the Cocoa Bar in Park Slope last night and ate chocolate cake and truffles until we felt sick. Then we both got inexplicably tired and had to go to bed kinda early...well, early for a Saturday night. I'm waiting to hear back from my friend Kristy as to what time we're meeting up to cheer our friend Deirdre on in the marathon. I just checked the marathon route map and realized the runners will be running a block away from me in probably an hour or two. Maybe I'll go shower and check it out. Yes, that's what I will do! 11*03*06 Just a quick note before I go to bed early for my on-call shift. Halloween was pretty great; got lots of compliments and posed for a bunch of strangers' photos. Patrick and I went to some club that was having a costume party on the Lower East Side. He kept spiking his fake brain like a football all night and when they dropped a bunch of balloons on the crowd, I went crazy trying to pop them with my high heels to the point that I bent one. I guess we were a little drunk. Otherwise I've been super busy all week at work due to two technicians getting fired. But I'll be going to San Francisco in less than two weeks, so I'm trying not to fret too much. Ok, now I'm going to bed.
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