Road Trip

So Swell and I just got back from our very quick, very spontaneous road trip. I was doing what I do best, nothing, when I saw an itinerary on the internet for a meeting occurring a mere 464 miles from our home. The first order of business on this itinerary was a presentation by a particular man. When I saw that this man was part of this meeting I said: "Swell. We've got to go to Tampa."

Swell: "Why in the world would we go to Tampa?"

Me: "I've got to see a man, about a thing."

With that she said, "Let's go."

Plans were made. Plans being we'll leave on Saturday after work get there in time to see the man about the thing and then come home on Monday. Plans did not include finding a place to stay. That would be too much planning.

On Saturday I was busy at work. The busiest I've been in years. No lies. Upon leaving I looked at one of the opticians (who used to work with me at my old job) and said, "that was worse than DVW" which is saying a lot.

A whole lot.

I saw my 30 patients and by 7:30 we were on our way to Tampa.

Long story short we were in bed by 4 am after searching for a reasonably priced hotel nearish to where the man was going to be.

I was up at 7 and out the door by 7:45.

I sat nearby the meeting and when I heard the applause indicating that the man was done speaking I stood near the door.

Upon seeing him I did what any sane person would do.

I said: "Dr. Man, I drove from Atlanta last night to give you this." and I handed him my CV/resume.

And that my friends is the way one gets noticed.

He was slightly taken aback and spent the next 10 minutes or so talking to me before he had to run to the airport to catch his flight to...


...Atlanta.

Goshdarnit.

The rest of Sunday was spent sleeping, visiting with some others who were in Tampa for the meeting and then going out with Swell for one of the best dinners we've ever had.

Swell asked the front desk person at the hotel what was nearby in terms of a good place to eat. We could have stayed for the meeting's dinner but since we had already stolen lunch from them as well as snacks we didn't feel it in our best interest to steal a $60 pp dinner although we easily could have...

...and were encouraged to.

We just wanted to go out on our own.

The front desk lady directed us to go from Tampa (nearish to the airport) to a town called Clearwater where we ate at the Island Way Grill. It was really good.

We started with an appetizer called Frankie's Tuna roll which is a sushi-like dish that was fantastic. Per the menu it is "TUNA, CREAM CHEESE, GOBO, ASPARAGUS, AND CRAB, BATTERED AND TEMPURA FRIED". It was out of this world.

Then we were, much to our surprise, given very large salads with Rice Wine Vinaigrette. This, too was fantastic.

Then for our main courses we had Szechwan Pepper Crusted Tuna. Which was recommended by the waiter to be prepared raw. It was served with wasabi mashed potatoes and sauteed Asian greens. We also got Macadamia Nut Crusted Mahi Mahi. It, too, came with the wasabi mashed potatoes. Notice I said "we got" because we shared each. I ate half of the tuna while Swell ate half of the Mahi-Mahi and then we switched. Portions were huge. Too big. We couldn't finish either.

It was a nice night. We were sitting near the water (although it was just a marina it was nice) on a large patio. It was nice to get away from Atlanta. We decided we have to do it more often.

Then funny thing about being in Tampa - funnier than driving all the way there just to give someone my resume - was that I felt a strange twinge of guilt.

You know that feeling you get when you pass near or through a city where you know someone and you feel like you should at least give them a call to say "Hi"? Well we "know" someone who lives in Tampa and thought about looking them up on Monday morning but didn't. So as we left town on a disappointingly rainy Monday we felt a small twinge of guilt for not at least dropping some cookies off at this person's work place.

What's funny about this?

We've never met this person in real life.

We only know of them via the internet.

Yet we felt like we should say "Hi" because we were in the area.

That really would have taken my stalking to a whole new level. Pounce on someone unannounced as they leave a meeting just to hand them a resume and then show up at a person's work cookies in hand that we've never really met.

Maybe its good that we didn't.

Livid

So my column was put online yesterday. I still haven't received my hard copy. If the online version is the same as the published version I am livid.

It is not what I wrote. I never agreed to have my name associated with this version. It has blatant errors in it! I will soon see if the published one is the same as the online one.

See the online one here

My version is below:

A Mission for Vision

Teaching or training optometry to those less fortunate has a far greater impact than providing direct care.

Sheepie O.D., M.P.H., Atlanta, Ga.

A look of sheer terror crossed my wife Swell’s face, as we heard the unmistakable sound of gunfire nearby. As all five passengers in the dilapidated van ducked for cover, I couldn’t help but think, “What have I gotten us into?”
Swell (also an optometrist) and I were returning to our flat in the beautiful, mountainous Palestinian city of Nablus after a full day of orientation meetings at An-Najah National University in the West Bank.

Vision camp flashback
In the few moments between hearing the gunfire and regaining my composure, I flashed back to my first trip to the occupied territories. It was the summer of 1999 and I had just finished my first year of optometry school.
I was in Palestine to provide eye care to the local population as a part of the Pacific University College of Optometry Amigos EyeCare group. Despite having made advance contact with our Palestinian hosts, once we arrived in the Gaza strip, local government officials told us our services were not welcome. These officials said the Palestinian people would find ways to take care of their own vision needs. After some pleading from our team leaders and our local hosts, however, the government officials relented, permitting us to provide care to a population they would select: grade-school children.

For the remainder of our trip, however, the statement, “the Palestinian people would find ways to take care of their own vision needs,” reverberated in my mind. Yes, our camp was able to treat many individuals, but we did nothing to create an infrastructure or human resources. I, therefore, felt the impact we made was temporary at best. After all, once we departed, so did the community’s opportunity for eye care.

The right to sight
Earlier in 1999, the World Health Organization (WHO), the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) and other organizations concerned with global blindness, such as the International Council of Ophthalmology (ICO) developed VISION 2020: The Right to Sight. This global initiative calls for local human resource and infrastructure development in developing countries to combat preventable blindness by the year 2020.
Because of my concern regarding the long-term benefit and sustainability of care that came from my vision-camp experience, I was eager to put the principles of VISION 2020 into action in Palestine. So, when I discovered that An-Najah University was seeking foreign O.D.s to teach optometry, I convinced my wife to join me in Palestine for the spring 2007 semester.

A yearn to learn
Swell and I spent 16 weeks teaching various optometric courses, and we were thrilled with our bright young students. They earn their Bachelor of Science degree in Optometry while taking all classes in English. Due to procurement difficulties the entire faculty was without optometric equipment until just before our arrival yet the students were well prepared to pick up the equipment and begin to fine tune their finger skills. Despite a lack of previous teaching experience, we found teaching optometry came very easily. We were, after all, simply teaching what we do and see as clinical optometrists.
The program at An-Najah will produce optometrists skilled in all aspects of vision care including “medical optometry.” In May 2008, the first graduating class of Palestinian optometrists will receive their degrees. This will enable them to meet the vision-care needs of Palestinians for many years to come through constant direct service as a result of their optometric education and by acting as optometric educators.
The gunshots we heard on our first day turned out to come from a young policeman firing his rifle into the air. Perhaps he was acting as our unofficial welcome wagon, thanking us for trying to leave a lasting impact on the visual health needs of the Palestinian people. OM


If you're really in a reading mood you can Read this as well

The weekend is coming

Swell's Mum arrives for a visit early tomorrow morning. Sometime around 6 am we need to be at the airport to pick her up, then its off to our respective places of business. She will leave bright and early Tuesday morning - I think.

Swell faxed a contract and a payment to the consulting company I wrote about earlier. That means we're on our way to moving - somewhere - and owning a practice.

We're very excited. Although I'm hesitant to get terribly excited because there are other things we want to be able to do that could take a back seat with the stresses and demands of being business owners.

I'm a professional author... officially.

My column will be published in Optometric Management this month's issue (i.e. it is in the mail now). I will be paid for its inclusion in the journal.

My collaboration article is in November's issue of Clinical and Experimental Optometry which will be out soon. (I've seen the final version as it will appear in the Journal. Very exciting.)

My written all by lonesome article has passed one of two reviewers' second review but I have not yet heard back from the second second reviewer.

I am working on analyzing some silly data that we collected while in Nablus that Swell and I will turn into a paper soon after.

Upon receipt of the contract for my Optometric Management column I was reminded that they are always looking for "good" writers. I suggested a series of articles that I would write that would track our opening of our practice. Discussions on choosing a location. Choosing whether to buy or open cold. Decisions on what insurance to take, etc. The idea is being passed along so I may have some more writing to do. I'm already doing a very silly version of those articles on a secret blog that you're not allowed to see so it would just be taking those ideas and making them more serious and thoughtful. Fun to think that I may be able to write some serious public health things and then some more generic optometry things.

Things are really good around here. We spent a small fortune getting some paintings framed. They turned out awesome. We've framed 5 paintings (Two from Egypt, two from Moldova, and one from South Africa). A sixth (from South Africa) was simply stretched onto a frame.

The Moldova ones (which were sitting in a book for 7 years) are my favourite although the others look really, really good as well.

Sorry so boring but we really haven't been up to much lately. I think we're going to head down to Florida next weekend for Sunday as we want to get away for a bit and there are some folks we wouldn't mind saying "hi" to. I also want to give a small gift to the outgoing president of the main optometry group that provides volunteer services in developing countries. They are having their annual meeting a week from Sunday in Florida (we went last year). I want to give her a gift for being such an understanding and kind person despite the recent "attacks" on her organization's methods.

Thats it. More later.

I can't believe I get paid.

Today was, as was last Wednesday, my easy and guilty day.

I got paid - well - to see one patient. The rest of the day I just sat around doing nothing.

Nothing.

This particular practice depends upon insurance to draw patients in. I am in the process of being credentialed on the main insurances they take.

In the process means I am unable to see many of the patients as we wouldn't be reimbursed by their insurance company. So I sit.

And do nothing.

And get paid.

I feel quite guilty but they could have phoned and said: "Don't come in" but they didn't. So I did.

I am keeping up relatively well with my workouts.

I am following a training guide and do quite well with it. I didn't do my long run last Sunday so I'm repeating that week. Yesterday I upped my pace from the sloth-enly pace of 10:30 minutes/mile to the slightly more swift 10:00 min/mile and it actually felt better.

I missed last Sunday's long run because I was cooking with Swell.

We attend a bible study (Financial Peace by Dave Ramsey) immediately following church on Sundays. Church starts at 5:30pm and our bible study (not really at all a study of the bible...) ends at around 9:00 pm. This doesn't bode well for people's consumption of supper so one couple or two singles bring food for the group each week.

This week was our turn. Swell bristled at my suggestion of fruit roll-ups, chips, and doughnuts. She wanted to impress people (real Christianly, no?). So on Sunday, we cooked.

Swell We decided on chiftele, potato salad, tomato/cucumber/feta cheese salad, bread and confetti squares for desert.

Chiftele is a typical Romanian dish.

Meat mixed with more meat with a dash of meat for good measure.

Sunday morning found us at the local Farmer's market (Your Dekalb Farmer's Market - Mine? I didn't even ask for it!) buying ground beef (3 pounds), ground turkey (1 pound) and ground pork (1 pound).

I told you it was meaty.

In addition to these meats (of which we used all the turkey, pork and 2.5 pounds of the beef) mashed potatoes were added along with egg, seasonings, and bread crumbs.

The meats were mixed expertly by your's truly made into balls squished into patties and then fried.

I did a fantabulous job on the meat and meat by-products while Swell made the potato salad.

As a former vegetarian I was simultaneously revolted and intrigued.

Despite a late start to bible study and another couple bringing a dish (poor communication in our group - our leader wasn't there this week [it's a video series] and he neglected to inform them that we had volunteered to bring the meal this week) oh well.

They were sufficiently impressed and Swell beamed appropriately.

ASIDE:

For goodness sake if someone doesn't tell this ignorant hick family to stop yelling at each other sometime soon I may have to scream. Furthermore if the mother doesn't stop telling her kid he's wrong about why we celebrate Thanksgiving by telling him that it is the day the Mayflower landed I'll go over there take their youngest, screamingist child and beat them each with her.

/ASIDE

It was declared that we made the best meal yet and that we should just be left in charge of the food.

Now if Swell would only cook for me.

Tomorrow is my day off. Swell works. I don't. Life is good. Thanks for asking.

We haven't updated in a few days. Not because we don't love you, simply because we have nothing to say.

Nothing ground breaking to talk about.

Nothing exciting going on in our lives.

We're just existing.

Working.

Sleeping.

Dying a little on the inside every day.

Our time in Atlanta has to come to a close sooner, rather than later.

JDL and The Good One can testify to this. They are the ones who, if they were paying attention (unlikely), saw Swell crying up a storm on the shuttle from our hotel in Vegas to the airport.

She's tired of being alone in the big city.

Tired of missing out on all the good things life has to offer.

Decatur is great. Our condo is great but 3000 miles away from closest family is not. We can't leave Atlanta without new jobs in our new city. Even with new jobs we will be taking up to a 30% pay cut just by leaving the Southeast and heading to the Pacific Northwest. That is not something we can take lightly. An excess of optometrists leads to low wages. Three new optometry schools being opened in the next 5 years will drive wages down even further. While those that know me know that I'm not a money kind of guy I do have 6 figure student loans to pay back and I can't do that making minimum wage. We'll have to find something with guaranteed cash flow in a city with a relatively low cost of living. We'll see.

I'm on my Saturday lunch break again. Had 13 patient encounters in my three before lunch hours. Will have an equally busy afternoon and I'll then be exhausted until tomorrow. Swell must be busy selling glasses (She rarely sees patients but is expected to work the floor when not busy *roll eyes* as I've haven't heard from her all morning.)

I joined the American Public Health Association and they send me a monthly Journal with public health articles in them. The first one I read was quite interesting. It outlined the history of the availability of birth control through insurances.

Basically saying that through the history of birth control very few insurance companies are/were willing to pay for contraception despite the obvious cost savings they would have if women were able to plan their pregnancies.

This lack of coverage regained attention with the development of Viagra as it was quickly put on most insurance companies' covered drugs whereas many still refuse to cover contraception.

A strange contradiction. But to me shows the importance that western society places on Women's health, which is...

...it doesn't.

Today is my easy day.

Today is, therefore, also my guilty day.

It’s 9:30 am as I type this.

I’m at work.

My first patient is at 3:00 pm.

Easy and guilty.

So needless to say we’re back. We had a great time in Vegas which is always surprising to me as we don’t drink. At all. And we gamble very little. (Does throwing $20 in the penny slots constitute gambling?)

Vegas is a good time to people watch, see the sights, and eat too much. It was nice to have some visitors from Edmonton come down and spend some time with us. It was somewhat nice to be at an optometry conference although most of our education was dull. Swell was very keen on collecting free things from the vendors displaying their wares. She didn’t care if it was a pen, a balloon, a bag, or a piece of paper. If it was free it was snatched up by Swell.

Most of it will find its way to Romania.

It will cost more to mail it then it did to manufacture it.

The most exciting part of our trip was when I nearly won $30,000. One of the vendors at the show was giving away a two year lease on a Lexus Hybrid or $30,000. Knowing that money is far superior to a Lexus I would have chosen the money. They were giving away the car/money through a basic raffle.

They collected raffle cards every day. At the end of every day they drew 10 names. Those 10 people would be in the running for the car/money. You had to be present at the time of the drawing to win/get entered in the finals.

Day 1- We were unaware of the raffle and did not enter
Day 2 – We entered but did not have our names drawn
Day 3 – Swell didn’t want to hang out until the time of the drawing. She just wanted to leave. I insisted. Lo and behold my name was drawn. I was in the Semi-finals!

I now had a 1 in 30 chance of winning $30,000…

They actually changed the rules slightly and said they would now draw five names out of the 30 (actually 28 as 2 people didn’t show for the final drawing!?) and those five would have the chance to win the car/money.

My name was not drawn to be a member of the finals.

So I missed out on the money. Boo hoo.

While in Vegas we also went and saw Matsuri which is a great Japanese acrobatic/gymnastic/dance show. It was a lot of fun.

Other than that we wandered, laughed at people and ate too much food.

Swell and I also made an appointment to speak with a consulting group who will help us find a location to open a practice and give us business insight that we don’t currently have.

Very expensive but will be worthwhile. We will pay them a small amount in the next month or so and that will get us advice on where and how to open/buy a practice. When we buy or come closer to buying a practice we will fly down to their headquarters and go through business boot camp, we will then open and they will provide 6 months of support.

We’re both excited about this program as neither of us have any business skills and that was causing some concern when it came to working for ourselves.


Tomorrow, Thursday, October 11 is World Sight Day.

314 million people in the world are estimated to be visually impaired – with 45 million of them blind. 153 million are visually impaired due to uncorrected distance refractive error (need for glasses to see in the distance) and millions more are affected by uncorrected presbyopia (need for reading glasses). Optometry Giving Sight is an organization that collects money to be used to deliver eye care services and develop human resources and infrastructure.

Imagine going through life with decreased vision simply because you have no access to eye care and/or spectacles.

Consider helping to eliminate avoidable blindness/visual impairment by supporting Optometry Giving Sight on World Sight Day!

How can it be?

2 hour delay of a red eye flight + waiting for luggage + having to take the train home + having to be at work by 10 am + only 3 hours of airplane sleep over the past 36 hours = me being very tired.

Sooo tired.

Tired.

On to more important things. How can it be October already? On top of that How can it be Thanksgiving already?

I don't know but it is so...

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving!!!

I guess we'll make it a tradition...

It is Saturday. Obviously.

I am on my lunch break.

I am tired.

So tired.

Busyish morning. 8 exams and 1 follow up.

Busy afternoon coming up in a mere 30 minutes or so.

Swell must also be busy as she hasn't called/texted me back.

Swell has some good stories to tell but she isn't keen on telling them to you. They involve her being patronized, abused, and all around taken advantage of. Basically stories of being a young woman optometrist.

We've been attending church again. We hadn't gone in about a year (due in large part to living in a predominantly Islamic country).

Its been good. One thing I like about Veritas church is that they are socially aware and somewhat socially active. They will once again collect food for the food bank by going door to door in their communities. (We did our entire condo unit a couple of years ago and got a lot of food but will be away during this year's drive). They are also trying to become active in "Not for Sale" an anti-human trafficking group. Atlanta is the leading city in the US for human trafficking. Not a great distinction.

Swell and I are going to go to a movie tonight called Trade as a percentage of the first week's box office receipts will go to some groups involved in ending human trafficking. We were encouraged to go by the pastor of the church so we'll follow his suggestion. The movie only has a limited release this week so it may not be showing in your town.

In addition to being socially aware they are a young church (both the church and the members) and seem to want to do more than just preach at people. They want to help people.

We've been attending a financial "bible study" after church. Little bothers me more than a group of Christians getting together and talking about money. I know that we aren't the best with our money and that we could do more. We try to give a lot away between World Vision, Swell's family, Medical Teams International and our church but we don't do as much as we should/could.

But when the premise of the study is the building of wealth I just get irked a little. While there is nothing wrong with money the very first lesson in any Xian bible study, as far as I'm concerned, should be to consume less. To spend less. To be concerned about how our money is spent and where it goes. Instead the lessons are simply don't go into debt, rather save for the things you want. As Xians we should be called to watch our wants carefully. I'm very bad at this. I have too much. I should feel guilty about all the things that I have. I don't need it all. We should be encouraged to sacrifice multiple TVs. Multiple cars.

We should question the need of a bigger house when we really have very big houses to begin with.

Anyway. We'll keep going as we need to learn about investments, etc. But I'll fume a little bit every session.

Well its almost time to go back to work.

*sigh.

Happy Ameriversary!

So 20 years ago today Swell, her Mum and her Dad fled communism in Romania and wound up in Vancouver, Washington.

I, for one, appreciate their moving to the US.

So to them a Happy 20th Ameriversary.



And to my parents a Happy "some number that I have no idea what it is" Anniversary - tomorrow (?).

Dude...

To the dude in the red shirt and the blue shorts working out in the gym today.

Look dude, you're going to hurt yourself.

Calm down.

Lift less weight.

It does you no good to have to use such poor form to lift weights for 15 minutes.

You're going to give yourself a hernia. I will laugh when I discover you writhing in pain in the gym.


Open invitation: Party in Vegas from October 3 to the 7th. All are welcome!

You know what really grinds my gears?

To steal a phrase from the infamous Peter Griffin - you know what really grinds my gears?

Yes this will be a rambling self-involved post of little to no interest for those who are not, well, me.

I'm sitting here on my "lunch" break.

At the mall - yes, much like CWH, this grinds my gears but isn't the reason for this post - at Panera using their internet.

One thing that grinds my gears is that I'm sitting at Panera at "lunch" and it is only 1:00. Remember a previous post that indicated my start time? I start work at 10 am and end at 7. Why the heck is my lunch 3 hours after I start? Furthermore, why in the world do I have to work for 5 hours after lunch. My preference, not that anyone cares, is to work more hours before lunch and fewer after lunch. I hate going back to work after lunch.

Its like when I was in track. I hated the rest lap between intervals. It made the start of the next interval more difficult.

Its also like going to a show. I hated the part of the set where the band felt it necessary to talk and then play slow songs. It made me so tired that when they played fast songs again I couldn't "dance" anymore.

I guess I should count it lucky that I get lunch. At DVW it was a 10 hour work day with NO lunch. Insert roll eyes here.

It also grinds my gears that this morning I only saw 5 exams and an office visit and this afternoon I have a million people scheduled. Some of the times I have three scheduled for the same time. Sure some probably won't show but I prefer a perfectly symmetrical schedule. We as optometrists are too concerned, probably due to the levels of competition out there, that people won't come see us if we don't bend to their every fancy. We, therefore, ask "when do you want to come in?" rather than saying "we can see you at this time".

So this afternoon I'll be running around like the proverbial chicken with its head cut off - which is really quite the sight, not me, the chicken. I encourage everyone to see, at least once in their life, a chicken with its head cut off. At least it will make the afternoon go quickly.

My gears were further ground by the fact that yet again I needed to refer someone out of the office for something stupid. When you work the types of jobs I do the type of equipment at your disposal is very limited. I saw a fine chap for an exam this morning and between the looks of his optic nerve heads and his results on a very rudimentary visual field test I was slightly concerned that he might have glaucoma.

Now note I said slightly concerned. When you don't have equipment on hand and you are slightly concerned about something a great debate begins. Do I really want to refer this person out of the office for something that will probably be ok? If I had the equipment it would be so easy just to say we need to run these tests. Now it is explain the problem, explain the tests, explain why I think its important for them to go. Hope that they go, hope that the doctor sends a note back, hope that the doctor doesn't think me a fool for being even slightly concerned.

Oh well. I figure if you're having the debate you might as well send the patient out.

It will be nice to work at a practice that has at least some basic "non-prescription finding" equipment at my disposal. It will be even nicer if I could get paid to use it (that is an insurance rant that you Canadians just wouldn't understand).

My gears are still being ground by the fact that the Canadian dollar is nearly on par with the US dollar. I paid much of my optometry school tuition in Canadian dollars while the Canadian dollar was at record lows. When I started school it was at about 63 cents on the dollar. For my four years of school it ranged from 63 to 68 cents. So every dollar I borrowed I was only getting 60 some cents of goods and services.

I figured by staying in the US and earning US dollars paying back the Canadian loans wouldn't be a big deal. For every dollar I earned I would be able to pay back $1.54.

Wrong.

For every dollar I earn now I can pay $1 back. Do the math. I'm losing my shirt.

I blame Bush whether its his fault or not.

I should mention what I got for my birthday because some of you are curious.

I haven't actually spent my birthday money (received from my parents and parents-in-law) but the plan is to buy Corner Gas Season 4 (season one will soon be shown on TBS for those in the US who want to see what its all about - check your local listings) and a better zoom lens for my camera.

After I buy said lens I'll have a cheaper version of the lens for sale to anyone interested in a Canon compatible 70-300 mm lens with macro. Will sell cheap.

Oh! One last piece of sad news. The chairs that have been in my family for over 30 years are no longer members of our family. I asked a million times, a million people in the family if they wanted them and nobody jumped at the opportunity. Our place is far too small for 6 dining room chairs and a dining room table so we got rid of them. They are now for sale at a Goodwill somewhere in the greater Atlanta area.

Long live the chairs.

Odds and Ends, Bits and Pieces

This post will be very uninteresting, unless you know us and want to know the mundane details of our lives. If you know us a little and are looking for excitement you'll have to go elsewhere. Ever since our return to the US our lives have become more and more normal.

No more gunshots. No more snow days. No more feeling proud-but-not-in-an-obnoxious-way of what we were accomplishing - or not accomplishing.

Normalcy has returned.

I'm not taking it well.

Our days consist of some combination of the following.

Wake up to the shrill sound of the alarm.
Drive to work.
Work.
Drive home.
Realize that its 8pm and we don't feel like cooking.
Go out.
Come home.
Go to sleep.

It isn't an exciting life but it is our lives now. We work really crappy hours. Most days we start at 10 and work until 7. Not really banker's hours are they.

In some ways the late start and late finish are good. It does decrease the amount of traffic that we need to deal with. Traffic is still a nightmare but it isn't as bad as it could be.

We were out for a walk the other night. I don't remember why we were out for a walk but we were out for a walk. We walked by the store front that used to contain our Cold Stone Creamery. Note the use of the words used to contain. At some point during our time away they closed our Cold Stone and tore out all the ice cream goodness. It is being replaced by a jewelry store.

Oh the humanity! We were bitterly disappointed. No longer can we walk for 2 minutes and get our fill of yummy ice cream. They closed the store! We only had the desire for Cold Stone maybe once or twice a year. Perhaps thats why they closed down.

We don't like change. It was a sad day.

Other changes in our neighbourhood have been good. They finally finished the construction on Decatur Square and it is once again a big and lively place. They had a book festival on the square a few weeks ago and it was nice to see people sitting on the square again.

Some more bad changes were the loss of our Indian store beneath our condos and its replacement by Verizon Wireless. We went from being able to buy goods made in India by Indians to being able to buy cell phones. How often does one need a cell phone? Besides, we don't even use Verizon. Very disappointing.

When we were considering buying our place the store fronts had yet to be sold. We were promised a variety of restaurants and other hip and happening things. The reality (from right to left) is:
A cigar store (often very stinky)
A real estate agency (Morris and Raper Intown. RAPER!!!)
An overpriced hair salon (called Oh. La La. Note the spelling. I'm sure they meant Oooh La La.)
Verizon Wireless (as mentioned above)
A Mortgage company (A MORTGAGE COMPANY! What kind of mortgage company wants their offices in a store front?)
A nail salon. (Viet Tradition Nails or Viet Traditional Nails depending on which sign you read.)

We won the lottery on those businesses. Very disappointing.

So being back in Atlanta and dealing with newly mundane lives we've set out some goals.

Most are mine because Swell is perfect.

1 Year - 2 years.
Buy an optometry practice for Swell somewhere not in Southeast USA
Find me a public health type job not in Southeast USA

1 Year
Fix my bus (Body work, paint, interior, windows)
Me: Collect enough points to take my oral exam for Fellowship.

6 months
Start saving for retirement
Have enough money to go to Romania this summer
Me: Lose 30 pounds via exercise (I've started this already and have gotten to the stage where I feel guilty if I don't exercise - which is good), eating better (not going very well considering I'm sitting in Panera right now), and so on.

4 months
Me: Write two more papers and submit them for publication
Write a presentation for a conference in London taking place in April

Pretty boring goals. Hopefully within the next year or so we can finally decide where we want to live and what we want to do.

We'll see.

For now we're looking forward to going to Vegas, although some people still owe us A LOT of money for this trip and they seem to be ducking us every day. Enjoy sleeping on the street unnamed people.

He's Already a Disaster

So my 4:15pm patient and his mother show up at around 4:45pm today. I wasn't terribly bothered because it wasn't a full exam, I had a slow afternoon, and the mother screamed as she walked in the door: "We're late. Sorry. We completely forgot about the appointment and then when we remembered we rushed right over."

I took them back to the exam room and said: "So wuz up?" Nah. I really said "What can I do for you today?" As the kid had just had an exam a couple of months ago.

(Earlier in the day I came this close to saying: "Come back after you see your retinitis pigmentosa dude." but caught myself just in time and said, "come back after you see your retinitis pigmentosa duuu..doctor." Now for all of the optometrists who might read this don't roll your eyes at me. I don't know why she sees an RP dude. She just does. I'm not gonna steal patients.)

Anyway back to the kid.

I sit in my chair face the kid and ask "What can I do for you today." All of a sudden I hear a whirlwind of chatter from behind my back as the mother speaks a mile a minute about his eyes this and his contact lenses that. This kid is like 15 and Mum didn't even let him have a chance to answer. So she talks and talks. When she finishes I turn back to the kid and say, "So Jim (not his real name) what do you have to say?"

I hate it when the "guest" in the exam room talks for the patient. It bothers me so much.

Anyway it turns out that his contact lenses feel dry... or he has a tick from his ADHD... or its from his medicine for his ADHD because they just upped his meds. This started the first of many arguments between patient and Mum. He tells me that he has no idea what she is talking about. That his lenses are fine. That she made his physician up his meds and that they make him feel weird and so on and so forth.

Mum yells at patient that he just started his new meds a few days ago. He yells back. I sit and stare at my chart.

I end up changing his contact lenses because, in my humble opinion, he was in crappy contact lenses. We go back to the room so I can look at them as the patient complains that the lenses feel terrible.

He then proceeds to say that there was nothing wrong with his old lenses to which Mum yells then why were you rubbing your eyes so much, blinking so much, why did your teachers complain so much. And so on and so forth.

They continue to yell at each other while I look dumbly at the chart. Eventually they tire out and I ask the kid "Now that we've had a chance to talk about other things how do the lenses feel?"

Kid: "Oh. They actually feel very good. Much better than the other ones."

They argue some more.

Then Mum turns to me and says: "He just started his freshman year (Grade 9 for you Canadians)and they've only been in school for four weeks and he is already a disaster."

My heart breaks for the kid. His mum just called him a disaster. He is obviously socially awkward. I am sure that school isn't much fun for him. He probably has a few friends and they try to hide their days away in high school and here she is calling him a disaster.

What can you say? I just said, "You're not a disaster. I think these contact lenses will work much better for you."

What goes through parent's minds? Calling your kid a disaster! So sad.

Miserable day made better by...

So today was kind of a miserable day. One of those days made miserable simply because it was miserable. Nothing specific to make the day miserable other than the sun rising in the morning.

I took yet another extra day of work this week making my week go from 1 day of work to 4 days of work overnight. This is very good as, again, we need the money and I shouldn't be lazing around so much.

So today was the first of two days at a new place of work. I signed up with a company that provides "fill-in" optometric services. That means that if you own/lease a practice and need/want time off but don't want to close down the exam side of your practice you can phone this company and request fill-in coverage.

The company then phones optometrists on their list hoping that someone is available to fill-in.

Turns out someone had very last minute needs due to a death in the family and I was available. So lo and behold I worked today and will work tomorrow a few miles from where Swell worked today and will work tomorrow. Very convenient for us.

I wasn't entirely impressed with the location I was at today. Just wasn't a great place to be. I'll admit that when it comes to seeing patients I am lazy. Well, that isn't entirely true. If the book is fully scheduled when I get there I'm fine. Its when the book is empty (today had 4 people scheduled) and the day ends up being relatively busy that I get kind of angry.

I was told this am that it wasn't going to be busy and that they rarely get walkins. A 10 person day isn't that busy but when 6 of them are walk ins that you were promised wouldn't come...

It is also somewhat difficult to work at a new place and learn new forms. Learn what kind of contact lenses they have. Try to fit your practice style with the practice's rules and regulations. Learn where things are, etc.

It makes for a harder day than it needs to be.

Tomorrow I'll be in the same place and I have 9 patients scheduled.

7 of them before noon...

I start at 10.

Yippee!

To fill you in on some other goings on in our lives. I received the expected email back from Australia. I was disappointed but it was expected.

"Our client (the job was posted through a recruiting company)is looking for someone with more experience." The recruiter did say that my CV was well written. I think she said it like you would say; "Beautiful colouring!" to a two year old with a box of crayons and a completely green picture of the sweet baby Jesus lying in a manger.

We have yet to meet with a financial planner. I've left that in Swell's hands... I'll take over when I'm done my paper.

We are going to have our picture published in the upcoming issue of Pacific University's Alumni magazine. They tracked us down on Myspace (N. is a friend of the Pacific Boxer's myspace page) and said their next issue was going to be about Pacific Alumni out in the world. They asked for pictures with international flair. It will either be a picture of me, Swell and Moses in front of a pyramid in Egypt or a picture of Swell on a camel in Jericho. They were going to choose whichever one fit their magazine better. We'll be famous!

So my miserable day was made better how? Well after work we went to a nearby mall for dinner as if we were to leave immediately following work we would be in traffic for 60-90 minutes.

We live 10 miles away.

We decided that our time would be better spent getting something to eat and of course looking for things to send to Romania.

Well at this mall, and I don't mean to be crude, Swell and I saw some sights.

Now most of you know that I am as far from a mall person as they come. I hate the mall. I hate what it stands for and I hate the people that go to malls.

This mall is actually where I work at Lenscrafters a few days a week. (Only on Saturday this week). And it is a young people, see and be seen mall. (Usher was there today. Who is Usher?


No, I'm asking you. Who is Usher? Well he was at Macy's for an event promoting his new perfume/cologne. Apparently Usher requires 10 armed policemen where ever he goes.)

Usher isn't the point. When we walked into the mall we headed directly for the down escalator. We were going down and Breasty McBreasts Alot was coming up.

Ladies. If you are well endowed there is no reason to buy a bra that shoves your ginormous breasts toward the heavens. If you choose to buy a bra that enables the heavenly hosts to get a better view please don't wear a scoop neck shirt.

If you choose to wear the bra that makes your breasts touch your ears while wearing a scoop neck shirt please don't go up the escalator while I go down the other side. You'll hurt my eyes.

No, not by what I see. You'll literally hurt my eyes as your gigantic breasts that have been pushed so far up your body that they somehow defy the very law of gravity slap me in the face as we go by each other.

As we saw this sight - one of the eight wonder (whys) of the world - Swell kept muttering: "Look away, look away" as if chanting a protective spell over our soon to be breast beaten bodies. Soon after passing this sight we made it to where we going to eat.

I see a second sight. A sight worse than the first. Here is a young woman her punkness shining so brightly that it was startling. It is fine with me if you want to have a lot of tattoos. Doesn't bother me. Fine also if you choose to have multiple piercings although having four below your bottom lip is slightly startling.

But the punk fashion should be approached with great caution. Try to avoid the scoop neck shirt with the push up bra that must be a few sizes too small.

If you choose to ignore this advice your endowment will be unprotected from the world and it will take on a shape that is not becoming. If your "lovely lady lumps" take on this sine wave shape due to your choice in attire and you are sitting at a low table leaning over flirting with the poor fool sitting across from you, you will look beyond silly. In fact it will look like you have bags under your eyes. Large, large bags. In addition you will not be able to see your plate of food.

You will starve.

But you will make a miserable day better because I can laugh at you.

One final word of advice.

LOOK IN A MIRROR!

Pictures from Swell

Swell wanted me to tell you about some pictures that she put up on the internet.

I told her to put up fewer pics but...

Crazy millions of pictures

Entertain You?

Entertain you? Entertain you? Entertain you?

No.

You heard me. No.

I will not entertain you. I will not entertain you because I'm tired, I'm busy and I'm not happy.

As I said earlier (if you were paying attention) I've been writing some papers and have been hit with some deadlines.

I wrote one which will be published very soon (next month?) and I was consistently emailing back and forth with the editor. It is a simple one page "story" about our time away. I never would have guessed a one page story would be so much work.

So. Much. Work.

I'll take a picture of the published paper when I receive it.

I've also been revising a paper I wrote while in Nablus. I think I wrote about getting the paper back with some comments calling for revisions. I was not surprised with the need to revise, however, I was surprised with how much work and time it would take to revise. The plan was to do it while I was sitting around bored in Romania but as you know my computer was dead and I was unable to work on it until recently.

I've spent hours and hours working on it over the last week or 10 days and have just sent it to a friend/colleague to read it over and give some feedback. While he has the paper I will be writing (as I've just learned from said friend/colleague) a long/detailed letter to the editor indicating what changes I've made to the paper (many) as well as nicely telling one of the reviewers to shove it on a couple of their suggestions.

I was to work on that today but Swell also had today off... when Swell has the day off we have to leave to buy things for people in Romania. So instead of working on said letter I went shopping.

I've also picked up two extra work days this week as we need the money and I was only going to work Saturday this week so my schedule has been changed yet again. I'm hoping that it won't be busy tomorrow as I'm working for Swell's boss and she's never busy but I'm working at a location that had the Optometrist had to leave for an emergency so it may be busy with his patients. We'll see. Hopefully I'll be paid to work on the paper.

That said. Entertain yourselves.

(I hope you know I'm just teasing Mr. or Ms. Anonymous. Thanks for reading.)

Another Day

Funny story. Well not funny, funny. Just funny.

Swell is sick.

Now before a select few of you go crazy and start to get real worried she is sick but she's not sick sick. Well she's sick, sick but not sick sick.

We got home yesterday she said "I'm sick. I think I should go in for treatment."

She phones treatment dude. He never phones back. We drive over there in the hope that he will get back to us while we were on the way. We get there he never phones back. She phones multiple times. She texts. She hopes. She cries.

He never gets back to her.

Just after midnight I hear her phone buzzing. I check. It is a text indicating that the treatment dude is in the midst of moving and had put his phone down while he was moving and never heard it/saw it/etc.

He felt terrible but Swell had to stick her HAE out like they do in deep, dark Africa.

She's on the mend but we find it funny that the only time she's decided to go for treatment without much encouragement it isn't available.

See its funny, but not funny, funny.

Where were we?

Yes, that’s right we were at the entrance to Universal Studios Orlando.

Me “Ma, you don’t need to show your ID for everyone’s tickets that doesn’t make any sense at all.”
Ma “Well when I printed the tickets at home it said that I, the purchaser, would be asked for my ID when we first used the tickets.”
Me “Why would they care about your ID for my ticket? So silly. You won’t need to show your ID.”
Guy at gate “Is this the first use of your 7 day ticket?”
Me “Yes.”
Guy at gate “I’ll need to see the ID of the person who purchased the tickets.”
Ma looking smug. “Here you go.”

Now I don’t care that they required my Ma to produce ID. What I do care is that they had to ask me for the ID when the rest of my family was using a different turnstile and not being asked for my Ma’s ID. Why do I care?

‘Cause my Ma was able to look smug at my expense.

Tears were shed.

Cheese standing on his tiptoes at the measuring sign. Note the blue change purse thingie gift from Loews hotel.


For some reason we lost our minds upon entering Universal Studios. Rather than avoid the crowd we just followed them. Our front of the line passes in hand we couldn’t be stopped.

We first joined the very short line for Shrek 4-D which everyone very much enjoyed. It’s always fun to go with someone who hasn’t seen it before. Their reactions are usually worth the price of admission. A very funny and fun show.

The only problem (and probably not something others think about) is that I have great difficulty fusing 3D movies. If the image is stable I can see depth quite well but once I start moving or the image moves it either becomes flat or double. It’s because I have a touch of convergence excess and really have to r-e-l-a-x to make the images jump out. I know I should relax. I know that deep breathing will help make the show more 3D but I just can’t do it while the show is going on. This causes headaches and a slight decrease in the enjoyment of the show. Still fun though.

After Shrek we crossed the street to go to Jimmy Neutron. We really enjoyed this ride last year and were looking forward to it this year. We so enjoyed it that:

Me to motion sick prone Ma “It’s not that bad Ma. I think you won’t have any problems on it. It is a lot of fun!”
Ma “Are you sure?”
Me “Sure. You’ll like it! Come on!”

Ride starts. Ma sitting next to me.

Me “Sorry.”
Ma Groan. Moan.

We enjoyed it more last year. It seemed that the chicken dance lasted longer last year but it was still fun and the boys enjoyed themselves.

We just kept making our way around the park and stopped at Twister. Now Cami was excessively nervous about this attraction. I’m not really sure why as he wasn’t alive during Edmonton’s “Black Friday” Tornado. His uncle, Jill, however, was and I will always have the image of him running around our basement screaming in fear. Funny now. Then? Not so much.

Cami was talked into going in and at the conclusion said: “That was ok. But I’m not doing it again!” Good enough.

Revenge of the Mummy was next. Cheese wasn’t tall enough to do this one. He knew he wasn’t tall enough. He was told he wasn’t tall enough many times long before the trip started. He was fine with not being tall enough until he was reminded he had to stay with Grandma while we went on the ride. He didn’t like that at all. This was the first time he couldn’t go on a ride with all of us (aside from Rock ‘n’ Roller coaster but his Ma sat out with him that time.) He cried. A little.

We left joined the express line and when I say line I really mean we joined the empty space as we walked past all the other poor saps in the stand by line. Right on to the ride with nary a break in stride. Great ride and everyone really enjoyed it.

As soon as we got out we couldn’t find G-Ma and Cheese. Where did they go? We all fanned out and searched. Eventually finding them in the arcade next to Revenge of the Mummy. Cheese was, apparently fine with not riding as soon as we left and they enjoyed their very few minutes waiting for us.

Just as we all regrouped the Blues Brothers were beginning their show. Not wanting to see said show most of us returned to the Mummy but Mustard, JDL and Cheese stayed behind to watch the show.

Next stop was to be Men in Black. We first stopped in at Finnegans as it is a tradition to have lunch there when visiting Universal Studios. We stopped to find out if they take reservations – they don’t – and check their hours. We decided to do Men in Black first and then head back for lunch.

On the way to MIB I think we stopped at Fear Factor Live as it was just starting. It is always an enjoyable show and with three young boys it is extra enjoyable.

We arrived at MIB walked the length of the express line only to stop and wait. And wait. And wait.

After 10 minutes or so the announcement that they were experiencing technical difficulties began. Not a big deal as we had FOTL. We left the line as there was no point waiting it out when we could just come back later and get to the front of the line quickly. That is one of the good things about FOTL. When you’re in a regular standby line you invest a lot of time into any given line. If the ride goes down you have a big decision to make. Do you risk investing more time or do you cut your losses – which can be quite large losses – and leave the line to head elsewhere. With FOTL the choice is simple. Leave. Come back later.

We did.

I think Earthquake was next. Cami was dead set against riding this one as he had enough of the natural disasters. He eventually decided to ride as his brothers were going to and I’m sure he didn’t want to be the only one too scared to ride.

We went through the enjoyable pre-show and ride and when it was all said and done Cami said: “That was fun. Way better than Twister.”

Lunch was next.

We stopped for a quick break so Jill could cheat on his girlfriend.


Sorry for the short update. I’m writing a couple of papers and have been hit with some deadlines. More soon.

Today

Happy Birthday Mustard! wherever you are.

Day 4 and 5

Rest Day

During the planning phase of our trip we decided that it would be prudent, in fact welcome, to have a day away from the parks. The plan was to have an easy day where everyone could sleep in. We could lounge by the pool, perhaps go mini-golfing, shopping, and end the day at dinner theater of some type.

By the time our rest day rolled around during our vacation everyone was quite anxious to relax but they still wanted to accomplish something, after all how often does one find their way to Orlando?

So we slept longer this day but we didn’t sleep too long. We had to head for Pirate’s Cove Mini-Golf.

Mini-golf for some of us is a time to prove our superiority to the rest of the family. Now it’s known that I am vastly superior to the family in every regard but it is an unspoken superiority. When mini-golf time rolls around the silence is broken and everyone is left gasping at the manifestation of my superiority. Today’s mini-golf would be no different.

Mini-golf is a funny thing because my brother, Jill, has grand delusions before every game that this could be his day to shine. It really never is.

We split into three groups. Played the “difficult” course at Pirate’s cove. Not because we were up for a challenge but rather because the nice young lady running the register mentioned that there were 200 fewer stairs on the difficult side.

Being Pearce’s slothfulness supersedes the desire for a challenge so had the easy course had moving sidewalks and a robot to putt for you we would have done the easy side. On this day, at this course the difficult side allowed for less expenditure of energy so we did the difficult side.

I was in a group with Swell, her Dad, and little Cheese. We had fun. I think everyone else did as well despite the ridiculous temperatures and their terrible mini-golf skills.

I was, of course the grand champion by tens of strokes and the family was reminded of my superiority in all things once again.

Following mini-golf it was time for SHOPPING!

There is very little I hate more than shopping. Shopping for souvenirs is one step worse than just regular shopping. Shopping for souvenirs in the discount stores is slightly worse than regular souvenir shopping. Shopping for souvenirs in the discount stores with 11 other people… Jesus take me home.

They shopped. I stewed. We were lucky enough to shop at multiple discount stores and just when everyone was done my brother, Jill, decided that it was a good time to FINALLY START LOOKING FOR SOMETHING FOR HIS GIRLFRIEND.

What did you do for the last 3 hours!!!!!

The only thing that made that afternoon worthwhile was lunch at Chick-Fil-A. Southwest Chicken Salad with Spicy dressing.

Manna from heaven.

We then made our way home to shower, change in time to go to Medieval times Dinner Theater.

On my last trip to Orlando I was lucky enough to experience Sleuth’s dinner theater which was quite fun (see earlier post) and the Pirate’s waste-of-time-and-money-please-don’t-make-me-do-it-again Dinner Extravaganza.

I had low hopes for Medieval Times.

It turned out to actually be quite fun although it is a little disconcerting to hear your young nephews shouting at the top of their lungs: “KILL HIM! KILL HIM! KILL HIM!”

I slept with one eye open the rest of the trip.

Medieval Times had something for everyone in my group.
Horses for my Pa, BBL, and “The Good One”
Action for the three boys, Cami, George and Cheese.
An easy to follow story – a necessity for my Mustard.
Meat for Swell’s dad (including the now infamous family joke - Bar-B-Que Spare Rib – note the lack of plural spare ribs. It was a grammatically correct menu, I’ll have you know.)
Dreamboat actors for my three sis’s BBL, JDL and the Good one
And little flags to wave around for Me, Jill and Swell. Fun, fun flags.

Our rest day concluded with a swim in the pool. And according to photo documentation recently uncovered this was actually the day I “fell” in the pool.

It was a great rest day all in all and I’m glad we took some time to do things away from the theme parks. I highly recommend a day to explore other tourist traps in Orlando if you get a chance.

Going Home To Universal Studios that is!

By now we had reached our 5th full day in Orlando and we would be transferring from our mansion of a house – which Ma had booked for the correct amount of days, starting on the correct day (I never doubted her…much) – to a great four star hotel.

I was excited. So excited.

I really don’t know why I was looking forward to Universal so much. Last year we spent two days at Universal and one at Disney and we seemed to just have a better time at Universal. We didn’t have a bad time at Disney but my Ma didn’t come that day but she did come to the Universal days. There are rides at Universal that we could all go on including motion sick Ma that aren’t really there at Disney.

We were also looking forward to Front of the Line passes from the hotel. This perk sounded cool but we hadn’t ever experienced it. Our last day at Universal last year was marred by out of control lines (school groups) and we spent much of our otherwise great day fighting off rowdy, line-cutting kids. The last four hours at Islands of Adventure last year was heaven when all the kids had gone and we had the park to ourselves. Front of the line sounded like those four hours being available all day.

We were not disappointed.

Arrival

We left the house quite early and hoped to get to the hotel, check-in – get our FOTL passes – and get to the parks before 9.

We arrived to the parking lot of the Portofino Bay in good time and found our way to the lobby without difficulty.

Swell and I booked the hotel so we were left in charge of checking in.

There was no wait at the front desk in the beautiful lobby. Our reservation was found without issue and they even remembered to give us adjoining rooms (two adjoining, the third room was down a floor).

No check in problems at all.

Except.

Now I think some of you may have figured this out by now.

I’m not the brightest guy in the world. To say I’m a little slow is a wonderful compliment and I thank you for your kind words.

The lovely woman at the front desk says: “So, who is in room 1?”

I respond: “Say whaaaat?”
Lovely woman: “I need the names and ages of the people who are staying in the room.”
Me: “Ummmm… sure.” I then list four names of the people in our party randomly.
Lovely woman: “Ok, and how about in room 2?”
Me: Randomly blurting out names half of which I’ve already said.
Lovely woman a little exasperated: “Are there two Cheeses in your party?”

By the time we got to the third room I didn’t know who I’d said, who I hadn’t and more importantly I actually couldn’t even remember everyone who was with us.

It was embarrassing…for Swell.
For me? Meh.
I knew I had a room key. The rest of the party? Meh.

My advice. If you’re checking in to a hotel in a large group have your room assignments written down in advance. Unless of course you’re smart and can do it off the top of your head.

We were given our 12 room keys along with 12 really cool little change purse thingies that you could hang around your neck.
They could hold your money.
Your tickets.
Your room key: AKA no line for me passes.
As well as the keys to your rental van. (Remember this one it will become important later!)

So much for our buying name badge holders on a retractable string. Everyone far preferred this free gift and wore it proudly for the next two days.

We were done checking in (one room ready the other two would be ready later) and headed immediately for the water taxi that would take us to Universal studios.

We were a little behind schedule but it was just after 9am and we would soon be in Universal Studios Orlando.

Out of my league but email sent...

"A high profile IAPB member has an opportunity for an exceptional Programme Development Manager..."











"...Based in Australia, the successful candidate will design and plan country programmes and individual projects that are internationally recognised as best practice."

Florida continued...

Our first three days in Orlando were Disney World days. Due to various events along the planning route of our trip we decided that it would be best if we did three Disney World days in a row followed by a rest day and then two Universal days. (Swell and I would add another three Universal days after everyone else left for home).

Our itinerary changed multiple times as well. We eventually – for a vast number of reasons – decided on doing three Disney Parks and doing them in this order:

Animal Kingdom
Magic Kingdom
Disney MGM Studios

So real briefly here are our Disney days.

I did just enough planning to kind of know that we should get to the parks early and that there were certain rides we should do in the am and then fastpass if we wanted to do them again.

Our plan for Animal Kingdom was not grand. We wanted to ride Expedition Everest (the three young boys were really looking forward to this – the eldest especially – after watching the Disney World trip planning DVD) and we wanted to do the Safari.

We were at the park at opening. We made it to Expedition Everest quickly and found a short standby line. While my Mum, who doesn’t do rides, got fastpasses the rest of the group rode EE and loved it. Well everyone loved it but me. You see I don’t have kids. I have nephews that I see once a year. Half way through the ride the ride did something and as it went through that motion (an intended motion) I couldn’t help but think, “Well Cheese just fell out.” Cheese is the youngest of the three boys and is just tall enough to ride EE. I know that it was an irrational thought that he fell out but it was a thought that flashed across my brain and it kind of took the fun away from the second half of the ride. Although the second time we did it I enjoyed it more. When we finished our second EE ride (having used our fastpasses a couple hours later) we received Year of a Million Dreams Ears which made everyone very happy. We even wore them for a while. I’d post pictures but I forgot the battery for my camera in Atlanta and, therefore, took no pictures. Ooops. Others took pictures but there is only so many pictures of a group of people standing around looking lost that you can post without becoming boring. I’ll save the boring pictures for later.

ETA: Pictures from Swell's camera added!







We saw Devine on the way to the Safari.

We also really liked the safari. It was great and we saw lots of animals. It had the same feel as the real safari Swell and I did in South Africa earlier this year. It was great to see people enjoying seeing the animals up close and personal.



Kali river rapids was fun but we did it only once as we knew we had a similar although superior ride to go on our universal days. We didn’t really get wet although it is a water ride. My sister really wanted to see the bird show. I was meh! But it turned out to be quite good and most importantly the boys really liked it. Nothing else really stands out in my memory on the Animal Kingdom day and we left around 4. That night Swell and I had to drive to the airport to pick up her Dad. With his arrival our group was complete.

Magic Kingdom day was a lot of fun. I wasn’t expecting much from this day as I had never been to the MK before but it was very enjoyable.



We rode all the popular rides multiple times and were impressed with them (Space mountain, splash mountain, etc.).



Saw the afternoon parade at which Cheese – who is unbelievably cute – was greeted by many, many characters. They would come up to him and rustle his hair, poke him, high five him, etc. They seemed to come to him more than other kids but I’m sure every family thinks that.



We particularly liked Big Thunder Mountain Railroad although we were only able to ride it once because it was down for part of the day (we were in line when it went down and they evacuated everyone from the line – we were grateful not to be stuck on the ride in the blistering heat). Many liked Buzz Lightyear, and we enjoyed riding a lot of the family/young kids rides like Snow White, Winnie the Pooh, etc. It was a good day. Cami loved Monster’s as he has a great sense of humour. He was in stitches and it was fun to hear him laugh so much. Stitch was fun as a one time only type thing. Poor George was a little scared I think because the shoulder harness didn’t come down on him the way it was supposed to (for those who don’t know the shoulder harness isn’t a protective device in this ride it simply adds to the – well it creates – sensory experience). A very hot day but the boys were great and we didn’t experience any meltdowns. We left in the early evening despite the park being open until 11 so that we could have an evening of swimming at home.

I don’t go in pools. Its not that I completely despise the concept of communal bathing (which is really what swimming is at its core) its just that I don’t swim. I took lessons as a kid but they didn’t stick. I started to take adult swimming lessons when I was in grade 12 but shortly after finishing a course I was in a pedestrian vs. motor vehicle accident.

I was the pedestrian.

This caused my left shoulder to have permanent nerve damage and muscle wastage. I have limited range of motion of my left arm. So if I was to swim I would only be able to manage swimming in a clockwise circle.

One of my life goals is to stand next to as many large bodies of water as possible without actually going in them.

Anyway the boys were super thrilled to be able to swim and seemed almost as excited or more excited to do that than go to parks. Nothing eventful happened during swimming except when I was watching the boys to ensure that if they were drowning I could explain precisely to the EMTs how they drown I “accidentally” fell in the pool (fully clothed of course) after taking my phone, wallet and keys out of my pocket and setting them on the table. I think the boys thought my “accident” was a hoot. ETA: actually looking at pictures it seems that this happened during our off day. Hmmmm... I'll leave the story here because I already typed it...and I'm lazy.



Disney MGM Studios days was great. We love the Tower of Terror (although Cheese looked terrified the first three times. I think he was about to cry after the first ride but when the rest of us were hooting and hollering about how fun it was he started to believe that what was probably to that point in his life the worst thing he’s ever experienced – and he’s had major surgery – was actually fun) and Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster (George just about didn’t ride this one. We were nearing the front of the line and he was certain he wasn’t going to do it so his Grandpa was going to take him out the chicken exit but just as we got to the front he said “I’m gonna do it!” and he did. No one prodded him or told him to do it or else. I think he just did it because Cami – his older brother – was going to and he didn’t want to be “behind” his brother in the ride count.) The boys enjoyed the playland, and the various shows (Backlot tour, Great Movie ride, Drew Carey, The stunt shows etc.) We stayed late this night to enjoy Fantasmic. There were some crummy things this day as well but we chose to ignore them (Rock ‘n’ Roller coaster went down when a few of us were trying to rush through the single riders line. We waited it out but had to send Swell’s Dad back down to the rest of the group to tell them to go and get their Fantasmic seats. A protein spill on Star Wars by another guest was also a negative. I didn’t experience that as I ride Star Tours once and only once at the very most and this occurred on the group’s second ride.) We also saw a lot of line cutting. Groups going into the single rider line only to join the standby line during the preshow. Anyway it was a very fun day and we were able to enjoy all of our favourites many, many times. (Thanks to an expertly planned trip – of course by me.)

Like I said I won’t go into a lot of detail on the Disney side of our trip because I was looking forward to Universal much more and the stories from Universal are better.

Next up rest day (how much shopping can one family do? and how I beat Jill senseless in mini-golf) and then moving from a great house to an even better hotel.

Most of you were there but...

On Saturday, August 11, 2007 the Hootenanny officially began. At 5:30 am Eastern Time Swell and Sheepie woke with great anticipation for the good times – and long drive – ahead. Around the same time 3:30 am Mountain Time the rest of the clan were on their way to the airport in Edmonton, Alberta.

The plan was for Swell and Sheepie to pick up a few remaining groceries (they already had a trunk full of non-perishables) in Orlando drop them off at the rental home and meet up with the rest of the group at Downtown Disney for shopping and dinner.

By 6:30 pm the whole group would be together and the fun would begin in earnest.

But before that, traveling would have to be done.

Swell and Sheepie left Atlanta around the scheduled time of 6:45 am. After a short drive it was already time to stop for a quick Chick-Fil-A breakfast. The drive was very uneventful and Pam-Pam (our GPS) guided us flawlessly. Traffic slowed dramatically near Arabi, Georgia – what kind of name is Arabi anyway?

We were dismayed to see the aftermath of what seemed to be a very serious single car accident. There was a pick-up truck straddling the central median with its roof completely pushed in from what appeared to be a multiple rollover accident. Having been in a car (1970 VW bus) that slid on its side down the highway after hitting a moose it always bothers me to see accidents. It always brings back bad memories. After making it by the accident (a tow truck was at that point pulling the truck of the median) we resumed to normal freeway speed and made it into Orlando with no further issues.

We weren’t able to access the rental house until 4pm and we arrived in Orlando at 1:30ish so we decided to go and do the remainder of our grocery shopping prior to heading to the house. We found a Costco via Pam-Pam’s vast memory and were soon on our way to the I-4 parking lot. Traffic was not moving… at all.

After about an hour we found the cause of the non-moving traffic. It appeared to by, yet again, a single car roll over accident. Again the car was on the center median and the tow truck was nearby getting ready to pull the car off the road. Strange coincidence.

Shopping done we headed back toward the house with our perishables quickly melting in the oppressive heat of Orlando. It was hot. Soooo hot.

We were listening intently to Pam-Pam for the route to “home”.

Pam-Pam Prepare to exit to the right.
Me OK
Pam-Pam Exit Freeway on the right… Now.
Me What!? There is no exit on the right! Pam-Pam what do I do?
Pam-Pam Recalculating route… exit on the right… now.
Me What!? There is still no exit. Am I supposed to drive through the grass? What are you telling me Pam-Pam?
Pam-Pam Recalculating route you idiot. Stay to the left. I’ve now added 10 extra miles to your trip.

It appears that the map that Pam-Pam uses has two freeway exits on it that don’t exist in real life. So for the rest of the week we would fly past the correct exit saying as we did – I think we should have exited there – only to hear Pam-Pam say “exit now” when there was no exit around. We would then have 10 miles added to our trip. Good times. Good times.

I should mention that we had dinner reservations at the Rainforest Café at Downtown Disney scheduled for 10 pm. We’re not real good planner aheaders. So we didn’t call until somewhere on the route to make a reservation. By that time the only time available was 10pm. I took the reservation but fully expected to go elsewhere.

Pam-Pam eventually took us to our rental home. We pulled into the driveway and had the following conversation.

Swell: “Ummmm… how do we get into the house?”
Sheepie: “Easy. The management company gave us a code. We just need to pull up the code on my computer. Enter it into the keypad and we’ll be in the house putting away the groceries.”
Swell: “Sounds good, but can you explain to me why there are people in the house?”
Sheepie: “No. I actually can’t explain that. I’m going to continue with my plan of finding the code on my computer and entering the house.”
Swell: “Well I’m going to find out who is in the house and why.”

Swell comes back stating three surprising things:
1) We’re not expected until tomorrow
2) They are cleaning the house
3) The house doesn’t look like the pictures

I’m very, very slow and put all the blame on my mother who booked the house. I wouldn’t have been surprised had she booked for the wrong dates. We had a meeting time fast approaching so Swell arranged to have our perishables put in the fridge while the house was being cleaned. The cleaners phoned the home owner and he said we could stay that night but might owe a little bit more money. We left all of our food – perishables in the fridge the rest in the garage – and left for our dinner date.

Every 15 passenger van we passed on our way to Downtown Disney received stares as we scanned the passenger’s faces looking for our family.

At 6:30 pm exactly we saw a bright red van pulling into the parking lot of Downtown Disney. I pulled up alongside it and saw that it was, in fact, filled with the 9 Edmonton members of our Orlando Hootenanny. We all waved at each other with excitement and soon parked our respective vehicles.

We spent the next couple of hours exploring Downtown Disney and when I say Downtown Disney I mean the Lego store as we had three young boys with us. We decided to cancel our 10pm Rainforest Café reservation and head elsewhere as the Edmonton folks had yet to eat since early that morning.

After dinner we pulled up to the house – after missing the exit of course. The van arrived prior to our car and we pulled up to a very confused group of people.

The magic code didn’t work for the door. The house didn’t look like the right house. My father pointed out that the house across the street actually looked like the right house. We all compared the address we had to the address on the house. We were at the right address but the picture included in the rental package looked a lot like the house across the street.

As my mother phoned the management company – no answer – my father and brother walked across the street tried the magic code on that door and presto/chango was granted access.

Three problems arose from this:
1) The house had not been completely cleaned
2) Our food was in the other house
3) I was very confused

After 30 minutes of phone calls we finally got a hold of someone and it turns out that we were given the wrong address and we had, in fact, rented the house to which we were able to gain access. We were given a code for the first house and retrieved our food. Someone soon came to finish cleaning the house (one room was a mess, the rest was fine) and we were happy. The house was everything that was promised to my Mum and matched the photos she had viewed on line.

Our first day in Orlando came to a close and we had an early morning planned so everyone fell into a deep, content sleep.

Upcoming installments:
Three days of Disney in a paragraph (or 2)
Why doesn’t my camera work?
Portofino Bay is NICE
Why can kids ride roller coasters with no fear but freak out in Twister?
Dudley Do-Right ate my keys

We're here and we're...

well we're not doing much.

We returned from a great vacation in Florida to a few days of work. I worked my regular Wednesday job and it was ok. Yesterday was my first day at my new part-time job...

It was also good but very, very interesting. Three major things happened. None of which I will repeat here. But I will tell stories to those that ask on a non-public forum. One of the stories is crazy, one is interesting, the other is sad but all told they made for an interesting day. I was extremely busy and expect to be very busy the days that I am there. I will be there this Tuesday, Saturday and then on Labour day for a half day. The good thing about getting this job is that it is on the Marta (subway) line so I can take the train to work rather than having to buy a second car. Score!

In our personal lives we will be visiting with a financial planner in the next few weeks. We found an organization through the pastor of the church we attend that offers true financial planning. They will write up a report which will suggest how much to invest, how to invest, where to invest. How to save for retirement. Etc. Basically they look at your financial position and your short and long term goals and develop a plan to get you there. If they figure we make enough money and require more personalized/frequent investment advice we can hire them (they are paid a fee rather than working off of commission) to control our finances. We've been married and working for five years and haven't started planning for our future so we're looking forward to getting some direction. We were very lucky to come home from Florida to a bunch of money. Our tax return, our mortgage refund, and an overdue paycheque for me. It was all our money but it was nice to get it.

Swell has had her job finalized. She will be working 4-5 days a week at her old job and is somewhat happy with that. She will be paid as an employee which is really important. She will have health insurance - which is also really important.

So it has been a good week back from our time in Florida. I'll write some about Florida tomorrow.

My Wednesday.

So what was my Wednesday like? Well it was a pretty good Wednesday as far as Wednesdays go.

It was a good Wednesday and it was an interesting Wednesday.

My Wednesday started out with me getting up and leaving a swollen Swell sleeping while I went to work. Two big things in that sentence!

1) Swell is in fact swollen yet again. This is odd as she usually only gets sick once or twice a year and she has been sick twice this month. She was very foolish and regrets it now but didn't go in for treatment at the start of this episode. She has been living with a swollen abdomen for the past week and is on the mend but has been very uncomfortable for the week. For those who have never seen a swollen Swell here it is. This is from a year and a half ago but it gives you a general idea of what HAE causes.





2) I went to work. That's right my second day of work in 6 weeks. This job is a continuous-every-Wednesday job at a private practice close to home. I enjoyed it. It was very easy as the staff is well trained and it wasn't really high volume. I am paid well and will be there every Wednesday that they want me. Hopefully it will increase to a few days per week (although I have a very good lead on a 3 or 4 day job elsewhere. I met with this Lenscrafter's optometrist today and he was impressed more with my life than my optometric skills. Again, an optometry interview which consisted more of me describing our 6 months away and the life of a Palestinian than talking about optometry. Oh, for those interested the Wal-Mart chick decided to go with another "candidate". Too funny.)

During my lunch break at my new gig I walked to a nearby restaurant that had free wifi. Using their wifi I submitted a short 600 word (as opposed to a long 600 word) paper to an optometry journal. It isn't a scientific paper rather it is a simple description of our time away and why I went. If they publish it I'll get an honorarium and will, therefore, be a professional author! They'll let me know in a couple of weeks if they like what I wrote. It's not a big deal so I suspect they'll take it as is or with minor changes.

After a very slow afternoon at work (one and a half patients - there were four scheduled but I'm not allowed to see patients from a certain insurance company so the owning optometrist saw two and a half of them) I came home and worked out. That's right worked out.

I lost about 15 pounds while we were away but have been rapidly putting it back on. Not liking this I decided to search the internet for a work out plan that would take an out of shape former athlete and turn them into someone who could complete a marathon. I found a good program and started it at the beginning of the week. Why did I start when I won't be able to workout this upcoming week? Because I needed to. If I didn't start then I would never start. It has been a good week of short runs and they are getting more enjoyable very quickly. Only complaint is that I've been running with tight shoulders and my left shoulder has really been bothering me this week. For those that don't know what I look like my left shoulder is a hideous mess. A large number of years ago I was hit by a car which caused substantial nerve damage and, in turn, muscle wastage of my left shoulder. It is basically bone. Very freaky looking and, now, painful. I'll try to find a marathon to run 18 weeks from now or so but if none are available I will start the next cycle and run one next spring. I need a goal or I won't continue working out. Here's hoping.

After my workout we had a big condo meeting! It was very juicy. As a condo association we have just fired our management company for questionable accounting practices and poor supervision of the workers. Our board is very upset about the state of our condos (lack of maintenance and cleaning) as well as poor financial record keeping/disclosure.

Our board gave all of the home owners a letter indicating that they were giving the management company 30 days notice and the general reasons why. A few days later we got a very poorly written and very angry letter from the management company disputing all claims made by the board. It was in very poor taste but added to the drama. The big question now is whether or not the old management company will continue to provide the services they have been contracted to provide until the end of the month. Many are betting they won't.

We met our new onsite manager and the CEO of the management company. They both seem quite nice and are going to crack down on many of the things that the old management company has been letting slide. Cleaning, maintenance as discussed above as well as the dreaded renters.

In our bylaws a maximum of 25% of units are allowed to be rental units. Most of the owners believe that this has been drastically exceeded as people are moving in and out weekly. Movers cause damage to the hall walls, the carpet, elevator, etc. Renters care less about the open spaces, etc.

It should make for some interesting meetings in the coming months.

Well. We're off early tomorrow for Florida and will be back late on August 21. I work on the 22nd and have my second interview/meeting with the Lenscrafter's optometrist on the 23rd.

Hope everyone is well and those with new babies are getting at least some sleep. and congratulations?

Hired? Fired?

So the Wal-Mart chick emailed me and asked if I could start for $x four days a week as an independent contractor until the end of December.

Let me tell you another little optometric secret. Optometrists as a whole will do nothing to benefit any other optometrist. It is a cut throat world. Often, in fact I would say more often than not, "employer" optometrists "hire" their employees as independent contractors. This saves the employer money on payroll taxes but screws the employee over because they have to pay extra - self-employment - taxes. If the employee is technically an independent contractor they should set their own hours, practice however they want, own the charts, collect all fees, etc. This is never what happens. The independent contractors are told when and how to practice etc. I would not be truly an independent contractor under the proposal she sent me. This is against the law, but is really only trouble for her not me. If I worked for her and complained she would get in trouble from the IRS, I believe, for not paying proper payroll taxes.

I wrote her back and said "No unless you pay me $y and I will not guarantee until the end of December. I'll guarantee that I'll give you two weeks notice but that is it."

She wrote back and said, and I quote, "I have another interview setup on Thurs and then I will let you know. Is that ok?"

Apparently from past posts people don't find things as funny as Swell and I. The above quote we found very funny. For many reasons. Anyone else find it funny?

And you thought I was mean.

So Swell told me this story the other day I found it funny and slightly mean. Let me preface the story by telling you a little about where Swell works.

She works in an upscaleish commercial optometry practice. Commercial optometry means that the optical is the focus of the business and the optometry is the afterthought.

She also works in the suburbs of Atlanta.

OTP.

Outside the Perimeter.

ITP inside the perimeter is either ghetto or expensive with very little in between. For the same amount of money our condo cost ITP we could have purchased a 4 bedroom/2 bath house OTP.

The drawback? A very time consuming commute. Traffic coming in from the suburbs is atrocious. 2 hour drives just to get to work. It would suck. I couldn't do it so we have a smaller place and we live in the city.

Anyway a lot of suburbanites in Metro-Atlanta seem to have the attitude that they are very wealthy, and very important. Swell sees many of them.

Many of her patients are better than the employees at the store, better than Swell, and are some of the most important people in the world. They take every opportunity to indicate how important they are.

My car!
My house!
My job!
My traveling!
My importance!

Patient in a condescending I'm better than you tone "We're going to be going to London pretty soon."
Swell "Oh, it was cold last time we were there."
Patient "Tsk. When was that? because I'm going soon and I'm better than you".
Swell "Well we were last there on July 4th and it was cold. It was also cold when we flew through there on May 25th and in January."

That is how I heard the story. In reality? I'm not sure but I laughed and laughed when she told me the story. Maybe its just me. Maybe its just the way she tells the story. So funny.

So I worked! I worked yesterday way out in Hickville. It was soooo far away. (50 miles) and we had to rent a car because there was really no way to carpool. I got to work at a Wal-Mart. A filthy disgusting Wal-Mart.

I know that I'm not the tidiest person in the world. We're not messy per se. We are slightly cluttered, however. Our floors are clean and our kitchen/dishes are done every night. Our laundry doesn't pile up but all of our bookshelves, extra drawers are overflowing. I'm getting better as we threw a lot of stuff away when we came home last month.

A lot of stuff.

But anyway nothing bothers me more (well a lot of things bother me equally to this) than a messy practice. This Wal-Mart I was at was a pig sty. Stains all over the carpets. Junk all over the counters. Drawers unorganized. You'd be amazed how many optometry practices are like this. Just filthy.

It would make it difficult for me to go in everyday to an unorganized mess.

I don't know why I'm writing this story. I guess it just irked me.

I work next Wednesday as well at my new one-day-per-week job. Then next weekend we are off to Florida.

We are really looking forward to the drive.

In fact that is what we're looking forward to the most. Call us weird. We don't care. We embrace our weirdness.

I'll end with a statement and a question.

Statement Congratulations Matt and Crina (on the birth of your daughter) A. Person. Yes I know its funny! I love it. They named their kid A. Person!

Question How many times does one congratulate a pregnant woman? I assume one congratulates them when they announce their pregnancy. One then congratulates them when they give birth. Do we congratulate them again when we see them? When they make it home? When we give them a gift?

Its all for really the same thing. Is there a way to give them a half a congratulations at announcement and then a quarter of a congratulations at birth and the final quarter when you finally meet the rugrat? I feel that with all the people that we know that are/were pregnant they are going to steal all of my congratulations.