House O' Sickness

Apparently something other than cake was passed around at that wedding we went to weekend before last. One of the classmates in attendance, along with her husband, came down with the flu. Then the groom was down and out with an illness. Come Tuesday, Travis started to feel bad. We think it was just a virus of some form and not the flu. He was out of commission from Tuesday through Thursday. You have to love married life where you share EVERYTHING. On Saturday I started to get some congestion and a bit of a fever which lasted through Monday. Travis and I are both still battling congestion and a cough, but we are doing much better than we were.

(Happy 20th Birthday to my sisters, Jennifer and Traci!)

We're Still Here

Once again I have fallen off the blog wagon. It's time to do some major catching up.

* Heather's wedding was wonderful and it was great to be back in Texas with good friends. I was able to meet Kristi's precious little boy and see Trish pregnant. It was a little hard not having Travis there with me. Because the wedding was in College Station I was able to surprise many people at A&M C of C with a Sunday morning visit. I also was able to make a trip down to the museum and visit with everyone which made my heart happy. I haven't seen my co-workers since we left for Chicago.



* I realized how accustomed I have become to the Illinois weather. It was in the 90's on Saturday in Texas, and I thought I was going to melt. When I left Chicago to go to Texas it was a balmy 70. I get back 2 days later and it's 40 something. Not a good prelude to the winter.

* Travis has been doing well in his classes, as always. He picked up a Radiology class a few weeks ago, and he will start a Surgery class next year. Of course these are tacked on without any of his other classes ending. He is very ready for the classwork to be over and the clinical work to start.

* Work is going well. So far we have had 5 successful interview days. On a couple of days it has been a little stressful trying to find faculty to come interview, but other than that we have been fully prepared. I am thoroughly enjoying my new position and the people I work with. For know I am still walking to work. We shall see what the next months are like.

* Besides work and school, Travis and I have been having our share of fun. A couple weeks ago we celebrated the birthday of one of Travis's classmates at a place called Gameworks. It was a two-story arcade. The best part about this arcade was at 9:00 they kicked anyone who was under 21 out--teenie bopper free zone. I can't tell you the last time I was at an arcade and we both had a blast. Travis stuck mainly to the shooting games, although he was quite the champ at ski ball. I decided to waste some points on one of those crane games. I actually won, not one prize but two in one pull! The prizes were these weird guys with four arms, but I still won. Last weekend we went to a classmates wedding in a small town near Springfield. We had a great time, but that is one boring drive--cornfield after cornfield.

I apologize for the lack of blogging. Well, I am on my 4th week of the new job and enjoying it so much more! My first day was rather boring because I went through orientation. The second day was my actual first in my office area. I found out that day that I was going to be sole person for the Chicago Medical Admissions. The girl I had met on my interview was switching to another department. (I am so thankful she is still in the building because I call her daily with questions). So the past few weeks have been all about digesting large amounts of information as well as keeping everything moving. As of right now we have a temp receptionist who helps me with the phones, filing, and mail. However, there is the possibility of her leaving at anytime which will not be good. Our department has gone through major changes and is looking to hire a couple more admissions people to help out.

The Chicago Medical School receives 8,000-10,000 applications a year. That is way too much for one person to handle! Right now I am learning how to manage what needs to get done each day and pass on jobs to others to help get it done. So far I have helped run an interviewer training session, a tour guide training session, a Q and A session with a prematriculation group at the school, and sat in on my first committee meeting. Next Tuesday is our first interview day which I am busy getting ready for. My Mondays and Tuesdays from next week until early May will, for the most part, be overrun by interviews. One of the good things about this job is there is always something that needs to be done...and the days just fly by!

This Friday I am headed to Texas for Heather's wedding. I am truly looking forward to coming home and spending time with some very dear friends.

Last Day

The last day has come and gone, and I can feel that the stress and anxiety has completely drained from my body. The ending of the day was bittersweet. As much as I disliked the work, I really enjoyed my coworkers, the doctors, and clinical assistants. The other podiatry schedulers signed a card for me and got me a gift card to Bath and Body Works. One of the clinical assistants, who I talked to everyday, gave me her email address and asked me to keep in touch. My manager asked that I keep in touch with everyone to let them know how I am doing. Bittersweet, but glad to be out. I have new employee orientation on Monday at Rosalind Franklin...and will be walking over to my new job at 8:00!

Counting Down

For the past two weeks we have been counting down the days. Each day I come home and Travis asks how the day was,then reminds me how many days I have left. The two weeks has gone very quickly which I am thankful for. I'm getting to that point where I know I'm almost out and really don't care anymore. But I'm forcing myself to continue to do my best work, especially if it means it will be less my coworkers will have to do once I'm gone. The other day, after continuous nagging to a facility to finalize a list (one of the many things I hate about this job), my boss said to me, "won't you miss this feeling of accomplishment?" I just laughed it off. No, I will not miss meeting deadlines at the expense of courtesy, professionalism and respect to others.

Travis's first week went well, although he was incredibly tired. He was in classes almost everyday from 8:00-4:00. He also is in charge of a couple organizations which equates to after class and sometimes evening meeting. This year is going to be different from his previous year, especially with his clinic time, which I believe he enjoys much more than sitting in class.

This Saturday Travis and I begin a new endeavor. Somehow or another one of Travis's classmates talked us into playing intramural flag football. I think the last time I played flag football was in 6th grade p.e. The teams have to be co-ed, and I know pretty much everyone on the team. Thankfully our group is not that big on winning but just having fun. My plan is to run around and make it look like I know what I'm doing. We'll see how it goes.

Update--Good News!

I apologize for my lack of blogging, and I know some of you are interested to know about the job prospect. I finally have something to tell. For awhile I thought that the position had been filled without me knowing. I found out via Travis that the school was on a hiring freeze for awhile. This Wednesday I received a call from the lady I interviewed with back in July. She explained that the school had been going through some department changes, and she will no longer be over the admissions department. She had showed my resume to the lady who would be taking over and wanted to set up a time for her to meet me. I gave her some dates for next week and waited to hear back. Friday came and I hadn't heard anything. I needed to know before the day was out so I could put in a time off request.She called me later that day to report some good news. It hadn't worked it's way completely through all of the channels, but I was offered the job! She told me to act surprised when HR called with the offer. They need me to start as soon as possible, so I was more than happy to turn in my two week notice before leaving work today. I can make it two more weeks, knowing there is an out.

Travis finished his summer class and clinical work last week and had this week off, though he stayed very busy. He was an Orientation Administrator for the new podiatry class. He had a small group of students, around 8, who he led and gave advice to. He and his friend Chris also spent the week cleaning the anatomy lab and getting it ready for the new class. He told me stories about that which I will not share on this blog. Feel free to ask him about it. When I returned home from work each day this week he was incredibly tired. We decided he needed a week off from his week off. Monday he officially starts his second year of school--his last year in the classroom. I know he is very ready to get the classwork over and start his externships.

Dim Sum and Sharks

Lately we have been pretty busy on the weekends. I think we are trying to do as much enjoyable events as possible while Travis has time...and while the weather is nice. This Saturday we went downtown with two of Travis's classmates, Jason and Raquel. We started off by having dim sum in Chinatown. I always thought that dim sum was a specific Chinese dish, but it is not. I looked it up and literally it means "a bit of heart". It is a meal of small dishes usually served as a brunch. The restaurant we went to had ladies pushing carts around with different food options. I was very glad we had Jason with us, who is Chinese, and could suggest what to try. I can't remember what everything was called that we ate, but all of it was fantastic! We also ate everything with chopsticks, which was a trick for me, but I believe by the end of the meal I reached intermediate level of chopstick use.







After our wonderful meal we head off to the Shedd Aquarium. We had to stand in line for about an hour waiting to purchase tickets, but it went by quick. We started off with the 4-D Planet Earth experience. It was one of those short movies where the chair vibrates, puffs of air come from the floor, etc. Our movie was mostly about penguins in the Artic. We had "arctic winds" blow through the theater and at least three squirts on water on our faces. The aquarium is huge, filled with fish and mammals from all over. Some of our favorites were the beluga whales, sea/river otters, penguins, and tank of sharks. Travis could have spent all day in front of the sharks. He really wants to swim with sharks. He also enjoyed the anaconda... me, not so much. We had a wonderful time and would recommend the aquarium to anyone visiting Chicago.









Finding Nemo didn't lie to us: Clown fish really do live in anemones!


These are shark eggs with baby sharks inside!



Here is a very short video of the Beluga whale. I tried to get pictures of the whales but they wouldn't stay still long enough. :)


I had my interview at Travis's school last Thursday. I felt it went very well. For the small amount of time that I was in the office I could feel such a difference in the attitude and overall ambiance from the job I am at now. Now I am just waiting to hear back.