February 1, 2010
JFK
“We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win…”
-JFK at Rice University on Sept 12, 1962
January 31, 2010
emerson
“Do not go where the path might lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”“I hate quotations, tell me what you know.”-Ralph Waldo Emerson
January 19, 2010
Great drives in Colorado
I love to drive. More specifically, I love exploring new places in a car. Yesterday, we left Denver around 2 on the afternoon and headed south. We drove through the city and picked up Highway 285 just outside of Lakewood. The road quickly climbed into the foothills of the Rockies. We stopped for a quick hike on the Colorado Trail from the Kenosha Pass Trailhead which offered a beautiful view of South Park below.
We made it as far as Fairplay before retracing our steps back to Denver. If the traffic wouldn’t have been so bad along eastbound 70 or northbound 25 from Colorado Springs, we would have finished off the loop down HWY9 to 24. Its hard to believe that such wide open land and beautiful vistas is only a half hour outside the city. If you do the drive on a clear night, the mountains protect you from the city’s light pollution and you can see so many stars that finding constellations becomes a game of Where’s Waldo?.
January 18, 2010
waffles sans waffles
We’ve got this great tradition here in the Denver. Every Sunday, the girls at the Gaylord House open their doors to anyone with an appetite for waffles. The idea is to spend a little time together with friends new and old. Since there were only a few of us this weekend, we decided to change things up a bit. Eggs with asparagus, peppers, fontina and mozzarella cheese. Pizza with asparagus, garlic, olive oil, prosciutto ham, red peper flakes and fontina cheese. Cheese biscuits glazed with garlic butter.
December 31, 2009
year of the tiger
Happy 2010 to everyone!
New Years Celebration with the O’Neills in Frisco, Colorado.
Skiing – Hiking – Hot Tub – Euker – Barbecue on chips (on O’Neill-ism) – Cookie Dough – Fu Manchu – Wipe-outs in the powder – Awkward Family Video Moments – Laughter – Cigars - Snuggie – Snowball Snipers – Did I mention the Skiing?
Livin’ the Dream
December 30, 2009
rocky mountain high
After another long day of driving I finally reached Denver. There is something about this city that makes it feel so comfortable to me; like the beat up old hat I can’t seem to part with. Through trials and triumphs, we have been formed by and left impressions on each other to the point that we fit like a lock and key. Yet, mixed in with the feelings of excitement and nostalgia was something else. While driving down Wynkoop past the pubs, shops and well dressed people I realized that the heavy feeling was a bit of culture shock. Denver is a really nice place. There isn’t trash lining the streets or crippled old men and women sifting through the refuse looking for scraps to eat or recyclables to make a little money. There was no choking pollution from the industry or burning garbage hanging in the air causing me to cough uncontrollably. Everyone was driving cars that were made within the past decade and cloths that had been recently washed in clean water and free of holes and stains. Shops were wide and grand and so were the shops. The sewage was completely out of site and mind unlike the uncovered, running sewage through the streets of India. No one was trying to scam me or tossing cow shit on my shoes so they could sell me a shoe shining. And I, I was in my nice clean, well running car surrounded by thousands of dollars of gear; camera equipment, computer, iPod, motorcycle gear, jackets, boots.
Perhaps the thing that hit me the hardest was that these people walking along the sidewalk had no idea what life was like on the other side of the planet. This was striking not because I was judging them as ignorant fools, but it made me realize how naive I was before this whole thing started. Being back here makes me conscious of my own potential to get wrapped back up in life here in the states and forget what I have seen. I don’t want that to happen. I don’t want to get so wrapped up in the things that surround me that I loose perspective on the rest of the world.
December 29, 2009
roadtrippin’…again
Right, so after only four short days with the fam in Gig Harbor I am once again on the road. This time, I am headed from the Harbor back to Denver. No time for the scenic route along the coast or stopping to see friends along the way, new years eve is quickly approaching and the call of the mountains is getting louder and louder by the day.
I left my parents’ house around 10 this morning and made my way, uneventfully, through Washington, Oregon and half of Idaho. The drive is beautiful and the time alone in the car gave me some much needed space to contemplate my next move in life. For now, I am drawn between Medical Device sales and Project Engineering in the Military. Both have their ups and down and while I am currently leaning toward the latter, my mood will most likely swing again by morning. Well, there are still 12 more hours of driving between me and Denver. Perhaps the epiphany will come tomorrow.
My next stop after picking up a few things in Denver will be Frisco to hang out with Megger and the O’Neills for a few days. Then it’s down to business…looking for jobs. If you know of anyone hiring. Please let me know!
December 26, 2009
509 in 2 weeks
Screening for the mission in Guwahati was done at the police hospital down the street from the mission hospital. Every morning, local police officers would sit around waiting to start their shift. I have never been nervous about people with guns before, but when the police officers are resting their chest or chin on the muzzle, I start to worry.
Our fearless Clinical Coordinator Lee O’Malley sporting Jimmy’s sexy new old man shades.
Our home for 3 weeks, the Ginger Hotel. Owned and operated by the TATA Corporation. Which also manufactured the towels and linens in the hotel, the bus and cars that took us from the hotel to the hospital every day, and controls the internet service for all of Guwahati. Almost everything we touched in India was a TATA product.
The street vendor across from the Hotel sells snacks and tobacco products to the locals.
The three weeks we spent in Guwahati, India was one of the most intense missions to date. We were attempting to complete something that had never been done before and succeeded. Over one week of screening, 871 people received a basic health care checkup. Over two weeks of surgery, 509 people from all over the state of Assam received surgery.
This mission brought a new role for me. With the PIT position already filled by a local volunteer, Brooke, I stepped took over the lead for Electronic Medical Records. Victoria and I spent 16 hours a day for 3 weeks trying to keep up with the volume of data we were to enter. In the end, we were not as successful as I would have hoped, but we learned a lot and improved something about the EMR process every day.
