I love my job.

I could just stop with the title, but since this is a blog, I'll go into further details for your reading pleasure.

I work for an ophthalmologist in Bryan, Dr. Marr. It's just me and him......and 7 technicians and 5 front desk people. We see about 80 patients per day--give or take 10 or so. I see about 1/3 to 1/2 of them now. The average age of our patients is about 75. (Dr. Marr does mainly cataract surgeries, which I guess explains our older population.) I've seen more ocular pathology in the 3 months that I've worked there than I did last year working in Baytown plus my 4 years in school all together. Crazy fun stuff. I do still get to do basic eye exams and contact lenses too, which I welcome as a nice break from the "sick" eyes.

Here's a few lessons I've learned while on the new job:

1. Leadership makes all the difference. I've always heard this, but I'd never seen it in action until now. Having a Christian boss whose first priority is patient care and secondly to take good care of his staff makes for a very happy, functional practice. The office manager, Elaine, has worked for Dr. Marr since he opened his doors almost 30 years ago. So have 2 others. That says a lot.

2. Old people are precious. I've always liked older people. I think it's because I grew up spending a LOT of time with my two grandmothers and great aunts. But now my relationship to them has changed, and it's taken some getting used to. I still think it's weird to hear an 80-something-year-old person call me "ma'am".

3. Being told that I'm "too young to be a doctor" is actually a compliment. This used to offend me horrifically. I still don't really like it. But I've noticed that most of them follow it up with "you must be really smart." So if they want to think that I'm a child prodigy or something, then ok, fine with me. It even fits well with their Doogie Howser jokes.

I feel extremely blessed to be where I am. I have no doubt I am where I need to be and that makes me feel content.....fulfilled......happy.

Moving Day

This past Tuesday was our "official" moving day.  By official, I mean it was the day we hired the movers to come and get our stuff.  I've never really heard of a moving day story that went perfectly as planned, so I guess it was silly for me to expect that ours would be any different.

My sweet (and painfully thorough) husband called around to many moving companies to find the best deal and seemingly most reliable movers.  We had several stops for them to make.....the furniture store warehouse, a friend's garage, our condo....so he found someone who was not paid by the hour....perfect.  I (un)fortunately had to work on moving day so Kuy was on his own with the movers, who turned out to be two really sweet guys (Pedro and Sergio) who actually did speak some English, which was helpful.  The day started out great.  P&S were there right at 9:00 as scheduled.  They made all their stops and had everything loaded up and were headed to College Station by noon.  Kuy called to check in with me on the way.  He drove his truck loaded with clothes, and P&S drove their truck with our stuff in a trailer.  He said everything was going perfectly so far but "let me call you back.  The movers aren't behind me anymore."  Uh-oh.  

Houstonians, you know when you're driving up to CS on highway 6, and there's that cute little place in Navasota called Martha's Bloomers?  (Haven't you always wanted to stop there?!)  Well, that's where P&S were.  They had not stopped for tea, though.  Their truck had started to overheat so they pulled over to "fix" it.  Luckily Martha has a pond on her property so Pedro just helped himself to some pond water to cool off the engine.  It actually worked.  For about a mile.  Grrrr.  P&S said, "Don't worry, amigo.  The boss is sending another truck, and we can just put the trailer with your stuff in it onto their truck and it will be no problemo!"

So Kuy goes to our house and waits.  and waits.  and waits.  Mom arrived around 6:30.  Still no stuff.  Mom and Kuy went to dinner and came home.  Still no stuff.  Kuy called the boss-man himself, and the boss reported, "Well, we decided to go ahead and send a mechanic to fix the truck instead of sending another truck.  But they've got it fixed and will be there soon."  Meanwhile, I got off work, loaded up my car with more stuff (it turns out we have a lot of stuff!) and headed to CS myself.  When I arrived, which was around 10:00 pm, P&S had just gotten there and were unloading our things.  Hallelujah.  

Now, I generally consider myself a sweet person.  At least my mom tells me I am.  Even when I'm upset, I try to maintain a sweet disposition.  I really wasn't too upset about the delay, but I am not a night owl by any means, and I was definitely ready to go to sleep (even if our bed was still in pieces in various boxes in our garage--the mattresses by themselves would do).  I admit, in my head I was blaming P&S for my having to stay up until 2:00 am.  But not Kuy.  He insisted that we buy them dinner and powerade AND give them a huge tip "for all their trouble."  My sweetness is peanuts compared to Kuy's....sometimes. 

The next day, Mom was up at the crack of dawn all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and buzzing around unpacking and organizing.  She is amazing.  We got most of the boxes unpacked and organized and all the furniture put together and arranged.  We even got to do a little decorating in the living room and kitchen.  Pics to come soon.  Promise. 

Sadly, I had to return to H-town to work and had to leave Kuy there by himself.  Since then, "the blind guy" has come and installed all the blinds and Kuy has ferociously begun building his beloved pergola over our patio slab.  He says it should be done today or tomorrow.  I can't wait to see it!  Pics to come soon.  Promise.

Oh, and Kuy and Andrew built a little garden for me!  Randalyn and I picked out the veggies for it.....tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers, and Kuy and Andrew made the wooden frame, filled it with dirt, and planted the baby plants.  Thanks to the sprinkler system, it's doing well!  Pics to come soon.  Promise.

Upcoming events include the delivery of our frig and washer/dryer tomorrow, Kuy's graduation from med school on Saturday, and a family party at our new house Saturday evening.  My last day of work in Baytown is Thursday, and there's still some work to be done on our house to get it party-ready, but fun times are ahead!!

 

Painting Party #1

Man, I am a terrible blogger. It's been over a week since I started this thing. Since then Kuy and I have closed on a house, I've gotten a job in College Station, and Kuy has left for a mission trip to Honduras: plenty of topics; zero blogs. Maybe practice makes perfect when it comes to blogging. Anyways, we closed on our house last Wednesday!! Everything went perfectly with the closing....no surprises. Kuy left on Saturday morning for Honduras so I had a little "painting party" at our new house with some of my girlfriends. Thanks to Jill, Sarah G, and Randalyn, the whole living room is DONE! I'm going to attempt to post a picture of it on here. If you don't like the color, don't tell me because I am not repainting it. Also, notice the title of this blog is "Painting Party #1"......yes, there will be more parties so don't fret if you weren't at this one, you'll have a chance if you want =).

Ok, I started a blog.

So I've started a blog (against my will) due mostly to the strong encouragment from my friend, Allison. I guess it does make sense seeing as we have several HUGE changes going on in our lives right now....we're moving back to College Station, buying a house, Kuy's starting residency, and I'm starting a new job. Maybe I will have stuff to blog about after all. Thanks, Allison. Plus all the cool kids have blogs, and I want to be cool.