1st Day in Argentina!

I had left Houston in the evening, around 9 pm, armed with pillows, a blankie, earplugs, eyecovers and (most importantly) ambien. Since my previous red-eye experience had resulted in being awake the.entire.12.hour.flight, I was thrilled when my physician had offered me sleeping pills, and prayed that they would work, since the last 12 hour flight I was awake for had been with ativan, benadryl, restoril, advil, and a hefty glass of red wine for synergistic effects, which proved ineffective. I watched the sun set over the wings before settling myself for a night of slumber. When I woke up, yes I slept!!!!!, I was in a brand new country on the other side of the equator. ARGENTINA!!!!!!


After checking out the gift shops (they love themselves some soccer), I got my rental car, and I was off!
The stick shift grey car with a name I had never heard of was an adventure in and of itself, seeing as how I had not driven a stick shift since I was around 19 years of age. The traffic in the city was wild, but nothing worse than a crazy friday evening before a major holiday weekend in LA or San Diego, or New York city. Maybe that was just my impression. I did find the lack of attention to the lines painted on the freeway to be more fun, creative or something!!! Lets just say God kept His hands on me.
The toll booths gave me a bit of stick-shift practice, with the tolls being on average $2.10 in Argentinian money, roughly 50 cents in US dollars. My first night was spent in Mar Del Plata, approximately 200 miles to the south of Buenos Aires. Silly me, I had thought that by traveling south it would be warmer, since that was what happens when I travel south when I live. Funny how that "other side of the world" thing works, and how south of the equator, you have to go north for warmer weather!

The room was very welcoming, with a beautiful view of both the ocean and the city. I layed out my money to look carefully at it so as to be familiar when shopping and the like.

I rather thought the $20 guy was handsome. What do you think?

This next shot is from my window of the morning sunrise over the ocean. I keep thinking its sunset, but that's just my west-coast mind working.

A shower and having gotten dressed later, I headed down to the complementary breakfast buffet.
It turns out "medialunes" are very, very popular and common. Thankfully, I LOVED them! Roughly translated, croissants, but tasted nothing like the croissants I was used to. It was more like a blend of hawaiian sweetbread with a softer touch. I also enjoyed the cheese selection, the yogurts, and juice selections. As for the dulce de leche, well, I wish I had developed a sweet tooth, as I could tell it was good, but it is simply not my cup of tea. So I snuck a packet to bring home to my mom, who I knew would love it!

Then I was off for my first day of real adventure....

Rehearsal

I just wanted to throw a few pictures from Melissa's Rehearsal dinner onto the blog.

Julie (one of the bridesmaids) and her daughter with a REALLY BIG BOW. The bouquet used for the rehearsal dinner...
Here's to old friends!

The newest family! Congrats!

May 11th, 2011

The 2 week journey started out with a 3 day bit in Houston, Swedish style, with Janitha.
She makes the best food!!! Breakfast was toast with turkey, cucumber, cheese and her special Swedish flavoring, the name of which I cannot recall, but is pictured above. Do you see the Swedish crown on the napkin? Hi Pia!!!

As she prepared dinner we sipped wine and caught up on good times.

A salad and a Swedish style stroganoff were served, and the conversation flowed.

So a good chunk of the conversation revolved around these two: Turbo (above) and Spooky (below)

We ended up staying up until 4 am laughing, chatting, reminiscing, and generally enjoying each others company.

We both wish somehow Houston was closer to San Diego, but isn't it amazing how time and distance doesn't matter once you are back with friends?

Don't cry for me, I was in Argentina!

The time has come to get out of this country, and into another one far, far away. Last week's journey took me south of the equator to Argentina...
...where I galloped across the pampas....

...and relaxed at an estancia.

More to come soon, now that I am safely back in my home, sweet home. It's good to be home!

Happy Nurses Week 2011

Ode to nurses... To each one of you who decided, either from the time you could talk, or the time you had to chose a major, to be someone who would touch lives...

To each one of you who took the cap off the needle and gave a shot for the first time...

To each one of you who felt the pride of the first time you put a stethascope around your neck...

To each one of you who put on white scrubs and worried about panty-lines, poop, blood, or puke showing...

To each one of you who conquored the NCLEX....

To each one of you who held a hand, gave a hug, gave a bedbath of spa-like quality...

To each of you who has made a meal off of graham crackers, pudding, and grape juice...

To each one of you who has gotten your patient through the night...

To each one of you who has not been able to get your patient through the night...

To each one of you who has wanted to, or actually have thrown away scrubs because that shift was just too gross...

To each one of you who respects HIPPA, DNR's, MAPs, and PTO (most of all PTO)...

To each one of you who has wondered why you do this, and then go back...

To each one of you who has used a sheet as a fancy table cloth, and bedpan as a chip bowl...

To each one of you who daily makes a huge, indescribeable impact on many, many lives...

To each one of you whose existance makes other's life never, ever the same...

To each one of you who are proud to serve in your calling...

Happy Nurse's Week!!!!!
And especially to my favorite nurses: Andrea, Kati, Tracee, Leslie, Heather (all you heather's out there), RW, Stacy, NurseXY, Nicole, Jason, Chris, John, Cecelia, Aran, Jennifer, Sheila, Amy, Shauna, Erin, Jackie, Carol, Jeannie, Jane, Sherry, Molly, Jen, Monica, Katy and Julia. I would be honored to have any of you care for me, but hope I never, ever need you to, you oncology/hospice/ER/icu nurses!!! :)

A 4 mile hike

Would you like to take a hike with me? It starts off with a colorful bang!
Flowers are not the only nice view. These birdwatchers were equally delighted by the sights.


Here it gets a bit trickier...

The trail then came to ..... THE hill. This is my new archnemesis. (if that's spelled correctly. If not, I have a new word for vomit that goes up into the air first.) I have yet to make it all the way up that bad boy in 1 attempt. My personal best was just 1 stop to get my heart back in my chest and my lungs to quit screaming. My worst? 3 takes. Then I came to the second set of hills! UGH!!! If you note, it is so steep you can't even see where it goes down!!!

And then I had to go back up this bugga!

I was not alone on my walk. I met this kind fellow at the top of the first hill.

If you click on him, you can see his blue-belly. Very kind of him to stand up so straight for me.

Some of the flowers were taller than I was! I could imagine how fun it would be as a smaller child to run with abandon through these and build forts in the fragrance.

...that is until I saw all of these!!! Fun for faries, but snails are better left to rest undisturbed. I could just imagine coming out of the fields covered in slime. Yick!!!

In a few days time, these thistles should be magnificent! (Grandma S...these reminded me of you and Scotland!)

Now, this next one had a fragrance that rivaled stock. I kept stopping to inhale the sweet scents, and resisted the temptation to cut off a few pieces to bring home with me.

These petals were like freshly crumpled linen. So like a poppy! They were bigger than my palm though.

Ah, but what are birds when there are lizards and flowers to see?

My Vegetable Garden

Sometime around the middle of the month, on a whim I decided I needed a vegetable garden. It must have been a night after a class about something perfectly dreadful, like the endocrine system. So I bought myself some seeds, a planter, a bit of dirt, and a strawberry plant since I didn't want to look at just dirt. I planted the seeds, watered them, and I was suprised a few days later when I came out to see these little buggers!

I left my faithful Mermaid to tend to my garden. On the 20th, this is what I had: So I will give you the vegetable garden tour. There are peas to the one side, which are growing the fastest.

In the middle, there are cucumber plants, and somewhere tucked in there are 2 garlic bulbs.

I'm hoping my stawberry plant actually continues on to produce strawberries.

This was today: Between the strawberry plant and the peas there is lettuce, and carrots. Unfortunately, I cannot remember which side is which. Ah well. Time will tell.

So I'm not exactly a farmer, but at least some things are growing! I will keep updated, now that the semester is calming down!