Excessive Sorrow

Today I discovered something that has brought me great sorrow. What, might you ask, could make me sorrowful. Well let's see.

Is it Becca? Well, we've just spent a month together and I think we are closer now than ever. The worst part of it is that I'm leaving on Wednesday. But even that is tempered by the fact that I will be back within a month. So that can't be the source of my depression.

The weather? Hmm, good thought when I'm living in Albany. In Tucson, however, the sun shines around 99.89975% of daytime. Except for some sunburns I have developed from our weekend in Mexico and a hike this morning, there is no cause for saddness due to the weather.

Sports? Those can often be a significant source of living in the dumps, especially for people like me who get far too excited about them. That said, the Buckeyes are likely to play in the National Championship, the Patriots haven't even come close to loosing, and the Red Sox are a game away from winning the World Series. No cause for grouchiness there.

So what could it be? Let me tell you. I was reading a website this morning when I read something shocking and depressing, at least for me. Some of you may not care, others may already know. In fact, the entirety of my avid reader base may fall into one of those 2 categories. Now that I've run out of ways to stretch this out, I will tell you. September 17, 2007 the world lost a great man. A man who has captured the imagination of thousands of avid readers. A man who wrote probably the single best fantasy book I've ever read. A man who took a great novel, and stretched it out as far as anyone could possibly imagine, then just kept stretching. A man who could describe someone taking a bath using 4 pages, not make any progress in the story, and in fact not say anything even the least bit interesting during that time, then proceed to do that again with her brushing her hair, then getting dressed, and so on and so forth. A man who I am attempting, buy the simple process of extending this beyond the limits of reason, to emulate. But most importantly a man who wrote 12 books in a series that I have grown to love only to die before writing the last book. That's right ladies and gentleman. Robert Jordan has died. The author of the series The Wheel of Time will not write the final chapter. He apparently left behind some notes describing his intentions for the 13th and hopefully last book. But he will not write it. I don't know who would be willing to pick up the torch, or how I would feel if someone did, but I sure would like to know how the story ends.

Alright, if you read all of this I should really feel sorry for you. That was a fascinatingly long way of presenting news that is over a month old already. However, that doesn't change the fact that I was sorely saddened by hearing the news.

Rental Cars

While I've been out in Tucson, I've needed to rent a car in order to be able to get to work. As I am here for over 28 days, I was having a difficult time finding a place willing to rent a car for the entire time. Instead, I split the month approximately in half and returned the first car last Thursday, then picked up my second car on Sunday. That worked out well as we were going to Mexico for Becca's class retreat, so I wouldn't have been using the car during that time anyway.

So I ended up renting two cars. I signed up for economy class for both rentals, but when I picked up my first rental, I was given a free upgrade to the next level and ended up with a Chevy Impala. It was quite nice. The coolest thing to me was that it had a remote car starter, which I've never gotten to use before. I just had fun starting the car as I walked up to it, and that way the air conditioner was already running before we got in. Additionally, the car only had 334 miles on it when I got it. I had never driven a car with that few miles on it. I even got to drive the car past 1,000 miles which felt like a kind of rite of passage. That was pretty exciting.

For the second rental, however, I was not fortunate enough to get a free upgrade. Instead, I ended up with a Chevy Cobalt. It's small. It smells like a wet dog. It does not have a remote car starter. It doesn't have power windows or even power locks. It's depressing. But worse yet, it had 26,000 miles on it. Admittedly, that doesn't sound like all that much. Unfortunately, it drives like it has at least 75,000 - 100,000 miles on it. It sounds bad. It even shakes while driving. It's really quite pathetic.

The moral of the story? It is OK to rent a cheap car, after all the price is right and you just accept that you get what you pay for. But seriously, don't buy a Cobalt. They suck.

Tucson

I've been out in Tucson for the month doing a Neurology rotation and spending a lot of time with Becca. Its been going really well. During the day I've been working with the Pediatric Neurology group here which has 3 Attendings, but I've been working with 2 of them. Most of what I've done is outpatient at this point, but I may be doing more inpatient this coming week. The primary Attending is a unique individual but I've really enjoyed working with him so far. One additional piece is that the office works on a computer based chart system which just went live the week I started. Its been interesting seeing some of the problems they've had and the solutions they've come up with, as our continuity clinic is planning on a similar transformation in February.

I'll get on later and write about some of the places we've been so far this month. But for now I need to watch the completion of the Red Sox game. Go Sox!!!