i love the holidays

this would be my favorite time of the year, if it weren't for the bitter chicago COLD. we had a week of mind-numbing coldness but it's since warmed up a bit, which is much appreciated. :)

last friday night, the peds residents had an awesome holiday party that started out at the Grand Lux Cafe downtown and ended at Rockit, a club.

Supposedly, there is this tradition that an intern always throws up at the holiday party... and then he/she goes on to be a Chief. Everyone had bets that it was going to be me this year. I tried not to disappoint but in the end, I got totally drunk and had fun, but DID NOT throw up at the party. I saved that until the next morning. So here's a picture toward the end of the evening, but before we got to the club:

I look pretty happy. I got home at around 2am and was very rudely awakened by my pager going off at 4:30am. It was my chief resident telling me that I had to come in and take call for an intern who was sick. (I was backup call that weekend). SICK?!?! I was the one who was still drunk and massively hungover and threw up my entire undigested dinner and had to put on a good attitude as I barely made it to the hospital by 6:45am, to get sign-out from the attendings who kindly covered the hospital for us so everyone could make it to the holiday party.

That was brutal.

But once the morning passed, I felt better and had a good time. I love being on the general peds floor. It's fun.

a night of news

Last night, we discovered a new sushi restaurant called Izumi Sushi on the same Randolph strip as Sushi Wabi and Starfish. We went there because I actually couldn't book a table at Sushi Wabi. To our delight, Izumi turned out to be quite good. Maybe not quite as fancy or creative as Sushi Wabi and Starfish, but solid sushi. Plus, they have a BYO with NO CORKAGE fee!!

Then, we headed to Sweet Mandy B's dessert place in Lincoln Park. I've been wanting to try it for a long time and finally we had the opportunity. I had the pecan pie, Armand had the snickerdoodle, and my Bolivian doctor friend Carlos had the peanut butter brownie with chocolate chips. I was slightly disappointed with the pecan pie but maybe it's because I was already stuffed from dinner. Everyone else seemed to really enjoy their desserts.

I saw "Volver" tonight. I love Almodovar. He made another movie centered around strong-minded women who have complex lives/situations.

medical blooper for Nov 27th

"I took my 5-year-old son to a new pediatrician. He placed my son on the exam table and introduced himself. He then held out his hand, and said "Let's shake."

My son looked at him for a second and then said, "Okay." He then began to shake his entire body.

The pediatrician laughed so hard. He looked at me, the mother, and stated, "That is why I went into pediatrics!"

touche.