Cold.  Yes, it’s cold.  I’m sure this is no newsflash to most of you, since most of my readers live in the Midwestern United States, where temperatures are below 0° F right now.  For the record, it is currently -9° F (-22° Celsius, for those of you from countries that haven’t landed on the moon).   We lit off our fireplace last night, which was nice, not because it made it any warmer in here, but because it made us THINK it was warmer.   The pipes froze in our downstairs bathroom again.  They do that every year when the temperatures approach zero.  I should probably rip the drywall off and throw in a bunch of insulation, but I haven’t gotten to that yet.

Which brings me to what I’m doing currently.  For those of you who missed my last post, I did not pass my Pediatrics class (got a B- average instead of a B on the tests).  Since my university only offers that class once a year, and since these classes are cumulative (not the right word, but it’s where you have to take the first one before you can take the next, and so on), I have to wait until this September to retake Pediatrics before I can do my residency in the spring of 2016 and graduate in May 2016.

What does this mean?  It means a couple of things. First of all, it means I need a job, because I’m only PRN (as needed) at my old job, and I would really like to find something full time that is closer, better hours, etc.    Secondly, it means that for the first time since 2011 I am not enrolled in classes, because this program I’m in is an around the calendar program (we have classes in the summer, in other words).  I actually get a break.

And what am I doing with this break?  Well my plan is to work (obviously), study (so it’s easier the second time), and fix up my house so I can sell it.   I worked my last regular shift in December, celebrated Christmas in Indiana, and then we went on an 8 day trip to Iowa (including 2 travel days) to celebrate Christmas with our family and friends there.  That was a really great time. We got to do a white elephant gift exchange with my Iowa family, spend a few days playing games with them and just hanging out, and then we spent a few days with my best friend and his family.  I got him a few, small Christmas and birthday gifts, and he got me something too (which I wasn’t expecting).  He got me a set of targets that have bags of explosive powder attached so that when you hit the target, there’s an explosion (kind of like this, but not as dramatic.

On Thursday we took the targets to a local shooting place (i.e. some guy’s soybean field) and got the targets ready. The first thing you do is mix these two powders together,which the packaging stated made us “explosives manufacturers” according to the law, so if we blew our legs off, they would not be liable for giving us explosives because WE were the ones who manufactured them. Whatever. We set up the targets and only one of the eight actually exploded. It was worth it, though.

We said goodbye to Iowa and came home. And I think we brought the Iowa temperatures with us.