P2SF reunion '011

Oh yes, in case you were wondering, vacations are still amazing in my book. This one was extended a bit because of a crazy blizzard that hit the East coast the day I was supposed to leave, but for me that just meant an impromptu trip to Portland, ME to hang with my brother and sister for a few days while we waited out the storm! In any case, that portion of the trip is going to be part 2 since I have to return to work tonight (in an hour) and I wanted to get the first portion up for you all to see! For some reason there wasn't much photo documentation that went on, probably because it was too cold to take off your mittens to get the picture, and because it was such a chaotic quick trip for most of the visitors! In any case we had a blast being back together again! The majority of us stayed in Erica's apartment (I think there were 20 staying there!), where lined up thermarests took over any available floor space, it was nice to be cozy, squished in together again! We got out to see some NY staples like the Rockefeller Center, (where we missed seeing the tree by less than a few hours!) and Central Park. We ate yummy food both at restaurants and at Zach's apartment where the NYC'ers made us amazing GF chili that was gone pretty quick! Mostly we just hung out together and reminisced about our crazy summer. It was pretty perfect.

A really awkwardly spaced picture of some of us while watching the zambonie in Central Park.


Melon and I. We were seriously mistaken for twins TWICE while I was there.

Erica, Kristie and I after stuffing our faces with chili!

home for the holidays

Oh vacation was amazing! I bunched all my shifts at the hospital in a clump both before and after the holiday so that I could have the most amount of time home possible, but that led me to work five shifts in six days with no energy left for blogging. I just, just finished my last shift for the week, and am going back on vacation tomorrow! Life without school is a pretty good thing I think. But if I have to have a life with school, at least it doesn't have to start until the 18th of January and from where I am sitting that's still a pretty good distance from today. Joy! In any case, now that I have re-introduced myself as a scattered brain, I have some pictures from Christmas to show you all! We had such a great (although it's always too short isn't it?) time together in Duluth. Christmas day started out a bit rough with me coming off a night shift and then staying up until our flight which was supposed to be at 2:00 but was broken, delayed, waitlisted and then delayed again until around 9:00. At which point, after nabbing a coma-esque nap on the airport floor for a whole 30 minutes, I was basically a ridiculous tear-stained mess of an Elise. We got to Chicago and the airline booked us a room at a Hilton that was attached to the airport. We decided against having a drink at the hotel bar when the menu listed a coors light at a whooping $12. Seriously. BUT we had a great room with a bed, which was all we needed:


Although we missed having Christmas with my family, they waited to start the celebrating, eating and tree decorating and dad even claimed that they wouldn't have any fun at all until we got there. Although there was tell of Micah giving the family an impromptu solo on the panda flute, but I suppose they couldn't abstain from all fun things! In any case, we eventually made it, and were probably in better moods (heh, at least I was) for having gotten a full ten hours of sleep before arriving. Everything went by so quickly, but we made the most of the snow and got out for sledding, and JP skated for the first time even holding his own in a hockey game in which two of his opponents were Joe and Emily who are pretty fierce competitors especially when they are charging at you full speed on skates while you teeter and try not to fall... It was great fun. Here are a few pictures from the trip:






Now it's off to NYC for a Bike & Build P2SF reunion extravaganza!

but first, about my birthday

To celebrate my birthday I slept all day and then went to the hospital for a twelve hour shift. Fortunately I am dating a very sweet, well-intentioned boy who wasn't going to let my 26th year on this earth go by so unnoticed. My parents arranged for a gluten free cake with my name on it (literally) to be made at a bakery here in Denver. JP picked it up and brought it to the hospital to celebrate the day, complete with candles. Yes, he brought candles, because what is a birthday cake without candles? Unfortunately, and he was pretty excited about this part, he seized this first opportunity in his life to buy trick candles that relight and relight and relight. When they relight they also emit a lot of smoke. The sweet gesture ended in a panicked frenzy of magazine waving, door opening, and squashing candles between wet fingers in an effort to avoid setting off the fire alarm in the hospital at midnight. Luckily we did not in fact set off the alarm, but more than one person commented on how it smelled like something was burning and we quickly redirected their fear by shoving (delicious) cake in their faces.

All in all, it was a great birthday.

i'm not convinced that it's december

I feel like I have put myself back together again, just like humpty dumpty, and I didn't even know I had fallen apart! After this summer the "Elise that loves to bike" died slightly and the "Elise that loves any form of transportation that doesn't involve exercise" came to be. It was a good few months being that Elise, and as you know the whole no transportation as exercise also evolved into just no exercise period. BUT, that has all changed. The feeble attempt to shame myself back to the gym actually worked, that and not really fitting comfortably into my clothes anymore helped too! I've been dutifully going to the gym and doing pilates at home, but today was SIXTY-TWO DEGREES and while we were driving around finishing up our christmas shopping I saw so many people in their attractive spandex and I just could not resist the temptation to jump right back into my own outfit that is a constant hug. And seriously I haven't been on a "real" ride since crossing the Golden Gate bridge back in August. It was so, so great. I am finally re-embracing the bike and I can not tell you how much I missed it and didn't even know it! I dug out my gear and pumped up my tires with the stupid little hard to actually fill my tires with pump. I tucked a clif bar into my jersey pocket, a water bottle in my holster and didn't even glance twice at the camelbak in the front closet. Another joy of riding now is that I don't have to carry squat on my back. NADA. That one factor makes such a huge difference. I took streets for about 5 miles until I hit my old training path and turned on towards the reservoir. It was so weird being back on the old bike path, I knew it so well from riding all spring on it and remembered places I stopped to picnic and how excited I was with San Francisco in my minds eye. I think back then it was a kind of unbelievable thing that I was training for, and to be honest the routes I trained on are pretty laughable when I compare them to the Appalachians and the Rockies, and Nevada... but you know what? It was the perfect route for today and a great one for me to get back on the (literal) saddle. Speaking of saddles, can someone please explain to me why I didn't invest in a decent saddle?! Ever at all during the trip?! I know I had my excuses and I know people thought I was crazy and should have spared no expense for the limited padding my bum would be perched upon, but I was nervous to get one because of the expense and the fact that they are so different on different people. I wasn't confident that I would pick the right one and as a result I just resorted to tilting the stock seat at an absolutely ridiculous angle and literally perch perching on the rear seam of the seat in order to assure that the least amount of contact between my rear and the seat could be achieved. Incidentally I kept it that way during a recent ride to school and for the next two days could feel my bones ever single time I sat down. In any case, the reason for all this explanation and rumination is because I recently came across this beauty for only $2.99 at Goodwill:

Handmade in Italy, this saddle usually costs over $100! It was pretty much a steal, but for some reason (probably similar to the reasons that I didn't ever buy a saddle the whole 4,200 miles across the US) after I bought it almost two months ago I didn't put it on my bike until today! Luckily I did because it is worlds more comfortable than my old saddle. WORLDS I say. But(t) in addition to my now comfortable derriere, my body felt pretty good too. It was just a perfect ride, I stopped when I wanted to take pictures because I didn't have to worry about cramming in some training miles, and even chatted with a guy about routes around Denver while dodging wayward pedestrians and their un-leashed dogs. Pretty fun, and picturesque, especially when you consider that it's the last week of December and it looks like this:

In addition to finding a new trail that runs really close to our house, I found our old, dear friend Dry Creek (pictured above, and no that's not the actual name). I don't know if I ever mentioned that old, dear friend, but Dry Creek was a constant companion on the trip this summer. I think we found a version of it in almost every state, some of them were even literally named Dry Creek, so I had to include this picture for Robby. Now I have to go to work, and in just a few more days it will be my birthday and a few days after that I will be home! I can't wait! I have some posts lined up from the crafting I have been doing for presents, but I can't post them until after Christmas. I've been busy though and am particularly proud of one project that I sewed with only a pattern that I made in my head with a few tips for attaching the final piece found on the internet. Hope you are enjoying the season, and getting more snow than us!

DONE!

Oh I am done, done, done with this semester! What started out as a fairly manageable schedule somehow turned into a crumbling, falling apart semester in the last few weeks of the term. BUT none of that matters now because I can't change any outcomes and for better or worse (oh chemistry final that I probably bombed with flying colors) it is FINISHED. I am so excited to finally take a breath without feeling like I should be studying or making note cards. I have today and tomorrow off from work and I am going to fill the days with making decorations, finishing shopping, sewing, crafting, cleaning and hanging out. I have been so close to the end for a while now, and now I am just going to enjoy the season. Incidentally we aren't even having many of the symptoms of the season, and although Minnesota got a dumping blizzard of a weekend, we are basking in a high of 62 today. I've been a little happy that the cold weather has been holding off because it makes my commute to school that much better, but now that the 16 mile round trip by bike or scoot has been eliminated I am hoping for some snow before I leave for home!

Our first and only "snow" of the season...

In other news, I feel like I am finally settling into a routine at work. I am confident now, and am making friends with my co workers! It's a really hard job, but I do feel like I am making a difference in these people's lives, and that makes me feel good. One of my favorite patients is such a delightful hilarious old man who makes me laugh all the time. He reminds me so much of what I imagine my dad would be like if he were in that situation, commenting on everything, making jokes, getting dressed up in ironic t-shirts (my favorite says "cow pi" with a picture of the pi symbol in cow print) truly enjoying every one's presence and making the best of the situation. But, I could ramble on about work for a while and I won't bore you with that any more than I already have. Outside of work I am very much looking forward to celebrating my birthday (how on earth am I already 26?!), going home for christmas on the 25th with JP in tow and going to NYC in January for a bike & build reunion! I am just feeling very content and blessed at this moment for a lot of reasons. Things seem to be going well for many people that I love, and I am so excited for them too! I am happy to bid good riddance to the fall semester of 2010 and am looking forward to being almost, ALMOST done with undergrad requirements altogether!

brocah comes to denver

I know this was a little bit ago, but I promised pictures and I finally have the ten minutes that it takes to upload them...so here is my brother while he was visiting me!

Some of you might recognize the rusty trusty walsh-mobile behind him, which in true walsh-mobile form blew a tire about fifty miles outside of Denver on a cold windy night. Luckily my dad is a member of every roadside assistance club that will take him, and one of them was able to tow the van to our house. After conversing with our crazy neighbor while the tow truck banged around in the street for a while, we warmed up with beer and bbq fresh off the grill.

Here are Micah and Danny stretching together before heading to the skate park. I think Micah is far less amused by my documentation..

I took like fifty pictures of them at the park. JP took two. Guess who shot this one?! grrr....

There is always time for scooter time.

and also always time for a walsh fam photo op.

my wednesdays start on tuesday

I was trying to think how best to describe how busy things are in my life, and how ridiculously much I am looking forward to being DONE with this semester, when I thought of my horrible Wednesdays and this post was born. Wednesday is my craziest day of the week, and these are the many reasons why:

On Tuesday, I try to sleep until about 2:30 in the afternoon. I get up and study a bit and try to eat a bunch of food before leaving for work at 6:00. (Insert props to my boyfriend ((yes I just said that, and used a double parenthesis in the middle of a sentence that is already in a parenthesis to confirm that for you)) for making me amazing breakfast sandwiches for my breakfast at 5:30pm that help fuel me!) I work at the hospital from 6:30pm until 7:00am. After my shift, I rush home to get in the shower at 7:30 and let all the infectious everything wash down the drain and off of my skin. I make a sandwich, snacks and a big ol' cup of coffee to bring with me to school. I scoot over to school for my biology class from 9:00-1:00, after which I try to grab a few hours of sleep in the library until my night class starts at 5:00. Chemistry goes from 5:00-7:00 and then I am free, free, free to get home and eat everything in sight as fast as possible before crashing into bed. The only redeeming part of the whole day is that afterward I get to sleep from whenever my little head hits the pillow until 3:00 the following day. Every step listed above includes a lot of caffeine consumption and as little conversation as possible, both because I get weirdly emotional between work and being so tired, and because I get seriously dumb when I haven't slept.

So, that's how I spend the middle of my week. The good news is that I only have two more weeks of school left...wait, I just finished one of the weeks tonight with a big chemistry exam, so I suppose the REALLY good news is that I only have ONE WEEK left until this semester is kaput and I can go back to a normal person's schedule of working 40 hours a week between the hours of 6:30pm and 7:00am. And in answer to your unasked questions, yes I am still awake and writing this post at 9:27pm, and no I have no idea where my energy is coming from, at this point, I think I'm just running on fumes..