Danny

We were fortunate to have a visit from Danny, Spencer's brother, this past weekend. He was only in town for two nights but we still had a great time. On Friday, we had lunch at one of Milwaukee's oddities--The Safehouse. A totally spy-themed restaurant, this place is full of secret messages, passages, and hidden cameras. You need a password to get in after 8pm, but they will still let you in if you do what they tell you. The food is your typical bar fare, but you go more for the experience than you do for the food.

Friday night was spent at a Brewer's game. For some reason it seems like every time we make it out the team loses. We got a few good runs in though, and I indulged in the cheese-covered waffle fries that come in a souvenir Brewer's cap.

Saturday was especially fun. We made the trek down to Chicago to check out the sites. I've never really been downtown, so it was fun for me, too. The city runs a free trolley system in the summers to boost tourism, so getting around was pretty easy. Thanks to Spencer's new GPS, so was parking. No more guessing what road is next! The funny thing was that half the roads around Grant Park were closed to we couldn't get where we needed to go. The GPS really came in handy! We toured the Sears Tower, perused Millennium and Grant parks, and dined at Navy Pier. Unfortunately, Danny had to head off to Uruguay for work so we dropped him off at O'Hare and headed to our favorite place in the world...IKEA!

We are moving to a new, bigger place in about a month so of course that means more stuff! One of the conditions of our tenancy was that we put down area rugs in the living room to protect her lovely wood floors. We accomplished that goal with two beautiful blue square rugs, but failed to pick up the right size padding to go underneath. We also picked up a few items to increase our organization, plus one nifty futon-chair that folds into a twin sized bed that will go in the second bedroom in the new place. So now we have a sleeping arrangements for up to 5 people if we put 2 on the old futon and 2 on the air matress! Visitors welcome... :)

Music

I added a music player at the bottom of the blog with some songs if you want to listen to something.

~Sp

Summer Fun, Flooding, and DHL

This will be my last summer as a student where I am free of educational and occupational demands. Even though I am working on a research project this summer I still am taking full advantage of the summer. Two weekends ago Megan and I went camping with our good friends, the Schmutz family to kick off our summer. We went to Pike Lake, WI and had a wonderful time. Interestingly enough, we left right after some tornado warnings expired for our area, and we returned the next afternoon right before we received more tornado warnings. Good timing on our part!

Last weekend we had a camping trip that we had planned for a few months up to Door County, WI to visit the Peninsula State Park. The night we arrived it was raining but the trees kept most of the rain from falling on us, at least until we would experience a wind gust. We ended up playing Skip-Bo in a large tent with friends after dinner to wait out the storm. The next two days were absolutely gorgeous. We hiked, saw Lake Michigan, went to the beach, and enjoyed our trip. I would love to spend more time in Door County as we didn't visit the small towns up there, nor did we get to go fishing or boating on Lake Michigan.

With these two trips, summer vacation has officially begun. My brother Danny will be flying in to Milwaukee to see us for a couple nights and we will be going to the friday night Brewers v. Orioles game here at Miller Park. We will also go down to Chicago for a day trip and see some sites before sending him off to Uruguay for his work. There is much, much more going on this summer, but I'll fill you in later.

Unfortunately, due to the horrible storms about a week ago, much of Southeastern Wisconsin remains underwater. The devastation is unimaginable. Entire towns sit under feet of flood water. I have never before lived in a county that has been declared a federal disaster area. Our main interstate has even been temporarily shut down in areas, requiring hundreds of miles of detours for many people. The LDS Church sent some semi-trucks filled with disaster response kits that arrived at our church building over the weekend, and many more trucks were sent to Iowa where the disaster is even worse. I hope that the midwest can dry up soon.

Lastly, something odd has happened with a package I am expecting to get today, perhaps it is even slightly comical. I have never really understood the effects of time travel or Casimir effect-type wormholes, but I believe my DHL package has experienced them firsthand:

6/17/2008 6:35 am Arrived at DHL facility. Milwaukee, WI
6:32 am Arrived at DHL facility. South Plainfield, NJ
5:59 am Depart Facility Niles Regional Hub, MI
3:59 am Depart Facility Allentown Hub, PA
6/16/2008 9:20 pm Processed at DHL Location. Niles Regional Hub, MI

Amazingly enough, my package made it from Michigan to New Jersey in 33 mins, and then from New Jersey to Milwaukee in a short 3 mins. It also took a short trip to Pennsylvania early this morning. With this kind of technology in its grasp, DHL should be focusing on more important things than moving my package to each of its east coast facilities on the same day. (Sarcasm noted)

BTW, pictures from camping coming sooon.

~Sp

Chillin' and Grillin

We are moving in the middle of July to a new apartment that will be a little nicer, a little closer, and a little less expensive. That isn't the topic of this post, but rather the catalyst for the big news, I have my very own grill! I have missed grilling on a charcoal grill since I moved away from Provo. I bought this grill on Amazon after signing our new lease agreement as our new apartment has its own large backyard. Here are some pics of the grill that I received, put together, and grilled on today. It's the Char-Griller Patio Pro:





This grill I bought for $80.99 from Amazon.com. One of the nicest features is the grilling grate is made of a nice heavy cast iron. I am very excited to grill more during this summer. Check the grill out there at Amazon: LINK.

And of course. . . that's a Wisconsin Brat. . . delicious.

Quick update about everything else: School's out - yeah! Summer research work started - meh. That's about it. L8R

~Sp

First Class!

I've had a request to blog about my trip home last weekend. I will do my best to post something more detailed soon, but I'm crunched for time so let me just tell you how I got out there.

NWA overbooked my flight on the way out so they bumped me to a much earlier one. Fortunately, I had gone home early from work so I made it to the airport on time. The first leg of the flight was uneventful, as was the stop in Minneapolis. (For never living there, I am intimately familiar with that airport--but that's another story.) The second leg of the flight was wonderful because when they bumped me---dum da da dum!---I got to fly first class! I must say, I was pretty excited and Spencer was pretty jealous. It was a brand new plane and the leather seats were roomy and super nice. I could even cross my legs! The trays were roomy and they serve you drinks right when you get on the plane. We even had dinner with real silverware and real glasses! I had the vegetable ravioli, a side salad, a roll, lots of diet Pepsi, and Ben and Jerry's Cherry Garcia. It was awesome! Needless to say, all flights from here on out are mildly disappointing. But, in the end, whether you sit in coach or in first class, everyone gets there at the same time. Some of them just get there with fuller stomachs. :)

Tag!

My cousin Bailey tagged me, so here goes!

5 Things I have on my "To Do" list this week:
laundry, dishes, dentist appointment, eye doctor, and make banana bread from soon to be rotting bananas.

5 snacks I enjoy:
popcorn, carrots, apples with peanut butter, nuts, and hot cinnamon bears.

5 things I would do if I suddenly became a billionaire:
pay for Spencer's medical school, rent a nicer place/buy a condo, replace my car, travel more, and invest/diversify my portfolio.

5 places I've lived:
San Jose, CA. Sterling, VA. Provo, UT. Milwaukee, WI. (that's it)

5 jobs I've had:
office assistant for a dentist, Freddie Mac intern, animal care provider, testing center supervisor/proctor, clinical research coordinator.

5 things people may not know about me:
I recently joined the Wisconsin Athletic Club and am loving it, I enjoy baking, I would like a dog but have settled on a hamster since we can't have them in our place and Spencer is allergic, I am headed back to school part time for a masters this fall, and I learned how to drive a stick shift this summer about two days before we moved cross country and I had to drive one straight for five days...lots of stalling and peeling out!

5 favorite musicians/bands:
The Beatles, Blue October, Gnarles Barkley, Imogen Heap, Moxie Fruvious.

I'm not sure how this whole tagging thing works...I guess I'm supposed to tag someone now? I kind of like being "it"...I tag Brad and Becca Reid (and new baby Alexis).

Washing Machine!

Craigslist is a wonderful thing. Our place in Milwaukee has its positives and negative. On the positive side, we are in a great neighborhood with a beautiful hard wood floors with a ton of storage and space in general. On the other hand, we are sorely lack in several amenities that we had in Provo. First off, we don't have a dishwasher. I thought that was going to be a huge deal for us because even when we had one there were always dirty dishes, but not having one and having limited counter space really keeps us motivated to clean up after ourselves. The second thing that was lacking is central air. Since most of our time in Milwaukee has been spent below freezing, that's not too much of a problem. But the first month or so we were here it was unbearably hot and humid. We fixed that problem by getting a window unit for our bedroom and are looking into getting them for the other rooms in the house. The third and final thing that we lost when we moved here was a washer/dryer. We have coin operated ones in the basement, but we usually ended up at the laundry mat. Well, no longer because thanks to craigslist, we have fixed this problem!!

Our new washer is great! It hooks up to the sink and runs on a regular three-prong outlet. I hang my clothes to dry and since we got it last Saturday, I think I've done maybe ten loads of laundry. Portable washers are definitely great for people without W/D hookups and with limited space. My only complaint is that it gets unbalanced really easily so I kind of have to watch it. It's a really cool little machine and so far it's been great. Thank you craigslist!

More on Hurley

Hurley earned the nickname "demon hamster" this week because of a rather odd episode on Saturday. I came home in the middle of the afternoon and tapped on the cage to see if he was in there. He had buried himself under a pile of bedding to sleep and it was impossible to tell if he was there or not. (I'm afraid he will escape) At any rate, it woke him up and he stumbled around all sleepy-like and then went back to sleep. I picked up a comic book and started to read it, still sitting in front of his cage. He woke up about five minutes later, came out, and started to growl. Now, I've had many hamsters over the years and none of them have ever growled (or made any other noise). It sounded kind of like a scream. Click here to hear something like it. He then proceeded to stand up on his little back paws, bear his teeth and lunge at me several times (he growled the whole time). About five minutes later, everything was totally normal again and he has never exhibited this behavior since then or (to my knowledge) before that weird, weird day. Thankfully, Spencer saw it happen so he knows I'm not crazy. But my hamster may be....

Hurley the Hamster

Megan made this video of Hurley running.



Here are some pictures of Hurley as well (click for large picture):

Monday and More Pictures

It was back to school for me this morning. This is the last week before our third set of exams for the semester. Luckily, there is more "study time" built into this week so it will not be a very stressful week. In less than 7 weeks my first year at medical school will be over, and the following Monday I start my job in the Department of Surgery. Luckily, there will be plenty of vacation, camping, and relaxation that is planned for the summer in addition to working.

I uploaded more pictures to the slideshow on the sidebar. If you click on it, it will take you to a bigger picture and the whole album of pictures I put up. These pictures range from right after my mission to my journeys through Southeast Asia, my marriage and on through my start here at medical school. They are some of my favorites.

I am looking forward to American Idol tomorrow and will probably have a few thoughts after the show.