Victor's Tacos

these are Victor's tacos. he only makes them on the night shift at my hospital cafeteria, and only on special nights. he does this with no discernable predictability, which elevates these very tasty carne asada tacos to a near-mythological status. these tacos have a cult following- any time there's a line of 8+ people at the grill, you can bet that Victor's making the tacos. seriously, people page each other about this in the middle of the night.

while i do love me my tacos, they remind me in many ways of night float... both cause heartburn, both are generally bad for my health, both can hold unexpected bits of piquancy/spicyness... oh what am i saying, night float is nothing like tacos. tacos make me happy, at least transiently, whereas night float certainly does NOT. i have 3 more nights left, and counting down the hours. last night i had an unexpected treat- tara came in to keep my company while her patient was being induced, so i didn't spend too much time bumming around the call room in a lonely funk. not that i've spent much time bumming around anywhere this past week... it's been busy.

blurgh. can't wait to be done. i feel like a big lumbering bear in hibernation mode- when i go home, i'm either eating, sleeping, or slumped on my couch trying to catch up on my recorded shows. at work, i'm a big lumbering bear in survival mode- half-panicked and desperately hoping to go back to my cave and sleep. some people just aren't meant to work at night. i'm one of them.

late summer festivities

so i feel like i've been on OB forever, which is my excuse for not updating more often... or rather, for not going out and having a life, which would prompt more frequent and exciting updates. however, as the summer draws to a close (though you'd think someone would have told the sacramento weather system that it should be getting COOLER), i've definitely been able to spend some time on Park Family Traditions. now that we've lived here for 2+ years, there are at least 2 things we MUST do in August/September-
#1 - go to the fair!! which was dehydrating and artery-clogging as usual, though at least this year they decided to pull the fried White Castle burgers from the menu... i know because the hubby went looking for them. *sigh*

#2 - visit apple hill!

this year we were fortunate enough to have alice, my sister-in-law, around for the trip. we've essentially given up all pretenses of actually picking fruit by this point, and simply drive up to taste the baked goods and fresh apple cider. there's really nothing like fresh apple pie a la mode, or moist apple cider doughnuts hot from the fryer. pleasant discovery of the year- chocolate apple cookies... surprisingly tasty!

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i'm about to start 2 weeks of night float, which is a teensy bit terrifying as i generally dislike not having the comfort of a team around me. it's also the most overwhelming feeling in the world when the pagers start going off like crazy with admissions and triage and laboring patients, and there's just little ole me to take care of it all- i had a call night recently which very nearly provoked me into shedding tears at work, which i just do not do. i save them for the drive home. i had 3 laboring patients (who require q2 notes), 2 of which had crappy looking strips (fetal monitoring), several OB triage pts sprinkled in, phone triages every other hour, and 3 medicine admissions (one of which i blocked by going down and essentially taking a H&P) over a 12 hour call. i really hope i don't have too many nights like that... the upside? andy's on night float these next 2 weeks as well, so i have a chance of actually seeing my husband during the week... also, the light at the end of the tunnel- an all inclusive SPA vacation to cancun after night float concludes... only 14 more days...

random bit

Here's my 15 seconds of fame in Sacramento. A surprising number of people still read the newspaper, y'all.

Overhauling Health Care: Med school grads spurn family practice September 07, 2009 Bobby Caina Calvan
"You can make a lot more money with less pain, suffering and sleep deprivation,'' said Park, a third-year resident in family practice and psychiatry at UC Davis Medical Center...