Semester 2 Week 1

Wow, what a Christmas break. It felt so good to have some time off after a stressful end to a semester. We went to visit our parents in Utah and saw our family and some old friends. Anyway, when I saw this semesters calendar I wanted to cry. It looks to be a very busy semester, and I only have one anesthesia class. I guess our Prof's didn't think we were challenged enough last semester so they added some pop quizes and presentations. Then you add the fact that I have to take Research, Stats and Anatomy and thats going to be a recipe for a tough semester. Well, gotta go watch Sunday Night Football.

Week 16

Yes, it has finally arrived. I finished my last final on wednesday, needless to say the scores got progressively worse, but I passed all of my classes. It was pretty sucessful. I am glad it will be over for a while and it will definetly be good to go home for the holidays. We will fly home with the squirt tomorrow, oh he joy. Well I am going to sign off until next semester! Phil

Week 15

We took our first final this week. It was just supposed to be on a few subjects but when they were making the test, our instructors decided that it was to easy so they made it comprehensive. Needless to say, after all of that stress, I ended up acing the test. That was a huge relief. There are 3 finals coming up this week and I have been studying so much it is going to make me sick. Megan hasn't stopped complaining yet about how much I have been studying. I just hope that it will be worth it in the end. We also got a few of those ND storms everyone has been telling us about. I went to school the other day and it was -14 with a wind chill of another -6. That has been the coldest and it has finally made enough snow to talk about. I think the big difference between here and Boise is that the snow won't melt here until the spring. It just won't get warm enough. Well I gotta run. Phil

Week 14

Well this week has been the calm before the storm. We had our class on Tuesday and had the rest of the week off for Thanksgiving. It was pretty awesome. I didn't really get much done so I have a lot of studying to do tomorrow for the test coming this week. The following week will be finals and I will be done with the first semester. Well nothing interesting happened so I won't bore you with the details. Phil

Week 13

This week in clinical's was so awesome. The first day I was in a room and we were doing some lap chole's and an inguinal hernia repair. While we were prepping for the hernia repair the MDA asked me if I wanted to do the spinal. I said sure and he taught me how to do it and I assisted him placing a spinal. It was totally awesome. The people at the hospital are really nice and willing to work with students. The second day we were doing a bunch of lithotripsies. By the second and third case, I had things under control and the CRNA basically let me run the show. It was fun to be able to make some decisions and see them through. He also told me at the end of the shift that I did a really good job and that I caught on really fast. That made me feel really good about myself. Well I gotta run. Phil

Week 12

This has been such as lazy week for me. If I were a writer I would have a severe form of writers block. The unfortunate part is that I still have a test on Monday. I am hoping that it will pass and tomorrow I can study hard. One interesting thing did happen this week, I was able to go to the interview luncheon. I am so glad that I was not in that position again. They had 34 interviews and only 12 will be admitted to the program. There were three interviewee's that came from Utah. Heidi had me speak to one applicant who I guess I spoke with while I was traveling at LDS. I met another one at the luncheon and we'll see about the other one. Well, it should be fun this week with the test and clinicals. I gotta run. Phil

Week 11

Well, it has been quite an eventful week. we had our two test week and I was able to pull an A on both of my tests, which was a relief. It gives me added hope for finals week when I have 4 tests in 3 days. We also went as a class down to the NDANA conference in Bismark. I was inadvertently voted to be the class Representative for this year, which was exciting. It only meant that I had to go to the Board meetings. It was really interesting to see how the board was run. I found out that there is a lot of participation in the ANA for the state, but that not many people wanted to serve as board members. Hopefully, the participation will grow in the future, because it would be nice to see the board function autonomously without the need for another company. It will also give me the opportunity to go to DC during and watch legislation and lobbying in regards to the profession. It will be a really good expereince. Well I gotta go play with the family. Phil