July 4th-6th: Dublin --> London

Pre-flights

The beast has risen.

 The flight from Pittsburgh to Boston was short and sweet. Boston is beautiful. When you fly in over the harbor and see the sun's reflection off the water and the city of Boston in the distance-- it's quite impressive. The flight from Boston to Dublin started out with the giddy excitement of starting our journey to Europe. About halfway through we had the attitude of normal fliers, and a couple hours before we landed we started to get reeeaaaally restless. Of course, Joan was passed out the majority of the time. ;)

The first thing you see when you fly over Ireland is GREEEEEEN. It's no wonder Ireland's trademark is green. The whole swath of land is lush, full, green-ness. For our flight in, we were only able to stay in the airport for a layover. The people were nice (a surprising amount of people were, indeed, red-head) and very bold, straight-forward personalities. 

Ireland! 

First passport stamp of many

The Dublin airport, itself, is one big sky mall. Instead of walking through clear, sterile hallways like we do in the U.S., here you had to wind your way in and around the labyrinth of stores and leprechaun-wear. Altogether, the mall part in between where you fly in and where our connecting flight was the distance was probably close to a half-mile. We got all settled in to our connect flight's terminal and waited around for our Ryanair flight to come in. Ryanair is known throughout Europe as the cheapest, quickest, lightest way to get from point A to point B

Playing at the mac store in the labyrinth.

in Europe. They don't mess around. The airline lines up and boards in 5 minutes flat. No joke. We were the second people in line. We got to the attendant who looked at our tickets and said to me, "How fast can you run?" I looked at him with confusion. He then explained that we had to have our tickets approved from customs all the way back at where we had flown into. Knowing we had maybe five minutes, we turned and started our sprint back through the labyrinth of stores with our full packs on. We made it to the customs table in probably 4 min. The customs lady we met was having probably the most relaxing day of her career judging by the speed with which she did things. When we told her our flight was to leave in about 60 seconds, she looked at us like we were trolls who had come to burn down her paradise of relaxation. Luckily she got a nasty call from the track coach attendant who had sent us there, and that put a little fire under her plastic-chair shaped bottom. Somehow we managed to skip security on the way back (this ain't no 'Murican airport security) and were about halfway back when we just couldn't run anymore. Our 40 lbs. packs were begging for us to collapse and die in the labyrinth. Lucky, right as we were slowing to a resigned canter, our track coach in shining caution vest pulled up in the transportation cart to take us the rest of the way. We hauled our sorry butts onto the plane and settled in after getting kicked out of the reserved seats.

Ryanair death-trap

 Flying Ryanair is always an experience. The flight attendants don't "attend" anyone. They'll try to get you to buy something, but besides that, they'll just stare at you from the front of the plane. The plane itself is stripped down to the bare-minimum. No amenities, no fancy seats, and no in-flight snacks. You are allowed one small bag. That's it. No exceptions. Also, every time a Ryanair flight lands, an audio clip plays a trumpet announcing the arrival and then applause followed by a voice that says, "Another successful trip by Ryanair!". Everyone on the plane joins in the applause--most likely expressing their joy at landing safely.

Recuperating after arrival

After taking the tram into London from the airport we had some time to kill before checking into the hostel. We wandered the streets, checking out the markets, eating at a cafe, and enjoying just being in famous London! To be honest, we were kinda worn out from all the travel of the past two days. We forced ourselves to keep on truckin' until that night. We walked through King's Cross station, witnessed (accidentally) the opening of the Shard in London. Apparently some royalty was there. We ate in front of an old English church that had been a place of worship since 600 A.D. Finally, we made our way to the hostel....and what an experience THAT was for us. 

Joan's post-flight, swollen ankles

Our hostel room consisted of 10 bunk beds. All you get is the bed, and a nice little curtain to secure you in your luxuriousness. Naturally, Joan and I fell in love with it (NOT) and tried to spend as much time as possible here (NOT). We scoped out the communal showers (Joan burned herself in the super hot shower) and tried to lay low. We spent the rest of the night out wandering the streets of London, exploring the Underground, and trying not to get too lost. We even stopped at McDonald's and got some "real" food. We had a great time. We got back "home" late at night and doubled up in that top right bunk next to the window. The beds are smaller than a twin. So, we were suuuuper comfy. Plus, the place smelled like 7 different kinds of athlete's foot. Seriously though, I'm pretty sure we had at least that many nationalities in there. 

Hostel

The next morning we got an early start, had communal breakfast with the other early-risers and headed out to the Tube. We rode the Tube to parliament square where we saw Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, and then Buckingham Palace. Big Ben was awesome to see. Westminster Abbey was beautiful. It was awesome to see the tombs of some famous composers and ship captains who had been buried there. The history of Westminster Abbey was cool. Buckingham palace was kind of a let-down. We saw the guards with the fuzzy hats and all that, but overall it was just a palace. We still had a blast walking through the beautiful gardens and parks around it though. The Queen's Diamond Jubilee was going on at this time, so everything was extremely festive. Also, the London Olympics were going to be there just a couple weeks after us. The place felt like a beehive getting ready for the big show. 

Westminster Abbey

I LIKE BIG.....BUTTRESSES

Royal College of Surgeons

Next we went to the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons. The Royal College of Surgeons was one of the first companies of physicians in Europe. It was founded in 1540. John Hunter was a collector of all sorts of anatomical abnormalities. His collection was added to the Royal College of Surgeons giving it the name of the Hunterian Museum. The Museum was my favorite part of all of London. I was geeking out at the enormous hydrocephalic head and the reconstructed corpse of an Irish giant. Also, they had the skeleton of a man who had died of Fibrodysplasia Ossificans Progressiva, which is a disease that causes your muscles to turn to bone. Anyway, they also had a museum collection of the history of surgery. They had some of the first tools used for surgery on display in addition to the evolution of surgery. It was fan-freaking-tastic. We had lunch there as well.

Ye Olde British Museum

Next up was the British Museum! This place is HUGE! Like, real big. They had all sorts of stuff here. I couldn't help feeling like I was in Night at the Museum with Ben Stiller. We saw the Rosetta Stone, the Egyptian collection, the mummies, the Samurai armor, the Parthenon sculptures, and the Easter Island dude ("ME no dum-dum. YOU dum-dum! You bring me gum-gum?"). It was a very big place with tons and tons of stuff to see in it. Unless you know a lot about history, though, most of it is just cool old stuff to see. Still worth the jaunt though. 

We bought some Chicken Tikka Marsala, Pellegrino club soda, and some bread from a local store and had a wee lil' picnic in the park. It was nice and relaxing. After exploring a little more around town, we turned in and played some Cribbage for our last night in London.

Large Benjamin

Buckingham Palace!

Buckingham Palace Gates

Ice?

Rock On!

"Dum-dum"

THE Rosetta Stone

Memorial to Cpt. James Cook (this is for you, Dad)

Europa Trip Intro

July 4-25, 2012. We covered 9 countries, 1200 miles of European road driven by car, even more by train, and still more by plane. We slept in a hostel, train, car, plane, restaurant booth, and a few hotels. We packed one backpack each. We used physical maps (*gasp*) for the majority of our travels and used our phones only when we could get free wi-fi. We laughed, we cried, we were scared (Geneva was a liiiittle bit sketchy), we geeked out with some things...and not so much with other things, we stood in awe, and we ate....a lot.

Our trip took us from Pittsburgh, PA--> Boston, MA --> Dublin, Ireland --> London, UK --> Paris, France --> Geneva, Switzerland --> Nice, France --> Cinque Terre, Italy --> Pisa, Italy --> Rome, Italy --> Venice, Italy --> Vienna, Austria --> Budapest, Hungary --> Esztergom, Hungary --> Nana, Slovakia --> Bekes, Hungary --> Arad, Romania --> Budapest, Hungary --> Dublin, Ireland --> Boston, MA --> Pittsburgh, PA

I'm just going to do a few days of the trip with each post. That way the whole shindig comes out in reader's digestible tidbits. Enjoy!

Long time no see?

So, it's only been, like... a year since we last posted. That's pretty crummy for a blog. I'm not even sure if anyone still reads this, but if you do, we're happy to have you!
Joan and I, we are not the best at writing in journals or anything like that. Actually, you could say we are the WORST at that. The blog is our feeble attempt to at least give our posterity some sense of all the crazy stuff we do.
So, I promised Joan I would blog our Europe trip...you know, the one that happened a year ago this time. Here I am. Blogging. Happy day.

First Photo Book

Here is my first photo book creation! Let me know what you think! I plan to make a couple more! I think the next one might be our trip to Europe! It takes awhile to load but ENJOY!

Click here to view this photo book larger

Create a gorgeous, high quality wedding photo album at Shutterfly.com.

EUROPA!

Europe! Yes, this has been a dream of ours for a very long time. We feel very very lucky to be able to go. There's no other time in our lives that we will have this opportunity. So, "Carpe diem!" or whatever.

The best part about this itinerary is that we have personalized it as much as we can. At first we wanted to see all the typical sights (and yes, we are seeing a lot of those), but then we realized that if we are spending our hard-earned money to go, we might as well do EXACTLY what we want. So here she goes.

Dublin, Ireland

Our first stop here is merely a layover. We plan on spending more time here on our way out of Europe. However, I'm determined to find a short, red-headed Irishman passed out in a local pub. Our trip to Ireland will then be complete.

London, UK

London! Oh man. We're barely missing the Olympics (by a couple of weeks). I think that might be a good thing. We are staying at a hostel in the middle of the city. We will be sleeping in a room with 8 other people. Wish us luck! Haha. 

The afternoon we get in, we'll be taking the time to relax a bit. See the shops, find Abbey Road, etc... 

The next morning we see Parliament, Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, and a bike-ride through Hyde Park. 

That afternoon we will see the Hunterian Museum (Awesome museum at the Royal College of Surgeons. The place is famous for having anatomical anomalies like the bones of an Irish Giant! This is where I get my medstudent-nerdfest on. I'm stoked). Then it's a short walk over to the British Museum (Rosetta Stone, Easter Island statue, Egyptian tombs, Magna Carta). Late that night we will go up to the Tower of London and see the London Bridge.

The best part about that entire day? Everything I listed above is free. :)

Paris, France

We take an early, 3-hr Chunnel (the train actually goes under the English Channel for a bit) ride to Paris. 

Our first stop is going to be Notre Dame. Then it's a trip to the Catacombs

 (where over 6 million Parisian remains were moved to get rid of disease-ridden cemeteries in Paris). Then it's to the Montparnasse Tower (only skyscraper in Paris. Awesome view of the city and the sparkling Eiffel Tower). Our night in Paris will be spent in a nice little hotel close to the city center.

The next day will be spent seeing eating at the bakeries, making out in front of the French, and a view of the 

gardens at Versailles. Finally, we'll night-cap our Paris trip with a climb up the Eiffel Tower. Late that night we'll board our night train to Nice, France. It should be pretty nice... (get it? Nice and it will be nice?...I mean, do you get the joke?)

Nice, France

Not too much to say about this stop. It will be our "relaxing phase" of our trip. We are spending two days here in a beach-side flat. There's an antique market, a bastille, and lots of shops. 

Cinque Terre, Italy

This beautiful Mediterranean coast-line group of five fishing villages is one part of our trip that I am most excited about. The Cinque Terre area is not as touristy as the rest of our stops. We are staying in a B&B in the Riomaggiore village for two nights. We'll be going from village to village (a hiking trail that goes along the cliffside through occasional olive groves) cliff diving, swimming, eating, and relaxing.

Alright...take a break. We're only halfway through the trip. Go get a snack or something. 

Pisa, Italy

 Our train goes right through Pisa on the way to Rome...so why not stop there for a lunch date? 

Rome, Italy

I know, I know. Of all the pictures of Rome I could've posted, I posted the Trevi Fountain? Well, the reason the fountain is significant is because our B&B is literally an alley away from it! We're spending two days in Rome. First day is seeing the usual attractions: Colosseum, Roman Forum, Pantheon, gelato...

The second day will be our trip to the Vatican!

Venice, Italy

Although Venice has always been a must-see for me, there are not a whole lot of things to do there. We will spend a lot of our time there just enjoying the sights and culture.

My one goal: Eat Venetian gelato on a bridge (possibly ^that bridge) over a Venetian canal. I know, historians and museum-goers alike are cringing at my lack of appreciation of all Italy has to offer. Oh well.

Vienna, Austria

Our night-train from Venice brings us to Vienna in the early morning. Our Vienna stay itinerary is currently under construction. We are open to suggestions!

Budapest, Hungary

Finally, four years after leaving the beloved country, I'm able to return! 

We'll be staying with Timi, a good friend in Budapest. There will be much to see and do. I'm excited to show Joan everything. 

I would list everything here, but there is going to be a lot packed in. We are renting a car here in Hungary for four days. This will allow us to go to places like:

The Balaton. 

Esztergom. (Seat of the Catholic Church in Hungary. Largest cathedral in Hungary. It has been inhabited since 300 BC.) Esztergom is also on the border of Slovakia. We'll most likely pop over and do lunch in Slovakia.

Some other things we are doing is seeing the Terror House in Pest, Heroes Square, Moszkva Ter, Parliament building, and the Danube. We will go down to Kaposvar and over to Debrecen as well.

Bekescsaba, Hungary

The last four days of our trip will be spent here. I love this place. We found a nice B&B on the outskirts of Bekescsaba. We'll be hanging out with Julika, having a bogracs, church, then lunch in Romania. We will actually be leaving Hungary on the 4 year anniversary of when I first left Hungary. It should be a wonderful way to end the trip.

Besides the car in Hungary, we will be traveling with our Eurail Pass that allows us to get on and off the train in our select countries as much as we want. We each have just our backpacks (REI is a European backpacker' wonderland). We'll be taking our phones and can be reached through the app Viber (Uses Wi-fi). I was surprised at how low we were able to keep the cost of our whole trip. If you want the details, just email me. It's pretty sweet. Joan has been the spreadsheeting master-- budgeting our way through the plans. Seriously, without her this trip would be a financial disaster. (It might still be...) 

Anyway, we'll take lots of pictures and buy lots of European chocolate. And get fat off the bakeries and delicacies (we need to start stocking up to hibernate in PA).

We fly out on July 4th and return on July 25th. 8 countries in 21 days. Europe here we come!

*I do not own the rights to any of the images in this blog. Sources can be found attached to the images themselves. 

Hey there, stranger!

Hey! Long time, no see!

 I know, you saw us pop up in your blog reader or facebook feed and thought, "Wow, I don't remember the last time they blogged..." My good buddy Aaron even said, "Yeah, you're blog died a horrible death." I couldn't agree more. We are sporadic bloggers, I admit. I commit to being better....at least until medical school starts. If all you did was read our blog and nothing else, you just  re-read that last sentence. Medical school?? Last time we blogged we said that we got a new dog, Sunny. An insane amount of stuff has happened since then! It is going to be an arduous task to try to recap it all. I will blog separately for a few of the main points, but the main gist of the past 9 months has been as follows (picture me saying it all in one breath): we got our little Sunny girl (and she really has been our little best friend), I got 3 medical school interview invites. I went to one of those (out in Erie, PA) and was accepted! (Yeah, I still have to pinch myself to make sure it's true.....more about this topic later), We surprised my family up in Utah for the Christmas holiday. We spent the New Year holiday in Kerrville, TX (just outside San Antonio) to be with Joan's family as her grandparents passed away :(. I got a job at a pediatric clinic here in Fort Worth. Joan visited her best friend Tamanna in Seattle (we miss them). I witnessed the marriage of one of my best friends, Dusty. I believe Joan has finally subdued the beast that is: deciding on a career that she loves (as opposed to the one she is in now that she doesn't love). Joan went to Norway with her mom and sisters for 9 days. I finally finished all my undergrad and pre-reqs for medschool (Halle-freaking-lujah). So, we're all caught up now, right?

Part of the reason why we wanted to revive the blog lately is because of our summer plans. They are insane.... The above picture is an illustration of where we will be throughout the next two months. You just tried to look more closely at the picture and noticed the red lines going over the big blue part... right? Europe?! O....M.....G...... Yeah, we're pretty excited too! Let's slow down though. We'll get to that. In fact, I think I'd rather post solely about Europe in the next post. So, relax. I wanna talk about where we are going to be for the next four + years... Pennsylvania!l

Wooh! PA is just as exciting as Europe?! Okay, probably not exciting for you. But it is for us! I was accepted to LECOM (Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine).

The school is the biggest medical school in the nation. It has three branches (Erie, PA; Bradenton, FL; and Greensburg, PA<-- where I'll be!). We're stoked. We will be moving our stuff up there at the beginning of July. So, if you are able to follow the dots on the map, this is our itinerary:

End of this month: Drive down to Houston to drop our little Sunny off at Joan's parent's place (not for good, just while we move and are in Europe). We're also going to try to make a stop at Schlitterbahn (it's like the Disneyland of water parks).
July 2: We're off!
July 2,3: We stop in Louisville, KY to hang out with our good friends Jeremy and Kim! We're glad they are going to be close to us. (And by close...I mean 7 hours away...)
Once we get into Greensburg we'll unpack the Uhaul into a storage unit for a month.
July 4th: Our flight leaves from Pitt to Boston to Chicago and finally to Dublin, Ireland!




Welcome back to our blog! Stay tuned for the Europe trip details soon...

New Pup

Well, the blog format changed. Joan and I are apart for one Summer and the blog ends up with a purple background and cute quotes down at the bottom. Although I enjoyed my previous set-up that was very sterile and clean cut, I believe Joan's set up is a little more aesthetically pleasing. Moving on...

On Sept. 17th (last Saturday) our little family went from 2 to 3. Just like that. No morning sickness, no stretch marks, no weight gain, no doctor's visits or prenatal stuff, no messy delivery...just a puppy. It was fun to pick her out. As we walked down the row of puppies, it was pretty easy to pick her out. The first set of puppies had poop all over them and they were climbing all over each other. Cute, in a mud-wrestling sort of way....but no. The second set had a CRAZY puppy that was dragging his bottom teeth up and down the glass. Cute in a hey-lets-give-him-a-chalkboard-that-he-can-scratch-his-nails-down sort of way. Definitely no. The next one was full of wiener dogs and chihuahuas. Both cute, but the wiener dogs (dachshund) remind me of, well, hot dogs; and if I wanted a chihuahua I'd probably just get a rat--much cheaper. Then, there they were. Two sibling Maltipoos (Maltese Poodle Mix). Sunny's brother had a head that looked like an orange on a toothpick. He was wrestling with Sunny. We knew she was the one. We wanted to make sure that we weren't just rushing into the decision though. We put her on hold and slept on it (not actually on the puppy....). The next morning we went to all the local rescue centers and pounds. We saw some cute dogs, really cute. But either they were too big or too crazy. Finally, after much deliberation we went and got our pup.

She's a great dog. Training her is tough and takes a lot of patience. Its worth it though. For the times when she curls up on our feet in the kitchen while we're making dinner (and literally moves and resettles herself on our feet every time we move). Or when all my rough housing with her pays off when she catches a cricket! I was so proud! The many times she falls asleep on her back with her feet in the air or with her upside down. The funniest is probably when she goes to eat from her bowl and her back legs lift off the ground because her head is too heavy....haha.
Anyway, she's a good pup. We're happy to have her.

The Summer of Fortune Cookies!

Oh, what do I say about this summer?

It has been the longest, hottest, driest, most lonely summers of all time.  

 

Here is a short run-down:

1,000,000 fortune cookies brought home by my brother from Panda Express.  Okay, maybe not a million BUT we have a whole drawer full of fortune cookies and fortune papers littering the front room.

2 ½ months with only one night of rainfall.   Instead of reading road billboards saying that there is an accident on 9000 South, we have signs reading extreme wildfire danger and extreme drought conditions.

67 days living in Texas without my baby.

39 consecutive days of enduring the blistering heat of temperatures over 100 degrees.

2 visits from Adam to Texas to keep me company.

1 trip to Utah for the 4^th of July for an AWESOME weekend!

1 new big girl job.

BUT all of this doesn’t compare to

1 day away from Adam moving down to Texas to stay forever!

I can't believe it, it is finally the home stretch! I can’t wait for Friday! Adam and Cole (his brother) will be arriving from their cross country road trip.  Adam took 2 finals Wednesday morning, packed up the car, went and visited family, and then started their drive from Salt Lake City, UT, then venting down to St. George, UT, then moseying through Arizona, then flying on through to the home-stretch to end destination of our apartment in Texas! 

He will be arriving in just the right amount of time.  Our one year anniversary is already this Sunday! I can’t believe it, time has flown.  We have been through some highs and lows but everything has made us just that much stronger!  I am so happy and grateful to have a man like Adam by my side forever and always.  Thank you for always being patient and understanding with me.  Adam, you really are my best friend.  I love you so much and I can’t wait for you to get here and keep me company!! :)

Ode to BYU

**Disclaimer: This is just as much for my own journal as it is for you. So if you aren't in the mood to go down memory lane here, don't read on.**

I spent 16 hours on campus today. Ridiculous eh? It was 11:30pm, I was sitting on the 4th floor of the library (you know, just over by the children's literature mural? the one with the lion and dinosaurs and the kid with a walking stick poking a skull on the ground?) rapidly finishing up my online mastering chemistry assignment that was due by midnight. I got it done just in time for the usual wake-up-and-get-your-butt-out-of-the-library music to come on at 11:45pm. For four of the last seven years I have heard everything from Duel of the Fates from Star Wars to If I Had a $1,000,000 by Barenaked Ladies as I walked out of the HBLL. Tonight I'm walking home in some sort of weird existential state. As I walk past the beautifully terraced square in front of the monstrous JFSB I can't help but recant my many desires to "get out of here as fast as I can". I slow my pace a little and take it all in. I don't care who you are or what color you bleed, you can't refute the fact that BYU campus is pretty. Very pretty. I can see the "Tree of Wisdom" statue glowing in the moonlight as I walk toward what is known as the "Fishbowl" of the Benson Chemistry building (another favorite study place of mine). Now i'm walking down the South Campus stairs. I can hear the peaceful stream behind me as I descend to the newly-renovated duck pond. I can barely make out the figures of those notoriously mischievous ducks enjoying the quiet of the night. Finally, I reach my car. Its the only one in the parking lot. Thats a good feeling. Many of you know the feeling. Its the feeling that you know you just outlasted all the other peeps who parked there that day. Its the feeling of getting into your car and knowing that you just studied your brains out and are that much better for it. Yeah, thats a good feeling. As i'm driving away from BYU, it hits me in the stomach....i'm hungry. I might as well stop by Wendy's on the way home. Dang, I think i've eaten more today than I did this whole past weekend. Thats a good feeling too, though. It means your brain is using up massive amounts of glucose. It means that tonight you are the Ironman of Academia.

Today, I finished my chemistry midterm, I walked down the stairs of the largest college testing center in the nation, opened the door and looked for my number on that screen. I've done it probably at least 100 times now. You know what i'm talking about. That moment of intense anxiety as you check and double check to make sure that the score next to your ID number is correct. Yes, it took a long time, but I can say that my score has had an "Awesome!" next to it. Its a far cry from my 13% on one of my tests from freshman year. (Let's just say that if you took my GPA now and divided it by my freshman GPA you would get a number a lot closer to 2 than 1)

A week from today I will take my last exam ever at BYU. The time is ripe. I don't quite belong here anymore. I'm the last of the Mohicans. All my friends have moved on. I've had my fun. You ask anyone close to me and they will tell you that I definitely have had my fair share of fun. :)

I walk into what will be my last course of my BYU education, Music 101(a GE I postponed til the very end). As I sit there I watch the band-spanking-new freshmen walk in. This one kid is wearing gym shorts with a button up shirt and last year's EFY lanyard, his face is peppered with acne, he has a lost look on his face although its the end of the term and he's been doing this for 7 weeks already. I watch as he scopes out where exactly he's going to sit, who is having the best conversation, which girl can he sit next to that will wait for him while he goes on his mission.... They are so fresh. I'm not. I've been where they are. I've done everything they are going to do. Its my time to peace out. It feels right. I feel good.

So here is my Ode to the school that took in a punk teenager when it probably shouldn't have. Here's to the school that beat me into academic submission, nurtured my maturity (because we all knew it was only going to happen by a miracle from God), helped me grow spiritually (even though i'd still rather watch paint dry than go to a group FHE), and introduced me to a group of friends i'll never forget. Here's to golfing off of Heritage Halls, saran-wrapping a Canadian, eating frosties with pickles, watching Jimmer make 3-point shots from past half court, Mona, road-trips to Vegas, staying up all night and then winning our basketball game by pounding monster drinks (not recommended), playing bball against Aaron (its always an adventure), Lodge 29, arguing with towing companies, doughnuts in the parking lot with Dusty....when there is no snow on the ground, hot springs in Midway, bubbles! (Ken), sneaking in to play basketball in the MTC gym, sleeping over in front of the Wilk doors for textbook buyback, throwing TVs and monitors off the balcony, baking bacon naked (definitely not recommended!), sledding without shirts, restraining Joan from trying to touch Abouo's butt, true blue football, hiking the Y, nutty putty caves, Walmart (in EVERY sense of the word), All-American Rejects and second-hand high, eating Bertie Bott's every flavor beans and almost throwing up (Dave, i'm gonna drop a soap one in your food next time i see you), NCMO (everyone had to try it once...right?), rolling golf carts, Halo parties, riding Emily as hard as she likes to be ridden (that one's for you Dusty), dry ice bombs, every possible intramural sport, turf-burn, barbecue sauce, bowling in the Wilky, Imagine Dragons, turning on all the water in the apartment when your roommate wants to conserve water (poor Glen), roommates with green socks....that were originally white, and most importantly here's to meeting my best friend and eternal companion (love ya YLT).

Yes, tonight I'm proud to be a cougar. Tonight and forever I'll bleed True Blue.

  Esse quam videri.

You lost a third of your colon? Can you even go to the bathroom anymore?!!!!

 So, it went like this. Joan and i were out shooting with Dusty. A bear came down from the close-by mountain and charged after me. You see, bears only really go after the alpha male in a group of mammals. Naturally, the bear gravitated towards me....Anyway, i secure Joan behind me and wait to see what the bear's next move is going to be. As it bounds toward me, i dig my feet in and prepare for the impact (Alpha males don't run, they challenge!). The bear is bounding closer and closer and just when it is about 5 feet away, i hear a loud BANG!!! I look up just as the bear goes lifeless in mid-air due to the impact of the shotgun Joan just shot the bear with. The bear falls onto me and his lifeless claw splits open my stomach as we collapse to the ground.  The adrenaline is pumping through my veins, my stomach feels warm as my shirt sticks to my torn flesh. I'm being crushed by the massive weight of this Grizzly Bear. Dusty picks up the bear (literally, he picked it up) and throws it in the back of the 4runner. (Naturally, we're going to want to show the bear off later. If anything, Joan and i could cut it up and live off the meat for a year and donate the brain to the BYU anatomy lab...) He then picks me up, puts me in the 4runner. Joan speeds across the countryside to the nearest hospital as i slip into an unconscious state. Finally, just before my body begins to shut down, the surgeons contain the bleeding. I stabilize.

Yeah......so, maybe it didn't quite go like that. Here's the story in a nutshell. End of January i had started feeling sick in the stomach. I thought it was the usual stomach flu. This goes on for the weekend. Finally, Sunday night rolls around and i am having bring-you-to-your-knees pain in my stomach, specifically in my right side. Naturally, we thought it was appendicitis. ER admits me. An intravenous ct scan, rectal contrast ct scan, 6 vials of blood, and a few pushes of morphine and i'm sitting on the 6th floor at 4am. It wasn't appendicitis, but they could see air trapped in the wall of my colon. Something called pneumatosis intestinalis.

Okay, we're going to pause here for a second and clear some things up. For some odd reason, people think that your colon somehow means your anus or your butt or some other inappropriate body part. For the record, the colon= large intestine. I told someone at school the other day that i had a third of my colon taken out and he was like,"Dude! That sucks! Can you even go to the bathroom anymore?!!?! That must suck to sit down!" No, actually, when they took out my colon they took out my digestive system. I don't eat anymore, so i don't have to go to the bathroom....Of course i can still go to the... You know what, nevermind. Moving on.

Anyway, they take me off food altogether in the hospital. They gave me a "pick line". Which is like an IV but its a catheter that goes in through a vein in your inner bicep and they feed the catheter through the vein all the way to the heart. I could feel them pushing it through....and a good portion of the way to my heart. It was trippy. Actually, i enjoyed seeing them do all the different tests and stuff. It was fascinating! So, this catheter is what pumps my food straight to my heart. I was on this for about a week. To the right here, you can see three of the usual four bags of liquid going into my heart. The yellow stuff is the food. The small one is my antibiotic. The back one is just your usual saline solution. I usually had a white bag which was giving me my lipids and fats. Anyway, i could go off about all the cool things i liked...but i'll spare you the time.

So, they did 3 X-rays, 3 ct scans, 2 EKGs, an echocardiogram, and i was usually wearing a heart monitor stuck to my chest. It was fantastic. In this picture you can see the falls risk sign on my door. Yeah, so the first night i was there, they had taken all this blood and i was on morphine, and they weren't letting me eat anything (i'm hypoglycemic...bad idea) so i get up to go to the john at like 3 am. As i head back to bed i just plain passed out. I was out before i hit my head on the door frame and then collapsed to the ground. Joan freaked and ran out to get the nurses. Anyway, about 20 seconds later i wake up to the nurses and Joan pulling me up off the ground. So, for the next two weeks i got to deal with nurses thinking i was an eighty-year -old "Falls Risk".




After a week of not knowing exactly what was causing so much pain, the doctor decided to just take out the inflamed portion of my colon. Its the ascending colon. So, they gave me an epidural (not too comfy...) to paralyze me. Next thing i knew, i was being wheeled back up to my floor. The next day i tried to sit up and instantly a massive headache hit me. Turns out, the epidural punctured my spinal column and i was leaking cerebral spinal fluid. They thought it would go away with a day or so. It didn't. So they did a blood patch to fix it. That was equally comfortable to the epidural. Within 30 minutes i was feeling good! Basically what they did was cut down around my belly button. The doctor reached in, cut off my ascending colon and took it out. He then reattached the rest of my large intestine to my small intestine. As they were putting the cut-out portion of my large intestine in the biohazard bin a large parasite crawled out of it. The doctor tried to grab it, but then it knocked him over. The nurses had to pile on to the parasite. Unfortunately the doctor got bit by it and lost a finger......


Turns out, when they finally pulled out the bad part of my intestine they were really glad they took it out. The intestinal wall was inflamed and weakened. The doctor said my intestine had flipped and was cutting off its own circulation. If they hadn't have taken it out, the intestine most likely would have burst....which would have been horrible. Overall, it was 13 days in the hospital. Joan slept the night in that wretched chair almost every night. I have to give her credit for always being there for me. She's such a sweetheart. I appreciate every one who came to visit, called, sent messages, and helped out with meals. It really meant so much! A special shout-out goes to my family for making the effort to come down (especially my brothers and Dusty for the blessing), for Devin in supplying me with endless movies, and for Dusty in making me smell his amazing burger as he ate it right next to me as i soaked in my IV.... (just kidding, Dusty was there every single day, thanks Dusty)






They stapled my stomach shut. It looked like a caterpillar!

This was the day they took the staples out. Awesome!

 And the final product. They kept my mole intact. For this, i am grateful.

On a different topic. Blog followers meet Xenia. She went mudding a little while ago and was just loving it. She actually had surgery today! They fixed her control arm, exhaust, replaced some lights, and got her re-registered!

Alright peeps, thats it for now. Have a good night!