Oregon Trail

Well, I know you have all been waiting with bated breath to find out where my next assignment will be! Drumroll please.........I will be going to the fantastic and luxurious Salem, Oregon! Okay, so I have no idea if Salem is either fantastic or luxurious because I have never been there! But it is a job and it's on the west coast! And only about 2.5 hours from here so hopefully it won't be the move from hell like moving up here was! My last day here is on December 31st (what a way to ring in the new year! yah!) and I start there on January 6th. I will be in a "recovery unit" which apparently means they do procedure prep (like say, lung biopsies, laparascopic procedures, cardiac cath etc.) and the recovery for a few hours to overnight after the procedure. They do some inpatient overflow from the telemetry unit as well. For now, they are not open on Sundays but I guess they are going to start taking more inpatients so they will probably start opening 7 days a week. Anywho...it pays three dollars an hour more than here, so that's nice! And the manager didn't have a heart attack about me needing time off for my cruise and to go to New York in February (I hope!) so I think it will be a good thing. The manager also seemed pretty laid back unlike the butthole manager here, so we shall see! All in all, this has been a great experience and I have met some awesome people here! But I am definitely ready to move on...

So, I did make it to Salt Lake last week. I didn't realize how much I missed it there! I almost shed a tear or two when I stopped by my storage unit. I really miss a lot of my "comforts of home" as Kim calls them. Especially my amazing bed and my washer and dryer. I went to lunch with a lot of my IHC peeps on Thursday. So much fun! I miss everyone so much!! here's a picture of most of us.

Patty, Sara, Me, Tessa, Elsha, Heidi, Sadie, Normandy, Erica and Hunter

Patty, Sara, Elsha, me and Tessa.

I took a trip to the MAC counter in the blizzard on Saturday with Erin and we stopped at PF Chang's for some lemon pepper shrimp while we were there. Yum! I made the mistake of eating some leftover Mountain of Meat pizza from the Pie on Saturday afternoon. Let's just say it did NOT agree with me! I ended up meeting up with some friends that night and of course it was fun, I just wish I wouldn't have felt so crappy. I guess we will just have to do it again next time I am there and I will try to avoid any food with "mountain" in the name. I was happy that it snowed while I was there, but I was even happier that I got to come back home and not have to drive in the snow. Oh, how wrong I was! I came back to....snow! Apparently Seattle/Tacoma does get snow occasionally, but they are calling this one the Blizzard of '08. Don't get me wrong, if we were in Utah or somewhere equally as prepared for the inclement weather, this would really be nothing. But these people don't have plows and they don't spread salt on the road. Not to mention they DO NOT know how to drive in the snow. I thought they were bad drivers when the roads were dry! HA! I was thisclose to getting stuck in my parking lot on Thursday thanks to a bonehead move by a lady driving in front of me. Fortunately I was able to get myself out of the situation after screaming a few choice words! People just don't think sometimes! In any case, it snowed off and on all day today and I was happy to stay in and finish cleaning my apartment!

I had another adventure on Friday. I took a fun day trip up to Forks with Kim and another traveler I work with, Trish. What a trip! I have to admit, Forks really wasn't anything all that exciting but I am very happy to be able to say that I have been there!

This is on the way to Forks...it was pretty awesome scenery most of the way there!

Yes, you are reading that sign right, there was a road called kitchen-dick. And if you'll notice, the sign down in the corner is for weaner pigs. I couldn't make this up if I wanted to! We saw several interestingly named roads, but this one was definitely the best! We laughed about it for the entire trip!

Crescent Lake on the way to Forks. So quaint!

Finally made it to Forks! I wanted to pose with the famous sign, but it was kind of up on a hill and as you can see it was snowy and pretty darn cold, so I didn't want to climb up the hill.

This was a hotel with a clever sign!

We also found Forks High School.

Me and Kim, apparently Forks is the logging capital of the world? I mean, that's great and everything but really the most important thing is Twilight! Right?

We stopped at the ocean on the way home and did a little self photography. It was freezing, but totally breathtaking! I just love the ocean. The sound and watching it....I could sit there for days if only it was a little warmer. It was a fun trip with some fun friends and I'm glad we got to do it!

Saturday night I went out on the town for one last time with Kim and Emile. The town was pretty dead since the "blizzard of '08" was in full force. But we found a karaoke joint yet again and again, Kim talked me into singing a few songs with her. It was fun, as always! I'm definitely going to have to go to Boston and sing some more karaoke and have Kim show me around!

I can't remember what Kim and Emile were singing but they were really feelin' it!

This picture doesn't really do justice, but this is the gigantic hill on the way to our house. We have pretty much been avoiding it since it snowed, but I thought it would be fun if we drove down it. Kim agreed and down we went! It was fun, sliding all around on the non plowed roads. It was late enough there were not very many people out, so Kim could drive as crazily as she wanted. This is what all the roads in town looked like as well. Good times!

My dad is coming up tomorrow to hang with me for Christmas! I'm so excited! And we are going to head up to Canada on Friday or Saturday. Yay! I just wish I wasn't working on Christmas Eve and Christmas day....but I will live and I will be making time and a half. I hope everyone has the merriest Christmas ever! Thanks to everyone for being such great friends! I am truly blessed to know all of you!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!