Let the Gastronomic Tour Continue, It's Time For Clinkerdaggers!

Our last day in Spokane arrived far too quickly. Farley and I decided to head out and look for some new headphones to use while taking our Kaplan Step 1 prep course (our lectures are on DVDs so we wanted something comfortable). We went to a few places in town and finally came across a good deal on exactly what we needed. We headed home so I could get changed and ready to go meet up with my friend Brenda. I can't believe that she agreed to meet up with us, as she is an RN who had been working the last three nights at the hospital (she works 12 hour shifts, so I'm sure she was exhausted). Also, we met at 1:00pm which was probably in the middle of her "night". Anyway, it was exciting to see her and hear about how she has been doing. I think she has been an RN for about two years now and it was nice to see how much fun she seems to be having now after gaining some experience. (Taking care of people is a stressful job and I think that gaining experience and confidence makes it a lot more fun than when one is first starting. I look forward to, years from now, when being a physician will be more fun because I'll have more experience and confidence).

We had one thing left to do in Spokane: Dinner at Clinkerdaggers! I rarely went to Clinkerdaggers before leaving for medical school, but now it seems that I go at least once every time I’m home. Mom and Dad’s 29th wedding anniversary is the 31st of August (and Farley and I had our 2nd anniversary on the 27th of August) so we decided a special dinner was deserved. As usual it was amazing. I could eat there all the time, except that I couldn’t afford to do so!! I was joking with Farley that I took him on a gastronomic tour of Spokane because we ate at so many different places. It is a good thing we walk around so much or I would have gained a million pounds!!



Here are some pictures from Clinkerdaggers and from our walk along the bridges on the north side of the Spokane River leading toward Riverfront Park.


Dad and Mom in the lobby at Clinkerdaggers:

Farley and me at the Clinkerdagger Lobby:

The view of the river from our table at Clinkerdagger:

Taken right outside of the Flour Mill (where Clinkerdagger's is located). We walked down to the bridge in the foreground:Below is a picture of Farley and me standing on the bridge, which connects the north side of Spokane to Canada Island in Riverfront Park

Picture, from the Bridge connecting the north side of Spokane to Canada Island in Riverfront Park, looking west

Another picture from the same bridge, looking east.

This picture is from the bridge connecting Canada Island to the South side of the Spokane River and the bulk of Riverfront Park.

Another picture from the same bridge as above, looking east toward the pavilion (the net like tent in the background) and the old downtown YMCA (brick building on the right side)
Another picture with the same view as above:

After dinner and our walk, we headed home to pack and have one last glass of wine with Bob and Kathy. It is amazing how quickly a week can go!

BBQ!

It was finally time for the last family BBQ of the season. I haven't been to a steak fry since the early summer of 2007--I left for medical school on June 30, 2007. In fact, I haven't been home in the spring or summer since then either. Needless to say, I was extremely excited.

Almost the whole gang showed up. I think there is only one cousin and one family friend in Spokane that couldn't make it; thus, poor Farley has met everyone in Spokane but those two. There are a few other important people on the Western side of Washington that he'll have to meet. It was so great to have everyone in one spot. All of my cousins' children have grown so much--even since I saw them in December. Also, another family friend with four girls--I only recognized the 16 year old by her voice. Wow! The only downside to this big BBQ was that I felt like I didn't really get to speak to anyone because I was moving so fast to talk to everyone I didn't get to actually sit down and really talk.

As usual, the steaks were amazing, the side dishes were scrumptious and the deserts--well they were gone by the end of the day. I don't think anyone noticed or cared about my error that resulted in a German Chocolate-Fudge cake. There were only two pieces left by the end of the day!

We kept fairly busy for a "relaxing" day at home

Saturday, we all actually did sleep in! We had a light breakfast ( I only toasted bagels, whereas earlier in the week we had turkey bacon, eggs and bagels, homemade coffee cake and popovers). Then we watched a movie on demand, Cadillac Man, with Robin Williams and Tim Robbins. It wasn't Robin Williams best movie, but we still got a few laughs out of it. Dad summoned Farley to get out of the house as soon as the movie was done because Mom and I had some baking to do (Dad likes to pretend he doesn't know how to do anything in the kitchen so that we don't ask for his help. He is trying to teach Farley his sneaky ways of getting out of helping, but I already know that Farley know his way around a kitchen better than he wants me to believe). First I made the home made chocolate cake. I can never, ever pour the cakes evenly into the cake pans so I had to have mom help me with it (so the layers of the cake are approximately equal). Mom started on the rhubarb pie filling and I had to start the pie crust. Well, it was my lucky day because I managed to get the pie crusts rolled out perfectly for both pies. We put the pies in the over after the cakes finished cooking. Then I started the German Chocolate Cake Frosting (the pecan or walnut, coconut, and sugar frosting). Unfortunately, the bottom layer of my cake broke in half when I took it out of the pan! This gave me two options: make a new cake or find a way to cover the sides of the cake (German Chocolate Cake does not have frosting on the sides of the cake, only on the layers). Well, Farley and Dad wanted both German chocolate frosting and fudge frosting so I decided to make the fudge frosting for the sides. In the end, the cake and pies turned out beautiful--and they tasted even better! I didn't even think to take a picture for the blog, but they were beautiful.

After Mom and I finished baking (and the guys finished eating the extra frosting), we got ready for Mass. I really love the 7:30 pm mass on Sunday nights at St. Al's but we had a BBQ planned for Sunday night so we decided to go to the Saturday night mass. I haven't been to the 5:15 mass at St. Als since I was a student at Gonzaga University. The priest was the (relatively) new priest at Gonzaga Prep and I had never seen him before. He was wonderful. I really, really liked him. However, he like so many other priests, really can't sing and sometimes I just feel badly for them when they have to sing so much of the Eucharistic prayer. Also, it is interesting how different the music is at the 7:30 Sunday mass vs. the 5:15 Saturday mass. Obviously, the words to many of the songs are the same (since they are prayers although sometimes they are in Latin and others in English). However, the melody is completely different. It was very strange because I knew all of the words but I didn't know the melodies so I couldn't really sing along. After we left, I was talking to Farley about the 8-10 different Masses that are held on the Gonzaga University Campus every weekend. I mentioned that there is a Gregorian Chat Mass at Jesuit House at 5:00pm on Saturday that I've always wanted to attend, but that I've never gone. Farley asked me why we didn't just go to that mass since it is at the same time (and less than 200 feet apart). Oh well, I guess I'll go in November!

When we were driving to Mass, we noticed and joked about the huge line outside of the Red Lobster. When we drove by again, there were still people waiting outside to get into the Red Lobster. Dad and I started listing restaurants in the area that we would go to rather than Red Lobster (especially me since I'm allergic to shellfish). I mentioned The Mustard Seed and before you could blink , Mom declared "Let's go!". So she turned around and we headed to dinner. I just love their chicken teriyaki--Yummy!!

After we got home, it was time to change to go over to Bob and Kathy's house (our favorite neighbors). Bob has gone patio crazy and converted half of the back yard into a beautiful patio and he even made a beautiful fire pit (with the help of his brother-in-law who welded a tractor wheel into the metal base of the fire pit and made a grill to place over top of it). It was just a beautiful evening--just cool enough to feel nice next to the fire. I don't think sitting next to a fire at night would be as much fun in Miami as the temperature really doesn't really drop at night like it does in the north--heck in Miami it is still 88 degrees at midnight! Anyway, Bob has been promising me s'mores since I left for medical school and he delivered. It was SOOOO much fun!!

Friday in Spokane: All Over Town

Friday, we got to sleep in (well, Farley slept in, I was so excited to get home I was sleeping maybe 6 hours a night). We went to the beauty supply houses where I bought some more makeup and Farley bought a professional grade clipper. Now he can open his own amateur barber shop! We had lunch with Crystal at C.I. Shenanigans and sat outside because it was such a beautiful day. I completely forgot to get a picture with Crystal, but here is a picture of the view from the patio, right on the centennial trail.

It was a wonderful lunch and even better company. Next, we headed down to Aunties to look over books before I had to go to a nurse practitioner's appointment. Luckily, the Nurse Practitioner was on time, which at this office is a miracle. I tried to make an appointment with my doctor, but was told he wasn't in the office. Funny thing, I spent as more time in the hallway talking to him about my upcoming boards and my first 2+ years of medical school as I did with the Nurse Practitioner. I have no problem with Nurse Practitioners, but I just love my personal doctors. This physician took really good care of me when I had problems with my asthma in college, so I would have preferred to see him over a Nurse Practitioner that I don't know. Oh well!!

After the appointment, we headed over to my friend Kelly’s house to meet her little girl, Abigail. She is one of the cutest one month olds, I’ve ever seen! We had such a fun time visiting with Kelly and Gabe (her husband). I would post a picture of little Abigail, but I don't post pictures of other people's kids without permission and I forgot to email Kelly to ask her if it was okay. Just take me word on it, Abigail is cute!

Later that night, we went downtown to a new piano bar, Gibliano Brothers. I’ve been to piano bars in Las Vegas, Seattle and San Francisco—in fact, piano bars are my favorite. I love singing along and getting right into the show. In Las Vegas, I was under a spot light and serenaded for my 22nd birthday. In San Francisco, Mary got up and sang with the pianoist. In fact, Mary was so good that the pianist got her contact information in case he needed a female singer at a show. I don’t think there is anything Mary can’t do—but that is another topic completely. Anyway, Gibliano Brothers was fun, but most of the people in the bar were quiet. A piano bar isn’t fun if the audience isn’t singing. Since I’ve been so a few of these places, I know the lyrics to almost all of the typical songs, “Piano Man”, “American Pie”, “Copacabana”, “Saturday Night is Alright For Fighting”, “Friends in Low Places” and “Rocket Man” just to name a few. Really, I even surprised myself at my ability to remember the lyrics to all of these songs at the first tickle of the ivories. I think that people in the crowd in Spokane, didn’t realize that they are suppose to be feisty, sing and dance at a piano bar. Most of the time, they were just looking at each other. Good thing Mom, Dad, Farley and I were there to liven the mood. We sang, danced in our seats and participated the whole time we were there. Heck, maybe I should apply for a job there after I finish medical school before starting residency…I did have a piano scholarship in college, but I suspect people at a piano bar don’t want to hear Chopin. After the piano bar, we went to the Davenport Tower and had a Thai Chicken flat bread that was, as expected, excellent.

Above: Farley and me at Gibliano Brother's

Below: An Artsy picture of Mom at Gibliano Brother's (note: it just about takes a miracle to get a picture of Dad...he is hiding in the darkness to Mom's right)

Thursday in Spokane: Manito Park

Thursday, we went to Manito Park to see the rose, Japanese, Duncan, lilac and the pond. Farley took lots of pictures. We all had some yummy lemonade at "The Park Bench", which is the little sandwich shop in the park. We walked around the park for almost three hours. Dad was such a trooper, I was so proud. Next we headed to the Elk Public House for an amazing lunch. In fact, just typing about it makes me want to go back. Yummy! Farley wanted to go to Nordstom Rack so that is where we headed next. I found a couple great pairs of jeans and a couple cute tops and he bought (dun, dun, dun) his first best of class tie. If you don't know about ties, let me tell you, this was a monumental moment in ties. Thursday was really non-stop fun because after having another super dinner at home, we went to Costco to buy supplies for the Sunday BBQ. Then we headed to a friend of the family's house to say hello before finally calling it a day!

Here are the pictures from Manito Park:

Farley and me in the conservatory at Manito Park.




The Duncan Garden's At Manito Park

Shrubs at the side of the Duncan Gardens at Manito Park

Local Plants in the Perennial Garden in Manito Park.

A Duck posing for the camera near The Manito Park Duck Pond:

The Manito Park Duck Pond:

Farley and me under a Willow Tree on the edge of the Duck Pond:

Koi in the Japanese Gardens at Manito Park:

Japanese Gardens at Manito Park:

The Bridge over the Koi Pond at the Japanese Gardens in Manito Park:

Farley and me in the Japanese Gardens:

Another view of the Koi pond in the Japanese Gardens:

The Rose Garden in Manito Park---they were spraying for bugs so we didn't get to look around as long in the rose garden.

Panoramic View of the Rose Gardens

Operation Ambush Big Bac--Big Success!

Operation Ambush Big Bac was a smashing success. Farley and I headed into Spokane, but only told my Mom. Dad thought that he was coming to the airport to pick up a friend of the family--so there he was waiting...patiently. I thought he was looking right at us, but I guess he was looking past us because he didn't respond to seeing us until we were about ten feet from him. His jaw just dropped. I think he is still shocked that we came up to Spokane! After he realized it was us, he asked if where our family friend was. Dad couldn't believe that our friend and his family were never coming at all.

Tuesday night, we headed home and Mom made a great BBQ. I had chicken and everyone else had salmon. I knew that my friend Rachel had a birthday coming up and that she might be leaving town to see her boyfriend in Portland so I got in contact with her and we saw her (and her boyfriend) later Tuesday night. We had such a great time!

Wednesday, Mom, Dad, Farley and I headed down to Riverfront Park and the Centennial Trail. We walked from the park down to Gonzaga University and back before heading to lunch at the Rock City Grill. Yummy!! Next, we went in to Nordstrom (I had to pick up a baby gift for another friend). Then we went to Sacred Heart Children's Hospital (SHCH) to see some of the physicians that I used to work under. Whenever I go back to SHCH, it is like an episode of Cheers: Everybody knows my name. I wouldn't wish anyone to have a sick child and need to spend time there, but if you have to spend time at a hospital, SHCH is a good place to be with wonderful nurses and some amazing physicians.

Here are some pictures from Riverfront Park. I have been having trouble with this post (in fact, it has been deleted a few times). I hope everything shows up correctly!

Below: The Spokane River

Above: The clock tower, taken near the carrousel
Below: Picture of the river, taken a short walk from the carrousel.

Above: The Garbage Goat (which was my favorite thing as a kid)

Below: Another view of the clock tower

Relaxing for a little while at least...

We finished our school's review for the boards last Wednesday and decided to take a week or so off before starting our study for Step One (the first set of boards). Farley and I having been taking it really easy. We went to Costco with a friend on Thursday and spent THREE HOURS shopping around. I've never spent this much time in Costco...ever! We had lunch, chit-chatted and it was lot of fun. After we got back, we headed to Blockbuster and grabbed a few movies. We watched Elegy which is a bit of an artsy-fartsy movie. Both Farley and I enjoyed it--it discusses art and music, death and love--but to forwarn you: the ending is a bit sad. On Friday, we went to the gym for 45 minutes of a heart pounding cardiovascular workout, showered and headed to our pool. We were going to go to the beach, but it would have just been the two of us and we decided that since the pool is just downstairs that it would be easier to stay at home (besides, the University of Miami starts school on Monday so there are wild and crazy co-eds all over Miami trying to have their last bit of fun before the new semester starts). I finished reading The Time Traveler's Wife, which was a wonderful book. I'm not a huge science fiction reader, and there is a little of science fiction, but it was amazing. I'm amazed at how the author kept the story line straight as you were jumping around in time (each chapter started by saying how old the Time Traveler and his Wife were and they took turns telling the story so you heard the story from two perspectives and sometimes you would hear the same story at different times in the book as the Wife might be 16 when something happens and the Time Traveler might be 36). I can see why some people don't get into the book, as it jumps around a lot, but I really enjoyed it. I was trying to finish it so that Farley and I could go see the movie, but the movie is getting horrible reviews and I think a film adaptation might loose some of the magic of the book. Parts of it were a bit sad, but overall it was a great book. I might even read it again after I take Step 1 because there was so much foreshadowing and I'm sure I missed things the first time around not realizing how important the details would be.

Without having school, I've been tearing through books. Before reading The Time Traveler's Wife, I finished up The Agony and the Ecstasy, which I've been nursing all semester--nursing all 700+ pages! Farley was also reading it--it was our book club read. The first 500 pages or so were complete ecstasy--you felt like you were walking down an Italian street during the Renaissance and I learned so much about art history. However, there was a 50-100 page span where I couldn't wait to be done with the book. I felt like the book picked up again in the end, but not to the same level as the first 500 pages. Nonetheless, it was an amazing book overall and I'd suggest it to anyone who enjoys historical fiction. Bear in mind that the author spent about 6 years researching the book so there is a lot more history than the normal historical fiction, but if you read this book you will definitely learn something!

Anyway, after reading by the pool, Farley and I decided to watch Vicky Christina Barcelona, which was also artsy-fartsy. It wasn't my favorite movie, but there were moments that it was great. I've never seen a Woody Allen film before and it had a few interesting moments. I thought it should have been funnier given the set up: two American girls and close friends go to Barcelona for the summer fall and fall in love with the same man--a man whose ex-wife tried to kill him and reappears to complicate things as she is also still in love with this man. Really, it could have been extremely funny and it really wasn't in my opinion. It wasn't bad by any means, but it just wasn't at all what I expected.

To continue our relaxing break, I went to the gym early this morning so Farley and I could hit the pool a bit earlier. We both started reading A Good and Happy Child, which is a debut novel by Justin Evans. It is about a man in his 30s who cannot bring himself to hold his son and his wife demands that he goes to therapy. He begins to remember some horrible things from his childhood, including a murder. It is a psychological thriller and it must have been good because I read all 300+ pages in an afternoon. It was an interesting book and Farley and I have had fun discussing it. I was a little worried about reading it because I have an active imagination and get scared easily, but I wasn't really scared. I just really wanted to know how it was going to end.

After finishing the book, Farley and I watched another movie. This time an older movie, Primal Fear. It is a legal thriller with Edward Norton and Richard Gere. There are tons of twists and turns and the acting was superb. It came out in 1996, so I'm sure many people have seen it and if you haven't I won't say anymore because I don't want to give any of the plot twists away. It was a great movie.

And that is about that. It's been nice to be relaxing and I'm not looking forward to starting the official Step Review, but all of this relaxing makes me feel like I'm not getting enough done. I guess it is the medical student in me--we must always be accomplishing some goal. One of our professors said that anyone who goes to medical school is some sort of masochist: we go hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt, attend classes seven days a week sometimes for 10 hours a day often in rooms without windows, carry an incredible responsibility and burden, and sign up to work nights, weekends and holidays for the rest of our lives. To top it all off, we spend a good 10-15 years getting trained before we start to make any money and by then we have enough student loans that we basically have two house payments. I'm beginning to think he is right: I've been feeling like a I need a break for the last few weeks and now that I finally have a chance to relax for a week or so I have an overwhelming feeling that I should be studying, in a room without a window!

I finished the semester last Friday and promptly came home to nap! I couldn't sleep a wink Thursday night, which is unusual for me. After a good three hour nap, I was back to being semi-human again. Farley's 13-year old brother was in town, so we headed to Farley's grandparent's house for a lovely dinner and to pick up his brother for a weekend of fun. One of Farley's cousins was in town, so I got to meet her (which was very fun). As usual, Farley's grandma made a lovely dinner and we had wonderful conversation. About 11:00 we left his grandparents headed back to South Miami. The boy's decided that we should go "shoot zombies" at GameWorks. I was so tired that I probably looked like a zombie, so we decided to head to the apartment about 12:30 or so. Here is a picture of Sunset mall with GameWorks in the background. Saturday morning, we went down to the pool. This is only the second time Farley and I have been able to go to the beautiful pool that is in our building. It was a beautiful Miami day and we found some seats in the sun (well one of us opted for the shade). We read books for a few hours and hopped in the pool. In true Miami fashion, the pool was almost as warm as a bath tub!

After the pool, we headed to the gym. The air conditioning was out in the gym and it was so unbelievably hot! We managed to solder through our work outs, changed and headed to Target and back to Sunset Mall. We wandered around the mall window shopping for a while, then headed to Barns & Noble to pick up Farley's brother a book. Farley wanted to go to Dan Marino's Fine Food and Spirits so we headed to dinner. Dan Marino's isn't my favorite place to eat, but it was okay (I think the bar is better than the kitchen). After dinner, we needed to head back to GameWorks for another riveting round of "zombie killing." It was really busy so we left fairly quickly, which was probably for the best anyway as we needed to be up early to get across town to Farley's Grandparents house so we would make it to church on time.

Sunday morning, we were all up bright and early to get into our Sunday Bests and headed to Farley's Grandparent's house. We met up with the family and headed down to church. Farley's Grandparents attend an AME, African Methodist Episcopal Church. It was a very warm and inviting church, but definitely different than my upbringing in the Catholic Church. After the service was finished, we headed back to Farley's grandparent's house for brunch. Farley has a lot of cousins in Miami and I was able to meet more of them during this brunch, which was fun. After that, we headed home changed into shorts (much to Farley's dismay as he LOVES to wear ties) and headed to Dadeland Mall. It is a fairly good sized mall near our apartment and we thought it'd be fun for Farley's brother to see somewhere different. After going to the mall, we decided to rent a movie because between Farley and his brother, they had seen just about everything that was in the movie theaters (and NOT rated R that is since Farley's brother is only 13 years old!). The guys decided to rent Push which was better than I anticipated.

Monday, the guys decided to sleep in. At 11:00 I decided to get them up so we could have a big breakfast before heading to South Beach. We finally managed to get there about 1:15. We drove around so Farley's brother could see the art deco architecture. We parked at 16th street and Washington (about two blocks from the beach) then found a clear spot to enjoy the beach at about 15th street. Here are some pictures:

After we finished on the beach, we headed to Rocky's for Italian Ice. It is a famous Italian Ice place and I've been looking forward to going for months. Unfortunately: It was closed for remodeling. So we walked up and down Ocean Avenue for a while searching before going to get smoothies and heading home. Farley took a few pictures while I was driving of downtown Miami.

After the beach, we headed to (guess where) THE GYM! I know, it is always a good time. We were all pretty tired, so we watched Yes Man! which was funnier than I expected! The guys did some laundry and we headed to bed.

Tuesday morning we had to take Farley's brother back to his Grandparent's house before we had our review course for the Step at 3:00pm. We had the course every day for 10 days from 1:00 pm until 9:00pm! But the professor is amazing so it is worth the long crazy hours.

A Change Would Do You Good

I feel like such a whiner this semester, but I'm so tired and ready to be done. Our final exam is on Friday and I've been doing my best to stay focused and review, but it's been surprisingly hard. This semester was no where near as academically challenging as the previous four; however, it was challenging in different ways. Our schedule was constantly changing which made planning study time extremely difficult--we even had emails sent at midnight several times changing things and one email giving us our schedule at 4:00 am! They tried to be very clear about expectations, but within the last week they changed the entire grading scheme. Things that were not even listed on the original grading scheme and syllabus were added (weeks after we submitted them). I'm so grateful that I took a lot of time with the projects that were not listed on the original syllabus, especially given this change. One good thing about all of these changes and about going to an international medical school in general is that one becomes very adapt at rolling with the punches. The Sheryl Crow song, "A Change Would Do You Good," could have been my theme song this semester.

I know I've complained a lot, but it wasn't a horrible semester: I loved working in the clinics and working with patients. If the semester was more organized, it probably would have been the best semester we've had so far. I think part of my whining about the semester was because I had SUCH high expectations for the semester. Obviously, I set myself up for disaster--if I just would have expected a so-so or even a bad semester, the last few months would have surpassed my expectations. I guess perspective is everything!

Our school requires 10 semesters of medical school to earn the MD degree (it adds up to 4 years total--no summers off). As of Friday, I will be 5/10th of the way done!!! Time flies when you are reading huge text books!

Dance Dance Revolution

Farley and I finally went to Game Works and I'm sorry to say that I lost horribly at dance dance revolution. I was just awful. We had a great time playing different games: we killed zombies, played basketball, football and skiball, dance dance revolution, and even virtual bowling. It was more fun than I thought it would be. Farley may have beat me at dance dance revolution, but I beat him at basketball, football and skiball. I was able to get one good picture at Game Works Farley in some video game (below) and one good picture of the two of us before we left for Game Works (above).