Christmas

Our second Christmas together and in Denver has been an improvement over the first. (I say that mostly because last Christmas day started out quite nicely and ended in me sick in bed - as luck would have it, the only day I've been sick enough to stay home from work was a paid holiday.)

Our Christmas tree, nativity, and stockings. Sorry for the blurriness - the mirrors on the wall behind the tree don't make it easy to take pictures with necessary flash.

Ross and I committed to ourselves and our families before we were married that Christmas would be a holiday for us to celebrate as our own nuclear family. Thanksgiving is our time to celebrate with his family and New Year's Day is for mine.

Christmas Eve involved an a treasured lazy morning full of coffee and pajamas; the last of Christmas shopping; and the Christmas Eve service. First Mennonite has beautiful Christmas Eve service - readings from Isaiah and Luke, choral music, and lots of Christmas hymns followed by wassail.

Christmas Day began with exchanging gifts, and then we headed up to the mountains for a full day of skiing at Winter Park. Christmas ski traffic, both on I-70 and on the slopes, turned out to be much lighter than most Saturdays. We were also delighted to discover the ski in - ski out parking. We came back exhausted, called and Skyped our families to wish them a Merry Christmas, and went to bed early.

On top of Mary Jane peak with the Continental Divide behind us on Christmas Day.

OMT

Sometime in November, I decided to just take the many suggestions I've gotten that I apply to osteopathic (D.O.-granting) medical schools as well as allopathic (M.D.-granting). I've been open to it, but I just found a connection to a D.O. to shadow (which osteopathic schools really want you to do when you're applying). In the last month or so, I have been shadowing a doctor who actually does osteopathic manipulative treatment (OMT, the hands-on musculoskeletal manipulations that DOs learn which constitute the difference between them and MDs but that a lot of DOs don't do in practice) one morning a week to see what it's all about.

OMT is pretty cool. And a quick search of PubMed (a database of scientific studies) shows that it works better than placebo or physical therapy to treat some back pain, ankle injuries, and ear infections, actually (which I think is so weird!) among other ailments. With some patients, you actually see a difference in how they move immediately after treatment, which is awesome. It definitely seems like a great treatment option for musculoskeletal pain.

So today as part of my shadowing experience I decided to be the patient. I definitely have some occupation-related back and neck pain (sitting all day with a phone cradled against your shoulder while typing? It gets to you after a year or so) which makes me a good candidate for OMT. Plus, watching a doctor do it doesn't show as much as I would like, because so much of it seems to be small, slow, gentle movements rather than large or jerky movements that would make clear what's happening. To be honest, I sometimes wondered if anything was really happening. So I had my neck, back, and pelvis realigned this morning.

The doctor held my arms in weird positions while putting pressure on the muscles in my back that are always tight (this is called counterstrain, and if I remember right, the idea is that you stretch the tight muscles in the opposite direction). He cracked my T1 vertebra (the only cracking I've seen him do, actually - apparently unlike chiropractic, OMT doesn't involve a lot of that, but it sure felt good). He put pressure with his fingertips on points on my neck and my pectoral muscles. The med student doing a fellowship there had me squeeze my knees together and push them apart against resistance, put pressure on areas of my lower back, and had me move my legs around in a particular way. Very little of it hurt at all, it was not like a massage - they barely moved their hands, it was mostly slow, and it took about half an hour.

This afternoon and still somewhat now, I felt like I'd lifted weights for about two hours. I was SORE. And thirsty. But the good kind of sore - when I feel my shoulder muscles, they are much more relaxed than they have been. My upper back feels refreshingly loose and mobile. When I feel my spine from my shoulder blades up my neck, it actually feels and looks straighter.

Buying a camera

I am planning to buy a digital SLR camera sometime in the next few months and I need recommendations. I've read through some review sites and based on that, I'm thinking about a Canon Rebel XS or XSi or a Nikon D60, D3000, or D5000. I'm looking for something in the $500-$650 range for the camera and standard lens, and ideally for a telephoto lens also (I'm pushing my luck a bit there, but Amazon has a few packages like that).

I wish I knew a little more about the technicalities of digital photography. I'm doing some reading online, but it's difficult to keep all the terms straight. I've read that you're supposed to think about what you take pictures of, and for me that's mostly landscapes, macro photography of nature, and documenting events (portraits of people standing in front of something). However, I've been saying I'd upgrade to digital SLR on the occasion of either going on a major trip or having a baby, and we're planning a trip to Scandinavia this spring. Thus, I'm planning to use this camera to take pictures of interesting things I see while traveling, and later on when we have kids I'll use it to take pictures of them.

From what I've read, it seems like the cameras in the category I'm looking at (bottom of the price range for dSLRs, good for someone like me who is not a professional photographer and just wants better picture quality than a point-and-shoot can provide) are all about equal in terms of photo quality. So how do I figure out which one to buy?

A Blanket for Hope

I have been very crafty lately. And when I say crafts, I mean sewing. I took a quilting class this summer and have been excited about using my sewing machine for the last several months. A recent project was this:



















I made this blanket for an adorable 5-year-old girl named Mia. She is my coworker Michelle's daughter, and she was diagnosed with leukemia a few years ago. The orange ribbon for awareness is associated with childhood cancers, and Mia's family has adopted the orange ribbon as a sign of hope and support. Last year, they had a banquet and auction to support her cancer treatment. (They sold t-shirts with "Cure LeukeMIA!" on them - isn't that creative?) This year, Michelle was planning another event, so I told her I'd make a blanket to auction.

I used orange satin for the back and trim of the blanket, and picked a pink and orange heart patterned fleece for the front. "Princess" Mia is a very girly girl, and I thought pink hearts with orange satin made a sweet, spunky blanket to support Mia and her treatment.

As I was working on the blanket, I decided I'd tell Michelle that she could decide whether to auction the blanket or to just give it to Mia. After all, I made the blanket with Mia in mind, and it was a gift for her either way. When I took it to work, Michelle decided to give it to Mia. Apparently, Mia loves blankets and always has them with her.

Today, Michelle shared some great news on Facebook -- Mia's doctors say she has just one month of treatment left before she will be considered cancer-free! So I'm glad to be able to share about the blanket, and joyful beyond words for Mia, Michelle, and their family that Mia's road to recovery is almost over.

(I've made another blanket for another adorable little girl - Ross's new baby niece - but I won't post pictures until we meet her and give her the blanket at Thanksgiving.)

John Updike's Churchgoing

On the way home from running errands, NPR was airing a tribute to John Updike episode of A Prairie Home Companion, and this striking (at least to me) bit of prose is what I heard Garrison Keillor read:

from Churchgoing

There was a time when I wondered why more people did
not go to church. Taken purely as a human recreation, what
could be more delightful, more unexpected than to enter a
venerable and lavishly scaled building kept warm and clean
for us one or two hours a week and to sit and stand in unison
and sing and recite creeds and petitions that are like paths
worn smooth in the raw terrain of our hearts? To listen, or not
listen, as a poorly paid but resplendently robed man strives to
console us with scraps of ancient epistles and halting accounts,
hopelessly compromised by words, of those intimations of
divine joy that are like pain in that, their instant gone, the
mind cannot remember or believe them; to witness the
windows donated by departed patrons and the altar flowers
arranged by withdrawn hands and the whole considered
spectacle lustrous beneath its patina of inheritance; to pay, for
all this, no more than we are moved to give-surely in all
democracy there is nothing like it. Indeed, it is the most
available democratic experience. We vote less than once a
year. Only in church and at the polls are we actually given our
supposed value, the soul-unit of one, with its noumenal
arithmetic of equality: one equals one."

--from Churchgoing, from Pigeon Feathers and Other Stories, 1962, pp 249-250

(Text pulled from http://prairiehome.publicradio.org/programs/2009/01/31/scripts/updike.shtml, where you can also find a link to the audio.)

Summertime

Seventeen school years is enough to train a 23-year-old person to expect something different by the time June rolls around, and this is the first summer in my memory that has not included a significant change of pace (read: a different job). It's weird. I have no better way to say that.

The spring went by so quickly. It had just been Christmas by the time it was Ross's birthday (April 8) and there was scarcely enough time between his birthday and mine (May 19) to get anything done. Now, though, we're halfway into July and it feels like May was forever ago. The summer is just dragging on. Fortunately, I love summer, especially in Colorado, where yesterday I went to Lilith Fair in 98-degree heat and enough sun to give even my resilient skin a sunburn, and it wasn't even a problem because there is NO humidity here. Colorado is the best. In Kansas it would be 104 and 95% humidity.

Anyway, June and July have been full of events -- camping, friends visiting, our anniversary, two weddings in Kansas, farmers market on Saturdays, quilting class on Wednesdays, recreational kickball on Mondays, Lilith Fair... and yet my longing for newness in everyday life has kept all these events and commitments from feeling like a whirlwind.

I should be grateful that this favorite season of mine is taking its time to pass, yet I have been uneasy since the beginning of May. That expectant student whom I am used to being is still in the stressful May-time when days and weeks never seem to end and yet are never long enough, waiting for finals to be over, for a break from classes and juggling work and extracurricular activities, waiting to escape to a 9-to-5 workday for three precious months. Only now that the 9-to-5 workday is the everyday normal, I want to escape from it.

One year

Today is Ross's and my first anniversary. It's been a wonderful year.

















I have heard that the first year of marriage is the hardest. If that's true, it bodes excellently for the rest of our marriage.

Tropical Dinner Party

Last weekend, my college roommate/sister-in-law Meredith stayed with us, so we had Ross's cousins over for dinner. I had been craving coconut shrimp for at least a month, so I knew I wanted to make that. From there, I decided that a tropical theme for the meal would be good. So here's what we had:

Coconut shrimp with dipping sauce (which was delicious, by the way)
Kebabs (pepper, onion, pineapple, and optional chicken)
Mixed greens salad with Annie's Organics Papaya and Poppyseed dressing
Basil rice
Colorful potatoes with peanut sauce

Unfortunately, I failed to take any pictures. I didn't even think about it until we were finished eating.

Name Nerdery: Twilight

In my last post, I mentioned that Isabella and Jacob, the SSA's #1-ranked names for 2009, have gotten some press because they are both used in Stephanie Myers' Twilight series. I thought I'd expand this a little further.

A name can get all the pop-culture references you can shake a stick at, and unless it fits parents' collective naming taste -- a trend -- it won't rise in popularity. Take, for example, the show Friends. It was extremely popular, and aired from 1994-2004. During that time, the names used on Friends got a lot of exposure. Phoebe was the only name of a main character that rose in popularity. Chandler got an initial boost in popularity in 1995, and then along with all the rest of the main characters names, fell steadily during Friends' ten-year run.

In 2000, though, when Phoebe was the surrogate for her brother's triplets, one of which was a girl she named Chandler, the name Chandler made it onto the top 1000 for girls for the first time ever. But at the same time, traditionally male trade names for girls were gaining popularity: Taylor was popular throughout the '90s; Hunter peaked in 2000, Tyler gained popularity in the late 1990s, and Piper and Parker made it onto the charts in 1999 and have been rising ever since. Hearing Chandler used on a baby girl on Friends probably sounded fresh and unique to expectant parents who were drawn to girls' names like Taylor, Hunter, and Parker.

So how are the other characters' names faring in terms of popularity? Pretty well, it turns out.

Edward was in the Top 10 from the 1880s through 1930. It has slowly decreased in popularity since then (it was in the Top 100 until 1997), and there does not appear to be a Twilight-induced bump in popularity despite all the Edward fans.

Alice peaked in popularity in 1906. It has stayed in the Top 1000, but since 2005, when Twilight was released, it has increased 156 spots in the rankings, from 414 to 258. The number of babies named Alice since 2005 has gone from 751 to 1,251. It is worth noting another pop-culture reference to Alice -- comedian Tina Fey's daughter, born in September 2005.

Jasper peaked in the 1880s. It was on the Top 1000, but relatively obscure, throughout the 20th century. It started regaining popularity in 2000. Since 2005, it has moved from #537 to #337 -- 200 ranks in 5 years.

Esme has never been in the top 1000. (But on a personal note, I wish it would be! I think Esme is a lovely name that deserves to be used.)

Carlisle has never been in the top 1000, but the spelling Carlyle peaked in 1918. It hasn't been in the top 1000 since 1950.

Rosalie peaked in the 1930s and declined off the charts afterward. It popped back up in 2009 at #840.

Emmett peaked in 1895. It also stayed in the Top 1000. Since 1990, it has been coming out of obscurity (from 964 into the 500s), but Twilight probably gave it a boost -- between 2008 and 2009, Emmett jumped up 215 ranks, from #547 to #332.

The names from Twilight work the same way. Isabella and Jacob were popular before Stephanie Meyer wrote Twilight. In fact, the author has said that she used Bella's name because it was the name she had chosen for the daughter she never had. According to Wikipedia, Meyer's sons are named Gabe, Seth, and Eli -- like Jacob, biblical names that have been gaining popularity in recent years.

Names tend to be popular in cycles. Every generation has its own unique names, and some names are eternally popular (Elizabeth and John, for example) but as a whole, names fall in and out of popularity with time. Parents tend to think that names that were popular for their own, their parents, and their grandparents generations sound too dated. Names that were popular in their great-grandparents' generation, though, sound fresh -- because most people's lifespans don't overlap with their great grandparents'.

Cullen is a an exception. The name has been used as a first name on and off since 1880; consistently since 1978. In 2009, it hit a 129-year peak in popularity: #485, with 555 babies named Cullen in 2009. This is one name that is almost certainly attributable to Twilight. Cullen was declining steadily -- from a previous peak in 1997 (#505) down to #782 in 2008. There is really no force other than Twilight that would reverse that decline so sharply. Similar-sounding names Colin, Collin, and Calvin have been fairly stagnant in the past decade, and Cullen is not a recycled great-grandpa name -- it was obscure 100 years ago.

The vampires in Twilight are all just about 100 years old -- great-grandparent age. And in fact, their names are period-appropriate. For her protagonist vampires, Meyer presumably chose names that sounded old enough but also appealing to her. And since Meyer is in today's parent generation, is it any surprise that the 100-year-old names she chose are ones that appeal to other modern parents?

Name Nerdery: Aiden Rhymers

Mother's Day weekend is always pretty exciting for me. My mom is awesome, but I am pretty equally excited about her all the time. No, the reason I get so excited about Mother's Day weekend is that the Social Security Administration releases the top 1000 most popular names for the previous year. Last Friday they released 2009's. I'll probably have at least a couple of posts about names. Readers, please let me know if there's anything you'd like me to analyze!

Clearly, the news broke into the regular media that Isabella is the new #1 girls' name, ending a 13-year run by Emily and Emma. But while the media is making a big deal that Isabella and Jacob -- names of main characters in the Twilight series -- are ranked #1, I don't think too much of that. Jacob has been #1 since 1999, and Isabella has been flying up the charts since 1990. When Twilight was released in 2005, both names were already super-popular. The name recognition from Twilight may have given Isabella a boost, but it was popular anyway.

What the SSA data doesn't tell, though, is some other big news: Jacob is actually the #3 most popular name for boys. You see, the SSA doesn't combine alternate spellings of names. It does, however, tell the number of babies named each name, which can then be combined and ranked. When you do that, as I have, you discover the two actual most popular names for boys born in 2009: Aiden and Jayden. On the SSA list, Aiden is ranked #12 and Jayden #8. The reason Aiden and Jayden don't show up as #1 and #2?

There were 15,846 baby boys named Aiden in 2009. But Aiden can also be spelled Aidan (#72), Ayden (#85), Aden (#253), Aaden (#271), Aydan (#622), Aydin (#646), Aidyn (#724), and Aedan (#838). And some boys named Adan (#293) certainly also will pronounce their names like Aiden, though others are the Spanish Adán (accents don't show up on the SSA list). Add those all together, and you get 30,518 little Aiden-variants (not even including the 1117 Adans, because who knows how their names are pronounced). That's DOUBLE the Aidens! On the other hand, the alternate spellings of Jacob on the list (Jakob and Jaycob) add only 1179 babies to the 20,878 Jacobs.

Americans' propensity to play with spelling creates a lot of false data like this. Names like Aiden and Jayden that follow a certain pattern are immensely popular (on the girls' side, Hailey and Kaylee are the highest ranking names for this pattern). Parents can pretty much create a name using this formula:

[K, C, J, H, Br, R, Z, Sh] + [long A] + [L or D] + [-en, -ee, -a]
And then change the spelling to suit one's fancy.

The possibilities are finite, of course, but they seem endless: Braylen, Jayla, Hayleigh, Shaylee, Braedon, Raelyn, Cailyn, Zaiden, Shayla, Jaelyn, Raiden... all of those are in the top 1000.

A brief rant

I deal with ignorance a lot at work. Not bigotry, just lack of awareness about things. And I really don't blame people for it too much. But today I encountered a pretty ridiculous example, and I would like to share it with you.

A patient is having trouble getting her insurance to cover a couple of routine screenings and another test. She called about it today. Apparently the insurance company is saying they have the wrong diagnosis codes for the procedures she had done. So I called her insurance company to see if I could help her figure things out. Here is how the call went.

[Holds for 10 minutes.]
Customer Service Rep: Blue Shield of California, my name is [name]. This call is being recorded. How can I help you?
Me: I'm calling from a doctor's office, and I have a patient who is having trouble getting you to cover some tests we ordered. Can you please tell me what information you have on file for [date of service]?
Rep: Do you know how much the claim is for?
Me: Around $2000? I don't know exactly, I don't have the patient's bill in front of me.
Rep: It must be this claim for $2210. I show that the services were not covered benefits. Oh wait! It looks like we covered $220.
Me: And what was that for?
Rep: Diagnosis code V76.12 and procedure code 00403.
Me: Okay, V76.12 is "need for screening mammography." What is 00403?
Rep: It's the procedure code.
Me: What type? It's not a CPT code [standard procedure code]. It must be unique to your system. What does it mean?
Rep: Uhh... let me check.
[Puts me on hold for 2 minutes.]
Rep: Hemo- hemoglobin.
Me: Hemoglobin is not a procedure. There is no way that's right. The only procedure code that should go with the diagnosis code "need for screening mammography" is a procedure code for a mammogram.
Rep: Uh... hold on.
[Puts me on hold.]
[Disconnected.]

SERIOUSLY. WTF. This guy works in the health insurance industry and he doesn't know what hemoglobin is. It's the protein on red blood cells that transports oxygen. It is NOT a procedure. It's like saying "eyeball" or "toenail" or "skin cell" is a procedure. What a dumbass. I would like to say I can't believe insurance companies hire people who don't know anything about medicine or medical terminology, but I can. This guy was clearly not familiar with the word "hemoglobin" and he definitely didn't even realize the idiocy of what he was saying to me.

O nata lux

I struggle with Easter. It is the pinnacle of the Christian liturgical calendar, the highest of holy days. And yet, it has not resonated with me.

The coming of spring and new life is part of my life experience and is welcome. Easter is happily aligned with the vernal equinox thanks to pagan influence. There is, as Christians say, new life in Christ. I've even had to remind myself that the Latin phrase-concept nata lux, "birth of light" refers to Christmas, not Easter. Yet Easter could be described as a birth of light -- as the days get longer, the stone is rolled away from the tomb. Jesus, light of the world, is reborn through resurrection.

But as we celebrate it, Easter is about the resurrection's implications for salvation, the defeat of death. "Up from the grave he arose, with a mighty triumph o'er his foes!"; "Christ is arisen and we shall not die!" the hymns go. But my faith is not one of Christus victor theology, not one that emphasizes salvation, and certainly not personal salvation. And to me, what comes after death is less important than what comes before. The gospels, which come between Christmas and Easter, which are elevated above the rest of the Bible in Mennonite theology, are the heart and soul of my faith.

And on Easter, when the gospels come to an end, perhaps it is natural to feel a little lost. It's like finishing a captivating novel -- I'm never satisfied with the ending, and I wish to be back in the throes of the narrative. On Easter morning, I'm with the disciples. I want to be with Jesus again as he heals and multiplies food and drink and speaks in parables and teaches what is dangerous, exciting, new, even revolutionary. I want to come along with this Messiah as he brings in the Kingdom of God. I am not comfortable with Easter morning reality. I do not want this empty tomb, this figure who is unrecognizable even as he speaks to Mary in the garden and the disciples on the road to Emmaus, whom Thomas must touch to believe.

And then, one by one, the disciples recognize Jesus. They come to terms with the new, impossible reality that their belief was not in vain. This miraculous reappearance cements their certainty that this Messiah was for real, although this new reality was unexpected and maybe even a little disappointing for some of them who were expecting a significantly different manifestation of God's kingdom. But here among them was the impossible. This experience would be the push that gave the early church momentum. Rather than return, defeated, to their hometowns, they would "make disciples of all nations."

As we observe Holy Week, we know what's coming. Part of our yearly cycle, it lacks the despair it held for the disciples; it is preparation for the celebration of Easter, not the end of everything we hold dear. Easter is not a surprise for us. And there is a lot of theology between us and those who experienced the resurrection in the gospel stories. Easter means both more and less. This - this separation - is where Easter loses meaning for me.

With the disciples, we have learned from Jesus how to build God's kingdom. And today, Jesus, our teacher, the prophet, is born anew from the grave. The birth of light, which the darkness has not overcome. As we, with the disciples but in a different way, suspend reality to experience the risen Christ, we come to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is the anointed one, God's son, love embodied, the light of the world. In Jesus' resurrection, our journey is validated. The end of the gospel story is satisfying.

Why I support health care reform

As a political enthusiast working in the health care field, I have been following the health care reform debate fairly closely. I was upset -- but not surprised -- when single payer was never put on the table, and when a public option was dismissed. I think that either of those would be a major improvement to the system we have.

I have some issues with the new law -- mainly that it effectively cuts Medicare payments to health care providers. Medicare reimbursements are already low, and this cut will probably lead to a decreased pool of providers willing to serve America's elderly and disabled populations -- groups that need medical care more than most.

However, I ardently support the legislation that passed on Sunday night.

Why?

It regulates the insurance industry. From an AP article that seems to be fairly comprehensive in its summarization of the law, here are some new regulations to insurance companies:

- Prohibits insurers from changing an existing policy to exclude payment for a child's medical condition.
- Prohibits lifetime coverage limits.
- Prohibits insurers from canceling policies except for fraud.
- Prohibits denial of coverage or higher rates for preexisting conditions.
- Though it's not in the article, I believe that the law requires that no less than 80% of insurance company income be spent on medical payments.

Insurance companies are infamous for doing all of those things and more. It's disgusting and immoral, and if health insurance must be private, it must be regulated. This law is a good start.

Real food

After four years of college cafeteria food, it continues to be delightful to eat real food. In the eight months of having an independent household, Ross and I have not had a prepackaged meal for dinner. We have bought some Lean Cuisines for lunches, and recently we bought some ramen bowls (I hate ramen and will not be eating those, but the idea was that Ross and Jess could eat them for lunch). We eat a lot of vegetables and whole grains. I always buy organic, cage-free eggs and frequently buy organic, free-range meat. High-quality meat is expensive, so we don't eat that much meat.

This afternoon I made granola. The great thing about granola is that there are a few basic ingredients (oats, oil, honey, cinnamon, salt) and after that you can really use whatever grains, nuts, seeds, spices, or dried fruit you want or have handy. Today I used flax seed -- I bought some yesterday at the natural grocery because I'm trying to diversify my grain intake and flax is high in omega-3 fatty acids. I modified this recipe and it is good. Here's what I did:

2 and 2/3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
1/3 cup golden flax seed
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp salt
3 tbsp plus 1 tsp canola oil
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2/3 cup slivered almonds

0. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
1. Combine oats, flax seed, cinnamon, and salt in a large bowl. Set aside.
2. Combine oil, honey, brown sugar, and vanilla in a medium bowl. Whisk until combined.
3. Pour wet mixture over dry mixture. Combine using your hands until oats are evenly coated.
4. Spread granola evenly on a cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes.
5. Remove cookie sheet from oven. Turn granola with a spatula. Add almonds.
6. Return cookie sheet to oven and bake for 15 more minutes.
7. Let cool and store in airtight container.

Menu Plan!

I got a new cookbook -- The Tropical Vegan Kitchen -- which I am very excited to use. No, we have not gone vegan. However, we do limit our meat consumption, and I have been looking for low-fat vegetarian recipes. I usually hesitate to use vegan recipes because of either a great deal of soy (which I avoid for health reasons) or dairy substitutes. However, this cookbook promised to not use things like that (except for the occasional tofu) because many of the recipes from tropical regions are vegan anyway. So 3 of this week's meals come from that cookbook.

Monday - Black bean & avocado enchiladas w/ chipotle sauce
Tuesday - Brats & sweet potato fries
Wednesday - Thai pumpkin curry over rice
Thursday - Hot mango pilaf w/ almonds
Friday - Pizza
Saturday - Chili
Sunday - Leftovers

I also bought supplies for guacamole from this recipe. It really is perfect, only Ross hates tomatoes so I don't always use them.

I just returned from shopping and my cart was full of fruits and veggies. What a good feeling that is!

I get to...

The other day at work I heard something that really struck me. In a conversation about New Year's resolutions:

"I've resolved to say 'I get to' instead of 'I have to.'"

Wow. What a simple way to change an attitude. I've been thinking about it ever since.

For example,

I have to get to go to the grocery store. I have the means to buy food for my family, and furthermore, I have the power to make decisions about what food to buy. I can pick up a bag of kettle chips, see what novel citrus fruits are there this week, maybe find a great deal on manager's special organic free-range meat.

I have to get to work out. I am blessed with a young, healthy body that I can control. I have access to safe places to exercise. I get to feel my body work as I push myself. I can make myself become stronger, faster, healthier.

Or even something like this: I have to get to call this patient and tell him he has diabetes. If someone has to call with bad news, I know I can be kind and reassuring while I deliver it.

Think about these...

I get to work. I get to give a speech. I get to go to the doctor. I get to go to a funeral. I get to buy a present for someone. I get to write thank-you notes. I get to stop eating so much sugar. I get to cut back on spending. I get to pay my taxes.

Not that I think people should actually SAY some of these things. After all, it's socially inappropriate to say things like "I get to go to a funeral." But I still like the thought exercise. Even the mundane and unpleasant things can have a silver lining when you change that one word.

How I feel about drug reps

So the office I work for is visited regularly by pharmaceutical company reps. Before I started working there, and when I first started, I was pretty unilaterally opposed to that. I tended to think that offices that barred drug reps from their doors were providing better patient care because they weren't under the influence of the drug companies' bullshit. Now that I've worked there longer, I have mixed feelings about it. For one thing, the providers I work for have told me that they take everything the reps say with a few giant chunks of salt -- they're not passive listeners. For another thing, some of the drug reps are in the business to help the patient/consumer -- you can really tell the difference between reps who are in it for the money only and reps who do truly want to help get good treatment to patients.

But my mixed feelings are primarily because letting drug reps into the office provides samples, and those samples can sometimes be lifesavers for patients.

For example, we have a patient who is an insulin-dependent diabetic. He has private insurance, but not very good coverage. I don't think insulin comes as a generic, and it is expensive. One brand of insulin pen, for example, costs around $200 out of pocket for about a month's supply. We give him his insulin -- via samples -- on a pretty regular basis. It's a similar situation for a lot of patients on anti-osteoporosis medication, testosterone gel, sleep aids, and several medications for acid reflux.

Another thing is that insurance companies are ridiculous and, as you know, enjoy denying coverage as much as possible. One thing that you may not know about is the "prior authorization." It works like this: You go to the doctor for, say, acid reflux. You have already tried a bunch of OTC medications and they're not working for you. Your doctor prescribes Nexium, AcipHex, Prilosec, etc. or their generic forms (which are not on the $4 list). The pharmacy runs the prescription through your insurance and they receive a message that says "Requires preauthorization."

This means that insurance will not pay for the medication your doctor wants you to have unless the doctor's office calls the insurance company and convinces them to cover it. It is usually the same deal for MRIs and CT scans. This call takes about 20 minutes for most insurance companies and sometimes takes up to 2 weeks for the insurance company to decide (Medicaid and TriCare are the easiest -- they have one-page paper forms and reply in 1-2 days).

During this time, what are you supposed to do? Your chest is burning, you can't sleep, and you're at your wits end. Answer? Get samples from your doctor.

To me, it's clear that the real problem here is our fucked-up private health insurance system. It would be awesome if there were a national healthcare system that did not "come between doctor and patient" as we hear pretty frequently these days. Even if that system did continue to require prior authorizations, the government model works much, much better than the private model as it stands (and Medicaid and TriCare approve most submissions).

However, since over half the country insists that socialized medicine is Satan incarnate, we're going to keep having evil insurance companies that refuse to cover necessary medications, and as long as that's the case I think it's good medicine to provide patients with samples. Remove the insurance industry and the need for samples it generates, and there's no need for drug companies to insert themselves into offices. And then the drug companies take a big hit too. Everyone wins.

What I love about names

I remember learning to play Bach's "Minuet in G Major" for two reasons. For one, it was one of the first pieces I played that was written by a famous composer, and I liked the piece. The other reason was the note on the piece: "From the Anna Magdalena Bach Notebook." The name Anna Magdalena struck me as absolutely gorgeous.

I have been interested in names since I was 8 years old. My mom was pregnant with my little brother, and while his middle name was decided, my parents were having trouble finding the perfect first name. I suppose those discussions started the wheels turning. Around the same time, I found the baby name book that my parents had used to name my brother Nicholas and me. It solidified my interest -- which over the last 14 years grew from merely what I would name my future babies to memorizing meanings and etymologies and following trends in American baby naming.

However, I don't think most people take names -- and naming -- as seriously as I do. I can't fathom when parents admit to having given total control of their child's name to their spouse. To me, names can be exquisite or atrocious or unremarkable; they convey social demographics, personality characteristics, even values.

People judge others based on names alone -- studies have shown that essays and resumes with common English names on them receive better responses, and how often have you heard someone refer to a name as "a stripper name"?

To me, a name can be appreciated in the same way as anything that's a matter of taste. A good name has a comfortable syllabic flow. Its vowels or consonants don't run together. The relative obscurity of each name (first, middle, last) strikes a balance which keeps it from being boring but also from being too out-there. If these elements are broken, it is a purposeful disruption with a striking result. A good name has substance, history, meaning.

The middle name is not wasted, given no thought -- a middle name is a perfect place to honor a loved one, use a meaningful name, balance out an unusual first name with a common middle name or vice versa. It's a good place to experiment; after all, very few people use their middle names, so if a person hates theirs it's not difficult to hide behind its first letter.

Beyond name appreciation, I also find it interesting to see how the American public's taste in names changes. Right now, the trends are:

For boys:
- Old Testament biblical names (Jacob, Isaiah, Noah)
- Names that are or rhyme with Aidan (Braden, Kaden, Hayden, Jayden, etc.)

For girls:
- "Old-fashioned" names (like Abigail, Sophia, Emma, and Grace -- this trend carries over to boys to some extent with names like Henry and Oliver)
- Names beginning in Mad- or Ad- (Madeline, Madison, Adeline, Addison, and variant spellings)
- Names that end in -aylee or -iley (Kaylee, Jaylee, Kiley, Miley, Riley and variants).

Evidently this interest -- at least this intense of one -- is not one that a lot of people share. Names provide a conversation-starter for me, and people usually are mildly curious about names and their usage. After all, everybody has a name.

This decade

On January 1, 2000, I...

- was 12 years old and in 7th grade.
- supported candidate John McCain for the 2000 election and would have classified myself as a Republican.
- was 5'2".
- loved The X-Files, the Goo Goo Dolls, and Rent.
- had never so much as held hands with a boy.
- would have had a hard time choosing a favorite subject because I liked all of them except Social Studies.
- wore glasses.
- aspired to be a physician.
- thought my blue Hard Rock Cafe t-shirt was the coolest piece of clothing I owned.
- didn't mind having braces.
- had been out of the country, but only to Mexico.
- hoped that in 10 years I would have graduated from Bethel, gotten married, and be a first-year medical student at KU.

On January 1, 2010, I...
- am 22 years old and work at a doctor's office.
- consider myself to be politically to the left of the U.S. Congress.
- am 5'5".
- enjoy Battlestar Galactica, Glee, and bluegrass and folk music (some things don't change that much).
- am married.
- live in Denver.
- have a bachelor's degree in biology.
- aspire to be a physician.
- think skinny jeans are probably the most fashionable piece of clothing I own, but am too self-conscious to wear them most of the time because I just bought them to wear with boots.
- have traveled to Mexico, Canada, England, France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy.

I think my 12-year-old self would be pretty happy with my current self. 12-year-old Allison would have been disappointed that I didn't get into medical school right after college, as that was part of my life plan then. But hey, I fulfilled most of my 10-year plan!