Updates, and blasts from the past...

I'm at a conference in Dallas right now, with some spare time in a hotel room, so I thought I'd update this rarely used blog.

First, some blasts from the past:

Nicole's graduation from PA school, winter '06

Me, Nicole, Sarah

Me, Nicole, Amy, Nate

Nicole's family, and Terry Mize, all proud of Nicole

Nate, with Sofie when she was just a pup!

Nicole at 28 weeks! That's right, she's pregnant!

Sofie last summer '08

Us at Barkwells, summer '08, for Mary's (Nicole's grandma)'s 80'th birthday.

Hanging out during the "What's the Sex" party for our baby!

The nursery, not yet complete, but painted light green and baby's new dresser.

At Top of the Hill for Nicole's 30th birthday, April 2009

Us at Nic's baby shower

Almost everyone at Nic's baby shower...

The girls...

Baby shower...we are lucky to have great friends...

Yes, you heard it here, we are pregnant! I think those of you who read this blog already know, but if not, Nicole is pregnant with our little girl, whose name will be Ansley _____ Cheng. Everything has gone well so far and we are fortunate that we've had no major problems. Parenthood looms close, and I am now learning an appreciation of all of those who raised children. Special thanks to Karen, Amy, and Sarah who threw the shower, and Barbara who catered it!

I plan on using this blog as a means to keep up with us, see pictures of baby, and so on...yes yes I know I have been terrible at this. I'm hoping that baby will be the motivation for this.

Have lots more pictures and events to mention, but will do that another time!

Love,

Alan

Fozzy Bear Cheng

Our beloved dog, Fozzy, died March 10, 2009. He was 14 years old, and we miss him very much.

It doesn't matter if I still think his name is spelled "Fozzy" or my sister thinks its "Fozzie". He had the middle name "Bear", because he was as cuddly and absent minded as the character he was named after, Fozzy Bear. He was a sweet, 95 pound mutt (we really have no idea what kind of dog he was), who Jenny adopted from a pound without asking permission from our parents. He was so cute coming home. I remember the first days we had him - my sister drove me to school (10th grade), and we brought Fozzy along. We almost got to school, when Fozzy started acting funny...he started moaning and pacing, and then suddenly he threw up on the car seat. What we saw were about 20 white noodle looking things. We also knew we ate speghetti the night before, so when we saw these "noodles", we wondered how he got a hold of them, and why they weren't digested. Until about 10 seconds later, when all of a sudden they ALL started moving. Even the one Jenny picked up started curling up in her hands. I thought I was gonna vomit. He's been the endeared family pet ever since.

He was a quick learner, thanks in part to my dad who liked to teach him tricks to the point of almost torturing him. He learned to lay still with human food on his paws, and he wouldn't move, sometimes for 1/2 hour at a time, until you said 'ok'. He learned to retrieve the newspaper, and learned to howl and sing when we did. He was protective, and he growled when a strange noise was coming from outside -- as well as one we hugged, yelled while watching football, or made any other strange gestures. He was our security guard. He always barked at Amy, probably because she was smaller than him when he was a puppy.

He also loved to be with us. He slept with me a lot when I was a high school student, and I watched movies on the floor with him as my pillow. We'd go running together, and I even wore him out rollerblading or biking. He loved to chase me, and even once I would have him chase me in the front yard, but juke and jive like a football player - I once juked around a tree, but poor Fozzy was watching me and not the tree and.....BAM! He slammed his poor little snout against the tree.

He was a wonderful companion, and as I left for college and medical school and residency, and Amy left for college, he always hung around mom and dad, and slept by their bed every night. He became older, gray, with lumps and bumps, but he always loved to go outside, catch the frisbee, pee on the lawn and sniff the air. This past Christmas, he looked old - his eyebrows were gray and overgrown, and he didn't have the pep in his step like he used too. Even the stairs were hard to conquer. But he still looked good, like he was enjoying himself...he still liked to eat and poop. However, come January and February of this year, he even stopped that. We knew it was close. I asked mom and dad if they could not 'do anything' until I came and visited this Spring...but he grew more tired, thin, and stopped eating and drinking. He became more snappy, probably from pain. He couldn't walk anymore.

Jenny and Jeff and Amy and mom and dad were all in agreement - Fozzy was dying. They went out and bought him a special treat - a full meal from Outback steakhouse. I wasn't sure if he would eat it - but eat it he did, and with great enthusiasm. And thus, after this, barely limping and with sunken eyes, Jenny let him pass away in her arms. We will miss him, and we know he's in dog heaven...though, he doesn't like dogs. He's joined our old, epileptic dog Toby, and my favorite golden retriever Sarge (Carrie and Steve's old dog)...and I hope he's chasing down frisbees and eating steak every night wherever he is. We love you Fozzy!

Good times in Tampa

working nights

Hey everyone,

 

I think my blog is about 3 years old now!  Woohoo!

 

I'm working nights at WakeMed Hospital in Raleigh, and the websites here are filtered, so it won't let me on my blog.  Haha, I have figured out, though, that I can e-mail the blog, then my post will be entered. 

 

The "night float" residents are the residents responsible for taking care of patients, and doing new patient admissions, at night.  We take care of all the internal medicine patients at UNC, so it requires 5 night float residents.  At WakeMed in Raleigh, we take care of only a minority of patients, so only 1 night float is needed.  I've been that 1 guy this past week. 

 

It's neat in one respect - you are the man (or woman), and the ultimate decisions rest on you, and there's really no one else immediately around to help.  Every night I've had at least one patient require transfer to the ICU, whether its from uncontrollable SVT (abnormally fast heart rate), delirium tremens (alcohol withdrawal delerium with unstable vital signs), recurrent pnuemothorax (abnormal air in the chest), hypoxic respiratory failure in a sickle cell patient, or a stroke.  It's been busy!

 

Speaking of...I just got paged to do 2 more admissions.  At Wake, we do 4 admissions a night, which isn't bad if other people aren't crashing on the floors.  So..I'll write more later, or during the holidays.  Can't wait to go to Tampa and see our family and friends!!

 

Alan

its feeling like winter

Us at Hanging Rock state park in Asheville, NC during an REI rock climbing trip.

Nicole is a monkey!

Yes, it really is this high!

Kaelyn aka Fat Piggy!

Colleen and Matt's wedding, the day after in Destin, FL

Jeff, Nate, and I rockin it out.

Congratulations Matt and Colleeen!

Alex and Sarah, with Hailey and Abby, in their mansion in Tallahassee!

Mark and Andi, Karen and Dave and Natalie, and us, with the dogs, on some trails on a cold wintery day! (today)

Scott, Cynthia, and us at the Medicine holiday party. And some drunk attendings!

Me putting up some lights, with a ceiling fan duster...

Nicole dogsitting Jazz...she's loving it.

Reconnecting with Shveta and Dorothy, 2 of my good med school friends.

The Asians at Phil and Zenia's wedding. Congrats!

Sofie hurt her paw. Nicole cleaning it. Poor thing...

Hi everyone,

Just trying to keep my promise of updating this blog more!!

Things are good here in North Carolina. There's been some new changes in our life. Nicole has a new job - she used to work for the UNC GI division, as a PA in the esophageal diseases clinic. Now she switched to become the PA for one of our best doctors, a geriatrics doctor at UNC who does primary care for older people. He also is the vice-president of UNC physicians. He's one of the older, wise, experienced clinicians that I love. So its a great move for Nicole, and she will learn a lot.

We went down to Atlanta for Thanksgiving, and spent the weekend at Amy and Nate's house, and Sofie got to play with their dogs, which was great. Props to Nate, who spent all day smoking a turkey which was awesome. We got to visit with Ben and Jen, Ben and Stephanie, Nicole's aunt Carey and her grandmother Mary, and her kids Warner and Kate. It made us miss Atlanta a lot, and it wasn't enough time down there to see everyone! Earlier in the fall, Nicole and I went outdoor rock climbing in Asheville, NC with Jenny, Jeff and Amy. It was awesome! We climbed the face of this granite rock, about 110 feet up (though the rock was probably 600-800 feet high). It was through REI, and we camped out in tents in 30 degree weather and had food in the campground, and a campfire going. Was a lot of fun. Amy is quite the climber...her arms are jacked. In addition, Colleen and Matt got married - congratulations! - then proceeded to get a new puppy, and about to move to Charlotte, NC, closer to us!

Here in North Carolina, life has been pretty good. We've started to get comfortable here. We've been playing softball in a neighborhood softball league - we're the youngest on the team, with most people in the 40s and 50s. We have a couple of good friends, the closest of which are Dave and Karen, their baby girl Natalie, and their dog Katie. We're often at each others house for dinner, or out on walks together with the dogs.

Finally, work for me has been a little less busy and more enjoyable, as I have become more experienced as a 3rd year resident. Its nice to have the experience and knowledge of having been around a while, and I realized how much I've learned, as a good deal of the patient care is now more routine for me. It's all relative though...it's never boring and always more to learn.

I've been lucky enough to have been selected as a chief resident for next year. This is an optional job, so I stay an extra year, with the same measley salary, to help run the residency program. Its a big honor - I, along with 3 others, will run the residency program, be in charge of much of the education of the residents and students, attend lots of meetings around the hospital, and run the day-to-day issues of the residency. The 2 main projects for the chiefs are to make the schedule for the next year, and to spearhead the recruiting effort for the residency, no easy tasks. I'm looking forward to the teaching more than anything else. Also, I'll be the attending physician for about a month in the hospital, and attend in the clinic as well. Crazy!

Nicole and I have more free time this year, so we got some UNC basketball tickets for this season. Go heels! We're #1 in the nation right now! I didn't realize how big Dean Smith was - one of the most famous college b-ball coaches in the nation!

Well, I'm finishing up my 2 1/2 years of residency right now...then Nicole and I will be heading to Tampa for Christmas. Can't wait for Andy's Christmas Party! It will be great to see everyone!

Alan (and Nicole and Sofie)

Figuring the world out

I'm always hearing about Al-Queda, Iraq, Afghanisttan, the ideologic struggles between Republicans and Democrats.

I'm always wondering what the hell drives people to do things. Why are Islamic extremists so hateful of the West? Why did Bush invade Iraq?

I'm no expert on history at all. In fact, I really know nothing about how we got to where we are, and where the current struggles of the world came from.

Anyways, I get snippets here and there from tv shows, movies, etc...and though they are certainly biased, they do their job...they make you think and wonder.

I just finished watching Charlie Wilson's War, a movie with Tom Hanks. It's about Charlie Wilson, a politician who had a large influence in providing US covert aid to the Mujahideen (sp?), a group in Afghanistan during the late 80's/early 90's who opposed Soviet intrusion into Afghanistan. It was a part of the Cold War that I really didn't know much about. Great movie, and eye opening.

After watching the movie, I started wondering about the Cold War and this Afghanistan thing a little more. I realized that I didn't remember much of the US history/World history I learned in high school, and what I did learn was probably very basic and very biased.

There are a few (biased, I'm sure) articles that I read, that at least shed some light on some perspectives.

http://michaeljohnsonfreedomandprosperity.blogspot.com/2008/01/charlie-wilsons-war-was-really-americas.html

If I had more time, I would love reading more stuff like this. I love conspiracy theories and world history...but I think its because I really love trying to figure out...why people are the way they are.

Anyways, if you're interested, there's another cool show that Andy Krueger pointed out to me, that was pretty informative. It's all about President Bush and the background for going into Iraq. I watched it a year ago...and already I forget the main reason why he went into Iraq.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/bushswar/

The blog is back! (I hope...)

Alan

China pictures

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