Um.

So yeah. Quite a bit shorter than I'd planned.

The long weekend

So last night was the first in awhile that I was up at 3 in the morning delivering a baby. I'd slept at the hospital, knowing it was coming, and when the nurse told me my patient was ready I stumbled out of the call room and down the flourescent bright hallway to do my job. I was spazzy; jerky and nauseous and quieter than I wanted to be to encourage her in her pushing. I had Friday's make-up on still, and sleepy crap built up in the corners of my eyes, and I forgot to get it out before I gowned and gloved for the delivery. Oh well. The baby came down well and I was driving through the empty streets towards home by 4:45. There was a neon "open" sign at the Cohutta Bonds place. I got the crap out of my eyes before I settled into my own bed.

Today I went to the Mexican grocery store to get some fresh produce and Japanese peanuts, which are kind of interesting tasting, and I made myself a huge salad for dinner. And I took a vitamin. And I drank some milk. And ate some defrosted shrimp, and tried to read a newspaper in Spanish that I'd picked up on my way out of the store. I sort of wished someone was around so I could be like, "hey what does that word mean?" but I don't know who. Probably Rachel.

I've been reading this book by a travel writer who goes around looking for the happiest places on the earth. It's made me wonder what my problem is with this town. It's a fine place to live. I was wondering maybe if it's because I haven't wanted to identify myself with any group here. I joined the gym, but then I quit. I go to my church when I'm in town, which is every other weekend, but I have a lot of mixed feelings about being there, and have gone back and forth in my mind about joining. I don't really have a neighborhood. I like most of my coworkers, but I don't hang out with any of them. I have a roommate, but we've both got a lot going on in our personal lives that gets in the way of us doing stuff together. I've got sort of a complicated relationship with my work; there are parts of it that I really like, and times when I feel like I am growing, but also parts where I am consistently disappointing myself, and times when I feel trapped. So I feel like a floater, and I'm not sure if I want to integrate myself better.

Some things I like about being here:
Going to the library every 3 weeks for more books.
Meeting up with Susan and Justin, or Roseanne, or Kristen.
Being close to the Lewins.
I feel like I know how to do things here. I know where stuff is, I know how things work, I know how to do my job. My body wakes up automatically in time to get to work, and I have a morning routine.
I get to see Kevin on a lot of weekends. He is great. I like the jokes he makes, the way he is considerate of me, and the way he talks.

This week Nicky had a birthday party at the Meeting Place. I drove up to Chattanooga early and picked up a necklace for her from Blue Skies, and sat outside at Stone Cup reading that book until it was time to meet everyone. It was really great, a really beautiful afternoon to be out there. There was some nerdy guy making electronic sounding music, a bored little girl with her Dad, and a group of teenagers commiserating about their awkward parents awkward responses to their marijuana use. I couldn't tell if the nerdy guy wanted people to notice him or not, because the music was pretty quiet most of the time. I guess he did.

I caught a 10lb, 2oz baby last week. So that wins the prize for my biggest, definitely. Up to 225 deliveries now.
Okay I'm done.

Hunan shrimp

So here's some pictures of Kevin and I. The top one is from this weekend, when we went to see his fam for his birthday in Mississippi. Did you ever know this? Mississippi is REALLY FAR to drive to. But we had fun, I met his parents and we ate a lot of food that his Mom cooked. I tried to look grown-up and help clean up after we ate and talk normal. Ha. It bothers me that I am so white but I think I'm avoiding the tanning bed this year. Last year, that got a little out of hand. I went like 50 times....not the most genius thing I've ever done.
We went to SnoBiz and to a petrified forest and we got a geode that we busted open with a hammer on the patio. It was white on the inside.

The second photo is from a picnic we had in Sewanee a few weeks ago, when we met up on a Thursday afternoon. We made sandwiches and ate pickle-flavored chips and hiked around and stuck our feet in the water.

In other news, work is going okay. This week has been decent. I'm on call this weekend. I delivered a 9 pound, 13 oz baby boy on Tuesday, which may be my biggest yet, #218. I'm eating a lot of Chinese food these days. I found a place with spicy Hunan shrimp and veggies that I like. Maybe I'll eat that today. Hm. Last night I went out with some girls and later I tried a strawberry jello shot. I think it had vodka in it. It was about 60% good and 40% weird.
This morning I didn't have to be at work until 9 am, so I woke up at the normal time and just laid there thinking about stuff. I tried to come up with a theme for the last 6 months.

I saw my sister last week. She is still going through stuff. I'm thinking about her a lot, but we aren't talking very much. Things are pretty crazy at my house right now, I think.

I'm going to go see Emily's baby soon. Like maybe next month, when I have my vacation. I'm planning on being crazy about baby Claire.