My Words Fly Up, My Thoughts Remain Below

The office has been very busy this past week.  Mainly with H1N1 influenza/ the swine flu and its ramifications, such as panic in the streets.  We are having a crescendo of cases over the last month.  As an example, virology at Children's Hospital tests submitted specimens for H1N1, hereafter known as the flu, and posts the positive identifications daily and weekly.  The first week of September they found 8 positives, 20 the next week, 45 the third week, and 80 the fourth week.  The first Tuesday in October they had 120 positives....That's one day instead of 7 days.  That's just the tip of the iceberg, because most doctor's only check 1 or 2 patients a day that seem the highest risk, and just treat or sympathize with the others.  So it's basically everywhere.  The people we see are generally not terribly ill, and seem to recover nicely after a few days of being miserable.  But many parents are panicing, and bringing their kids in after only a few hours of illness...At any rate, business is brisk.  One of the doctors at the office just keeps saying, "job security", bless his twisted but practical little soul.  Must go to bed soon, cause I need to make rounds at Children's tomorrow, to see kids with influenza, of course.

London withdrawal syndrome is still alive and well at my house......  I went to see the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra (DPO) at the Schuster Center last weekend.  After Kathryn saw Michael Tilson Thomas (San Francisco Symphony Orchestra) conduct the ninth symphony without a score, I have been longing to hear it performed live.  The concert was very good, and I enjoyed it immensely.  The man my age or oider in front of us was bouncing to the second movement, just as I do at home.  The Schuster had very few seats left open, I was happy to note.  I still love the London Symphony Orchestra best, but this was helpful in dealing with the let down after a wonderful vacation.  The DPO was less formally dressed than the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and the London Symphony was the most formally dressed of all.  I guess the more seriously you take yourself, the more formal the dress.  Alexander put up with it fairly well, even though he played gameboy with headphones the entire time.  Also, Michael Tilson Thomas is on the cover of this month's 'Listen' magazine, a classical music type magazine, and the lead article is about him.  Well, enough rambling for tonight.  I need to post this and get to bed soon, as I need to do rounds in the a.m.

It has been 26 weeks (sheepish look) since my last post , but I'm going to try and get it right today....I just returned from a two week vacation in London!!  It was wonderful, exciting, fun, and the highlight of my last year.  I love history, and London is full of it.  London is built upon layer after layer of older dwellings, forts, walls, and rivers from 800 B.C. or earlier.  The British treasure their antiquity, and many very ancient structures or their fragments are still standing. Museums abound, and many are free.  The British are inveterate collectors and managed to bring something of everything back with them from all their world explorations and conquests.  I feel that many precious artifacts would have been destroyed if it were not for the British collecting and preserving them for all the world to see for free!

I had my second interview with my prospective employers/colleagues last night.  I really like them a lot, and respect their commitment to their patients, their endeavor to remain current with practice standards, and like the idea of one weekend a month call/working in the office.  The office manager also seems very sweet and knowledgeable.  I am a shy, somewhat solitary person, not necessarily by choice, and literally have no other adults that I can bounce off my ideas and feelings, except the parents of my patients.  That necessitates only a limited, light toned expression of feelings, and I cannot speak of my impending move to any of them yet.  I also feel that I am leaving my only friends and can only hope that many of them will follow me.  I will post more later, as I am due at work soon.

Hear ye, hear ye ladies and nobles!  I wish to correctly ascribe the origin of the term Venti Chow to Jo, from whom it was adopted by Kathryn, and thence espoused by me during conversations over the last fortnight.   (Actually the last 4 days)  My venti chow is sleeping in my room, as is my grande chow, having done away with their bedtime snack.  They will soon have their sleep interrupted with a fierce tooth brushing, so as to keep doggie breath at bay, and preserve their gums from periodontal disease....and the wonderful music of Vaughn Williams continues to play!  Good night to all, and to all a good night.

I'm learning to make live journal entries!   Hopefully.....  My daughter is here for her quarterly visit with us, whether I need it or not, and I always need visits from my daughter.  She'll be going home to CA tomorrow, and I expect to miss her terribly, as usual.  After two or three days I buck up and return to my more sedate existence.  Maybe I should rename her hurricane Kathryn... It's good to have an infusion of insane energy periodically.  I also then enjoy doing only 2 or 3 things at one time (instead of 6) after she has subsided into the west.  Kathryn has decided to rename our two chows mixes as 'venti chow' and 'grande chow', instead of Jack and Wolfgang.  I also feel that Starbucks has a hand in this, as her boyfriend works there, and her favorite drinks also exist there. 

I am looking forward to the release of Anne Perry's new book in the William Monk series, Execution Dock.  I freely admit that I ordered a first US edition from Barnes & Nobles, a first UK edition from Blackwell's (in Oxford, UK), and a first Mystery Guild edition from the Mystery Guild.  I need to run out and buy a second 'first US edition from Barnes & Nobles, so I can have one to read, and one to save.  Perry's new release from last year will be out in paperback now, so I can also snap up two copies to read/save.  ( Buckingham Palace Gardens in the Thomas/Charlotte Pitt series was her release last March.)