Ike Videos

I'm glad to see that Ike had a sense of humor!

This is what it looked like looking out of my window during the hurricane (except for the surge).

I Survived Ike

These past few days have really brought a new meaning to "Surviving Houston & Dental School." Hurricane Ike made landfall at Galveston on September 13 at 2:10am as a Category 2 hurricane with winds of 110 mph (a high-end Category 2). I live in central Houston a little west of downtown. We lost power at about 1:00am and we lost water a little bit after that. The storm was in full-force here about 3:00ish. I peeked out of my window a few times just to look and it was like nothing I have ever seen. The best I can describe, it was like in the movies where a ship is on the ocean and the rain is blowing every way and there is absolutely no visibility. The trees that I could see were completely blowing sideways and the wind didn't let up for a second. I kept hearing sounds of things falling over and being blown around. Everyone has been asking me if I was scared and, honestly, I wasn't. I love storms and this one was just too cool. I know that it was dangerous, but I still thought it was one of the best storms I have ever seen. The aftermath was not so cool though.

The next day after the hurricane, people were already walking around looking at the damage. The pictures I took were directly after the storm. I was without power until about 3:45pm today (I got water back Saturday) so I haven't been able to look at all of the pictures from everywhere else around Houston. From what my mom has been telling me, some of the tall buildings downtown are in pretty bad shape. I drove around a little bit today to go find a restaurant with hot food and cold drinks and the biggest thing I saw was a lot of trees and debris on the ground. Of course there were a lot of buildings with wind damage and signs and traffic lights were torn up, but I think Houston will be able to recover.

The hardest thing about living in Houston with no power was, of course, the humidity. I took a shower Friday night before the storm, but by mid-day Saturday, I was already so sticky and so uncomfortable. I will never take electricity for granted again. I had to throw away everything in my refrigerator and I had to sit in my car for about an hour just to charge my cell phone and cool off. I've been living off of tuna, chips, crackers, and granola bars for 3 days, but I was able to treat myself to a steak at Saltgrass today. I felt like I deserved it! :) It will still be "Pringles and Milky Ways" for a few days until I can go get some groceries, but the worst is over. At least I can heat up a can of soup now.

I want to thank all of you who called or messaged to check on me. It made me feel better to know that I was in your prayers. It really means a lot to me to know that you care! :) Maybe when the next hurricane comes around, I'll be an evacuee. Until then, I'll be enjoying the luxuries of electricity and water!

I wish I were an....

I'm sure you're wondering why there is a picture of the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile on my blog. Well, I was lucky enough to spot it tonight while I was leaving SuperTarget at the intersection of Kirby and Main. It was about 8:15ish and it was dark. I saw a funny looking vehicle coming towards me and, as it passed, I saw the unmistakable square Oscar Mayer logo on the side. I was like "NO WAY!" I just saw the Wienermobile! I don't actually have a picture to prove it so you'll just have to take my word for it. But just think, this is way to random for me to just make up. I learned that there are only 6 or 7 (conflicting information) Wienermobiles in existence and they are driven by 2 "Hotdoggers." A person can only be a Hotdogger for 1 year and only seniors in college who are about to graduate are eligible to apply for the position. How cool would that be to graduate from college and drive around in the Wienermobile for a whole year? I wish I would have known this 3 years ago! Check out the Kraft Foods website for a virtual tour of the inside and the article from Wikipedia.

Other than the sighting, my week has been pretty fun. Analisa came to visit me from Lubbock this past weekend and we had so much fun! On Saturday we went to the Galleria and ate at the Cheescake Factory. It was amazing! I highly recommend the tiramisu cheesecake - my 2 favorite desserts in one! Analisa's uncle and aunt live here in Houston and her mom and dad came down from Austin to visit. We all hung out Saturday night and her uncle showed me around the city. I got to see all the cool places to hang out and shop and he took us to some really good restaurants. On Sunday morning, we went to Lakewood Church (Joel Osteen's church). It was AMAZING! The church is actually the building that the Houston Rockets used to play in. It is a massive arena made in to a church. The atmosphere is so wonderful, positive, and inviting. It is a non-denominational church and people from every nationality come to the service. The music rocks and Joel and his wife are the best! They are both very well spoken and just make you feel positive and full of life. I'm not a big singer during church usually, but I just couldn't help but get involved in the atmosphere of the place. It just sucks you in, but in a good way. I will definitely go back!

I have also survived my first set of tests in dental school. I had quizzes in histology and biochemistry (which sucked!) and an quiz/exam in dental anatomy (which I kicked butt on by the way!). Today I had my first REAL exam and it was in immunology. It was not fun, but I think I did okay. I have a physiology exam on Friday and then a tooth identification exam on Monday. I think from this point on, I will have at least 2 tests a week for the rest of the semester. It's craziness, but it makes school go by faster. I'm just living life test to test.

Hopefully Houston will survive the upcoming Hurricane Ike. The last time I checked it was heading straight for us. It is currently a category 2, but they say it will gain strength over the warm gulf waters and may get up to a category 4 before it hits us. A category 4 hurricane can have winds up to 155 mph! I went to Target tonight to get some more water and stuff and it was crazy there! People all over Houston are getting ready. I was worried about Gustav at first, but it never even hit us. I don't think Ike will do the same. I expect to see a lot of rain and a lot of wind. Hopefully my apartment will stand up to it. We'll see what happens. I may have to evacuate, but hopefully not. Everybody just hope for the best.

Article

Can you find me in the picture? (2nd row, 2nd seat)

This is just an article posted by my school about our ceremony. Just thought you might like to read it! http://www.db.uth.tmc.edu/UTDB_eflash/email/WhiteCoats2008.htm

2 Weeks Gone

I have so much to catch up on, I don't know where to start! I guess I need to go back to the second day of school. The rest of the first week wasn't all that eventful. We got out of a lot of our classes early so that was good, but we were kind of spoiled to that which made the second week harder. Tuesdays are our longest days. We go from 8am to 5pm. I know that doesn't seem long to people with full-time jobs, but it seems really long to us considering we get out at 11am on Wednesdays and usually before 3:00 every other day. I guess I'll have to get used to it before I become a dentist.

I'm really torn about how much information I should or should not post on my blog. I would like to tell you specifics on my professors like who is boring, monotone, psychotic, nice, etc., but I don't want this to fall upon the wrong eyes. My grade may depend on it! :) Since I won't go in to more detail about my profs and I'm sure you don't care about what we're learning in immunology, I'll skip to Friday of week 1. After school, me, Sunny, & Kasey were so happy to have survived that we decided to go find a "Happy Hour!" There is this place close to the dental school called the McGovern Commons and on the top floor (I think it is the 6th floor) is a restaurant called Trevisio. We knew that they had drinks and it was close so we went and celebrated the end of our first week (and by celebrated I mean we had 1 drink each, honestly).

The weekend was pretty boring and uneventful. I laid around the house and caught up on some rest. Of course I found time for a little Guitar Hero! :) I worked around my apartment a little too. It's still not "home," but it's getting closer. I got my new bedspread and sheets which make my room so much cozier! My bedspread is big zebra stripes and my sheets are RED! I love it! I got some black and silver pillowcases for my extra pillows and my bed looks gorgeous! I'll have to post a picture when I get my room all done. I still don't have anything hung on the walls or any decorations out. I'm still trying to decide how I want my furniture placed. I'll get to it eventually.

Well week 2 was nothing new. (haha...that rhymes!) Classes were generally boring and getting up early still sucked. On Wednesday, I hung out with my friend Valerie after school because we were going to the Astros game together. We had planned to study and then maybe work out, but we decided that going to the Galleria would be much more exciting. We did stay after school a little bit and worked on our waxing. While we were waxing, the president of the entire Health Science Center in Houston was touring the dental school and he came through our waxing lab. The dean of the dental school stopped by me and Valerie and was telling him about what we were doing and what we will be doing in the future. I said, "Don't scare us yet. We're only in our second week!" She laughed and said to me, "Well your posture is perfect!" That's not a huge compliment but it made me feel pretty good coming from the dean of the school. To add to that, one of the dentists that was touring with them pointed at my hand and said, "You would be surprised just how long it takes to perfect this pinky rest, but this girl has it down." Yay! I'm doing things right! A pinky rest is when you put your pinky on the edge of the tooth or whatever you're working on to stabilize your hand while you're holding the instrument with the other fingers. It appears as if I'm on my way to being a great dentist and, the president of the whole HSC knows! It's not a big deal, like I said, but any boost of confidence right now is great! So anyway, after we were done waxing, me and Valerie went to the Galleria where I got to shop at Sephora, the Apple Store, Coach, and all kinds of other places. I love going there! I just wish I had tons and tons of money to spend! We left the Galleria, went home to change, and then headed to the Astros game. One of the fraternities here (Psi Omega) bought tickets for everyone that wanted to go because it was their rush week. The game was so cool! The stadium or whatever it is called was huge and really neat! We stayed until the end of the 7th inning, but I'm pretty sure the Astros won. We were ahead 3-1 when we left. I bought a t-shirt to remember the occasion and then I went home.

Now for my long weekend, Labor Day Weekend 2008. I did absolutely nothing! Not working and being able to relax is awesome! It leaves so much time for studying and catching up! So, most of the weekend I spent worrying about Hurricane Gustav which never hit us! I was supposed to stock up on water, batteries, and food, but it is Tuesday and I have yet to see a drop of rain from it. I was kind of nervous, but kind of excited at the same time. It would have been cool to experience hurricane weather (since I love storms and rain) but the consequences might not have been so cool. I also got my cable and internet hooked up this weekend which was a big mess. The cable is great, but the internet, well, it's not so great. The speed is fine and everything, but I can only use it on 1 computer. I hooked it up to my router so I could get internet for my TiVo, my Wii, and my laptop like I always have, but that didn't work. I even went and bought another router thinking that mine was busted. The problem is, I didn't PAY for a networking service frrom Comcast. I would have to pay them $150 for someone to come out and flip a switch or whatever allowing me to use my router. So instead of doing that, I switched my Comcast internet to Comcast telephone and got internet through someone else. It was a huge fiasco! I never heard of not being able to use your router with an internet connection. That's ridiculous! So, I do have internet for now, but when I get my phone activated on Saturday, my internet will be canceled until the other people get there to install it again. Hopefully, everything will work eventually!

So now it is Tuesday and the first day of the week that I have my first tests. I have a histology quiz and a biochemistry quiz both on Thursday and then I have a dental anatomy quiz/test on Friday. I have a lot of studying to do this week! Well my dental informatics class is about to start so I better get going. Have a great week!

Orientation Video

During our orientation, the 2nd year students showed us a video that they had made for us telling us how our first year would be. It was really creative, cute, and funny so I thought I'd share it with you. Just follow the link and enjoy!

https://xfiles.uth.tmc.edu/xythoswfs/webui/Users/cmun?x=y&stk=61A8C93524251EB

Recovered Post

I recovered my blog from last Monday. Scroll down to read it. It's under the "Update" post. The internet isn't working too well in my apartment lounge tonight so I'm not going to try a long blog tonight. I'll try tomorrow so I can tell all about my long first week of school. As for now, have a blessed day!

Update

I hope everyone is not too disappointed that I haven't posted a blog in a few days. I don't have internet yet and I PROMISE I will be posting more regularly after August 30. I tried to post a blog about my first day on Monday night, but the internet in my apartment messed up and it didn't post even after I had it all written out. I just got to school this morning so I don't have very long to write, but sometime this weekend I will post a mega-blog updating everyone on my first week of dental school. Thank you all for reading and don't forget to leave me little love notes in my comments! :) Gotta get to histology! Have a wonderful day!

P.S. I'll post more pictures from my white coat ceremony soon!

First Day of School

This was supposed to be posted last Monday. I just figured out that there was a draft of it saved, thank goodness.

**********************************************************

It was a great day! I got up this morning, put on my new scrubs, my shiny new shoes, packed my new backpack with my cool new laptop and all of my awesome school supplies and I was off to my first day of dental school. My alarm was set to go off at about 5:00 am and I woke up at 5:20 realizing that I had been dreaming about a car alarm going off for 20 minutes. This annoying car alarm was going off and, in my dream, I had to take it to all of these places and try to get it deactivated but it never worked. I guess that was because it was really my annoying alarm clock! That's the first time I have ever really slept through my alarm. Good thing it was only 20 minutes though!

My first class was dental anatomy lecture immediately followed by dental anatomy lab where we had to perform our first "waxing." Basically what this is is filling in a drilled out hole in an over-sized tooth with wax and contouring it and polishing it to look like the tooth had never been drilled. Essentially, we filled cavities! So it sounds simple enough, but it is one of the more difficult things to do in your first year of dental school. Lots of people have trouble working with the wax.  After I worked on my first hole for a while I asked my professor to look at it and give me some pointers on what to do from that point on. She advised me a little, told me it looked really good, and asked me, "Have you ever done this before?" Ummm.....that is like the best thing I have ever heard! She actually thought I had some experience waxing! So I moved on to the biting surface of the molar which is much harder than what we were doing. Same thing...I worked on it a little and then asked for her criticism. She said it looked good again and said, "Girl, you're going to do good!" WOW! I'm a natural waxer! I was so scared of waxing (especially since I didn't know what it was until today), but I'm not scared anymore!

This afternoon I had a class called clinic skills and it only lasted 30 minutes today. The whole point of the class is to learn basic clinic stuff like how to disinfect an operatory, how to dress (gowns, masks, glasses, etc...), and we even get to assist in some clinics. We will spend 4 hours assisting 7 different times during the semester in 7 different specialties. I can't wait for that! It's actually going to be hands on experience. This is why I came to dental school!

That's all of the exciting stuff about my first day. I hope every day will be as encouraging as today was! So far, I love it! We'll see what the rest of the week brings. G'night!

Orientation Day 2 thru White Coat Ceremony

Well it's been a few days since my last blog and I apologize to you who have anxiously been awaiting a new post from me. I'm sure there was some sleep lost! :)

Day 2 of orientation was boring. Same stuff...presentations, paper work, and money spending. However, it marked the day of my first attempt at riding the shuttle to school. Getting on the shuttle at 7:00 am was no big deal except for the fact that it was the earliest I have been up and ready in the last 6 years and the humidity at that time is almost unbearable. Well we got out of orientation around 3:30 and my shuttle is scheduled to pick me up at the dental school at 3:18. Since I missed that one I had to wait for the next one at 4:18. So I'm sitting there watching all of these busses come by and a few shuttles I didn't recognize and 4:18 comes around. I didn't see a shuttle that I recognized and then I remembered that I hadn't been smart enough to look for any identifying marks on my shuttle when it picked me up that morning. There are no signs or anything on it by the way. Around 4:30 I realized I had probably missed my shuttle and realized I would have to wait until 5:24 for the next one. That means I waited for my shuttle from 3:30 to 5:24! The next morning I took down the license plate number! :)

Friday was also boring as far as orientation goes. My parents were here and we went out to eat at Pappasitos for some seafood enchiladas. (If I'm ever at a loss for a blog topic, I'll elaborate more on the importance of the seafood enchiladas.) It was yet another adventure around Houston trying to find the safest, non-scary Pappasitos. Lola took us first to a Little Pappasitos, but we were afraid they wouldn't have seafood enchiladas or something. The second one Lola took us to didn't even exist and the third one was the winner. I'm pretty sure it was about an hour of driving to find this place.

Saturday was my much awaited White Coat Ceremony! It was very similar to a graduation. There were a lot of speakers and then we walked across the stage and some dentists coated us. They literally put the coat on us and we became official members of the dental profession. Yay! I will put up a few pictures within the next few days whenever my mom sends some to me. After the white coat ceremony we just went to eat some pizza at the New York Pizzeria, which I highly recommend if you ever get the chance, and then we caught up on some much needed rest. Our adventure for the day was a trip to IKEA. I knew that it was a big store, but I had no idea how big it actually was. It was probably the equivalent of 10 Wal-Marts! We shopped a little, got some Jack in the Box and went home.

Today has been a day of organizing and getting ready to start school tomorrow. My scrubs are all ready to go, my laptop is charged, and I'm ready for my first day of school! I must admit that I'm a little nervous though. It's gonna be hard! I'm gonna try to get to bed early tonight, so I better go for now. Wish me luck tomorrow!

Move In Day thru Orientation Day 1

I've officially been a Houston resident for about 6 days now and I think I'm adjusting but there have definitely been some interesting experiences so far. Just to be thorough, I'll elaborate on some of the more entertaining ones.

The day I moved in, we were told we had to haul a huge Budget truck full of my belongings through a gate, up a freight elevator, across the entire parking garage, through a series of doors, and finally to my apartment. Keep in mind that it is August in HOUSTON, TX! It is HOT here by the way! I guess you could say that it wasn't really an ideal moving situation. I'm sure we wouldn't have made it without my dad and A.C. I knew men were good for something.... :)

So next comes finding a place to buy groceries and other stuff that I usually just run to Wal-Mart for. Apparently, people around here don't really go to Wal-Mart. I guess it's a West Texas thing. I needed little things like a poster frame, a harness for Bonni, and decorative stuff but I had no idea where to get them. Our first idea was to go to Target so I programmed Lola (my trusty GPS) to find a Target. We ended up driving around all of Houston for about an hour probably and finally found a Target we weren't afraid to go in to. Now for groceries... I have heard of Kroger and HEB (we don't have those in Lubbock) but I didn't know what would be our best bet. Lola took us to a place where we learned the true meaning of HEB and we decided maybe we should go to Kroger. It literally took us an entire day just to find safe places to shop and get the things I need. Houston life is complicated!

As if finding a grocery store wasn't hard enough, I ventured out on Monday to try and find a Bank of America so I could deposit my last paycheck from Logan's. Lola took me to a Bank of America, but I couldn't figure out how to pull in to the parking lot. There is a TON of construction around the medical center here and I'm all confused anyway. I drove around to where I thought I should be and made a left turn trying to get back to the bank area. Well...I drove right in to a parking garage! There was no way out without printing out a time ticket and paying for it at the booth. So at 4:03 pm I punched in my ticket and at 4:06 pm I took it to the lady at the booth. A whole 3 minutes! She just kind of looked at me and I just told her I was in the wrong place. Thank goodness I didn't have to pay to get out because, hello, I was trying to find the bank and I didn't have any money! I still am not sure what parking garage I was in and what building it was attached to.

That night was the Psi Omega social at a local bar. It was a lot of fun and my first chance to meet a lot of my classmates. I almost talked myself out of going because I just knew it would be awkward to walk in to a bar I have never been to with a ton of people I have never met all by myself. By the end of the night I was so glad I had gone! I met a lot of new people and made a lot of really good friends already. Now I actually have people I feel comfortable calling if I need anything.

Tuesday night was our "Meet Your Mentor" dinner and I met my mentor, Diana. I love her! She is so sweet and helpful! She took me and my friend Kasey on a private little tour of the dental school and it was great because it was on a more personal level than our other tours. She gives me little tips about things I would never think of otherwise. I'm sure she and I will get along great and I know I'll be needing her help a lot this year!

That brings us to today, Wednesday, my first day of dental school orientation. I had to get up at 5:00 am which is the earliest I have had to be up and dressed in a very, very long time. My hair and makeup were all done and pretty and then I had to take Bonni out. My makeup quickly melted off and my hair just gave up on me. I may never get used to the humidity here! The orientation was nothing special. We just listened to some people tell us how hard we were going to have to work and played the ever exciting ice-breaker and get-to-know-you games. I did, however, get all of my official dental student stuff like my ID badge, my 2 lockers, a key to my waxing lab drawers, my 1st year kit full of stuff I don't know what it is, and my user name and passwords to access all of the school stuff. I'm all set now!

After orientation I decided I would try to find some scrubs. I knew this would be difficult anyway since I'm a "curvy" girl and scrubs are not so curvy. I went to this one scrub shop and the lady told me I could only try on 3 sets. I've never worn scrubs in my life and I had to try on a lot of different combinations of tops and bottoms to find out what was going to look best. Apparently, this wasn't acceptable. I was only allowed 3 sets per visit. I wanted to ask her, "if I left, drove around the block, and came back in, could I try on some more?" She was rude so I left and I will never recommend that scrub shop to anyone! I won't ever buy anything from there. So I went to this other shop that was a little more questionable as far as the area was concerned. It looked a little rough on the outside, but I was so glad I went in! The sweet man in there helped me out so much and even hooked me up with different size tops and bottoms (they don't usually sell 2 separate sizes for the top and bottom - it's usually a set). I have always been a smaller size on top than on bottom and I knew there was going to be a problem if I couldn't buy scrubs like that. So this guy was so helpful and I got 3 pairs of scrubs that fit me great! I told him that I would tell everyone I know to buy stuff from him from now on. I now have my first sets of scrubs and I am all set to start school on Monday.

I still have 2 more days of orientation and then my white coat ceremony on Saturday. Monday will be the first day of actual classes and I was told we will hit the ground running. Hopefully I'll make it through.

I'm sure I tend to ramble in this blog a little, but it's my first time blogging and I really want to have a way to share my experiences with my family and friends that want to know what's going on with me. I'll try to put some pictures up if I can and try to blog as much as possible. I won't actually have full internet access until August 30 so I may not have regular blogs for a while.

To my friends and family - I miss you all and love each and every one of you! I wouldn't be here without your support! I really hope you all keep in touch and maybe even try to come visit if you can.

Until next time..... Cheers!