Lately.

I know, I know... I've been MIA lately.  Action definitely describes it. I've spent many, many late school nights at school getting the year up and running, working my once-a-week second job, and trying to figure out this whole year of med school.

...And what a year it is.  We're quickly approaching the heavy interview season.  Let me describe how this works.  Scott has applied to many programs.  With his desired career choice, he applied for two programs. The first is considered a transitional year.  For the first year of residency, he'll be gaining experience in all different types of general medicine before going on to more specialized training in later years.  Some places offer training with residency and transitional year combined, but most want you trained somewhere in your first year before going into the program.  We're eagerly awaiting both, as we'll be finished taking out loans and finally starting to feel as though we're both in careers.

He will be interviewing at more than 15 locations.  Now, some med students map looks crazier than ours... that's for sure.  We like our families, so we want to stay relatively close.  Therefore, we only sent out applications to those states in the Midwest.  Despite having a close-to-home map, imagine traveling all over these states in one month.  One long month of food on the go and sifting through many albums on the iPod... all to get dressed up in a fancy suit and have your next years of your life in the hands of interviewers.  Eeks.

Here's his destinations.... we got all the way to Destination Y on Google Maps.  We could add "Z" and another 325 miles when you factor in our annual trip to Canada for New Years.

Yep, that's a whopping 6,344 miles and 97 hours in the car (please let the weather stay nice and our cars stay working).  Because Google Maps was getting angry at me, I didn't factor in any special trips back home to see the lonely wife and cats.

So, busy months ahead.  The good news? You'll probably get some blog articles while I'm home.  At least, that's the hope. What do these interviews amount to? Match day! I'll explain more on that once Scott and I get over the fact that we're adding that many miles in the snow to our vehicles.

As for the wife? I have school until 9pm the next week as I meet with all my parents for conferences.  Then, it's Thanksgiving break. :)

Lots of love,