here we go again.

It's the Monday after the holidays, and I'm feeling refreshed.  It was not the holiday season I thought it would be-- this was the first year since medical school I've had Christmas off, and I was super looking forward to heading back East, but COVID clearly had other plans. 

Between the pandemic and an injury B is recovering from, we laid pretty low-- catching up on some reading, doing a little bit of research, watching a movie, cooking. We snuck in one easy weekend of skiing at Kirkwood and a couple of short hikes. Was it my perfect holiday? No, but we have our health and jobs and food and a place to live, and for that, I am grateful and refreshed.

happiest place

never. gets. old. 

Plus, it feels SO GOOD to write 2021 in my planner! NEW YEAR!

Reading:
-I finished Malignant, making it my first of 2021. To be frank, I was a little disappointed-- the author has a podcast that I adore, but much of the book felt like rehashing of ideas that had already been explored on the pod. I may not be intended audience.
-Started Bel Canto, making it my first fiction for 2021! Lately I've been gravitating toward older novels("older" meaning "I meant to read this years ago and never did," not actual classics.) I'll reserve judgement until I finish it. 

Watching:
-Soul! Pixar, you have my heart. 

Listening
-A Promised Land. Should this have gone in the "Reading" category? Perhaps. It's a long one, so this will be on the list for a while. 
-"First Arabesque", again. Found some stillness and played piano. It was nice. 

Cooking:
-I made what I've dubbed "Ginger No-Snaps" from this insanely popular recipe, and holy smokes! They were good. As in, no-time-for-a-photo, I-need-to-give-these-away-or-else-I'll-eat-them-all good. I may make more to eat/give--there's a few tweaks I'd be interested in trying, too (adding orange zest, adding rum, adding a glaze....).
-A pizza pile! My first foray into pizza making was more pizza flop than pizza pie. I used Jim Lahey's dough recipe (as modified by smitten kitchen), which sounds like it could do no wrong, and yet...sticky, dense, thick dough. I will try again. 

the pizza pile!

take 3 turned out a little better looking, but was still doughy and wrong. 

Working:
-I tried to use some of my holiday downtime to make some progress on a few longer-term projects. I finally started writing a population science AML paper that, to be frank, should have been written 2 months ago. The Intro/Methods/Results/Tables/Figures (aka, the easy parts) are all blissfully done, so now it's just putting it all into context and writing a Discussion (aka, the not-easy parts). Hoping to crank this out soon.
-I need to set aside sometime to analyze some data for lab. I have a feeling trying to balance older projects that are close to being done (or at least, closer to being done than they are to being started) with new projects is going to be a theme of 2021. Hopefully I'll stay refreshed, motivated, and boxes will keep getting checked. 

my stocking-stuffer knows me well :) 

books books books

My goal for 2020 was to read 52 books. I read 20. 

I'm proud of this and I'm not. While I don't like not meeting goals, 52 books was arguably too ambitious. I probably haven't read 52 books in a year since I was in middle school, and now that I have to do things like work and feed myself and be an actual adult, a book per week is a lot. 

On the other hand, I'm positive I could have read more. My reading definitely stalled for weeks (and in some cases, months) at a time when I got stuck on a couple particularly dull non-fiction reads, and I could have easily set the NF aside and tried a breezy novel instead. I also spend more time than I care to admit scrolling through junk-- instagram, twitter, buzzfeed, random new articles. None of that mindless scrolling is fulfilling or joy-sparking or even all that informative, to be honest. I'd rather read a book instead. 

All that's to say, this is what I read in 2020:

• Why We Sleep- Matthew Walker*
• Where the Crawdads Sing- Delia Owens
• Educated- Tara Westover*
• The Great Believers- Revecca Makkai*
• Born a Crime- Trevor Noah*
• Normal People- Sally Rooney
• Whisteblower- Susan Fowler
• The Dutch House- Ann Patchett
• Quiet-Susan Cain
• Circe- Madeline Miller
• When Blood Breaks Down- Mikkael Sekeres
• Red at the Bone- Jacqueline Woodson
• White Fragility- Robin DiAngelo
• The Mothers- Brit Bennett
• The Vanishing Half- Brit Bennett*
• Between the World and Me- Ta-Nejhisi Coates
• Such a Fun Age- Kiley Reid
• Nothing to See Here- Kevin Wilson
• Anxious People- Fredrik Backman
• The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue- V.E. Schwab

*5/5, would recommend.

8 NF, 12 F. I usually try to alternate F/NF, but my rhythm got a bit out of whack due to some longer, duller NF reads. I still want to finish these, by the way. Just because something is boring doesn't mean it isn't worth reading and learning about. That's part of the reason I'm not super bummed about not meeting my goal-- if I wanted to easily read 52 books in a year, then I'd just fly through a bunch of beach reads, thrillers, and fluff. Some books take more time, and that's okay. 

In looking back at this list, I'm struck that most of my 5/5 reads were relatively early in the year. In fact, my favorite NF (Why We Sleep) and my favorite fiction (The Great Believers) were in the first 4 books of the year! Perhaps that's another reason why my reading fell off the rails-- when the books I read are good, I want to read more of them. 

Reading goals for 2021:

• 26 books for the year. I'm so tempted to write 52 again because, dream big, no? But I think doable > dreamable for now. 
• If I don't like something, I should stop reading it. It doesn't have to be a permanent stop (although that's okay to), but this definitely tends to slow my reading. I need to be less stubborn here.
• Instead of alternating fiction (which I've done approximately forever), I'm going to aim for 15 minutes of NF per day, after which I can switch to fiction if I want. I've never really been a multiple-books-at-once sort of reader, so we'll see how this works.
• Audiobooks! This is a big opportunity. Usually if an audiobook is at all good, I abandon ship and download the Kindle version because I'll get too inpatient to finish it (I even did this with The Dutch House, which I didn't particularly like) but I want to learn to commit. I have at least 20-30 minutes of commute time per day-- this will add up. 

lately, again.

2020.
Back when I blogged semi-regularly-ish, I used to put together end-of-the-year recap posts-- 10 for 2010, 11 for 2011, etc. I thought about doing something similar for 2020, but it felt a little flat. For one, prior recap posts involved a lot of photos, and I'm far less inclined to post personal photos that I was a decade ago. For another, 2020 was a weird/tragic/monotonous/anxious year. And yet, I kind of want to? Just for the nostalgia of it? Perhaps. We will see.*

Running.
Out of habit? I'm currently logging** 3-4 miles 3-4 times per week, and this seems to be a nice balance for me. I'm sure I'll someday get the itch for bigger goals-- more half marathons, perhaps another full, perhaps a triathlon-- but for now, I'm content. I would like to do more in regard to strength training, however. 

Reading.
Some, but not enough. Is it ever enough? I just finished The Secret Life of Addie LaRue, and I'm frowning while typing this, because I didn't like it. I finished it, so I suppose it's a two-star read instead of a one-star one, but sheesh. Did I really waste good novel-reading time on that? I read 15, maybe 20, novels per year, and one of them was that? On the bright side, I have now (re)learned:
a) Just because friends like a novel on Good Reads does not mean I will.
and
b) I care a lot about writing style. While "also writes YA" should not be an automatic deal-breaker, it probably should be a red flag.

On the bright side, prior to this I read Anxious People, which was lovely, so my fiction-kick hasn't completely been thrown off the rails. 

Listening.
a) The new Obama (Barack, not Michelle) memoir. It's long-- 29 hours or so? We will see if I finish it. So far, I like Michelle's writing style better. Sorry, Barry.
b) evermore by Taylor Swift. I think I like folklore better overall, but "'tis the damn season" is hauntingly good. 
c) Can't believe I'm saying this, but am I podcasted out? Perhaps. I'm also not really commuting any more (see also: pandemic), so that may be the bigger factor here. 

Learning. 
Not enough. Will it ever be enough? I need to a make a more concentrated effort to both:
a) Study for the boards (>1 year away, but still)
and 
b) Learn more along the lines of programming/machine learning/bioinformatics.
I'm trying, but I'll be first to admit I could be more methodical here. Maybe this can be a place I document?*

Thinking.
Oh, you knew this was coming. Why else would I be writing? Although this is less about broad-strokes musings about my one wild and precious life*** and more about the ideas themselves. More specifically: Peto's Paradox. It's been like 5 years and I keep coming back to this. Would it be too dramatic to say this is my favorite idea in cancer biology, and perhaps in all of medicine? In all of science? This deserves more thought.*

*This implies future blog posts. This is usually the first warning sign the next blog post will appear in 2-3 years. You have been warned. 
**Metaphorically, of course. I don't actually log anything. The moment miles become something to chart is the moment I stop wanting to run them. Take that as you will.
***Two blog posts back and I'm already sneaking in Mary Oliver references. The more things change...

it's been said before

<Insert opening paragraph about how, especially when I find a moment of stillness, I always come back to writing>

Every couple years, I get a strange itch to see if this blog is still alive. The practical side of me knows I probably ought to download all my old blog post, spread thin over the past decade, because surely one day it will be gone. Do people even blog anymore? Isn't it all twitter and insta and tiktok (whatever that is) these days?

And yet. There's something special about still having this place here. As long as I can still log in, still type in the address without a "URL not found," I have a place I can write. Sure, maybe I'll someday (definitely?) lose a couple hundred old post when blogger finally dies. Does it matter? What sparks more joy, a bunch of random archived files or a place I can write when inspiration strikes?

I know. A mostly-anonymous-but-still-public blog is not the best avenue for this sort of writing. I should start a Word doc, or a Google doc, or find some fancy cloud-based journaling software. Or, I dunno, a notebook. But I've tried those*, and they don't work. This blog is the writing equivalent to working from a coffee shop**--semi-anonymous, but not alone. In theory recognizable, but in practice just another layer of background noise. 

I like it.

*Okay, so I haven't actually tried those, but I've thought about trying those, and immediately didn't like it, which is arguably even worse.

**Metaphorically, of course. Because pandemic. 

idea garden.

thoughts on warm, quiet sunday:

There are days my mind overflows with ideas.

The Notes app on my phone is in constant use.

I'll have nine million research project ideas. I'll constantly be plugging terms into PubMed, wondering has this been done before? Does this data set exist? What if we...?

I'll have nineteen million running ideas. I'll keep looking at my Google Calendar, noting what my golden weekends, and look up half marathons and trail races and triathalons. I'll swim for the first time in ages. I'll go to a weird new fitness class. I'll just want to run and skin and move.

I'll have ninety million adventure ideas. Climb Kilimanjaro? Macchu Picchu? Everest Base Camp? Sign. Me. Up. The world is so big, it'll swallow me up.

I have so many lists-- notes on my phone, email drafts to myself, sheets in my OneNote app, random scraps of paper on my desk.

There are days when my mind comes alive.

What do I do with these days? How do I balance them with the day-to-day consistency, the mundane work, the Hufflepuff-eque work effort needed to actually take these NINE ZILLION ideas and transform them into actions? How to I balance these days with the sixteen-hour call days when the only idea I have is to eat a frozen dinner, put on my pajamas, and sleep?

steps + words

I've noticed something.

Whenever my crazy-busy-no-sleep-zillion-miles-per-hour life slows down even just a little bit, I do more of two things:
1) I run more.
2) I write more.

There's something about regular running and writing that sits well with my soul.

Neither activity really has a purpose. Right now, I'm just running random circles around Stanford's campus. I like the idea of training for something, and there's a couple of races that have caught my eye, but I haven't signed up for anything. Maybe a half-marathon or even a (gasp!) triathlon in May or June?

It's the same with writing. Sure, I write a decent amount for work-- long-winded H&Ps and the like--but the kind of writing I really enjoy is a lot more low key. Random thoughts, stories about my day, reflections on what doctoring is all about-- it's not particularly intentional and certainly not meant for an audience, but it makes me happy.

Steps and words. They both feel right.

friday five: sip, sip, hooray!

It's been a good week.

I'm on a research block right now, which is a month (!) of mostly-protected research time. I still have a few half-days of clinic each week, but compared to the craziness of last month, my clinical volume is ridiculously light. I'm in the thick of two really exciting hematology projects and thoroughly enjoying having time to analyze and interpret data. It's been nice to use a different part of my brain.

Although I'm still putting in quite a few hours, my overall schedule is much, much more flexible. I've been exercising regularly and have a social life for the first time in months.

Like I said-- it's been a good week.

Some highlights:

/hang twenty
Did you know dog surfing competitions are a thing?

Because they are.

A really, really, really cute thing.

Do you know what else they are? A really fantastic way to spend a lazy Saturday morning hanging out with some of my favorite people. Also, research blocks are the best.

/wine time
On Sunday, I headed up (and up and up) to the Santa Cruz mountains to spend the afternoon at a vineyard, hanging out with some of my co-residents. We laughed, we snacked, we told middle-of-the-night hospital horror stories, and we talked about things that have absolutely nothing to do with medicine at all.

happiest hour. 

It was lovely. My co-residents are the best.

/barre3

I've been thinking for a while about starting a new fitness challenge and have considered everything from marathon #3 to learning to rock climb. After some thought, however, I've decided focus on strength training, with a goal of 3 strength sessions per week.

Strength training is pretty new for me, so I've decided to experiment with a few different classes to see if anything clicks. I decided to start with barre3-- I'd never done a barre class before, but Sarah from the shubox whites about it often, and I literally live 5 minutes from a studio. I started with a 3 class pack and went Sunday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings.

Overall? I'd give it a solid B. 

I liked the instructors and lower-body strengthening sets a lot, but wish there had been more upper body work. It was also a little spendy for a resident salary, even with the first-timers discount. There are a lot of fitness studios close to where we live, so I'm going to keep checking places out.

/mochi ice cream
I saw this at the grocery, and had no idea what it was, but it looked super cute and I'm definitely an icecreamaholic*, so I decided to try one.

these look like uncooked cookie dough balls.
they are not.
they are rice balls filled with ice cream, and I give them
a C-. 

I didn't love it. To be honest, I'm not even sure I liked it. But trying new things is fun!

/the big sick. 
bahahahahahaha. that is all.

I have time to see movies right now.
WHAT. 

*Would not be surprised if there's an ICD-10 code for this.