Jake turned 2!!

Jake had his 2nd birthday a couple of weeks ago so I had his picture taken.  I am really happy with the way they turned out. :) He is such a goof ball.  I just love him.  He is silly, cuddly, naughty, goofy, and so happy.  I feel really lucky to have such a sweet baby.  I thought the train track pictures were a really cute idea.  Unfortunately he threw a two-year-old-sized tantrum right before and was in a terrible mood.  And he refused to give up that ball.  I brought it for a couple of pictures towards the end, but there was no way he was giving it back for the rest of the session.  I don't know how the photographer was able to get a single decent picture of him since he was running from one stop to the next at lightening speed.  He was doing circles around us.

Seriously?!

So I read this article http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/sunday-commentary/20120727-eli-lehrer-your-doctor-makes-too-much-money.ece about how doctors and healthcare professionals make too much money.  I was so irritated by the end of it that I wanted to scream.  This guy doesn't know what he's talking about.  First of all, medical school tuition was much more than $25,000 a year.  Try double that.  And doctors have residencies they are required to complete, where other professions he is comparing them to don't.  Last I calculated, when Pete stays under the cap on hours each week (which they don't track because no one is going to be the guy who says, "Hey, I've worked too much this week.  I'm going home.") he was making 4-5 dollars an hour.  And the debt will take us much longer to pay off than this guy suggests.  In looking through job postings, I have never seen a job for a primary care physician making $200,000.  Plus, I think about the stress that some of these doctors are under; one wrong cut and the person they are trying to save could die.  That's a tremendous amount of responsibility that the average job doesn't have.  I liked this rebuttal that a physician sent in.  Especially the last paragraph because it is so true.  Same situation with teachers, too...  http://www.meandmydoctor.com/2012/07/setting-record-straight-on-doctor-pay.html?spref=fb&m=1&fwcc=1&fwcl=1&fwl

Phew.  Sorry for the rant.  Maybe at an earlier day, when I hadn't seen what I've seen or had the strain and stress on my husband and family that we've had, or packing around the enormous student loans, despite the fact that we lived on $20,000 a year during medical school, or heard the stories of patients spitting on my husband while he was trying to stitch up their gashed faces in the ER, or continually spent weekends, holidays, evenings, nights, parties, Christmas Eve, Christmas day, without my husband so that he could be in the hospital helping others, then maybe my opinion would be different.  But for now, you can't convince me that these doctors don't earn every cent of their keep.

San Diego

Wowsers.  It's been a long time since I've posted.  I hate that.  Then I feel all overwhelmed and irritated that I didn't keep up on it better.  Oh well.  You do what you can, right?

So Pete and I went to San Diego last week.  Alone.  Without kids.  None.  It was awesome!  Just to not have anyone hanging on me and crying and saying "Mom! mom! mom! mom! mom! mom!" 900 times was a much needed break.  Pete was presenting a research poster on the effectiveness of a boot camp-style training course they did last fall for the new otolaryngology residents at a conference down in San Diego, so I tagged along.  Pete's parents were nice enough to fly out and watch the kids while we went.  I knew the kids were in good hands and having a great time, so I didn't worry a bit.  About 20 minutes after we got to the airport and I had been reading a book while we waited at the gate I thought, "I feel so refreshed."  Just reading a book without interruption and being away from the kids for like an hour really helped!  Let alone having the whole weekend to myself. :)  Pete and I had a great time together.  We went to the San Diego zoo (Of course. Pete is a zoo junkie.), a Padres game, Old Town San Diego, the Mormon Battalion site, La Jolla Cove (beach with sea lions just hanging out.  So cool!) ate some great Mexican food, and had the biggest plate of yummy breakfast food I've ever seen (the pictures don't even do it justice).  We had a great time.

 French toast.  And it was so good!  Pete had biscuits and gravy with mashed potatoes and eggs.  I had a few bites and it was great.  We took our left overs back to the hotel and have them for dinner that night.

Here is a panda at the zoo. It was really cool.  It was laying back, just eating a bunch of bamboo, maybe 10 feet from us.  After living near the St. Louis zoo, which is awesome and free and cool, it is hard for me to get excited about zoos.  But the San Diego zoo was cool because you could see all of the animals really well and most of them were quite active.

Here are some pictures of La Jolla Cove and my super hot husband. :)

Here are some pics of Pete's parents with Jake.  I couldn't get pictures of the other two because they were busy running around.  The kids had a great time with them here.

Well there you have it.  Our trip to San Diego.

In other news, my children were driving me crazy today!  Argh!!  They were so naughty and were ignoring me and whining and screaming and sticking their hands in the toilet and scratching the paint on my new van, and not minding, and escaping time out, and making me crazy.  Hopefully tomorrow will be better.  It's gotta be.  Right??

My sister Shannon cracks me up.  I seriously look forward to reading her blog to see what she's up to.  She's just such an interesting person with an interesting life, which of course she doesn't think is interesting, but that's partly why it's so interesting.

Okay, I think I'm going to go to bed and start on life again tomorrow.  I'm done for tonight. :)