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Oh my goodness catching up on blogging is taking AGES. Good thing I don’t have much school work to do this weekend! I’m almost done though, I’ve finished my Fiji recaps and my next (DOUBLE) daily dinners post is almost finished and ready to post on Monday morning. Hooray!

Today I thought I’d just tie up a few loose ends and get completely caught up.

My overall impressions of Fiji are AWESOME. I LOVED my trip and I’m so grateful that I got to see and do so much. I feel like I got quite a decent picture of Fiji since I got to see it from so many different viewpoints: as a tourist, as an international student, as a local etc etc. It was great having Rosemarie to show me around and introduce me to her friends from Fiji and all over the place.

Fiji is a little more expensive than South East Asia but it’s also so much less stressful because (almost) no one tries to scam you! It seems that Fijians are very honest people. I found the prices to be generally fair and there were no tricks. I’m sure there are exceptions to this but really I didn’t have any problems. It is also handy that there is no language barrier.

One thing about travelling in Fiji though is that you have to be pretty willing to eat whatever is made for you. At a lot of the resorts you don’t get any choices and your dinner will just be brought out for you already served up on a plate. This is pretty much my favourite way to dine, so I was happy, haha. But if you’re a bit picky you might go a little hungry and I would pack some extra snacks.

I would totally return to Fiji. It’s really not too far from Australia so I’m quite confident we will return some day.

It was also soooooooooooo nice to spend so much sister-time with Rosemarie. She was fairly busy with school while I was there but we still managed to squeeze in a lot of visits. YAY! And then the family reunion at the end of the trip??! Even better! (It would have been perfect if Scott could have come too. :()

Oh kokoda, how I love you. I ate this FOUR times in Fiji. The first was homemade by Rosemarie. Then we ate it together for lunch at Beachouse. Then it was available for lunch at Octopus Resort, where my gushing convinced EVERYONE at the table to try it as well. And then finally they had it at my last meal (lunch) in Fiji on Robinson Crusoe Island. I WAS SO HAPPY.

I read 8.5 books on my Kindle on my trip. KINDLES ARE AWESOME. I read Hopeless, Safe Haven, The Silver Linings Playbook, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, The Power of Habit, Warm Bodies: A Novel, White Teeth, The New Rules of Lifting for Women, and half of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (no insignificant feat!).

I went to Trader Joe’s in Los Angeles again on the way home and they were sold out of cookie butter AGAIN! I seriously almost cried. I am cookie butter cursed, I swear.

Since I’ve been home I’ve just been at school mostly. I’m back at the gym too following a new weight lifting plan that I’m very excited about. And we had a games night the other night with Lesley. I don’t have very much school work so this weekend has been nice and relaxing. I am so so so close to finished school!!! (5 more weeks of classes/clinical, then 3 months of clinical over the summer…. at SURREY!! my first choice!!!). Then DONE!!! I CAN’T WAIT!!!

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I finished 1 of 4 midterms, I’m keeping up on labs, case study is done, essay draft is done, assignments are done. I’m doing well at keeping on schedule so far. Probably going up to Whistler this weekend is not the smartest choice, but it’s the last skeleton session of the season and I can’t miss that!!

I’m hoping that the ice will actually be a little slow, so that I can try out out some new things and try to arrive early in each corner as opposed to late. Early means less slingshot type forces on my body so hopefully that makes everything a little smoother. Our coach only told me this AFTER our last run of the last session, so I’ve been sitting on it for a month.

I am also really excited to see if my weight training has helped at all. I’ve been doing a lot of training of my traps, which should help in holding my head up in the really high pressure last corner. And hopefully I will have an easier time carrying my sled around as well. We shall see.

All for now, gotta get back to studying.

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I survived my first ever hot lab rotation. Waking up at 5:10AM was not fun for me at all, but once I got to work it was pretty good. It was an enjoyable two weeks of making kits, drawing doses, doing lots of injections, putting in lots of IVs, and running the stress lab. I used to find stress lab very stressful (for me!), but I am way more comfortable doing it now. And I improved a lot in putting in IVs. They’re no longer scary, it’s fun to try now! Sorry to all those patients that I poked unsuccessfully though…….

Hot lab was really tiring but I still managed to go to the gym a few times per week. Lately I’ve been doing about 30-45 minutes of assorted weights (mostly machines, because I don’t know anything) and then 20-30 minutes on the elliptical. I can’t see much progress yet other than a little weight loss, but I’m still motivated. Skeleton is a good motivator.

I am excited to make a real fitness/food plan when I come back from Fiji. Random stuff is ok for now because my Fiji trip is going to throw everything off, but when I get back I’m probably going to follow one of the plans in the books I got from the library. And get some help from some friends that are more gym savvy. I want to get strong!

I don’t have any pictures to share this time. Going to bed at 8PM does not leave a lot of time to do fun stuff.

Scott got his last three wisdom teeth out. He is recovering very well so far. DENTAL PLAN!

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Hmm what have we been up to in the last 11 days? I’ve been a terrible blogger lately. SO BUSY with school stuff, all in preparation for my big vacation that is rapidly approaching (YAY!).

  • Scott made a cool loaf of bread.
  • We went to a friends house to play Ticket To Ride and eat pizza. Panago butter chicken pizza really doesn’t taste like butter chicken at all.
  • Went out for drinks at the pub after school.
  • Lifted lots of weights at the gym.
  • A FREAKING LOT OF HOMEWORK.
  • Went out for a yummy Peruvian Valentines Day dinner of fish ceviche, deep fried pork, and amazing sweet potato chips.
  • Woke up at a painful hour of the morning to make it to work on time for my hotlab rotation.
  • Had much more success putting in IVs.
  • Went to bed at 8:00 PM.
  • Watched Amour, slow but good.
  • Ate a lot of Nerds.
  • Went to the library and got a bunch of books that I won’t have time to read.
  • Chatted with Rosemarie who is now back in Fiji for her second semester.

That is actually a pretty good representation of what I’ve been up to, if you multiply the homework by 50. I just keep reminding myself “it’ll all be worth it soon”.

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I haven’t been sleeping well for the past week or so. I lie down and my mind just races. I think it’s because of a combination of having 500 things on my To Do list, and also having so much exciting stuff to look forward to!

  • 2 days until the end of this school rotation!
  • 24 days until skeleton!
  • 30 days until Scott and I go to L.A.!
  • 34 days until I am in the same country as my sister (FIJI!!!)
  • 52 days until family reunion!
  • 100 days until I’m finished school!
  • 205 days until I’m finished BCIT!!

The week right before my big trip is going to very hard. So far we have 4 midterms scheduled, a big assignment for our online class, and a huge paper due within one week. I can’t really complain though because this is very good news for my holiday… so far it looks like I won’t have to do a single piece of work while I’m gone for 3 weeks!! YAHOO!!! That makes it ALL worth it.

Scott and I have been a lot more active lately. Scott has been running almost every day for the past couple months, and I just joined a gym last week and have gone a bunch of times already. I found a good place to go that is really close to our house so it’s pretty easy to work it in to my daily routine. I’ve been lifting weights and doing cardio. The weights are so I will be totally ready for skeleton next year, and the cardio is good for my fast heart.

I figure if I write about it all on here, that will keep me motivated because I don’t want you guys to yell at me if I get lazy again!

PS I thought exercise was supposed to help you sleep but it’s not really working for Scott OR I. Yeesh.

PPS I am nominated for a 2013 Homie Award in the Healthy Cooking Blog category. I don’t really expect to make it to the next round, but it’s been pretty neat to get so many new views from people checking out all the blogs. It would mean a lot to me if you voted for me as well to keep me up near the top of the list. :D You have to register but it only takes 5 seconds. THANK YOU!!!