80 day update

If you like my blog, there may be something wrong with you. Seriously, though, if you do, check out this one. This guy is doing the same blog I am, only he's one year behind me. CU is even his first choice school! At this point in the application process, his blog is a lot more interesting than mine.

It looked for a second like I was going to have a sweet set-up. The Target pharmacy by my house was all set to give me some intern hours this summer, and then I found out that you can't get the intern license until you start school. So that's going to have to wait. Bummer.

All of my transcripts have been received. All of my financial aid forms are in, too. They're processing students starting in the summer right now, but I should get my award package in June. That's also when they send out the fall schedule, orientation schedule, list of books, etc., etc. I may wait to post again until something from the school arrives.

Saturday we leave for Hawaii. That's going to be a great time. I'm thinking about buying a laptop before we leave so we can watch movies on the loooooong plane ride (five hours in the air from LAX to OGG). I actually already bought a computer once this summer, from Dell, but it got back-ordered twice. On the second time, I cancelled the order because it wasn't going to get here before vacation. I figure I can either buy one from the store or I can order a better one for less in a month or two.

Technically, it's already Wednesday, which means we have only 79 days to go, but I haven't slept so I count that as 80. You know, 80 nights of sleep to go. I'm in Hawaii on day 70, and there's no way I'm blogging from the beach, so don't expect much out of me for a while.

Happy birthday to Jaime!

Today (Wednesday) is my wife's birthday. I can't tell you what I got her because she might be secretly reading my blog. But tomorrow we get to spend most of the day together, which is rare these days with all our various commitments.

I called the financial aid office a few days ago. They got all my forms and I should get a decision back from them in the middle of June. I also bought a laptop; that should come by the end of the week. I'm excited 'bout that part.

Sigh. This summer is boring. I kind of want to go to sleep and wake up August 13th (I want a day to get ready for school). Well, I guess we're going to Hawai'i in a week, so that'll be great.

I got my new schedule (at work) today. It doesn't start until July, but it's exactly what I wanted: Friday-Monday nights, and the Friday night starts late (7 p.m.). I can make plenty of money on this one, but still have time for school. If I can lose the Monday, it's even better. That'll definitely work for as long as I need it to, even during school (I think).

OK, I need to get some sleep. This is the worst blog entry ever. Sorry!

3 months and counting

Well, the Nuggets did like I wanted and took care of business. It was cool to see graphic basketball ads next to my blog instead of the usual pharmacy tech school text ads. Hopefully the boys in powder blue can go take it to the Lakers. I think at this point they're over any psychological hang-up about historical trends or not being able to win in LA or any of that business. I hope.

Orientation starts three months from today. This means I'm going to post two countdown entries in three days, since Saturday will be 90 days. I hope you like the countdown!

There's still been little change in my enrollment progress. More of the waiting game. I did start memorizing the top 200 drugs to help fend off the boredom. I have 25 down, 175 to go.

A little off-topic

I had the itch to blog, but there's been no change in my pharmacy school adventure, so I'm going to talk about the latest bandwagon hometown heroes in Denver - the Nuggets.

I've been rooting hard for this team since they acquired Chauncey Billups. I love the Nuggets, and basketball might be my favorite sport to watch. Sadly, Denver is a one-sport team. Two years ago, the Rockies went to the World Series, and by the time they made it that far, the bandwagon was enormous. What people never talk about is that the Rockies were near the top of their division all year, won 92 games, and finished the regular season winning 13 of 14 games. It wasn't until about number 10 of those wins that anyone even noticed. But by the time Rocktober rolled around, everyone was a "hard core Rockies fan." Then when the Red Sox scored 6 runs in the third inning of game 3, suddenly it was all over and they were the same old Rockies that had let us down for so many years. Even though that wasn't true. I mean, it was the freakin' World Series! What Rockies team in the past even sniffed something that awesome?

I'm off the already off-topic topic. My point is that our fans are so fair-weather for any sport but football. Even in the midst of losing Jay Cutler, a lot of Broncos fans honestly believe that (1) they're better off without him and (2) the Broncos have any kind of a chance to make the playoffs this year. Ridiculous. Meanwhile, the Nuggets are in the midst of their best season in team history - ABA included - and only now can we start talking about them. On the day the Nuggets clinched the Northwest Division, the Rockies had won something like three games in a row. But the only topic of conversation on sports talk radio was Jay Cutler. This was some 10 days after he was traded to the Bears. Even after the Nuggies took it to the Hornets in round 1, no one seemed to notice. The record-tying 58-point road win in New Orleans wasn't even nationally televised. It drives me crazy that now, all of a sudden, the Nuggets are worthy of discussion. People, they've been this good all year. Why do they have to come within 2 points of sweeping the Mavericks for anyone to notice? Where were you people all year long?

Well, I'm glad I got that off my chest. Now let's go watch them destroy Dallas in game 5.

My adventure in Aurora

I love my new campus.

On Wednesday, I met my wife for lunch and then an old friend for coffee, both in Aurora. We live on the opposite side of Denver, about thirty miles from the CU medical campus, which is close enough not to need to move but far enough that I don't know the area at all. Several of my future classmates have asked where the good places to live are, and I really can't tell them anything. The general buzz is that the area immediately around the campus is not the safest, but that as you move south the neighborhoods get better. So I thought I would travel back home by driving up Peoria, which forms the western boundary of the campus.

I started at Peoria and Parker Road, which is absolutely gorgeous. Heading north on Peoria, the houses are well-maintained, the fences are wooden, the cars parked on the street are newer models, and everything is pretty green. All the way up to Mississippi, things look pretty good. From Mississippi to Alameda, the houses are older and some of the lawns are overgrown. The cars aren't as nice, and some of the fences are crappy chain-links, but it had the feeling of an older neighborhood. I did see kids walking around, which is a good sign, and my thought is that it was still safe enough to live in, just on the bottom end of middle class instead of the top.

At 6th Avenue is beautiful Del Mar Park. It's huge, with a new playground and lots of people recreating. That seems to be the boundary between nice and sketchy. After that park - immediately - the older but still nice houses were replaced with abandoned businesses, empty lots, dilapidated housing, and a general vibe of unease for me. It doesn't get any better until Colfax....

....where the beautiful brick and glass edifice of University Hospital suddenly appears, set against the matching backdrop of all those medical campus building. The other three corners are still run down, and the businesses on the west side of Peoria still make me nervous, but the campus is just perfect. I fell in love with it the first time I saw it, and I still love it. There's also a slowly growing wave of gentrification surrounding the campus. To the north is the apartment complex 21 Fitzsimmons, which is new and literally across the street from the new pharmacy building. If you're looking for a place to live while you go to school, you can't go wrong there (it is expensive, though). I think in about five years all the areas immediately around the campus will be pretty nice.

Anyway, I love the campus, and I can't wait to make it my home away from home over the next three years.

Happy Mother's Day, too! Call your moms.

100 days

With just 100 days to go, I find myself itching to get started. Most of my preparation is complete; now I'm just waiting on other people (like the financial aid office). My big concern these days is financial.

I work as a full-time poker dealer in Black Hawk, a small mining town 45 minutes west of Denver that in 1991 brought in legalized gambling in order to preserve the historic aspects of a town that was pretty much falling apart. Because my wife worked part-time this year, and because we are homeowners with a baby, I need to work full-time through the summer and then continuously through the school year. My hope is that at some point I'll be able to quit the casino job and start doing a pharmacy internship, but I can't wait for that to fall in my lap, so for the time being I need to find a part-time schedule that works with my classes.

In November, the voters of Colorado approved an increase in our gaming limits, along with 24-hour operation and the addition of craps and roulette. These changes take effect July 2, which means new schedules for everyone. They released the list of schedules this week, so I'm spending most of my time figuring out which schedules will work for me. The problem is that I want to work full-time for six weeks and then drop down to 25 hours in the middle of August. Officially, this can't be done, but I'm working on some clever ways around the rules.

But really I just wish the next 100 days would be over, so I could stop worrying about and planning the future and start living it! Well, we'll see how it all works out. It depends on some other things, too, like how much financial aid I can get and what kind of job my wife ends up with. I guess 100 days is not that long. As someone on facebook pointed out, it's only 0.273 years!

Just some thoughts

I feel like blogging a little but I don't have a whole lot to share. I sent in my financial aid forms last week. I also started a Google group for the class of 2013. Members of the class should join the group if you haven't already.

Swine flu is driving me crazy. I'm sorry, it's H1N1 flu now. Like it should have been all along. I'm pretty sure we're dealing with just one fatality still in the US (ordinary flu kills 36,000 annually) but people in "infected" areas are wearing surgical masks and trying to stockpile Tamiflu and generally freaking out. Yes, it's serious, and yes, it could become a global pandemic, but it's not the apocalypse! We have drugs to treat it, and we know the prevention steps that we should have already been doing. I guess it's a good reminder to stay clean and sanitary. Seasonal flu remains the bigger threat, though! Grrrrrrr....

I'm going to look like a moron when H1N1 kills millions. I really hope that doesn't happen.

I guess I'm going to bed now. Oh, one other thing! If you're reading this on facebook, it's because I imported my blog. The blog address is http://buffalopharmer.blogspot.com.

105 days and counting...