who's soonger??

Christmas already?!

Wednesday, Dec 3

This is getting ridiculous ... already December, which means Christmas is just around the corner. Tried to do my best and do early X-mas shopping but that didn't seem possible. (I did take a week off after my vacation but who's in the mood for X-mas shopping in early November?!) Well, my procrastination may get the better of me this year. Have to scramble to find something decent for some in my Christmas list. Was good with my 'secret santa' -- a bunch of my high school classmates have a secret santa thing going on ... got that gift. Hope they like it!

What else is going on with me? I went to visit the hospital (as a guest, not a patient) to the pharmacy dept. Good to see some familiar faces after a really long time (Dec 2002) Has it been already a year??? Guess so! Time flies ... looks like there will be a position opening once again. I said I would try to help out the other hospital in Windsor ... maybe I can help out both? I will write the boss a message to see what she has in mind.

In the horizon, I see that I'm working a lot of shifts to help some local pharmacies out. Guess pharmacists with families want to spend time with their children (makes sense to me) -- so it's up to the bachelor pharmacist to give them a hand. After all, I took all of October off ... so it's my turn to return the favour.

Most importantly, we recently picked up a new puppy. His name is Man Tou (Chinese for 'steamed bread bun') -- 8 weeks old when we picked him up. He's really cute (very small ... a little over a pound) but he's a handful. Hasn't quite mastered 'the paper' but what can you expect from such a small guy?

Sunday, Dec 7

It was a pretty cool w/e, despite me working. Worked 9-3 over at Ziter's on Saturday. Your usual walk-in clinic stuff without any real fanfare. Thank goodness I didn't have to 'fix' people's glucometers (or anything wacky) this time around. I don't mind problem-solving but when you're all alone and there are people waiting for scripts, it can be quite a pain ...

Had a visitor. Part of the New Crew came down for a visit. (Part of my posse from UofT Pharmacy days). G was down for a visit. More pleasure than business. He rolled in earlier but to visit people I knew from my youth. Kinda weird to have such a short degree of separation. Nonetheless, we caught up, had a few laughs.

I felt bad that I couldn't see him off today. I got up at 8 to get ready for work. Was out in Essex today (to help out a colleague in need). Wasn't that busy and the best part -- we got out really early (11:30) 'cause the clinic MD had to be somewhere. Yea! Had the day to myself ... picked up JJ and we went out for dim sum. Not much else of a productive day -- she's studying for finals whereas I was playing around with this laptop (my new electronic toy) Why have I been without a laptop for so long is beyond me.

Out in the county

Thursday, Dec 11

A pretty good day it was ... even though I had to get up early to get out into the county. Working at this place called Essex Pharma Care Pharmacy -- it's attached to a walk-in clinic so it's basically your cough & cold clinic. And you know certain docs have preferences for stuff ... drug du jour was Clavulin (amoxicillin / clavulinic acid combination -- aka Augmentin in the 'States.)

Also had quite a bit of free time here ... I think we've done about 60 Rx over the course of a day. As efficient as this place is, that means I can surf the 'net with ease. I worked on this webpage and entered new contect (take a look at: my Singapore 2k3 part journal). Yes -- a journal within a journal! So far, I've entered the first few days and the last few days. Nothing in the middle... I wasn't sure where I left off so I thought I'd start from the end and work forwards. There is a method to my madness!

It just picked up (4:00-4:15pm) due to the fact the doc wants to leave here pronto. So that means I finished working on the Singapore journal early. I had good intentions on finishing it when I got back but certain rate-limiting steps impeded my progression. Now that things have settled down, I can continue. I'll be back here in Essex next week so I can enter more of the journal. If I'm really keen, I can type some more while I'm in Riverside and post when I get back home from work... boy, am I such a devil!