Snow!

Tonight, Rochester is experiencing its first real snow of the year. There's about a half an inch on the ground now, as we return from Jasper's evening romp. We'd been waiting eagerly to see how Jasper would respond, and as we'd hoped, he loves the snow! He ran around and around as usual, occasionally stopping to bury his nose in the chilly white stuff. He looked like he was auditioning for Santa Claus or Gandalf by the end of our walk. The scary inflatable snowmen down the block have deflated, so he can even stroll down the sidewalk unmolested. So, a step in the right direction towards Jasper the mountain dog. Maybe we'll even be out on skis soon!

We spent the evening at the local Radisson, which was hosting a beer tasting to benefit Paws and Claws, the humane society where I volunteer. I helped man the front table with shelter information and a couple of puppies looking for homes, and Alex bought a ticket and got to sample all the beers and goodies. There was a guy talking about each of the different brews, and Alex took many notes, so I'm sure a separate post is forthcoming. I did get a sniff of the raspberry one, and it smelled delicious!

The pediatrics inpatient service is going wonderfully. I really like the team that I'm working with, and we've seen some very interesting patients. The consultant supervising the team this week is fantastic—he is very encouraging and also gives great feedback about how to improve, and he spends at least 30 minutes, sometimes an hour, with us students every day answering questions and quizzing us about patients and important pediatrics concepts. I had a good overnight call on Tuesday, with about 5 hours of sleep out of the 34 spent at the hospital. I'll be on again overnight on Saturday, the bummer is that I don't really get a weekend, since I'll be there from about 7 AM Sat to noon or 1 on Sunday. I'm sure Alex will delay the Sunday waffles until I get home, though! Knowing that Puerto Rico is coming up at the end of this stretch makes all things bearable.

More from Alex soon, I think. We'll see if we can get some snow pictures of Jasper, maybe Sunday afternoon if it sticks.