The 1st week of Early.

Last week began the time where I get the pleasure of opening the pharmacy 3 out of the next 4 weeks! One of the other pharmacists will be there with me, and this past week I played the role of our technician that was out on vacay. We would arrive and turn the lights on and the alarm off (which is a bit strange to have the power to do p.s.), then start heating water for making kits, get the messages off the machine, and start eluting the generators. The goal is to have all this finished within the first 30-60 minutes so that we are getting down to business around 0200 (yeah, that's two A.M.!)

I spent the week starting off the morning doing a little quality control on all the dose calibrators to make sure they are consistently reading the amount of radioactivity we're throwing down the hole and then I would draw doses for about 2 hours. Moving on to quality control for all the kits we made (to make sure they'll give nice pretty pictures for everyone) and then snack time! Around 0600 we'd do it all again, repeat, repeat, repeat.

As for sleeping, I did really well (almost, I'll get to that)! I stayed up all day and night Sunday and then slept all day after work. Surprisingly, I managed to get about 6-ish hours of sleep everyday, during the day, without even making the bedroom a cave. Then I'd get up in the afternoon/evening, go workout, and stay up all night. They only I really had trouble with is food -- still need to figure out when to eat, and what -- oh, and Thursday. So the big boss man (read owner of the company) called the beginning of the week and told us one pharmacist from CLT would need to go to Asheville Friday to cover. Since there are only three of us, and a minimum of two are needed to work a day, I got bumped to the day shift for Friday. T had Thursday off so I thought we could spend a day together doing whatever we wanted. Note to self, a 3 hour nap in one 24 hour period ≠ fun, happy Zan. Needless to say I was sent to my room multiple times to take more naps and will be planning a "sleep day" at the end of my early weeks.

Now to work the weekend and then the early shift again next week! Still loving it, still need LOTS of improvement, still grateful for a very understanding Thomas!

Put your lead-lined big girl panties on!

-my mother

A little over two weeks ago, on a Friday, there was a big change in my life. I turned my employee badge in to my supervisor and left the hospital for the last time as an employee. I'd worked there for almost 7 years; it was strange. I took the weekend to relax by myself while Thomas worked his first weekend in over 2 years. The next Monday, I got up an hour earlier than usual, and drove to my new job as a nuclear pharmacist!

I've wanted to be a nuclear pharmacist since high school, since I was 16, and there I was, walking in to the place that was my new home. Ten minutes later, the boss wanted me to get in the hood and draw doses. It had been about 18 months since I had drawn a dose and I just bumbled around with the syringe shield and tongs trying to get things straight. He could tell I was nervous and said, "Here's some saline, you can play with it later."

The first day I hit generators (washing off the radioactivity so we could use it), reviewed how to make kits and ship out packages. We talked about the schedule and being on-call and learning to judge how much time you'll need to send out a dose. And we talked about some of the new responsibilities I'll have in this job. I'll be in charge (really, really in charge, not like at the hospital where there were a couple levels of management and 15 other pharmacists that had been there longer than me to be in charge), and I'll get the opportunity (have to) precept some of the students we have (p.s. we have 11 coming between now and next April, not including the one here already! and the summer intern), and I'll also have the opportunity to conduct radiation safety audits at a series of heart clinics in town (they pay us to be their radiation safety officers). Wow.

The second day, we all learned how to set up and run the emergency power generator! There had been a bad storm (though not as bad as the one this weekend resulting in tornados) and it knocked out the power at the lab. I walked in and everything was dark in the front offices. The lab in the back was running, so we got all of our doses out on time, but it was a bit of a mess. Presby had definitely taught me to roll with the punches and find the gap where help is needed and fill it. I helped package a few doses to be sent out, but mostly stayed out of the way until things were caught up. Yay adventures in your first week!

Two weeks have gone by and I'm starting to feel more comfortable. I'm not dropping things (everyday) anymore and I'm learning to multi-task in a whole new way. I'm sleeping (so far) and I'm still pumped about this! It feels really good to be excited about my job again.

The Holidays

This year was the first year Thomas and I celebrated The Holidays together. It was a great and exhausting whirlwind of family and friends, parties and presents, and overall happiness with a little bit of awkwardness thrown in.

Thanksgiving was fairly simple. My dad's step-sister put everyoneon notice last March or April that she wanted to do a big Thanksgiving at her house and all were invited. There were about 16 of us, grandparents, parents, siblings, cousins, roommates, fiances, and friends. It was a great dinner with turkey and the usuals plus some scrumptious appetizers (my favs were the stuffed mushrooms and Mom's pumpkin dip).We came, we ate, we saw the beautiful house, and we all wanted a nap! Thomas and I went over to his parents' house for a little bit afterwards. His mom picked a girl movie to watch (Pretty Woman, I think) and since Thomas had no desire to watch it, he baked cookies instead! Best way to end a lovely holiday!

The Christmas holidays were a lot more hectic. We had about seven (or 8 depending on how you count) parties/family gatherings to attend in three days. Whew! It started off with the Dumpling Party. A high school friend of Thomas's brother and his family throw

a dumpling making party every year. We all come over, spend an hour or so making dumplings and then eat them! We made a ton, but they do not last long at all! Thomas and I had to leave early to go to Mark's small family party and start the gift giving off right! My brother got 2 out of three parts of a three piece suit,my aunt got a new Kindle, Mark got a new pot, Thomas and I got dance lessons, and we all laughed harder than we had in a long time!

Christmas Eve Day we went out to Tryon, NC for Mark's big Leatherman family Christmas party. This was the first time Thomas met by extend family on that side and finally got to join in one of our largest holiday traditions. He was in introduced to Aunt Frances's cookies and

had a few chats with the cousins before gifts were given out and names drawn for next year. Adding a new name to the hat is always a big deal, and proves there's no turning back now! We hopped back in the car and back on the road to the big Choiniere Christmas party. There were friends and food all over (and a few dumplings from the night before, though they were quickly snatched up!). The guys decided to play a practical joke on one of the family friends by dressing like him in sweater vests and bow ties. The joke was on them, however, when the guest strayed from his typical party attire and just wore a button down shirt this year! They had fun with it though!

Once the night wound down, Thomas and I headed home and to bed so Santa could come. We got up early and opened our stockings full of chocolates, Star Wars pancake molds, concert tickets, and a travel BattleShip game set (I know, I'm an awesome Santa). We had wonderful gifts from my father's side of the family to open as well, including an Xbox Kinect! We headed to my family's Christmas morning to open more stockings and gifts with my parents, brother, and grandmother; and to have my favorite breakfast of the year: Moravian Sugarloaf! Then it was off to Winston-Salem for the big Choiniere family gathering. Cousins, aunts, uncles, and desserts were present in massive amounts all of which made for a lovely afternoon (oh and the snow that was falling looked pretty but made the driving more of a pain). They have a white elephant gift exchange at the party which made for some pretty funny moments, some gifts were great, others - anyone would try to get rid of! As we headed off back to Charlotte, Thomas's grandmother gave me a special gift from herself and Thomas's grandfather. It made me feel so welcomed into there family! Once back in Charlotte, we had Thomas's immediate family Christmas (along with our favorite Chinese food for dinner) and watched a movie or two.

And after all that: we celebrated my mom's birthday!! We had a great lobster dinner and more family time before Thomas and I had to return to the adult working world for about a week! For New Year's Eve, Thomas and I had some friends over to celebrate (and show off the townhouse few have ever seen). We booted up the Xbox Kinect and it was a HUGE hit. We were hang-gliding, boxing, going on adventures, and dancing up a storm! People came and went to ours and other parties and at the end of the night we had a nice prosecco toast to ring in the new year! Here's to 2011 and all the great parties to come!!

Happy Holidays 2010 from the future Choinieres