Anyone want some raisin challah?

[elshiva]

Have you ever had it before? It's so sweet, it's like cake.

[rockymountaindem]

1. I just ate a ton of that

To be honest, I could do without the raisins, but it was still pretty good.

[elshiva]

3. But the raisins are so sweet and yummy.

:)

[Aristus]

2. Sure, I'll have some.

It looks delicious! :9

[elshiva]

4. Just tear a hunk of the loaf.

It is delicious. It's so thick and rich.

How are you? Do you want to talk? :hug:

[jeff30997]

5. Yummy, Yummy, Yummy...

I got love in my tummy.

Hey it looks delicious. :9

[elshiva]

8. Have as much as you want honey.

Do you want me to drink Canada Dry? ;) :evilgrin:

[Aristus]

6. I'd love to.

I'm doing some studying right now, but I can check in every once in a while... :-)

Yum! Good stuff!

[elshiva]

9. Have as much as you want. :)

What are you studying?

[Aristus]

11. Pathology. One of the toughest courses on the Fall Quarter syllabus.

So far, it's pretty fun. I'm only eighty pages into the textbook, and it's like a review of Anatomy & Physiology. But the hard stuff is still ahead...

[elshiva]

12. What is pathology?

Is this for college?

[Aristus]

13. The study of disease.

I'm in training to become a Physician Assistant. I just started Fall Quarter of my Didactic year of school (Clinical year is next.) I passed Summer Quarter with a 91% GPA. But the toughest challenges are just ahead in Fall and Winter Quarters.

[elshiva]

14. That's great.

Where do you want to work?

[Aristus]

15. There's a clinic in downtown Tacoma that provides healthcare for the city's homeless

population. I worked there for two years as a Medical Assistant. I want to go back there once I'm a P.A. I loved it there, and I really miss my patients.

[elshiva]

17. You have a big heart.

:hug: :hug: You will do such good work. I'm proud of you. When did you decide to become a physician?

[Aristus]

21. Physician Assistant. A P.A. is licensed to practice clinical medicine

under the supervision of a doctor. I decided about five years ago. I worked for four years at a job I hated in order to put my wife through Dental Hygiene school. When she graduated and started making good money, she said "Okay, now go do what you want to do." I come from a medical family, and after going my own way with little success, I decided to look into medicine as a career. I trained as a Medical Assistant in order to get the 4,000 hours of clinical experience necessary to apply to P.A. school.

I was accepted into the course at the University of Washington School of Medicine on my second attempt.


And the rest is history... B-)

[elshiva]

22. You are a supportive husband.

"I worked for four years at a job I hated in order to put my wife through Dental Hygiene school."
:) That's sweet.

So your wife is now a dentist?

[Aristus]

23. She's a Dental Hygienist. When you go to the dentist, the Hygienist

is usually the one who spends the most time with you; unless you're there for some major repair work.

Not to be confused with Dental Assistant, who usually just hands instruments to the dentist or the hygienist, and says "Yes, doctor" a lot.

[elshiva]

24. Yes, I know. I have a really nice Dental Hygienist.

She has these little green monsters in her office called "cavity creeps." Have you seen those? :)

How long have you been married?

[Aristus]

25. Never seen cavity creeps before. I wonder if my wife has...

We've been married almost ten years. And she was married before that for fifteen years. She had three kids with her first husband, and two of them have given us grandkids. To me, they are really step-grandkids, but they call me "grandpa", so that's that. :-)

[elshiva]

26. That's nice. :)

:hug: Have you lived in Washington all your life?

[Aristus]

27. No. I was born and raised in San Antonio, Texas.

My dad was career-Army, so we moved around a lot; when he retired from the service at Fort Lewis, we decided to stay here. That was back in 1981, and except for my own Army service, I've lived here ever since.

BTW, where do you live? I just realized I might be keeping you up much later than it is on the West Coast. :dunce:

[elshiva]

28. You are not keeping me up. I am a night owl ever since

I have had this pain. I live in Monkton, Maryland. I've never been to the West Coast. I don't like to travel, I'm a real homebody. I've only moved once in my life in that was from Parkton to Monkton, there is probably about a 20 mile distance between those two small towns.

I enjoy talking with you. Have you ever been out of this country? I haven't.

[Aristus]

30. I'm sorry you're in pain, sweetie.

Is it an acute or a chronic pain? And have you sought treatment for it? (Sorry, it's the P.A. in me coming out... :-) )

I've travelled a lot, mostly while I was in the Army. I've been to Canada, Mexico, Germany, the U.K., Ireland, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Saudi Arabia, and the Cayman Islands. There are hundreds of places I'd still love to see. Maybe someday. It's a beautiful world out there. I've met a lot of terrific people everywhere I've travelled.

[elshiva]

31. I don't know the technical name for what I am going through

and the doctors are puzzled, too. It's an aching, burning feeling in the left side of my stomach. I still have to go through tests and see a GI (Gastro-Intrologist sp?). They thought it was an ovarian cyst now they think endrometrisosis (sp?). I am on a birth control pill, which I might get off since it might have nothing to do with my ovaries, but it could have something to do with my uterus.

I forgot you were in the army, duh! What country do you want to see? I want to see England.

[Aristus]

33. I want to see Japan, Vietnam, India, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Spain, Portugal

Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Russia and Iceland. And more. Those were just the ones I could name off the top of my head.

England is beautiful; you'd love it there.

Here's a pic of me at Loch Ness in Scotland, Summer 1993:



Travel guides to Loch Ness always talk about the Monster, and never mention how stunningly gorgeous the place is. Just breathtaking.

[elshiva]

34. My brother got his Masters degree in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Scotland is so beautiful. I guess I just want to go where the people speak English. I am not fluent any other language.

How many languages do you know?

[Aristus]

35. I can speak German close to fluently. And I can say "I'm sorry, I don't speak the language."

in about eight languages. :D

I'm learning Spanish in order to better be able to help my Spanish-speaking patients. But I'm picking it up fairly slowly. Learning a new language is easiest when you're young...

Have your doctors ruled out a stomach ulcer? That was the first thing I thought of when you described your pain. If they sent you to a gastroenterologist, they must at least have considered it. There's a blood test they can run called helicobacter pylori that can confirm it or rule it out.

And congrats to your brother. He must be brilliant! B-)

[elshiva]

36. They never said anything about an ulcer.

I'll ask. Who knows? :shrug:

My mom can speak German pretty well.

My brother is on his way to becoming a philosophy professor. So we are all proud of him.

I think you'll learn Spanish very fast on the job, just to survive.

You've lead an exciting life. :)

[Lethe]

7. looks good to me

:)

[elshiva]

10. Go ahead and break off a piece.

:)

[KitchenWitch]

16. I am not Jewish, may I still partake?

:D

[elshiva]

19. Of course! This for everyone.

:hug: :hug: Tear off a piece. :)

[applegrove]

18. Looks delish!

[elshiva]

20. Have some.

:) How are you? :hi:

[applegrove]

46. Doing good.

[Jamastiene]

29. I've never had it before, but I would try it.

It looks tasty. :D

[elshiva]

32. It is yummy. We had some for dinner tonight.

It more like a dessert, it so sweet. :) How are you?

[Jamastiene]

37. I'm doing mostly ok.

I'm a little worried because my aunt goes to the doctor tomorrow out of town. She's going for routine yearly tests, but I don't like the idea of leaving my cats home alone. I never do, but right now I am feeling more anxious than usual about it.

We had a weird event happen Sunday night that really unnerved me. I had gone to the grocery store. The temperature was completely normal inside the house (about 70 to 72 degrees, not too bad). It was cool outside, but not too cool. I'd say it was maybe 65 to 68 degrees outside.

When I came home from the grocery store and opened the door, the heat damn near knocked me out. My aunt was coming to the kitchen (where the door in question is) and said it got hot within seconds like that. It was hot in every single room all at once. We turned the A/C on to cool it down while I brought the groceries in.

The temperature settled down to about normal in about 30 minutes or so, so I turned the A/C off. We thought it was weird, but at least it settled down to normal. Well, about two hours after that, the temperature dropped really fast to the point that I could see my breath. It got unbelievably cold in the entire place (again, every room) within seconds, literally.

That unnerved me. We didn't turn the heat on, but we did look for drafts. We found no drafts anywhere. I stepped outside and it was still in the mid 60s outside. We covered up and waited a few minutes. The temperature returned to normal.

I'm a little freaked out about that. When it got hot like that all of a sudden, I thought, "Oh no, we are living on top of a volcano no one knows about." Then, when it got cold all of a sudden, my first thought was "Oh, shit, we are haunted." I'm not sure what will happen next. I'm not sure what caused it. I wish I knew my babies are going to be ok tomorrow. :scared:

[elshiva]

38. Ohh, dear.

:hug: Sorry. :hug:

[Jamastiene]

43. Yeah, that was a rather freaky thing to have happen.

I'm not even sure what to think about it.
:hug:

[elshiva]

44. Don't worry about it.

:hug: :hug:

[Bullwinkle925]

39. i'll take raisin anything .. . . . . ...

mmmmmmm

[elshiva]

41. Raisin flavored herring?

[Bullwinkle925]

45. well . . .

as long as it is doused with a goodly amount of cinnamon - and baked into a
yummy pastry!

[cwydro]

40. Yes please.

I would love a piece.

[elshiva]

42. Go ahead, just break off a piece.