Packing

I hate packing, with a fiery, all-consuming passion. Seriously. It's become the bane of my existence, and to the next person who says, "Get used to it; you're in the Army," I have only only angry words for you. Honestly, though, a career in the Army has got to be more stable than the fourth year of medical school. I was not in the same place for longer than two months in the last year. Don't believe me? Here's a recap:

June 2008: Columbus, OH
June 27, 2008: Leave for Camas, WA
July 14-15, 2008: LA for USMLE Step 2 CS
July 28-Aug 12, 2008: Madigan Army Medical Center, Ft. Lewis, WA
Aug. 12-16, 2008: Albuquerque, NM for Force Health Protection conference
Aug. 16-23, 2008: Madigan
Aug. 23-27, 2008: Driving to Columbus, OH
Aug. 27-Sept. 1, 2008: Columbus, OH
Sept. 1-27, 2008: Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, Washington, DC
Sept. 28-Nov. 1, 2008: Columbus, OH
Nov. 2-27, 2008: Tripler Army Medical Center, Honolulu, HI
Nov. 28-Dec. 19, 2008: Columbus, OH
Dec. 20-27, 2008: Camas, WA
Dec. 27, 2008-Feb. 11, 2009: Papua New Guinea
Feb. 11-15, 2009: LA for American College of Preventive Medicine national conference
Feb. 15-17, 2009: Camas, WA
Feb. 17-22, 2009: Washington, DC
Feb. 22-28, 2009: Camas, WA
Feb. 28-April 25, 2009: Columbus, OH
April 25-26, 2009: Louisville, KY
April 26-May 7, 2009: Washington, DC
May 7-10, 2009: Louisville, KY
May 10-12, 2009: Columbus, OH
May 12-26, 2009: Camas, WA
May 26, 2009: Leave for Columbus, OH

And coming up: graduation on June 4, movers coming on June 8, leaving for Maryland for good on June 9. So yeah, it's been a busy year, and I hate packing.

Plane tickets and such

I just spent $2800 on my plane tickets from LA to Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, for my internation rotation from Dec. 27-Feb. 11. Yikes. I still need to get the tickets from Portland to LA, as well as from Port Moresby (the capital of Papua New Guinea) to Baimuru Station, from which I'll take a boat to Kapuna, the village the where the hospital is located. My credit cards are definitely going to be getting a workout in the coming months. On the plus side, I did just get approved for funding through OSU, which pays $2500 of my total cost.

All in all, it's going to be a busy year as far as travel. Here's the tentative plan:

July: okay, I'm not going anywhere in July, I'm just hanging out here in Camas
August: Madigan for most the month, with a conference in Albuquerque, then I'm driving back to Ohio at the end of the month
September: Washington, DC (well, Silver Spring, MD, but it's all the same)
October: I'll be relatively stationary in Ohio, but driving back and forth between Columbus and my rotation site (which is not Columbus)
November: Tripler, in Hawaii
December: Columbus, then flying home to Portland, then taking off for Papua New Guinea
January: Papua New Guinea
February: Papua New Guinea to LA for a conference, then up to Portland, then possibly to wherever I'm going to be doing residency to find a place to live, then back to Columbus
March-April: I'll actually be in Columbus for 2 whole months
May: moving my stuff to either Washington, DC or Tacoma
June: back to Columbus for a weekend to get hooded (med school graduation), then back to DC or Tacoma
July: start internship in either DC or Tacoma

So fourth year will be busy