Endoscopy adventures

Today for my voice class we went to the Voice Disorders center. Have to say...kind of cool! It was interesting being able to tour the clinic and see what goes on. For class we were there to be trained in performing rigid endoscopy of the larynx and vocal folds. Basically it is a small camera attached to about a 9 inch metal rod which is attached to the camera. You stick the metal rod in the person's mouth to their uvula (the hangy down part in your throat). Then you have the person say "eeee" and move the camera around slightly and can see their vocal folds to examine their health. We all crowded into a small exam room and took turns using the endoscope to look at someone's vocal folds. There were about 14 people there, and we all practiced on the same girl. She was a trooper for letting us all stick the camera in her mouth! My professor gave us the option of not doing the procedure if we did not want to. I almost chickened out but then thought to myself "you have to do it. you are here, and no one is going to make fun of you if you don't do it right, they are all just as nervous". Finally it was my turn. We had to put on a latex glove and hold the person's tongue with one hand while guiding the endoscope into their mouth with the other hand. I was afraid I would make the girl gag or poke her throat or something. But--I didn't! I pretty much just slid the endoscope in, and got a good view of her vocal folds on the first try! IT was really a lot easier than I thought it would be and I am really glad that I went and did it. Definitely something that not everyone gets to experience and practice doing!!

Tasty Celebration

I began a new tradition for myself last semester. The last day of class, when class had finally ended for the semester, I treated myself to Cafe Rio for dinner. I felt as thought I deserved some good food for my hard work. Since that day, I decided that each semester after classes had ended I would get Cafe Rio for dinner. Well, technically today wasn't the last day of classes, but it WAS the last day of clinic. Last day? Okay! Cafe Rio was on the menu for my dinner. It was so yummy! Their pork burritos are amazing. I love them. I really was in the mood for a pork salad, but they do not store well and I can't eat an entire salad for one meal and would have to save half of it. So I got the burrito and it was delish. Happy last day of clinic for the semester!!!

Random museings

Baking failure. Saturday night C and I made brownie batter. I have to admit I like the batter more than the baked product. So we made the batter and then made a few into cookies. (just taking the brownie batter, scooping it out like cookies and baking them) They turned out pretty good and instead of having an entire pan of brownies we just had 6 cookies. It was great. I took some of the batter home and wanted the cookies again monday night. I scooped the dough out on the pan, placed it in the oven, set the timer and patiently waited for the treats to be done. When the timer went off, this is what I pulled out of the oven:
Beautiful, aren't they? They didn't cook at all! The middle was goo and the outsides were pretty burnt. Not really sure what the difference between Saturday and Monday was, but it wasn't pretty. Bummer...
Beautiful! That is the weather we have been having this week. Absolutly beautiful. Love it! I even broke out the capri's yesterday. I couldn't help it. It was a bit chilly going to school at 8 in the morning, but by the time class was out at 12 I was glad I wore them. I love capri's, they are just fun, and a change from pants. I went to Park City with K 2 weeks ago and found a great deal on some way cute capri's from GAP. They definitely are a change from the normal colors I usually wear, but I think they are way cute!! (Yes, these are capri's...you just cant see my feet). I love wearing new clothes and was very excited to wear them today!!!
In other news: I am officially a card-carying patron of the Salt Lake City Library. Go me. The place is HUGE and beautiful and intimidating. I successfully navigated the streets of downtown Salt Lake to find my way to the building, and I got the card. AND since I live in Salt Lake, I can check out 100 items at a time. Anyone feel like reading???

Two and a half weeks of school left!! This is the last week of clinic (I officially have today and tomorrow left!!!), then a week to finish class a nd then finals. I am SUPER ready to be finished. We get 9 days off between semesters. I booked my flight home on sunday and am definitely ready for it to be here!! I am excited to go home and *not* be sick this time around!!!

Visitor

It has been raining pretty much all day long. I woke up to rain, and it rained all through class, after class, on my way home, and it is still going. Although, it sounds like it is coming down much harder right now than it has all day. Doesn't that always seem to be the case at night? I think it does. So I was at home today, doing some work and I was looking outside my window at the rain. I saw a big spot on the window so I had to investigate. I opened my blinds to find this visitor who came to visit...



SICK! A slug on my window!! So stinking gross! He was just slithering his way across the outside of my window. It was so not pretty watching him slink across the window so slowly. Gross. It took about a half hour for him to make his way from one end to the other, and then I lost sight of him. I am just glad he was on the OUTSIDE and not the inside. Slimy little visitor!

Spaghetti and Eggs

Last weekend C had to make some cupcakes for a family party. I was enlisted to help out. She found this cute idea and we decided to tackle it. They only took about a half hour total to make and they turned out pretty cute, at least I think so!!

The whole batch of yummy-ness!




I would have never come up with the idea to make spaghetti and meatball cupcakes! They are stinking cute though. Just a regular cupcake, cream cheese frosting (noodles), one of those chocolate hazlenut candies (meatball), and strawberry jam (spaghetti sauce). Creative, no?

Hope everyone had a good Easter! I did for sure. I went up to Park City for the day on saturday and stayed with K and C. Thanks for letting me crash! We watched movies (the Easter traditional "The Ten Commandments"), ate good yummy food, and just hung out. It was a nice relaxing weekend! Saturday night we dyed Easter Eggs. I have done this every year and I really love it. Its fun! The somewhat weird thing this year was this: The package of egg dye came with 12 color tablets, and we had 18 eggs to dye. That means one egg per color, plus 6 extra. Kind of strange to only be able to color one egg per color! I remember when the package used to only come with 6. Crazy! We didn't want to be finished after we did all the hard boiled eggs so we dyed the raw eggs too. Why not?! It was pretty fun. Look at all our pretty colors:

I had a good Easter. Dinner was yummy and there was a ton of food. C's family was really nice and it was good.

This week...today is absolutly beautiful! The temperature thing said it was 63 when I was out earlier. Lovely! I wore sandals to day, because I just had to. I love sandals! I stayed out and walked around a bit to enjoy the spring air. I heard that there is a storm coming in tomorrow afternoon that is supposed to bring snow. UGH. Going from spring back to winter. So over it. Schoolwise....I have a ton of stuff due on Friday. Hopefully I am going to work on it all over the week so it will not be a hassle on Friday and I can be done with it all. Cross your fingers! I can't believe I only have two weeks of clinic left for the semester! It has gone by so fast. Unbelievable!
My stomach is growling, meaning it is time for food. On the menu? Chicken Grape Salad. YUMMY!

Weekend Fun

Can you believe it is already April 1? I can't. I keep asking myself where did the last three months go? Craziness!!! Good news: I am finally all better. No sickness here! (Watch, with that one statement I will catch something very soon. Just my luck.) It feels really good to feel good. That sounds a little strange, but its true. I like waking up and not feeling gross. Yay!

After a little shopping trip this weekend, C and I came home with some fun purchases. First: flowers. These have been growing in popularity over the past while and they are pretty cute. So we gave in and bought some. We got one that is just a plain white flower, and then I got one that is white, pink, and brown. I think they are both pretty cute, and I have already worn them. They give a little kick of happiness, don't you think?A while ago on the Rachel Ray Show, she featured a sweet treat from a local bakery in Provo. They were little cake bites that looked quite yummy. Since C and I have this plan to visit all the local bakery and sweets shops in the area, we decided to venture to this store and taste the treats. We got to the store (which also sells gourmet cupcakes and cookies), found the cake bites (which were a little expensive for so few, but it was worth it!), and bought them. P wasn't impressed, but C and I really enjoyed them. They are just little bites of cake covered in chocolate. YUM!

These ones were chocolate, which is the only flavor they were selling that day. I am not sure if they offer more flavors on different days or what. But in the words of Rachel Ray: Yum-O!
We also stopped at Target to look around and found these little hats... I did not buy this one but had a fun time trying the different styles on. This one seems to be quite popular as of late. What do you think?


In other news...more snow. It doesn't stop around here. This week alone there are supposed to be three different storms. It snowed this morning in fact. Its spring for goodness sake! Lets be done already!!!

School is...school. Busy busy busy. Had two tests this week...one on tuesday which went fairly well I believe, and then one (a take home test) which is due tomorrow. This second one I am so unsure of. I really have no idea if I am doing it right, if I have enough information, and I am so done with it. I don't even care about it any more! Luckily I just have to turn it in in the morning and be done with it. Thank goodness. Therapy is going well. Making a little bit of progress with people. I would like to have made more by this point, but what are you gonna do? I am really surprised that we only have a few weeks left in the semester! This one went really fast. Exciteing for sure!! Just keep pushing through and get this one out of the way.

Oh by the way, today is a curly hair day. Having it curly always makes me happy. I think that I don't do it this way often enough. I am always surprised when I do it how much I like it. Maybe I will do it more??