Going Nuts!

With Jeff gone and me all by my lonesome, I feel like I’m going crazy. I’ve had problems sleeping more than four hours, losing weight, and getting the lowest test scores I’ve gotten all semester. I don’t know if I should accredit this to being burnt out or Jeff’s absence, but it has been really hard to get back into the groove of studying. I just have to keep telling myself that this isn’t undergrad, heck, it’s not even grad school—it’s professional school so it’s intended to be ridiculously hard. As Elder Watson said in the last General Conference, it is teaching me temperance (well, I don’t know if I’m always reacting in the right way for me to become more temperate, but it’s a good opportunity to learn temperance).

In anatomy, we’ve opened up the chest wall (I used the bone saw myself and took it off:), and have taken out the heart, lungs, stomach, pancreas, and intestines. The lungs are my favorite organ—they are like a stress ball because after you compress them, they automatically inflate. It’s awesome. This isn’t what happens while we’re alive—we use muscles to breathe in and then expiration is passive (meaning it doesn’t take any effort unless we’re exercising or we have something wrong with us). I would love to keep talking about really how awesome all of this stuff is, but I'll restrain myself.



Speaking of nuts (yes, I planned the title based on this), our PA class is doing a fundraiser selling nuts. I hate selling things (hence why I went into medicine—no selling involved, people need healthcare), so I figure if I put it on the blog I’m not putting anyone on the spot to buy anything, but I’m still making an effort to sell. Our class needs to raise ~$4,000 dollars to pay for sending a representative from our class to the National PA Conference (which travel + hotel + meals x 2 = expensive), our graduation dinner, composite fee, for doing volunteer activities in the community (such as making dinner for the residents of the Ronald McDonald House), and for various other things (if you really want to know, ask me—it’s a long list). So every PA student is assigned to sell 20 bags of nuts (which sounds pretty impossible for me, the girl who never sold any magazine subscriptions during elementary/middle school fundraisers). We are selling 1 pound bags of nuts (and some none-nut products) in the range of $6-8 to anyone living in my area and people I’ll see at Thanksgiving and Christmas. I’m always looking for a good deal, and even though it sounds expensive, it’s actually pretty right on or cheaper than what I’ve seen in the store—plus you’re getting nice gourmet things that most stores don’t offer (think chocolate covered yumminess). They’d make good stocking stuffers or good gifts for acquaintances/coworkers that you want to get something but aren’t sure what to get them. Here are the products we are selling:
Jumbo Pecan Halves, Natural Pistachios, Cashew Halves, Deluxe Mixed Nuts (no peanuts), Chocolate Pecan Turtles, Chocolate Covered Almonds, Chocolate Covered Peanuts, White Frosted Pretzels, and English Toffee Squares

I’m not much of a nut fanatic myself, but the English toffee squares (think Baker’s candies here in Nebraska) and Chocolate Covered Almonds look particularly delicious.

Jeff came down for the weekend and went to Stake Conference with me. It was so nice to have him back and I miss him already (it’s only been a couple of hours). Conference was so inspiring, and we got to shake Elder Oaks’ hand while we were at it! It doesn’t hurt having his brother as the temple president here!