I dream of fall. I dream of cool, crisp mornings that turn into still-cool afternoons. I dream of long-sleeved shirts and jeans and cozy sweatshirts. Of red, gold, purple leaves decorating the trees. Of the smoky smell of cold air in the evenings keeping me cool.

But I wake up and find myself in this god-forsaken state. With humid mornings and sweltering days and always necessary air conditioning. I see dry, parched grass and feel the same way. This long, lingering summer feeling abnormal. It may stretch half into November.

Half of my yearning for Iowa and disdain for this state is due to weather.

when I wear my white coat. Or so says the internal medicine doc who facilitated by history oral presentation today. It was actually way more chill than I anticipated and way more interesting. We talked about the cases instead of being ripped a new one by the attendings. Also we didn't get to all the cases, so I didn't have to / get to present. The facilitator though totally talked like a Dag guy. Or maybe I just think that because he talked exactly like someone I know but can't quite remember ... oh wait, maybe Benjie. The similarity was odd.

This morning though was pretty crappy what with Harry having a flat tire. Sigh. Another thing to take care of. I don't think I can get a new one though until Thursday since I have opthalmology clinic tomorrow.

This afternoon I also had my first MS1 curriculum committee meeting. I ate two cheese sticks and dried out my mouth and (I think) gave myself a headache. Other than that it was mildly interesting. Dr. Tansey sat next to me and was playing solitaire while someone was talking about how the MS2 courses do evaluations, and I had to fight not to laugh. The bio chem profs were all stats happy. Apparently the scantron machine has broken, and been broken for a week, and they had to grade ~ 1/3 of the biochem exams by hand.

Today's the first day that it hasn't even been hot. Fall is coming. How strange and fantastic. Soon it'll be pleasant enough to come home after class and curl up on the balcony with notecards and memorize them here. I still feel a little sad that I'm not going back to Grinnell - to study on the loggia and in Noyce and Burling. But Noyce is all new this year, and my little firsties are junior now. It's hardly the Grinnell I remember anymore. Hanghang has started med school, and I keep in touch with her via plans and the occasional phone call. She seems to be having a rough time with the transition between liberal arts and med school - ruminating and memorizing. I think that things will get easier for her, but she reminds me so much of me this time last year. It makes me glad that I don't have go through that again. Even though this year is harder, it feels less sad and hopeless. Even when I feel completely overwhelmed by the drugs I have to learn, the feeling doesn't last long. I just take a deep breath and focus on the now, knowing that what I'll need to do tomorrow, I'll do tomorrow.

Friday I saw Stardust with some people, and it was really excellent. I love Neil Gaiman. Saturday and Sunday I was in Fort Worth with Dad and Boomer. Boomie is definitely subdued, but he is still reasonably active. We played catch in the backyard on Sunday afternoon. I think Boomie's dilated cardiomyopathy is weighing heavily on Dad's mind, so I'm glad I went home.

Last night I drove back here, and on the way I listened to an episode of This American Life called Break Up, which was really interesting and cute. Starlee Kline wrote a break up song with help from Phil Collins, a girl named Betsy was interviewed by Morning Edition about writing to the NYC mayor about her parents' divorce and then again some 20 years later to reflect on the initial interview, and a man talked about his cooperative divorce litigation strategy. Oh, and there was a short story about divorce from the point of view of the dog also. But my favorite part was Starlee's song, especially the parts that involved Phil Collins.

So my dog has somewhere between a few months and a year to live.

He got sick all of a sudden, and then last night while I was studying all night in the carrel, I got a call from my mom saying that he's in congestive heart failure. I called again tonight, and I guess that they've brought him home, but he'll have to go back to the hospital tomorrow for more tests. He's on a ton of meds right now to treat the congestive heart failure, and Dad is going to take him down to Texas A&M to visit the vet school there and see if he can get some new medication that might give him a year.

It's just so sudden. He's only 6 1/2 years old. Still just a baby. I really bonded with him lately, housesitting this summer and then when I was home before med school started. It so wonderful having this living creature just love you so much, and he - for all of his annoying habits - is such a loveable and sweet dog. I'm going to go home next weekend for at least part of Labor Day to chill with him.

In other news I'm gunning for the immunology exam on Monday, and then I'll have to gun for the pharmacology exam on Tuesday. The sheer amount of ridiculousness associated with these upcoming exams pretty much guarrantees that this year's faculty roast will be hilarious.

So yesterday I had some problems with the Chevy HHR rental car when I was leaving school - namely, I couldn't shift it out of park. After a lot of stressing out, I finally got it to shift by just pulling as hard as possible. This morning though I had a problem that I couldn't just force my way out of. The key wouldn't come out of the ignition when I got to school this morning. I stressed over it for like an hour before finally giving up and calling for help. Several phone calls later, I drove to a Chevy dealership followed by the incredibly wonderful/helpful Michelle, who stayed with me and then drove me back to campus when there wasn't a replacement rental car for me to get. After school Enterprise got me a new car with no hastle - a Kia Optimum, and hopefully there won't be any problems associated with it. Apparently this problem of the Chevy being too stupid to realize that it's in park and thus can release its iron grip on the key is one that the dealership has "seen before." Oh great, that's really reassuring. Now I know why my parents (and apparently Michelle's dad) say to never drive a Chevy.

So last Saturday I met this MS1 guy at a party, and in the intervening days he's called/texted me literally every day. Yesterday we had a coffee, and while he seems nice enough, I don't get that feeling that I want to be in a relationship with him. So it seems simply like it'll be another guy who doesn't meet my admittedly high expectations and will thus be rejected ... right? Well, I'm having some conflicting thoughts. On the one hand, I feel a little guilty because he clearly likes me so much (since coffee <24 hours ago, he's texted/called me twice), and I don't want to hurt his feelings. And on a related note, I feel some pressure from my friends here to just go along with it for a while until I develop feelings for him. Of course my gut reaction, when he calls me/texts me/mentions coming by to my carrel is to hide and avoid him, so I figure that my gut at least doesn't want to date him. It's not that there's anything wrong with him per se, just that I can't stand that kind of clingy behavior. We just met!

It reminds me of an episode of Sex and the City. Maybe some girls think that it's better to fake it that to be alone ... that just because a guy likes you and isn't a bad guy is reason enough to date him ... but I'm quite picky. But am I being too picky?

So now that school is back in full swing, I've decided to start excising again. I skipped all of summer, even weekends, because it's been so hot and humid. The heat has really started with a vengeance.

My stats: Biked 30 minutes

Weight: 118, not bad for no exercise all summer

So I got back from my weekend with Jacqui and Jacob late last night. It was awesome. First, they live in an adorable apartment with an absolutely gorgeous view of trees and Berkeley below, since they live on a hill. All of Berkeley/San Francisco seems to be hills. Second, they live with four adorable pets, especially Timmy the two-legged cat. He was my weekend BFF.

Highlights:
The woman sitting behind me on the way to SFO, who talked loudly the whole way there about (among other things) the fact that she and her boyfriend wouldn't be having sex that night, but when they did he had a fascination with her belly button.
BART. I love trains.
On Saturday, biking from San Francisco to Sausalito across the Golden Gate Bridge and then taking the ferry back. Absolutely beautiful. Plus we biked through Crissy field.
On Sunday, going to the Berkeley marina and then to San Francisco for sushi and a movie - Sunshine, a pretty good but creepy sci-fi film.
On Monday, going hiking with Jacob up into the hills of Berkeley and drinking a milkshake.
On the return flight, watching Blades of Glory.

Now though I'm sleepy after having run errands.

( beneath the cut )

Besides reading that and not getting any sleep last night, my dad and brother brought me a washer/dryer today that my dad got used from a colleague. He'll have to come over again tomorrow to change the electrical cord so that it's compatible with the outlet in my laundry room.

Just now I was looking at my newly rearranged bookshelf - with some old Star Trek books removed so that Harry Potter will once again fit - and found some legal pad papers stuffed in my copy of A Swiftly Tilting Planet. Curious, I removed them to find genealogies that Sarah sketched out ages ago for the novel. I stuck them back inside, hoping that someday perhaps my daughter (or niece, or son, or nephew) will read the book and find them there. It made me remember that the books did belong to Sarah, but I commandeered them.

Tonight has been spent being pleasantly alone and introspective. I feel like a J.D. Salinger character. I've been reading Franny and Zooey (which no one in book club had heard about) and Nine Stories the past few days and finished them both tonight. I enjoyed them both, and they've set my mind a'spinning. They make me feel though somewhat isolated from my more "normal" peers. I met some friends for dinner (eating tapas in the posh Knox-Henderson area), and they spent the whole time bitching about working at Camp Sweeney - a diabetic-kid camp that they all work at. The whole time I wanted to be back with Franny and Zooey, not that I didn't have a nice time I suppose. Tomorrow night I'm having a few people over to watch Sex and the City, at least acting as typically twenty-something female as possible, but I'm actually more excited about going to Half-Priced Books and buying some of the books I've jotted down in my Book Book.

Anyway, I'm trying to stuff in as much reading as humanly possible before school starts up again.