christmas and beyond

hello readership! i am writing you from our most excellent holiday adventure. right now we're in the snowy mountains of southern california with kim's family, frolicking in the snow and relaxing in a cabin next to big bear lake. just before this, we were in nebraska for a few days to celebrate christmas over there, too. somehow we managed to leave snowy, blustery chicago to arrive in lincoln, where it was even colder, leaving only to come to rainy southern california and then to the ice-cold mountains, while lincoln and chicago warmed up to somewhere around 60 degrees. it's bad luck, but we've made the most of it. yesterday we recognized the virgin 2-3 feet of snow in the back yard as the perfect playground opportunity and made a series of tunnels which are, in my opinion, super awesome. SUPER! the photo above is of a portion of our tunnel system and was taken by occasional blog photograph contributor michael chan.

this break has been very much needed after a pretty brutal finals stretch to finish out the semester, and i'm finally feeling reenergized enough to start looking ahead to my last semester of classes in medical school, and just beyond that to what most people call the most important exam a doctor takes in his or her career--STEP-1. so there's that to look forward to. but for now, i'm going to enjoy the next week or so of not thinking too much about it.