Thursday:
Found out at 11am (results were released at 10am PST) that we matched at the University of Utah for the next three years (woo!) … was stuck in a meeting at work from 9:30 - 11am and had to wait an hour longer than everyone else in the rest of the country (un-woo!).

Friday:
Belated birthday lunch with coworkers manifested in a slap-bracelet (remember those?) gift card to Best Buy that I translated into a Logitech wireless keyboard/mouse combo (more on this later).

Also, finally found a floating frame for a beautiful card designed by someone at church.

Hooray, too, for surprise birthday cake #1 (ice-cream).  Life is full of unexpected blessings lately.

Saturday:
Made a noble attempt at finding wildflowers but failed miserably in discovering the expansive fields of them that we envisioned.  Did have an interesting encounter with a frumpy lady nicknamed “Wildflower Wendy” - you can take a guess at how the rest of the 1/4-mile ‘hike’ went from there.

Joint birthday celebration with another friend at The Beacon culminated in surprise birthday cake #2 (red velvet cake from the one and only Doughboys! … their store closing is one of the sadder stories I’ve read in the past year).

Sunday:
Concluded the solid week + 1 day of celebratory eating by getting dim sum and a gigantic fresh crab with my parents after church.

Came home and finally completed one of my long-standing geek projects: converting my LCD TV into a complete media center by repurposing my neglected, old computer tower (this is where the wireless keyboard/mouse played their part).

Advantages of media center:
- Free TV online (nearly everything I watch) on an actual TV
- Nearly no need for cable TV once I install the HDTV antenna
- Free Movies (BitTorrent)
- Free Music (Pandora, mp3’s) now piped through my sound system
- Fast internet connection in the living room
- Nearly limitless storage possibilities (can upgrade HD’s as needed)

Disadvantages:
- Need to upgrade video card
- Need to ugprade TV for HDTV/HD movies (currently 720p)
- Need to install Blu-ray drive

Final thank you to everyone who came out and helped celebrate with us this past week - Angela and I were abundantly blessed!

Initially, all I got this morning was an e-mail at 0850 PST titled “Did I match?” from NRMP (National Resident Match Program).  Lots of things were wrong this:

1. We weren’t supposed to find out until 0900 PST
2. The subject line of the e-mail made me throw up in my mouth a little
3. I was denied the opportunity to log into the website and find out through the proper channels for the 2nd year in a row
4. How could I be certain that an e-mail was legitimate?  Could’ve been a cruel/sick practical joke.

Angela and I were patiently huddled around the dining table, trying to kill time online until 9AM, the official release of everyone’s match results.  I had my Gmail window minimized while reading about the Bears and why they should trade for Jay Cutler… and quickly caught a glimpse of an updated window that now read: “Inbox - (1) - Did I match?”

Despite staying up until 2AM unable to sleep in anticipation of logging into the NRMP website to find out my results this morning… and despite shutting off my phone so that I wouldn’t find out through a phone call from my Dean’s office (would’ve been bad news) … I didn’t even have time to stop myself from clicking over to my Gmail account.

My eyes jumped to the only line in the e-mail that mattered: “Congratulations! You have matched.”  Before I knew it, I had already thrust both arms into the air in jubilation and insta-hugged Angela, who was standing next to me thoroughly confused.

Still skeptical of the premature e-mail, I waited until the results were official on the NRMP website at 0900 PST (the screen capture shown above).  Frantic text-messaging and phone calls ensued.

Best. Day. Ever. (of 2009 anyway)

Special thanks to anyone and everyone who prayed and waited in anticipation with us… tears were shed this morning and hopefully you all know how much it meant to us to have so much friendship and support surrounding us this last year.

Oddly enough, today was not about today.

Ultimately, when I look back on this, it’ll be about everyone that’s been a part of this last year of our lives, our first year of marriage, and deriving a sense of security and self-worth/confidence from sources beyond my own.

It’s been a long journey with lots of ups and downs, lots of lessons learned about myself, and it’s been incredibly difficult to endure at times… but it’s been worth it.  The grace, wisdom, and providence of God kind of blow my mind sometimes.

Next steps: finding out where I matched on Thursday at 1000 PST.

New job at Baxter has been good - in the style of my new favorite analogies: a paycheck is better than no paycheck (or a crappy paycheck).

The novelty of the job has worn off, and it is now just a job; thankfully, it’s been more interesting/exciting than not.

Surprisingly, it’s also translated well to my residency interviews.  As stated by one interviewer who interviewed me both this year and last at the University of Utah, “Your interpersonal skills are much better this year!” … umm, give backhanded compliments much?

The biggest adjustment has been finding balance between life/wife/work, which is something I don’t think I have a handle on yet.  Balancing 40 hours of work with life and wife is, oddly, much more difficult than balancing 80 hours of medical school with life.  Using some fuzzy logic, wife = 40 hours/week. (?)

All told, married/working life has been good - Angela and I celebrated 6 months last night!  Went by scary quick.  Must remember not to forget 1-year anniversary…