Showers for Andrew

Some super sweet and generous friends and family have hosted some awesome baby showers for us over the past few weeks. They have all been really special and James and I feel blessed to have so many friends and family members that are excited to meet Andrew and be a part of his life. I have not been the best at taking pictures at all of them, but I wanted to share a few that I had.

Side by Side shower at Katie's. Love those Muddy's cupcakes and diaper cake by Anna.

Diaper cake by Erin at my Nashville shower.

Sweet friends- Jenny and Caroline.

This was Tiffany's 1st try at fondant...cutest baby shower cake I've ever seen!

Tennessee Tuesday

I recently found another Memphis Gem. No, its not a new flavor at Muddy's Bake Shop (although there is always something new to try). On Tuesdays with a Tennessee Driver's License you get in free after 2 PM at the Memphis Zoo. I've been twice in the last three weeks to enjoy the animals. I would've been batting a thousand, but one day I showed up without my ID. I know, all you have to do is show up with your ID, and I left the house with my ID laying on the kitchen counter.

The Polar Bear peeking through the "sniffing hole" at us.

Old Man. Check out that face.

Young Man with bottle some lowlife threw in. He filled it up with water from the pond and was drinking out of it.

Love that petting zoo.

The Rhino we got to ride.

Tennessee Tuesday proves to be another of Memphis' gems. I often say that Memphis gets a "bad rap" and isn't as terrible as people make it out to be. Let Tennessee Tuesday at the Memphis Zoo represent one of the reasons that this is true.

Recently my accompaniment to the Zoo has been Craig Wright and Brandon Lokey. I plan to go each Tuesday until Andrew comes, and maybe take him although I'm not sure what kind of zoonoses he might catch. Who's coming with me next week?

"That jacket dun' drawn up on ya'..."

I have another memory to record because I almost lost it. A few weeks ago, I went with Craig Wright, Elizabeth's Dad, and Elizabeth's Uncle to St. Louis to watch the BasketVols play in the Elite Eight.

We made the 5 hour drive without tickets, knowing we could scalp some there. We did eventually find tickets and enjoyed the game, but that's not the memory I need to record - as the BasketVols in the Elite Eight will not soon be a fleeting memory.

As we hit the streets in search for tickets, St. Louis was covered with a light drizzle. The scalpers were ignoring the theories of Adam Smith asking for excessive amounts of green stuff for their tickets. Since no one was buying, they decided to make fun of one of their potential customers.

Enter Orange Jacket. I bought you at a thrift store in Knoxville. You were too small for me then. You are too small for me now. But you were only $5. And you look great with jeans. I can dress you up or down. As a classy UT fan, I can wear you over an white Oxford shirt. As a more focused fan, I can wear you over any of my non-orange colored UT shirts. You have ticket stubs in your pockets from games many moons ago. You, Orange Jacket, are my friend.

Orange Jacket In St. Louis watching BasketVols, dressed down with Black Tee.

Orange Jacket with Smokey before UT v. Arkansas game in 2007. Again dressed down with gray UT Tee.

Orange Jacket dressed up with white Oxford shirt before UT v. LSU 2006.

Enter Disgruntled Scalpers. From the scalpers I received the following heckles: "Did Pat Summit let you borrow her jacket?" Followed by, "Hey big guy, your little brother called, he wants his jacket back." Made complete with, "You better get outta the rain, that jacket dun' drawn up on ya'."

I considered retiring the Orange Jacket. But that would be a win for them. And I love that Orange Jacket.

And when I bought a pair of lower level seats for $106 below face value - I decided that I got the last laugh, in my Orange Jacket.

Writing Memories

Have you ever heard of this? People that write down every memory that ever arose within their brains? I think I read it in a book somewhere.

I pride myself on having the ability to remember things, often of little significance per my lovely wife, that happened years ago and for fleeting moments. I decided that I didn't want to start writing them all down, but Elizabeth suggested blogging them. After a few days of thought, this will be the first such blog. She may regret this.

I remember the first night I met Josh Stites. While sitting in Elizabeth's apartment with Jenny Dalton and others at the "Royal Arms of Love", Mr. Josh Stites entered my life. And the thing I can remember best about that night was that he had just picked up some new suits and one FINE pair of shoes.

Shoes that could set a dance floor on fire.

Shoes that could make a man.

Shoes that Jenny would die if he wore in public.

And that night, I met Josh for the first time and immediately associated him with what I thought was a pretty snazzy pair of shoes. To which I thought, "If this guy can pull off those shoes- he's gotta be a great guy".

Last Friday night, Elizabeth and I visited with Jenny and Josh at their house and before we got there, Josh put on those shoes. Josh, you looked and still look great in those shoes. Don't let people throw hatemakers at them. And in our future months and years in Nashville, I hope to see those shoes often.

Not the actual shoe.

"The envelope please..."

Ask me what the best week of my life is recently? I'll probably tell you Match Week. Not only was it an exciting time to find out where we would spend the next era of our life, but it was a week filled with good friends, family, and lots of fun times.

Pre-Match Breakfast.

On Monday, March15, 2010, I found out that I had matched in Emergency Medicine. I like to think of this as the day that I confirmed that I had actually inputted my rank list correctly and certified it. I had in fact done that leaving me in wait for 3 more days.

Thursday, March 18th was Match Day. UT's festivities were held at the beautiful Pink Palace in Memphis on a gorgeous day. Our friends had planned to all open our envelopes together, but my friends couldn't stand the wait. That might have been because I was in the slowest line ever to get my envelope and thought the Class of 2011 might match before I received mine. The time finally arrived for me to open my envelope...

I was very excited to have received my first choice and to be back in Nashville to Vanderbilt University Medical Center. We are looking forward to reuniting with many old friends and being near our families.

Booton is always good for an embrace after a big moment.

Kelsey matched in Nashville too!

The proud family.

Jay matched in Derm. Genius.

Muddy's Bake Shop had a nice surprise for us.

Craig will be down the road in Jackson.

The Lipscomb EM boys. Booton and Lokey are headed to Birmingham.

The week was capped off by Caduceus Ball on Saturday night, annual celebration of the M4 class, at the Cadre Building in Memphis. We all had a great time celebrating the end of Match Week and spending time together. Not to mention the fun we had watching a lot of future doctors tear up the dance floor.

The Lipscomb crowd plus Gavin (who should have come to Lipscomb).

Liz and I at the Ball.

All said, Match Week was by far the best week of medical school and produced many memories. I am so excited and blessed to have matched at Vanderbilt and look forward to my training there.

The move to Nashville will be May 31st - looking for volunteers to unload the truck. And we're still looking for a place to live. We'll be house and rental shopping, but if you have a house that you need someone to live in or elderly acquaintances that need an MD to live in their guest house - let me send you my CV! We appreciate everyone's help in giving us any leads to help us find our new home!

Nertz Weekend sans Nertz con ROCKBAND

Nertz Weekend 2010 was planned to follow Nertz Weekend 2009 that occurred last fall. However, after THE MAN made Heather work against her will, Nertz weekend 2010 featured no card games, but did prove to be a blast. Our time was instead filled with delicious BBQ, maximum bro-time (from 11-2 on Saturday), Buzzword, Jerry's SnoCones, buzzcuts, Muddy's Bake Shop, Super Mario Bros Wii, burgers with pimento cheese and grilled onions, Elvis sitings, and what may be pushing Nertz aside... ROCKBAND.

Brandon, Russ, Craig and James having Maximum Bro-Time at Central BBQ.

James, Liz, Meaghan, Brandon, Anna, and Craig at Muddy's.

I'd never played ROCKBAND before, but I'm hooked. I am convinced that when ROCKBAND is turned on, people morph into entirely different people with inhibitions thrown into the wind. Think about it: Who really gets in front of their friends and sings as loud as possible? And who grabs instruments they have never seen before and acts like they are Bon Jovi? This game is fabulous and the following pictures will tell you why.

Liz and I rockin' out.

Brandon and Kelsey. Brandon has transformed into Jimi Hendrix.

Craig "Pounding out some MBOD" Wright on the drums.

The ear-tingling crooning of Russ, James, and Brandon.

Meaghan tickling the twines on the guitar accompanied by Liz on the mic.

Nothing says "I'm feeling it" and "this is the real deal" like sticks in the air.

We had a fabulous weekend hanging out with some great friends we grown very close to while we've been in Memphis the last four years. We were glad Russ made it and missed Heather not being here. But Heather should see how much her presence was missed - as we couldn't even bare to deal the cards for a game of Nertz.

And no good weekend in Memphis passes without an Elvis siting. Seen below is a picture I snipped of Elvis at our local "stab 'n grab" Kroger on Poplar and Cleveland.

Friends in February

In February, we were glad to have lots of friends make their way through Memphis for a visit. We had a blast taking them to some of our favorite Memphis locations and teaching them to dodge bullets.

Thanks to Amy Stroup playing a show in Memphis and Lipscomb sending some friends to recruit - we had a great reunion of a lot of old friends. We went to our favorite Mexican Restaurant, Happy Mexican. Unfortunetly, the rest of Memphis also wanted to take their friends there which left us a 2.5 hour wait behind a party of 45. I didn't even know you could walk in with a party of 45 - but that was apparently what was going on. Instead, we had a fun dinner at El Mezcal (our former favorite Mexican restuarant). Afterwards, we took the opportunity of being in East Memphis (per normal) to make our way to Muddy's Bake Shop. Let's be honest. If you come to Memphis and you didn't go to Muddy's - you didn't hang out with us. That place is the glory.

Elizabeth, Amy, and Sarah at Muddy's Bake Shop.

James and Daley outside of El Mezcal.

On Valentine's weekend, Meggie, Caroline and Ashleigh came down for what has become an annual trip of Memphis fun. We had a blast with them doing Memphis things and planning for Andrew's nursery. For those of you who don't know, Ashleigh is an extremely talented artist and her canvases are starting to cover the walls of our apartment. We can't wait to see all the great things that will make Andrew's nursery so special and happy.

Elizabeth, Meggie, Caroline, James and Ashleigh at Muddy's.

It is always great to share our lives with friends and show them some positive things about Memphis. There really are a lot of things about Memphis that we will miss... Elizabeth may miss more than me - I spent way too much time inside the hospitals.