2010 November: North

We’ve had a good month here out East. A big story in the news lately has been the bad weather in the Utah/Idaho area; I guess you guys have had some pretty severe snow and cold over the last few weeks. I want you to know that I’m thinking of you. The day before Thanksgiving Becky, Sophie, and I went for a walk. It was around 2pm and it was so nice out that I left my jacket in the car. I thought of you all as I walked.

We had a nice Thanksgiving this year. We were invited over by one of my classmates to eat with him and his family and another med student. It was a small gathering of friends and we enjoyed each others’ company.

On Tuesday before Thanksgiving I went and bought new tires for our car; cost: $700. It shouldn’t have taken more than an hour or so to change the tires and do an alignment, but the shop was slammed with people trying to prep for their Thanksgiving travels so I spent 4 hours in the waiting room! I was hoping to get some homework done, but instead I just sat around switching between Fox news and CNN. I took all day Wednesday to finish my homework, which made for a long day, but I haven’t had to think about school for the last few days which has been nice.

On black Friday we went looking for new cell phones, and possibly a new cell plan. I was not surprised to learn that any switch in plans would cost us more than we are paying now. We signed a contract at 2007 rates and everything is more expensive now. We decided to keep our current plan for awhile longer or until they kick us off because they are losing money on us. I was surprised to learn that none of the simple ‘text and talk’ phones they make these days are as nice as ours. Our phones are dinosaurs in the phone industry, 2 ½ years old. I thought that we’d find lots of new and exciting models for us to choose from, and, if we were looking for a smart phone we would have. I guess phone companies have decided that there’s no money in a simple cell phone, so they aren’t working on any new ones. So we decided to keep our old plan and our old cell phones. After that we went shopping for a couch. Up until now we’ve been using Becky’s old bed as a couch. A few weeks ago we agreed that it was time to buy a real couch. So on Friday we did. New couch: $500. All in all it was an expensive week.

One more thing: Becky and I read 3 books together this year, plus another one that we started but didn’t finish. They total up to more than 1400 pages! I just thought you (especially Derik) should know that.

We hope that you each got to take time to count your blessings. We live in a marvelous, wonderful time!

Stewart, Becky, and Sophie