the merriest Christmas.

I had lofty aspirations of spending four hours every morning studying for the MCAT during my Christmas break. However, the postal system failed me and, 14 days after shipping, my study materials still haven’t arrived. So like any great best friend should, Bee gave me a creative assignment to keep me occupied: create a holiday film in her honor to be unveiled on Christmas eve.

I hope you have as much fun watching it as we had making it.

A special thanks to the whole Turner clan for contributing their top notch acting abilities.
[The soundtrack is “Christmas in the Room” by Sufjan Stevens.]
(For an explanation of the Megabus cameo at the end see this.)

Merry Christmas, one and all.

Don’t Drink Out of The Paint Cup.

On the morning of December 13th, there was a biostatistics final.

On the evening of December 13th, there was a raging painting party in a basement on Main street.

Sounds about right.

My international health cohort organized a party at this wonderful place called the Paint and Pour, an instructional art studio that encourages you to bring wine and your friends. So we did just that. It turned out to be an excellent way to blow of some steam and get some quality time in before powering through the rest of our finals and heading home for break.

I think the beauty of the whole thing is that it takes people who perceive themselves to be void of artistic skill and makes them all creative and stuff. Three cheers for broadening our horizons.

Oh, and, in case you were wondering, this one was mine. It’s leaning against my wall because I may have cracked a little plaster trying to hammer a push pin into the wall to hang it up. Oops.

Happy Sunday.

Throwback to Thanksgiving.

This year I have been tasked with creating photo books for my grandmothers using whatever tidbits of photographic evidence of the exploits of the Turner family I please. There’s nothing like reviewing all of your mother’s iPhone photos from the last year to make your heart feel full.

I’m writing to you from my favorite coffee shop in my favorite city in the world, fresh off my first set of grad school finals. And before I begin having new ludicrous adventures in this lovely little town, my hard drive is itching to get the ones from my last visit to our fine city off its chest.

Got my Thanksgiving break off to an excellent start by saving some lives. Let the record show that I can be counted on to offer some blood when pie is on the line.
And I savored that little thing while I pretended I hadn’t just watched a documentary that revealed the gargantuan bricks of shortening that go into making Sara Lee pies. It’s difficult to have your pie, know everything about it, and eat it, too.

Always count on the Turners to make a U-turn for the Krispy Kreme hot light.

I love them so much sometimes I think my heart is going to explode.

Unquestionably, this is not the face of someone who’s contributing significantly to the transport of a sizeable pine tree.
This year we actually retrieved our holiday shrubbery over Thanksgiving weekend. We always have lofty aspirations and say this is how it will happen. However, we almost always fail and find ourselves selecting a Charlie Brown-esque oversized twig with needles from the leftovers at Fruitbasket Flowerland on December 20th. One would assume this is an improvement. Unfortunately, I think we all found the possibility of infinite choice to be overwhelming. Thankfully, we managed to pull it together and this guy is now cheerfully twinkling in our living room.

Amy and I used the last of our season tickets and ventured back to Ann Arbor for the OSU game. Totally awesome experience. School spirit is infectious. Surprisingly, this was not covered in my course on infectious disease epidemiology.

This year I’m most grateful to be living closer to home. Which allows for frequent visiting and impromptu trips to the Big House. And, four days and a short car ride later, more visiting and more impromptu trips for warm donuts.

And once I got back to Ann Arbor, I hit the ground running head-first into finals week. I tried to keep things interesting by conducting a search for the best café miel in town as I traversed the coffee shop circuit trying out new study spots. Pictured above is Mighty Good Coffee’s submission to the competition. This was the only edible entry; the rest were blank stares. Apparently this divine nectar isn’t as wildly popular as I imagined it to be. It’s a shame. Truly.

Cheers to delicious coffee, donuts fresh from the fryer, and family that makes your heart feel whole.

Happy Saturday.