Monday, August 3, 2009

The Excitement is Building.

Two weeks from today I will leave my house on the beach (my summer home as I have enjoyed calling it) to go to North Carolina so I can spend a few days with my parents and see Grandma before my voyage. A lot has been going on in the past few weeks so let me give you the update.

I had a chance to actually meet my supervisor Byron for our 1:1 meeting back in early July. He was ‘meeting’ with most of the staff over the phone as we are scattered across the country but as he is just an hour inland I thought I would make the trip to meet him. As expected from my initial conversation with him during my interview and our exchanges via e-mail our lunch meeting was a great time. We talked some business and I shared with him my thoughts and goals for my position. He told me more about his experience on the ship and a few of his highlights along his journey. As if I was not excited enough our meeting got me even more energized and eager for the adventure. On the hour drive back to the Westside (fortunately avoiding the traffic from the Michael Jackson memorial that occurred the same day) my mind was spinning with excitement and ideas for what the journey would be like.

In other news, I finally finished all of my inoculations. I went to the Playa Vista Urgent Care Center last week and it was thankfully less eventful than the interaction with the staff at the farmers market. I told the guy at the desk that I needed the MMR booster, polio and yellow fever shots for travel. They asked me where I was going. ‘Seriously’ I thought to myself, having imagined that this process would be quick, as I knew just what I needed. ‘I’m going all over the place, but I specifically need yellow fever for Ghana.’ The physician’s assistant seemed to be ok with that. Being the only person there I didn’t have to wait too long before I was taken back into an exam room where I spoke to the doctor for a very brief moment about my travels. Moments later the assistant again came in and told me that the doctor wanted a full list of places that I would be going. Now having gotten pretty good at running through the list and being a little annoyed I gave him the list pretty quickly. (I do have to admit, being unemployed since the end of May I have plenty of time on my hands but I still I was annoyed as if I had ‘better things to do’ or ‘had someplace to go’ of which I had neither). He looked up from his note pad like a deer in headlights, ‘victory’ I thought to myself.

“What is Mauritius?” He asked.

“It’s an island of Madagascar, but I don’t need any shots for that area”

He walked out and sat down at a computer behind a desk and asked another staff member, “He is literally going around the world. Where is Mauritius? I don’t know how to spell it, I had to sound it out”

He later popped his in again with a big grin and said, “I found Mauritius!”

The doctor came in again and I told him more about the program and he, not so surprisingly asked if I was a student. When I told him that I was a staff member he seemed rather impressed, rightfully so. Nearly an hour after my arrival I finally got my shots and soon after went on my way to sit in my summer home and do nothing but watch TV. It’s a hard life.

1 comment:

  1. "When I told him that I was a staff member he seemed rather impressed, rightfully so."

    HA HA! Your travel plans are exceeded only by your modesty!

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