MICK IN THE THICK

Well, happy birthday to my sweetie, who turned the big FOUR-OH this weekend.

We started the celebrations by picking Mick up at school on Friday evening and heading for the Hukilau. That's right, we ate food from his homeland. The servers wore SPAM shirts, and we ate pu pus and ahi ahi, macaroni salad and bbq chicken meat.

Saturday, Mick spent the day in the lab, working on denture stuff. Before he went, though, he had a mini stress-session, articulating those overwhelming feelings that dental school can bring. The major stressors: managing his patient load, preparing labwork with limited hours in the lab, scheduling appointments, and, all the while, fitting in time to study for Fall Boards. Can't you just feel the stomach knots? And it doesn't help that he wants to play at the beach with us or just lay around on the couch for a spell.

Sunday he got to lay around on the couch for a spell; he also had the option to sleep in all morning/afternoon, but the rascal surprised and was up by 9! I was prepared to take the kids out of the house for the morning and to come back when he called. He was up and ready to roll, though, so we had a fun, full morning. We ate breakfast at the Bayside just a few blocks away (but we'd never been!), took a walk along the houseboats dock, bought bike tubes and tires for my bike at Mike's Bikes, and bought homemade ice cream fixin's for him to use in his BRAND NEW ICE CREAM BALL!

I think we OD'd on ice cream this weekend, but here are the 3 delicious flavors we made:
*coconut
*ginger
*cookies-n-cream
(Grandad, you can imagine the amount of crushed ice, rock salt, and shaking that required, can't you?)

Monday, Mick spent the day with 580 degree wax-ups at the kitchen table, preparing a crown for today. He took a break to play Lego Star Wars with the kids and to take an evening bike ride with us.

The kids just played at home all day, and I took them to the Marin City Blues and Soul Festival at the park next door, featuring the fabulous Booker T. The highlights for the kids were their root beer snow cones and the silky sun umbrellas we bought there (everybody had them -- it was a riot to see all these dainty little sun umbrellas at a blues festival). They worked well in that hot sun, though.

So, anyways, Happy Birthday, Mick. Dental school's supposed to be this busy and nerve-wracking. You're almost there. For the short term, think about wakeboarding during your next break -- at the end of September. For the long term, think about practicing dentistry in a new town with your happy family. xo