Settling Into A Routine

Monday, February 2, 2009

Mark had his first day of orientation at Tauranga Hospital today. It'd be a 5 minute drive with no traffic, but at rush hour it takes 10. The day was pretty similar to other hospital orientations...meeting with IT people, infection control people, touring the hospital and ED, etc... Unfortunately, it lasted until 4pm, so he just missed watching the Super Bowl. The other docs in his orientation group consisted of a Medical Registrar (roughly equivalent to a fellow) from Sri Lanka, and Consultants (like attending physicians) in Cardiology, Pediatrics, and Neurology from South Africa, Germany, and South Africa, respectively. About half the docs in the hospital are foreign. Everyone was very nice, but sorting through the various accents is getting to be a challenge. The hospital cafeteria was small, but with tasty food. Mark found it amusing that the corned beef sandwich he had was labeled a "Healthy Choice."

Sherry and Ronan took the 8-block walk to Memorial Park after seeing Mark off to work, where Ro amused himself on the jungle gym, swimming in the fountain, chasing seagulls, and climbing trees. After his nap, he swam in the pool and played on the trampoline with the innkeepers' kids. There were 4 kids on the thing, playing a sort of game where they rolled a ball around and jumped around, trying not to let the ball hit them. Ro fell off twice, and fortunately didn't break anything. No net, remember? Luke (5) bragged that he'd broken both of his arms on the trampoline, yet there he was, bouncing on it again. Sherry's not sure if American parents are overprotective, or Kiwi parents are too casual, but we definitely think this year will toughen the little guy up.

Ro's favorite deathtr...er, trampoline

Sherry drove here for the first time today, as we made a run to the mall to pick up a few essentials. She's become a fan of making extra left turns to avoid turning right during rush hour. Although she got the driving on the left thing down pretty good, and avoided turning on the wipers when she wants to signal a turn like Mark seems to do, she wasn't used to the car and forgot to put it in park when we stopped, and later tried to drive without starting the engine.