Cleaning to Avoid

These past few days when I have been at my house in Azusa, I have had the urge to just clean and organize. I am rarely home during the day and this past week I have been off from clinical. Meaning that instead of going to South Hills from 2 to whenever and then going straight to work or the library I have been at home.

And when you are around a mess for so long, it gets to you. And you can't help but clean and organize and scrub and drain-o that drain that is shared by three ladies with long hair.

I was telling my mom this when I went home for thanksgiving and she offered to let me organize her sewing room. I declined and the conversation went on. We talked about school, homework, roommates, friends, gifts, church and then grad school. I told her I was avoiding hitting submit. And then she said "Oh so that's why you are cleaning."

Bingo. I didn't even realize I was doing it. I mean, don't get me wrong, out house was messy but not as messy as I am probably making it seem. It was just something that I was doing to avoid that stupid admission essay.

But I finally finished it this morning. And we'll see what happens. Maybe nothing. And I don't even have a back up in line. I just want to go to this one school. I probably shouldn't put all my eggs in one basket, but for now that is what I am doing. I am looking at other options. But I'm not as excited at any of those.

Maybe it will just be a year off next year. And I'm just going to have to be ok with that.

Or maybe I'll get it.

Time will tell.

Big Sky Country

AKA Montana.

This past weekend I had the opportunity to go to Montana with APU football for the first round of playoffs. Chrissy, the Grad Assistant was in a wedding and couldn't make it. Glory, the head football AT, usually travels with her and two students. So he asked me to go and because we took a charter flight, another student got to go, too. It was one big happy family.

Here is a photo blog of the whole experience.

At the airport. Airports always make me go insane. Before we were able to board we had to tell them how much we weighed so that they could spread it out evenly, or something like that. Apparently last time APU took a charter flight, the plane wouldn't take off because there were too many heavy people concentrated in the front.

This is Glory and Duke. Pat Duke is the team physician. Duke is probably the most ridiculous individual in the world. He is so smart and so crass and yet so generous. He gives up his time to go to all the games with the team just so that we always have a team doc with us. And he always takes Glory and all the athletic training students out to eat. This time he took us to a very nice steak dinner.

This was our first view of Montana.

While we waited for our luggage we had a nice little photo shoot outside the airport. It was snowing. And our lack of layers made it really cold.

This was the view out our hotel window on the day of the game. We woke up to a nice blanket of this.

Here we are all bundled up, ready for the game. We also put on a huge outer layer of a jacket. But we knew that for treatment and taping we would get sweaty if we had everything on.

This was the entire game weather. Ashley and I were on first aid. Meaning our main job was to give the players cups of chicken broth. And use the chicken broth to melt the ice that closed up the water bottles. Other things we had the players do was put skin lube on their faces, put plastic bags on their feet in between sock layers, and hand and feet warmers. The table with the water had icicles hanging off the edges. The final weather report was that it was 5 degrees and -9 degrees with the wind chill.

This is us after the game. Our cheeks were so red. I'm just glad we came back with all our extremities.

At the airport ready to go home. Of course we had a photoshoot. This was one of my favorites. Too bad seats are crooked when we try to do a timer shot.

Ashley and I with some of the players. Still at the airport waiting to board.

This is our excited face that we got to wait on the plane for an hour and a half before it took off. Something about the weather and it being cold. It was just great. P.S. We weren't that excited. At all. (also this is Nick. Last year, he went down in the first home game and was unable to play the rest of the season. He took a medical redshirt and came back this year to play. When he went down, it was also my first time going out on the field to an injured player. We're kinda like best friends because of it. Ok. Not really.)

And that was the trip. APU lost but they played so well for most of them being Southern California boys with no concept of playing football in the snow. The final score was 35-21 and the last two touch downs Carroll scored were in the last 5 minutes. It was like we couldn't hold them anymore because we were so numb and probably so ready to get out of the snow.

brrrrr.

Current Montana Weather

High 22 degree

Low 2 degree.

Tomorrow (game day)

High 11 degree

Low -2 degree

NBD.

At least it'll be pretty.

Last League Game

Last night was the last league game for South Hills. If they won then there would have been a chance at playoffs. Meaning that they would play next week and get pummeled by a team like Centennial.

They played probably the best game ever and they lost in overtime. It was one of the most heartbreaking things. First the other team scored and then we scored and then we scored again. So its 14-7 going into the second half. We score again and make it 21-7. And then they get a touch down. And then they get another one. So its tied. We answer back with a touch down. And in the last two minutes so do they. So its ties 28-28 and we go into over time.

For high school the overtime rule is that both teams get four downs at the 35 yard line (it might be 25 or 40. semantics..) Any way, we go first and all we can get is a field goal. And when the other team goes they get a touch down. It was like a punch in the stomach when they got the touchdown.

The boys played so great though. So proud of them.
This is when someone went down. They all took a knee. So precious.

Manning first aid with two of the girls from Darrick's Athletic Training class.

Here's Lyndsay stretching out a cramp. It was insane. In the last quarter about four guys started getting cramps.

Yep. I'm going to miss Friday night lights.

I don't think its hit me that the season is over for the high school. I think it was easier at the end of APU football then it is at the end of this football. Its probably because I still see the APU guys ALL the time. But I probably won't see the high schoolers that much anymore. I'll still be going to south hills for the next few weeks but it just won't be the same.

Second largest city.

It doesn't look so big from way back here. (Bottom right on the horizon)

I went on a hike by myself yesterday. I needed to clear my head and just get away. (Of course I took my camera.) These past two weeks have been hard. This semester has been hard. It's time I finally admit this to myself. At church today, I realize that it is exactly six months until my graduation date. I'm freaking out.

Time to get back to work and cease my dilly dallying.

Lyndsay Dean

Soon to be Mrs. Lyndsay Trefzger. She is my co-hort at South Hills and has the absolute biggest heart. She's going to do great things in the world.