You Think You Know a Person . . .

Alright folks, it's time to reveal our deep, dark secret. Where exactly HAVE Jesse and Caitlin been spiriting off to the past few Thursday nights? What DOES that leather pouch clutched in Jesse's enthusiastic fist contain? Just HOW BIG of dorks are we?

Well, you probably already knew the answer to that last one, but as for the others . . .

Deep, dark confession here . . . .

Jesse and I have joined . . . a weekly D&D group. Now, wait!! For those of you with especially dirty minds (Lois!) D&D stands for Dungeons and Dragons - aka juuuuuuuust about the nerdiest past time that furtively pimpled, creative prepubescent minds could come up with. (Except for dressing as wizards and sword-playing with sticks in the front yard - which we are now that much closer to doing at some point, I'm not going to lie.) Oh, and our group is made up of college professors, work place professionals, food activists, public education teachers, and graduate students.

There! It is finally out! Phew! No more hiding in the shadows - I have been playing as a giant air-being named Kronos, who has a big spiked-chain-on-a-stick that he whirls around and kills werewolves with. Jesse is an elven tracker (think Legolas!) who's race is suffering from a mysterios Elf disease called 'the Gloaming'. We travel with a motley band consisting of a druid, a drunken monk, and a human - going on quests, rescuing kidnapped cousins . . . whoo hoo!

Now, I should attempt to clear something up here for those who are as clueless about D&D as I was only a few short weeks ago. Basically, you and the DM (Dungeon Master!) come up with a character that fits within the 'world' that the DM has created/thought up/etc. The character has back history (family, homeland, a certain race), characteristics depending on their race or orientation (bravery, fighting skills, sneakiness, healing powers), and their own agenda that the rest of the characters may or may not be aware of. Once the character is thought up, the group is given a 'quest' by the DM and the members of the group basically start telling a story, describing how their characters would proceed through the quest. Periodically, the DM says, "nope, that character wouldn't do that" or "suddenly a landslide buries Kronos!" and then inevitably the characters would work together with their different abilities to dig out Kronos, see through dirt, call up a windstorm to clear the dirt, heal Kronos with potions, something like that. It's fun because everyone takes a turn to tell part of the story - and the Thursday night group in general is pretty goofy so we have a good time.

So, there! Our secret is out. On Thursday nights we go to our friend Paul's house (met him and his husband through the CSA, also a board member of Syracuse chapter of Slow Food) and Jesse brings his leather pouch of special D&D dice. As I have been informed, it is NOT kosher to roll another man's die. I have not yet made the final step of purchasing my own multifaceted tumbling harbingers of chance, but I'm guessing it will be any day now . . . .

PS: The pictures are from our 2nd Anniversary weekend!

I am Looking Out the Window AND . . .

I SEE SNOW! Yes, that's right, our first snow fall. I have no idea if it's sticking around for long, but it is nice that it has happened on a Friday (no classes for me!) so I can mosey throughout the house with my cup of coffee, snug as a bug in a rug! I know as a Syracusian we are in for more than our fair share of the stuff, but I can't help still getting excited at the first snow . . .

So! Our night in Philly! It was combo surprise birthday party for Jill's bud Julia and our dear friend Tom (Jilly's hubs). Julia loves surprises and Tom hates them, so it kinda worked out well for both - Julia got to be surprised, and - once Tom realized that, no, he WAS NOT supposed to recognize everyone there - Tom was able to quickly shirk the spotlight and get to visit with us :) Philly is definitely a city we'd love to explore a little more. Jill and Tom live in the Museum District in a small but super cute apartment that--with only 3 months under their belts (and two busy schedules to boot)--they've already made into a home. Meanwhile, Jill is in the throws of grad school, getting her MFA in Directing (yay!!) and Tom has been recently hired as the Technical Director (may have got the EXACT title wrong there, but you get the idea) of Swarthmore College's Theater Department.

After the birthday bash and a night on probably THE most comfortable futon we have ever experienced, we jetted off to a Sunday Funday. No football involved on this Sunday Funday - a baby shower for me and golf with Dad and D for Jess. I've suddenly realized that may have sounded odd - no, I did not attend my OWN clandestine baby shower, which would have been a solo event because pretty much all you folks reading this would be the ones I'd want to be there! Anyway!! It was for cousin Maya! She and Dan are expecting Baby X in early December :) We oohed and ahhed over her impressive belly and played a few baby games (Did you know that the baby name for a Fox is a Kit? An armadillo, a pup? An eagle, an eaglet?!) Though pastels are not my favorite, I've got to admit, the cuteness factor went way off the charts once the bitty baby blankets and onseies started coming out - I've got some great pictures of my sisters scheming for future presents ;)

I GUESS the golf game should get a mention here . . .Jess, Dad, and Damian played in Warwick on THE perfect golf day of the year. They all played horribly and had an amazing time. I don't have pictures of that round, but you can stalk Jesse and Damian on Facebook to see the pictures there.

Oh yeah. Nope, my costumes did not pan out. Ah well - it got to about an hour before we were supposed to show up at a class Halloween shindig when Jesse picked up on my (not so sutble!) aimless wandering through Salvation Army as a cue to come up with some alternate plans. It's my fault for having spent the previous 6 hours on the couch watching an NCIS marathon . . .My husband, however, is brilliant, and he perked me up with the suggestion of a date night - a steak dinner (THAT'S how out of it I was, I haven't craved steak, well, ever) followed by the early evening showing of "Where the Wild Things Are". With some meat in my belly and giant wild fuzzies on the big screen, I was a happy camper. A happy Halloweeny camper :)

First Fellows Fall

I am BACK baby! With Clinic I under my belt, it's actually very nice to be back in the classroom and swapping experiences with my peers. I can't really express how different I felt in terms of confidence from Week 0 to Week 4 to Week 8! I know I've just gotten the tip of the iceberg of learning and knowledge, but at least now I have to tools to climb (descend?) the iceberg! Fort Drum broke me in a bit - and now I'm ready to take on the next year and a half of class/Clinics 2,3,and 4. My classes right now are not too intense, but very interesting: Acquired Conditions (orthotics, prosthetics, and spinal cord injuries) and Teaching. It's pretty amazing to be in these classes right now - I was starting to get a little too used to "higher functioning" patients at Fort Drum (think super active army guys with shin splints). At the first SCI (spinal cord injury) class of this shortened semester, I got a little freaked out talking about patients who didn't have any sensory or motor function below their biceps! Within the space of an hour or so, I remembered why I found physical therapy so exciting in the first place. Many people with spinal cord injuries learn to find THEIR optimal function, they push themselves to challenge their bodies as much as possible in order to participate in their homes and communities to the best of their abilities - how many of us do that on any given day? And in a couple years, I will be able to facilitate that process :) I TOLD you it was exciting!

So, yes! I am home! On the house front, we have two adorable new trees! They are itty bitty now (a crabapple and a maple) but as long as they survive this first winter, they should be good to go. We even had a little help from our friends to plant them :) It was lovely to commemorate putting down "roots" (awwwwwww we are ridiculous) with Damien (and Mustard!), Lauren, and Dan. The tree-planting was about as ambitious as we got all weekend - we spent the rest playing Beatles Rock Band! Finally some songs I knew the words to . . . .

On a mushy romantic note, Jess and I celebrated our 2-year anniversary a couple weeks ago :) As most of you know, our anniversary is October 13th, but since on the morning of the 13th I was driving BACK up to Fort Drum for my last week of Clinic 1, we decided to post-pone the festivities til the weekend. We spent Saturday night at one of our favorite B&B's in Spencer, NY: Slice of Home owned by Bea and Sterling. The morning spread is generous and home-cooked, the owners relaxed and knowledgeable, and the view from the outdoor hottub ("suits optional" as Sterling always says!) of Finger Lake hills fringing an open field is one of our favorites. A bit of wine tasting and a hike (a new anniversary tradition, 2 years running!) through Treman Park near Ithaca and we were happy campers.

Stay tuned soon for our weekend in Philly and my first ever baby shower. Plus, we'll see if I pull off the Halloween costumes for tomorrow - I always have lofty ambitions that rarely pan out :)

3 Weeks To Go

This Clinic I is flying by - I have less than 3 weeks left - how did that happen? It's hard to keep everyone up to date on how things are going. I feel like I internalize a lot - it's hard to tell day to day exactly what I'm absorbing, how it will shape my future PT practice, what lessons I'll have taken from this experience on an army post . . . We have the same schedule each week, but every day I'm honing my skills, picking up on the nuances of things that I thought I had 'down cold' - I can feel my confidence in my ability to communicate my knowledge and ideas to patients growing! That is a nice feeling - I insert my foot into my mouth only on special occasions now ;)

On the home front, Jess and I are continuing to make things homey at The House at Fellows. We are gelling nicely with our new tenant, Gemma. She's a grad student at SU's arts journalism program and she's gone berry picking with us and doesn't mind Jesse howling Grateful Dead at the top of his lungs :)

We have also gone on a bit of a rug binge - an EBAY rug binge - an ebay persian rug binge! We've put some down in the high-traffic areas of the house. I'll post some pictures here for you to take a look - they really make the rooms feel cozy (I feel like I say that with every new addition to the house, but it's true!).

Speaking of berry picking (a paragraph or two ago!) we went a little nuts with the berries - somewhere to the tune of about 50ish pounds of blueberries, red raspberries, and blackberries . . yes, we are indeed insane.

Knees and Ankles and Shoulders - Oh My!

I feel like I'm swimming in a sea of body parts! Gross as that sounds, I've definitely started dreaming in "PT" - which I think is a good thing ? At least it shows that my brain is working subconsciously as well to try and absorb as much as I can - though I've been dreaming about Buffy the Vampire Slayer too . . . hmm . . .

So, these past two weeks? Strikes and gutters, strikes and gutters, my friends :) Within the span of a single morning I can be on top of the world, humming along with a patient eval where I feel confident, proficient, a true PT-in-training! A few minutes later, I feel like a dunce, worse than a novice, slow, etc etc. There is SO much to learn, the brain wheels are turning non-stop trying to differentiate the essential bits from a patient history, a constantly flowing, shifting process of elimination type thing. Now that I'm getting a good idea of what I know that I DON'T know, I (kinda, sorta) wish I could take my first year over again! Ah yes, I should have paid more attention during THAT lecture . . . .

The end of this week will be the halfway mark - can't believe THAT. I've been spending a lot of time in the gym program where more advanced patients do rehab exercises for things like ACL repairs, anterior knee pain, shoulder impingement . . . did more of the foot screening again today as well . . .Today was a bit new in that I also got to spend some time in the 'clinic' seeing what the PT's do for 'post-op' patients. These are patients fresh from surgery the week before (ligament repairs, shoulder surgery, etc) so the tech's/PTA's assess their range of motion, strength, any swelling, how the incision is doing, etc and 'present' the patient to the PT. I got to do a partial eval of a patient actually coming for rehab BEFORE surgery, but next week I'll be spending the day seeing more of what the techs do and how the PT acts while on the receiving end of the post-op information. Again, a lot of winnowing of information to find the really important stuff pertinent to that acute stage. I'm a little nervous to be working with patients who will be so fresh from surgery (think pain, swelling, stitches!) but it will be a good experience - that's my middle name, didn't you know? Caitlin Experience Steeves.

Oi. Love to you all!
Caitlin

2 Weeks On-Post

In this context, I mean "post" as in - Fort Drum is a military post. Apparently, only the Air Force and the Navy have "bases"! And here, PT means Physical Training - it's the running, push-ups, and sit-ups all the soldiers have to do. So it's important not to confuse physical therapy PT with Physical Training PT - so much to learn!

My first two weeks of my first clinical experience have been illuminating. It's a challenge to take a year's-worth of academic information and immediately be able to apply it in a live, fast-paced physical therapy setting - I should say settings(s) because they've got me driving back and forth on post to get between the gym, the outpatient clinic, and medical in-processing! My CI is very kind and patient, but I've still spent a lot of my time there so far trying to not sound and feel like a dunce ("oh my god, what is the name for the head of the femur? what is the name for the head of the femur??!! oh . . . it's 'the head of the femur' . . ." - that was the 'sour patch kids day'). I think I just have to remember that my priority should be to focus on LEARNING, not being right - as funny as that many sound :)

The family I'm living with is very nice - and very large! I share an upstairs bathroom with three boys under the age of 13 - use your imaginations . . . . In addition to the 5 kids, mom, and dad, and myself, there are also 2 dogs, a cat, a turtle, several fish, and a large snake. ! I must admit, the only thing I was not prepared for was walking downstairs the morning after I'd first arrived and being greeted by one of the twin boys (as if by destiny) "We don't drink coffee here because we're Mormon!" It wasn't the Mormon part that took me aback, it was the lack of coffee!! One major withdrawal headache later, and I was headed to Walmart to pick up a box of single-serve instant - kinda more like coffee-flavored weak tea but it would do in a pinch!

Fort Drum is a unique setting in which to be learning. The physical therapists mostly do evaluations and re-evaluations - not much actual rehab with the patients - the PTA's and techs do that. So I'll be getting REALLY good at evaluating patients - plus I do get to see some rehab when we go to the morning gym program, which is for patients more advanced in their rehab. Soldiers in rehab can be transferred to another post, go on leave, or be deployed in the middle of their treatment - it's a challenge to maintain continuity of care. Another interesting twist is that we are working with a population of - for the most part - healthy and VERY active patients. Here, the soldiers get a full medical examination AT LEAST before and after they deploy(ie usually twice a year). The majority are under age 30, so there is little diabetes, hypertension, or cancer. At the same time, a lot of soldiers return from deployment with TBI's or traumatic brain injuries - these injuries, whether mild, moderate, or severe, can have a range of effects from physical performance to mood to learning abilities. The environment is fast-paced and the PT's have a lot of experience, so during their examination of a patient, they are able to modify, skip, and mentally note bits and pieces on the spot - it takes me much longer and I need to learn the 'rules' of examination before I can be so expertly altering them! As a student, that is to be expected, and my CI knows that, which is nice! Though we go pretty quickly, he encourages me to be thorough and to ask lots of questions.

One of the interesting things we do is a foot screen of every soldier who goes through medical in-processing when they first come on-post. These could be soldiers back from their 3rd deployment to Afghanistan or fresh from Basic Training - but, they all . . . run! So the physical therapy department has them take off their boots, take a quick look at their arches and foot alignment, and walk/run across a force plate. The force plate lets us take a computerized image of their foot movement during weight-bearing activities like walking and running. We can see if they are able to maintain their arch or if they flatten out! Based on what we see in that quick little assessment, we recommend different types of running shoes and refer them to set up a physical therapy eval if they are having any issues. We can get through 20 or so soldiers in one morning - I'm learning alot about feet!

I'll try to keep y'all up to date on my time at Fort Drum. I'm pretty busy (studying a bit almost every night!) and I do have to be careful about revealing identifying patient information - so I'll be tweaking what I say :) Will probably be posting on the weekends when I've got time to collect my thoughts and reflect.

Love love love
Caitlin

ps - sorry for the lack of pictures - Miss Nally is sending my camera soon! *hint hint* ;)

Hosta Queens

This was a week of 'finishing touches' for The House at Fellows. Up til now, we've been kinda 'Big Picture' people when it came to tackling this house's To-Do list (repair the walls, repair the eaves, dehumidify the basement, get the furniture in - especially our bookshelves - throw up some paint) - but it's amazing how taking care of some of the details can start to pull it all together.

The dining room is probably now the closest to being COMPLETELY done. We've got a beautiful ceiling fan up, curtains that are beautiful AND functional, and light sconces up on the walls. Everything in there has a rich, textured feel to it now - just what we were looking for in the space where we'd be entertaining!

The kitchen got a nice mini-makeover as well. We opened up A LOT of space by installing a permanent dishwasher and moving the oven (with a lovely new hood! Now when I burn the sausage all the smoke can go outside instead of us having to open windows all over the house!) over as well. We ended up losing a lot of cabinet space for our pots and pans, but Jesse is reorganizing things and we'll probably put some kind of pot rack up on the ceiling as well to keep things accessible. Pictures of the kitchen will follow just as soon as I get my camera back in the mail - left it up in Maine! Nal's is sending it through the mail (in TONS of bubble-wrap, right??!!) - thank you!!!!

Probably one of the most transformative projects we tackled this week was the front yard - Jesse and Stevo built us some raised beds - three tiers! Momma Margaret and Stevo had brought up a truck-load of day lillies and hostas and even a lilac bush (!) so we were able to get those guys into our newly constructed beds. I must admit, though I've always loved the idea of raised beds, I was having trouble seeing Jesse's vision for the front yard - and it came out beautifully! An immense amount of work went into hauling/shoveling/spreading the dirt needed for those beds - not to mention then nailing them all together like link 'n logs! Multiple tools plus some lengths of rebar did the trick :) So basically we've got this tiered system of beds, plus a couple of wavy ground beds on each side of the house to keep things asymmetrical. Definitely a fun WORK IN PROGRESS. (**We are always willing to accept any extra pesky perrenials clogging up your yard**) We've already had one of our green-thumb neighbors stop by with his van to drop off some asters, a flax, and a rose of sharon (my secret favorite mysterious plant that is all over Syracuse that I've been trying to identify!) - thank you Kevin! We do depend upon the kindness of strangers . . . and neighbors! ;)

Well, that's all I'm going to post for now. I'm starting Clinic I tomorrow and can't wait to share it with you all!

Lotsa love
Caitlin

Mid Week Report

Hey all - reporting to you live from sunny Syracuse (um, did I say sunny? I meant sticky, stagnant, simmering, scalding Syracuse!). Yes, we are back from living it up on Frye Island in Maine with the fam - we believe we've officially turned Lois into a Catan addict (and she agrees - Seafarers is da bomb). This week we are hosting Margaret and Stevo and . . . Mocha! Or Mochalicious as I like to call her. She's a four month old chocolate lab with honey colored eyes and big, big paws. She loves her treats and just being near people :)

Our projects this week are quite ambitious! Margaret and I have already put up curtains in the living room, dining room, and kitchen. They were all cheap, cheap but very lovely. I think we surprised ourselves a bit with how well everything came together! The curtains give the rooms that (next to) last polished touch - and a bit of privacy. I say "next to last" because we DO still have a couple light fixtures to put up in the dining room and some 3-prong outlets to place throughout . . . but we do finally have a ceiling light/fan up in the dining room! It looks fabulous AND was a blessing at dinner last night as one of the few rooms with circulating air! (Our bedroom, however, DOES have A/C but we'll keep that on the DL for now . . . )

We've got cabinets being sawed off, dishwashers slid in, ovens being shoved over, holes blasted through brick, oh my! Hostas and (black-eyed) Susans and Lilacs, oh my! The boys even got in 18 holes yesterday morning, on the very beautiful, very hilly Green Lakes course.

Additional grand plans for the week? I'll be doing a bit of studying each day this week (leaving for 8 weeks at Fort Drum this Saturday!), but we've got a whole day planned out for the Ithaca/Finger Lakes area tomorrow, Dinosaur BBQ at some point (really, we never need an excuse to go there), hopefully a day of sculpting some flower beds/grading away from the house so the weather stops ending up pooling on the floor of our oddly-tiled basement!

All in all, we are having a lovely time working and playing (and blogging). Love to you all!

Vote for Mocha!!!

Ok folks - meet Mocha, the lovey-dove googly-legged chocolate lab from Barnegat, NJ! Vote for her in the Cutest Dog Contest and Mocha could win a million clams! Bones! It could go towards replacing the 'puppy-proof' leashes she's been chewing through . . . Make Margaret and Stevo proud and vote once per day - you'll be glad you did!

Mocha will give you kisses. That's right, she's not above bribery.

Who could resist kisses from a face like this?

Week in Jersey

We were so glad to get to see so many folks on our trip down to Jersey - mostly thanks to Miss Nally's Graduation party, but we'll get to that in a minute . . .

Our vacation week started off with an overnight stop to Lauren and Dan's house in Nyack - we are so lucky that they are not sick of us yet, popping in whenever we head South (isn't EVERYTHING South of Syracuse??). We had a lovely dinner of salmon and asparaguy before preparing for the evenings main event . . .CATAN! No wait! Not just plain old CATAN - but Catan SEAFARERS!!! Yes, you know you have reached an entirely new level of dorkdom when you start searching out and playing the boardgame equivalent of a spin-off tv series . . . however, playing Catan ONLINE, I would say, is even dorkier (ahem, LAUREN!).

Seafarers is, by the way, WAY cooler than regular old Catan. You get ships and gold and . . .and . . .ok, I'll stop now . . .

We were glad to get to see them off before they headed out to Comicon 09 in San Diego, CA. Dan is a die-hard fan of all things comic/graphic/pop culture related and Lauren wanted a picture with Pacey from Dawson's Creek (he's now on a scifi-like show called Fringe). It sounds like they had an awesome time - can't wait to see pictures, you guys!

Next we headed to good old Jutland, NJ to help get ready for Miss Nally's Graduation/Birthday party. Dad's Bday was on the 17th so after spending the day cleaning (and watching the neighbor boys haul weeds and mulch around the yard) we had a quiet dinner - Miss Tiz was there too from the City - and made Dad open his present - the complete series of West Wing! I'm not gonna lie, we were just as excited for it as Dad (and we spent a lot of the following week burning through the first 2 seasons!).

Nally's party was wonderful in that it brought together so many people! We had the cousins Margaret and David (plus Margaret's leading man Greg AND Greg's brother Matt!) plus family from both sides, PLUS Margaret and Stevo (and their chocolate lab puppy Mocha!!) up from South Jersey, plus some of Nally's friends we hadn't seen in a while, the 4th Steeves child: Patrick, Jilly and Tom, AND loads of church/neighborhood friends we hadn't seen since our wedding - the VanArsdales, Mrs. Carvatt, George and Judy, Aunt Sandy, the Pellis's - forgive me if I'm forgetting anyone right now, but it was so great to get to catch up a bit.

And our adventure continues! The next day we headed into the City for Jesse's uncle Scott's 60th Birthday brunch (devout readers may remember we had attended Scott and Beth's wedding in the City back in February!) - and got to see Jed and Laurie as well! The brunch was lovely - it turned out Beth had made all the food that looked so good I had thought it was catered - and we were all briefly glued to the tv, watching Watson lose steam on the 72nd hole of the British Open. A lot of grown men were near tears following his loss - so we took Jed and Laurie on a brief jaunt through Central Park! Near the fountain, I know Jed got some great pictures/footage of Thoth - the ponytail-wearing, bell-clad, surprisingly buff man who frequents the park with his violin and his unique vocalizations! I've seen him before - he had a pink fairy-costumed friend with him this time! (Laurie and I got a semi-scandalous peek at how TRULY buff Thoth is when we passed by a second time to discover he had stripped down to nothing but a gold-lame [pronounced la-may] loin cloth - plus the bells, of course.) Our sojourn with Laurie was brief - she had to hop on a plane that afternoon - but we hope to make our way out to Chicago in the not-too-distant future for a proper visit :)

We were able to have an extended visit with Jed when we all trooped over to Jesse's Dad's house in Saddle Brook. Pops was feeling a little under the weather so we kept it an easy night with pizza, wine, and Balderdash!

This has turned into a monster of a post - I think I'll leave you all in suspense! What DID happen to our fearless travelers at the Russian Banya? Who saw Harry Potter, finally? Exactly how many consecutive hours of West Wing CAN you watch before permanently being molded into the couch?

All this - AND MORE - will be revealed, next time on: Week in Jersey, Part Deux!


luv luv
caitlin and jesse

Wally Turns . . . 100,000!!!!

Yes, we love our car, Wally - enough to name him Wally, and enough to document for posterity his 100,000th mile anniversary.

Yes, we are dorks. But you love us.






Dork-lovers!!

Ahem. Here it is.

Indoor painting done!

After 6 days, we're done with the living room! We convinced ourselves that we've gotten more efficient at the process, but it still took us almost a week to finish a room. Given, we had to repair some walls, and it was a big room -- we finished the trim last night at midnight - so much of it! By 11pm we were so delirious we began questioning our color decisions.

The kitchen and dining room are so bright with fresh colors, we were getting worried that the neutral tone of the off-white and the dark of the chocolate brown were going to be downers. Cait had chosen a lime green as an accent that we didn't add until this morning. That final burst of brightness saves the room from the complete lack of color.

Our basement got a minor facelift too this week. All five of the windows were replaced with glass block windows. The basement is enormously less creepy then it was a few months ago. Light pours through all day long and when you're down there the blocks look like shimmering ice cubes. So much more enjoyable then the rotting wood, rusty metal, grody glass we had before.

So - a bunch of pictures to enjoy!