Pete's Pearls

I think people are starting to realize...

2009-07-23T11:21:00.000-07:00

...this guy doesn't know anything about medicine...maybe you are allergic to the blue pill...maybe even though the end result is similar the blue pill is a first generation pill with different pharmacokinetics...maybe it still has all kinds of anti-cholinergic side effects and will make you feel like crap although, yes, it will still treat that pesky reflux...I love that he stands up there and pretends to know what he is talking about. And don't even get me started on his tonsillectomy vs. allergies crap...what a retard...

This link explains really well why someone with no medical training whatsoever shouldn't be allowed to dictate what we as physicians do...

When you only have a hammer....

2009-06-27T10:37:00.000-07:00

...everything looks like a nail.

Obama is about to make me grab my ankles yet again...

2009-06-18T09:19:00.000-07:00

This might be a little better than this:

Em's First Primary Talk

2009-05-11T01:19:00.001-07:00

This Sunday Em gave her first talk in Primary. It was pretty cute. We were quite proud of her!

Leavin' the Lou

2009-05-11T01:06:00.000-07:00

So we have been trying to take in all the STL sites one last time before we head up to Cincy. Me and Em went and caught a Cards game. We took the metro down to the stadium and had a great time. Busch is an amazing place and we really enjoyed the awesome spring weather. We also went to the temple over the weekend for a primary party. Again, the spring weather in STL is amazing. Here are a few pictures. I will post a bit more after graduation and the big move.

Adulthood officialy begins....the first real job :(

2009-04-11T08:50:00.000-07:00

Wanna laugh at our president?

2009-03-29T21:05:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. It was all fun and games to make fun of G.W., but for some reason we can't laugh at the clown currently occupying the oval office. Well, I couldn't resist this link. These are all AUTHENTIC audio clips of old B.O. reading his classic novels. This is for all of you who wanted to hear the man who takes him so seriously say stuff like "Get yo' hand outta my fries! You ain't my b**** n****" or "maybe they're lookin' at that big butt of yours". My favorite would have to be "I drank beer heavily, and tried drugs enthusiastically". HAHAHA!

http://obamasoundoff.com/

Sixty-nine years ago...

2009-03-10T16:19:00.000-07:00

CHUCK NORRIS ALLOWED HIMSELF TO BE BORN...HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHUCK!!!

Who says city council meetings are just full of old farts?

2009-03-10T09:20:00.000-07:00

HERE COMES THE BIG DAY!!!

2009-02-26T13:46:00.000-08:00

New Obama Poster

2009-02-15T19:33:00.001-08:00

FRRRRRRREEEEEEEDDDDDDDOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!

2009-01-26T19:03:00.001-08:00

I am finally free. For those who don't know why I haven't updated this blog in ages, I have been interviewing for jobs and preparing for a big test. Over the last month and a half I interviewed at 15 places in 15 different cities. In addition to that I had to study for and take the second portion of the United States Medical Licensing Exam. It was about as fun as it sounds. But today I took the 9 hour test and for the immediate future I am free as a bird. For those interested, these are the 15 places we are looking at going (in no particular order).

1. Lexington, Kentucky
2. San Antonio, Texas
3. Salt Lake City, Utah
4. Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
5. Portland, Oregon
6. Tampa, Florida
7. Houston, Texas
8. Ann Arbor, Michigan
9. Cincinnati, Ohio
10. Memphis Tennessee
11. Columbia, Missouri
12. St. Louis, Missouri
13. Springfield, Illinois
14. Oakland, California
15. Phoenix, Arizona

Any suggestions? The next step is for us to come up with a rank list. I know what mine would look like, but we will have to see what Heather's list looks like and come up with a "master rank list".

Sugar Bowl

2008-12-31T11:37:00.000-08:00

Guess who will be in Section 114 on January 2nd! Go UTES!

Yes we can.......go to jail

2008-12-17T08:51:00.000-08:00

Found a few sweet mug shots of people who would love to reap the benefits from our increasing taxes...

With Rahm recently revealed to be on the Blago tapes, maybe some of them can share deep political discussion in the clink.

Memphis

2008-12-13T15:39:00.000-08:00

This weekend Heather, Em and I went to Memphis. I had an interview and we had wanted to see the place for a while. We made the drive down and found ourselves at Corky's. This place was voted best BBQ in memphis 9 years in a row. It was phenomenal!!!

Before heading back to the hotel, I had to see where Johnny Cash started it all. Did I mention we listened to the man in black almost the entire trip?

We used the Trolleys a lot to avoid traffic and parking issues. Em thought it was great!

Friday was my interview. It went well and when I came home I found Heather and Em waiting for me in the lobby.

Friday night we went to Huey's whose burgers have been voted best in Memphis for 13 years in a row. The food was great! Also they encourage everybody to write on the wall and shoot their toothpick from their sandwich into the ceiling with their straw.

After dinner we took a carriage ride back to our hotel. Em thought it was pretty neat to see a horse up close.

Saturday morning we rode the trolley down to Beale St. It was kind of fun, but seemed more suited to those who like to get inebriated.

Our last stop in Memphis was at the famous Peabody hotel. Since the 30s there is a family of ducks that live in the penthouse. At 11:00 am each day the ducks come down the elevator into the main lobby, they roll out a red carpet for them and they waddle over to the fountain where they hang out for most of the day. It was kind of fun to watch. They also had a real gingerbread house they had been constructing since September, and a giant Christmas tree.

On our way back to St. Louis we stopped at a place called Lambert's. It is the hoome of the "throwed rolls". They have guys walking around the place and when you raise your hand they will chuck a roll across the room at you. Kinda fun. The portions were gigantic. We ordered the small portions of everything and still were stuffed. Anywhere that brings your coke in a cup like this is OK with me...

The quest for third...

2008-11-26T19:06:00.001-08:00

If I only...

2008-11-11T17:53:00.000-08:00

Here's the latest performance from Em.

Grillz

2008-11-10T18:08:00.000-08:00

Dis what ya do when in da Lou
Ice grill Country Grammar
Where da hustlas move bricks
And da gangsta's bang hamma's

Anderson's Haunted House

2008-11-10T18:05:00.001-08:00

When Heather went out of town during October I took it upon myself to do a little "decorating".

Halloween at the Anderson's

2008-11-02T15:38:00.000-08:00

We had a fun Halloween around these parts. Emily dressed as a princess, Heather as a pregnant person, and me as an evil white trash clown. Halloween night we had friends over for a nice dinner and trick or treating, and then I talked everybody into watching a movie from my horror collection..haha. Keep watching the blog...I am going to upload a video tour of all the Halloween decorations I put up while Heather was out of town...for now though, here are a few pictures.

Em at the Kirkwood Farmer's market sitting in the pumpkin patch.

Em riding a tractor full of hay at the Kirkwood Farmer's Market

Em on top of the hay piles.

Here's the princess all dolled up.

Trick or Treating

The Evil White Trash Clown

Emily the Witch

Our 3 Halloween pumpkins this year...a carved vampire mr. burns, a painted zombie, and a painted demonic clown.

Fall in St. Louis

Happy Halloween

2008-10-15T11:52:00.000-07:00

And finally for the real thing...

THRILLER

A crackhead among the mexicans

2008-09-06T23:09:00.000-07:00

So this weekend we decided to go to the St. Louis Hispanic Festival. The only problem is that there aren't that many hispanics in St. Louis. The festival was held next to this park with a bunch of homeless people/crackheads. As the mexican band started to play, the crackheads wandered out of the park to investigate. There was one in particular who managed to get his hands on a sombrero. He walked right to the front of the stage and proceeded to dance for the whole hour and a half we were there. It was hilarious. Luckily I had a camera and took some sweet video (see below). Also a highlight were the pork tamales, the the homemade XXX salsa, the fruit empanadas and the agua de horchata. Emily loved watching the mexican ladies
dance and twirl their dresses.

The E to the N to the T in the UT

2008-08-15T11:40:00.000-07:00

So we just got back from a two month trip to Utah where I did an away rotation. It was a busy but fun month. We went a couple week before the rotation and stayed late so we would have time to see family and friends. It was great to be home, and that's coming from someone who is usually indifferent to going home. I put in 90+ hours a week at the U when I was on service and it was nice to have family around to take care of us. We made a lot of fun memories. I found the rotation at the U to be intense, but they were a good group to work with and I really learned a lot. Overall I couldn't have asked for a better summer. Here are about a million pictures and videos to follow.

Em and Grandpa Anderson made a stepping stone for the garden

The cousins playing at Aunt Shannon's

Cute cousin Lex

Em making the hike up to Donut Falls

Em made it to the falls

The cousins roasting hot dogs at Mueller Park Canyon

Grandma Rasmussen and her birthday cake

Em with Grandma Rasmussen's birthday cake

Em and Lisa playing outside

Em at the parade on the 24th of July

Em and Lisa sharing a swing at Aunt Shannon's

This is me and Em at the Botanical Gardens

Em and her cute summer dress

Em enjoying the ride in her cousin's toys

A whole lotta cousins at Grandma Rasmussens

Em and Lisa at the table

Em was a bit hesitant to use the tramp at Aunt Shannon's but she got the hang of it

Heather and I went with my dad to see James Taylor in concert. It was a lot of fun.

Oh, here's what I was doing while everybody else was having fun ;)

This dad business is a good gig

2008-06-15T14:53:00.001-07:00

I love foreign films!

2008-06-10T09:43:00.000-07:00

So I watched a few films this week that were so good I thought I would post about them. The first is the city of lost children. It is a really creative sci-fi fantasy film from France. The second was another French filn called Inside. Probably one of the creepiest and most disturbing films I have seen in a loooooong time. Definitely not for the faint of heart. Lastly, I watched [Rec] an indie from Spain. It is a unique take on the zombie genre that mixes in a little bit of catholic corruption. Right up my alley! Below I added a clip of audience reactions from one of the first screenings of [Rec]. Pretty awesome. Lastly I watched Amelie again. I love this movie! I wish we could get some American filmakers that were doing cool stuff like this instead of Rocky, Rambo or Beverly Hills Cop remakes.

Graduation Pics

2008-06-07T15:05:00.000-07:00

This week we had our 4th year convocation and they took our graduation pictures before we all spread out for fourth year. Speaking of spreading out, we will be in Utah for almost two months starting at the end of this month. We are excited to see everybody!

Another doozy

2008-06-04T09:45:00.001-07:00

One thing that I love...

2008-06-02T20:30:00.000-07:00

I love it when really good bands get back together after a long time and they don't suck...

2008-05-11T17:40:00.000-07:00

So I took my last shelf exam of the year and it feels great to be done. I have 6 weeks of electives and then I will be a fourth year. YES! I am really excited because I have 3 weeks of ENT and then 3 weeks of ENT research. It should be fun. Today I got my needle driver out and practiced tying sutures on a banana. What fun...It was a nice Mother's day. I had the weekend off so me and Em spent Saturday morning running errands for mothers day. We got a bouquet of roses and the new Stephanie Meyer book. Tonight I made a fancy dinner and are watching the season finale of Survivor. Pretty decent. When you work 6 days a week you forget how fantastic it is to have Saturday and Sunday off.
On a wierder note I saw one of the craziest things of third year when I was on OB. We were working late at night and a lady came in with her boyfriend. They were both high as kites. I think they had been doing meth. They were from some town in western podunk missouri. Apparently they were driving in the middle of nowhere doing meth and she all of a sudden went into labor and delivered the baby. They tried to call an ambulance, but apparently there was no abulance service in that area. So what do they do? They drive to a Walgreens, buy scissors and cut the cord, buy some diapers for the kid, and a bucket...why a bucket you ask? to put the placenta in. So they show up to the L&D floor with a slimy baby wrapped in a huge diaper and a bucket with a placenta that is eight hours old and stinky. Oh yea, and they are buggin' out because they are on meth. Fortunately the kiddo was put up for adoption. Hopefully nurture wins out over nature. Yikes!!! Here is a picture of a placenta just to cement the story in your heads...

OB/GYN

2008-04-07T18:45:00.000-07:00

So I am in my second week on the OB rotation. I have seen some really cool things and some really disturbing things. I got to deliver my first baby on Sunday morning. I also got to scrub into a C-section. That was wild. It was an emergency section. The baby's heart rate slowed down and we had to rush into the OR. Within five minutes we had taken a ten and a half pound monster baby out. It was crazy. The attending let me sew the mom back up by myself. It was pretty sweet. As for the not so fun stuff....let's just say I have smelled and seen some very unclean things. Yuck. Also, It is never fun to see a 8 1/2 months pregnant 14 year old girl with her 17 year old "baby daddy". Also I don't know if I could ever do this for a living. It just feels uncomfortable/unnatural to check a cervix. I will leave you with a few pictures that sum up this last week and a half...

2008-03-21T13:01:00.001-07:00

Heather's dad Dennis passed away this week. I am really sad to see him go but count myself extremely lucky to have known him. He had many afflictions but you never would have known it. I never once heard him complain. He always made sure that I knew he was proud of me and that meant so much to me. I never felt like an in-law in the house. He had an great sense of humor and was the one guy in the house who I could get to laugh at a rowdy joke. He was such a good father to Heather and his other kids and I really admired that about him. I hope that when Emily gets older she feels the same way about me and Heather as we feel about Dennis. I am really going to miss him. It just wasn't the same yesterday when I came in the house and there wasn't a chilled cream soda waiting for me...

Saturday night in the Lou

2008-03-08T19:01:00.001-08:00

So tonight we decided to do what any ghetto Saint Louis folk would do. We started off the evening right heading to "da mall". After mixin' and minglin' with the baby mamas and strait thuggins we went to the classy establishment of Walmart to purchase diet coke. Then we finished the night right with a classy meal at the White Castle. I think we have been here too long...

Leaving the VA

2008-02-29T17:33:00.000-08:00

So today was my last day at the VA. It has been a rough month. I thought I would post a few of the things that got me through it, just in case anybody else is looking for a pick me up.

This is a clip from the movie "Once". It's a cool little indie romance about two street musicians. The music is AMAZING. The soundtrack has been going on my pocket pc constantly.

After a long day at work nothing feels better than clobbering your friends at Halo 3

This is one of my favorite bands Band of Horses...

We are big fans of Juno around here...I watched it twice over the last month...

Lots of Diet Coke with Lime consumption this month...and I mean loooooots

A little conversation from last night

2008-02-20T17:43:00.000-08:00

Setting: Tuesday - 6:30 p.m. 30 minutes before I am supposed to get off. I have been at the VA since 6:30 a.m. I get a call that I have a new patient in the ER. I am grumpy, because that means I won't get to go home on time.

Me: So Mr. ------, what brings you in to the hospital today?

Mr. ------: Well, I been having deez chest pains right hur (points at chest)

I proceed to ask him every question in the book to try and determine the cause of his chest pain. After about 10 minutes of interrogation we haven't come any closer to determining why he has chest pain. He is young, healthy, has no cardiac history, yet he gives a history that really sounds like cardiac chest pain...

Me: Hmmm, this is really puzzling. So, are you sure there is nothing you can think of that might have started this chest pain?

Mr. -------: Well, I have been smoking crack cocaine for about 7 days.

Me: Ya, that might do it...

A 70 hour week at the VA

2008-02-08T20:06:00.000-08:00

This week I started my internal medicine rotation at the VA. I have been (un)lucky enough to work at the VA more than any other med student in my class. I got to work there my entire psychiatry rotation, I spent my surgery weeks there, and now I get to do my internal medicine there. There are a lot of things I hate about the VA. I hate how lazy a lot of the nurses are. I watched my patient writhe around in bed last night for an hour after I ordered his pain meds because a nurse was too busy to spend 30 seconds to go give him a shot. I hate how there are certain hallways that smell like poo (somehow my patients always get assigned to the feces wing). I hate how the cafeteria is open for dinner from 1-2 pm. I hate the fact that nobody answers the phone in fear of having to do actual work, so I have to march down to the lab and demand that my stat blood work be done so I can go to sleep knowing my patient won't have a fatal arrhythmia overnight. In all honesty, every time I work at the VA I see things that really shake my faith in humanity. I really start to think the human race is in a pretty sad state.

Despite my moaning and groaning there is one thing that I like about the VA. I love the patients. Sure they are a little spicy. One of my patient's refers to his African American roomate as "the colored fella" or "the gorilla" (this nearly sparks a fight every time I see them together). One of my patients sat through an entire history and physical with his robe open, and at the end said "sorry you had to see my nuts all through that". In all seriousness, they are really great patients and I have learned so much from them. They are so patient and appreciative. I feel really hurt when I see them neglected or given bureaucratic runarounds to the detriment of their health. Over my months at various VA hospitals I have really come to respect our veterans, and I wish that the government would give them the respect they have earned. I hate how we can spend so much money on war, but we can't go the extra mile and pony up a little cash to better cover the health care of those who served.

This article sums up how the system is failing many of our veterans

New music

2008-02-02T20:32:00.000-08:00

So I just added a bunch of my favorite music to the blog. I think most of it conforms to the PG-13 standard, but if something slips through the cracks just put your earmuffs on. I highly recommend Band of Horses. There are a few of their tracks on there so give it a try. Also here's one more. This is Em's newest song/chant.

3 little monkeys swinging in the tree
Teasing Mr. Alligator "can't catch me, can't catch me"
Along comes Mr. Alligator quiet as can be and he
Snaps that monkey right out of that tree.

Last month's real St. Louis Moment

2008-02-02T09:12:00.000-08:00

So as most of you know, every month Heather prepares a newsletter for our friends and family. At the end we always conclude with a "St. Louis Momement", which usually consists of a story about someone doing something really ghetto. Last month my suggestion got vetoed (I don't think Heather could fathom my Grandparent's reading it). Thanks to this blog, this story has found a home. I was working in an outpatient pediatrics clinic. This lady brought her kids in for a physical. This lady was the typical ghetto mama. 20 years old with 4 kids with 4 different last names. I think she cared more about getting her nails done and getting huge pawprints tattoed on her exposed boobs than any one of these poor kids. Anyways, when you do a full physical on a little boy, you have to make sure that their testicles have fully descended, and the only way to do that is feel 'em. So I was doing just that, and this little 1 1/2 year old was less than pleased. His mom looked at him and said "Don't worry Keshawn, he's just feelin' on yo' nuts". Classy mom, reeeeeeal classy.

It begins....

2008-02-02T09:04:00.000-08:00

Everybody keeps buggin us to make a blog. We already have two family blogs that we post on, but I thought that I might throw a few things up here every now and again. Warning...this blog is rated PG-13. Enter at your own risk...