"my dear Doctor Whipple..."

I was doing some internet research today when I happened upon some copies of the original letters written by Virginia Apgar (yes, that Apgar) to Allen Whipple (yes, that Whipple) concerning the formalization of medical training for perioperative care, into what would eventually become the Department of Anesthesiology at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital.

Now I don't know if it's just because I'm a dork (certainly) or because the players were such medical legends that getting a chance to read their correspondence (along with handwritten notes jotted in the body and along the margins!) feels like watching history unfold in real time.  Or perhaps it's just seeing that familiar address on that old letterhead--the correspondence below detailing the formation of a department where, seventy years later, I myself would train--that got me all goose-bumpley.   But certainly, there's a reason that these were called The Days of the Giants, and Virginia Apgar no doubt stood tall among them.

For more on Dr. Apgar, they have quite a trove of biographical information, pictures, and letters in the "Profiles in Science" section in the National Library of Medicine.  Definitely worth checking out if you're a medical history wonk.  Or just look at this picture of C. Everett Koop and wonder why people don't grow beards like this anymore.

mack cheats at air hockey

AND NOW THE WHOLE WORLD KNOWS IT.

the taller it grows, the lower it bends

I know I haven't posted a lot this last week, but here, just because it looks so darn mystical, are some pictures of my kids in a bamboo forest.

 

It looks like the freaking mountains of China in those pictures (and frankly, in real-life as well), but it's actually just the back edge of a cluster of homes just a block or two off a major road here in metro Atlanta, right near hospitals and malls and giant highrises.  Atlanta, you are one weird city.

(I'm just going to put this part here because, next to medical stuff, photography is quite possibly the thing I get e-mailed the most frequently about: the square pictures I post on this blog (but more frequently here) are taken with my iPhone using the Hipstamatic app, with the lens and film combo that come with the app itself--John S lens, Ina 69 film.  I've tried many, many other photo apps, and this app, with this combo, is still my default, because in my opinion it produces the best quality pictures in the right lighting conditions--ideally natural light in partial shade.  On a broader note, the advent of digital photography overall has turned the hobby from a fairly expensive one to one that, minus startup costs, is essentially free, and one that more than ever can be both personal and public.  As much as I like my "real" camera, until digital cameras start adopting some of the smartphone features that allow you to instantly share photos online, my smartphone camera is the one I'm using basically 95% of the time.  Because the best camera is the one you have with you when you want to take photos, right?)

Apologies again for the lack of updates.  To be honest, we are going through a little bit of professional upheaval at the moment--nothing catastrophic, but also nothing that I can talk about here very much here, so I'll just leave it at that for now.  I hope you're all doing well and that you're enjoying the tail end of your summer.

** Residents of Los Angeles!  Tomorrow at 11:00am your time (2:00pm my time) I will be doing a 50-minute live interview with Allen Cardoza and Dr. Melody Foxx on LA Talk Radio on their show "Answers for the Family," about the book and issues related to families and whatnot.  I don't actually know what we're going to talk about actually, so tune in, find out with me.  It's a live interview, right? THOSE ARE ALWAYS EXCITING, in that Christians and lions kind of way.  (It also looks like they post the audio for their shows afterwards as well, so for non-Californians, I'll get the link up here after it's done.  Unless the interview is terrible, in which case I'll just bury the evidence.)

up the creek, no paddle

On call at the hospital yesterday, I had a beautiful grand scheme: finish rounding on my service first, then afterwards, reward myself with cup of coffee and some breakfast.  I was just in the middle of talking to the last patient on my list and trying to decide whether I should get bacon or cheese grits (to be honest, probably both) when then announced a code overhead in the ICU.  Ten hours later, I had my first meal of the day, which was a handful of Twizzler nibs crammed into my gaping maw as I waited for the water to heat up for my ramen noodles.  I only tell you that because the old adage they tell people in medical school is true.  Eat when you can, because you never know when your next meal will be.

Anyway.  That was yesterday.

One of the things that I find wonderful about Atlanta (and while my heart will always be in New York I am not immune to the charms of the South) is how much public green space there is everywhere, even within the city proper.  Joe and I were trying to figure out what to do with the kids this morning--I'm still on "backup" call today and didn't want to stray too far, but Cal and Mack were acting like one of those nature shows where hatchlings turn on each other and eventually cannibalize the runt.  (Unclear who is the runt and who is the Alpha in this equation, I guess if I was interested in finding out I could have just let their youthful exuberance play out to its eventual gruesome conclusion, but I just cleaned the floor last week.)

Anyway, Mack has been talking and talking and talking about going fishing for weeks now, and barring the freedom to go to any actual fishing spots, I pointed out that we did, in fact, have a nature preserve about a block away from our house.  To call it a "nature preserve" is, in fact, a little grandiose--it really just amounts to a creek that runs a few miles behind a stretch of residential housing and listlessly spreads into a nearby duck-and-turtle pond--but it's close and there's water in it, so off we went.

There was a sign at the trail head with notations on various animal tracks (Bobcats? Really?) which I was inclined to breeze by, but of which Cal made very careful notation.

When we got to the creek bed, the water level was very, very low--I guess we've been a little minus on rain lately, and what little water there was amounted to a trickle of ankle-deep runoff with a few minnows in it.  No matter.  A stick with some twine and a pinecone tied to the end was all Mack needed to amuse himself for the next hour.

I think Mack was fully expecting to catch a fish, and I'm just glad that he didn't pitch a fit when his dangling pinecone failed to attract anything more than assorted natural detritus from the creek bed.  Cal did a little "fishing" too, but spent most of his time amusing himself by skipping stones on the water and playing with a tire swing that someone had fixed up down near the water's edge.  I think it would have been a little more thrilling had the water level actually been higher, but I think he had fun all the same.

Mack, looking admiring, then apprehensive.

So actually, that was pretty fun.  What I always tell people about New York is that there's so much to see and so much to do that you'll never get bored, and that much is, of course, true.  But to live in the metro area and yet have a nature trail and a creek a three minute walk from our front door?  For my kids, I'll take that too.