Snow and Finals

We got some weather from the North that helped accumulate two inches of snow here in the Portland area. With two inches of snow the entire place comes to a stand still. No one here know how to handle a little snow and so the entire place is crippled from the light dusting we received on Sunday night. Some have speculated that this is because a significant portions of Oregonians are ex-Californians. The temperatures did not warm up enough to melt the snow as usuall around here and all classes at OHSU were canceled on Monday. This is a real pain in the behind because it pushes back the two finals we had scheduled today into later in the week that is already crowded with other finals. They have not told us of how our schedule is going to change so it is difficult to prioritize and delegate time to each final. Now it is seven finals in four days instead of five days. I wish that I could just get them over with. It seem as of Monday night that they are going to open school tomorrow with the same snow on the ground as there was today. The best part of this whole thing is the the weather forecast is calling for more snow showers on Wednesday and Thursday and temperature are not expected to get above freezing until later in the weekend.

Thanksgiving and Civil War

Thanks giving was great. My mom picked me up in Portland at noon and we traveled on to Yakima, Washington where my Aunt Jane lives. We drove north from Portland on I% to hwy 12 and then headed East past Mount St Helens, over White Pass and into Yakima. We had family from Washington, Oregon and Idaho all there. We had a relaxing turkey day and on Friday morning we went up into the woods to cut Christmas trees. We alos watched football and played card. On Saturday morning we left Yakima early headed south the the Columbia river gorge and the west back into portalnd. From there my othere drove south to Ashalnd and I drove south to Corvallis whrer the 112th playing to the Civil war between the Uof O duck and the OSU beavers was being played. The Beavers lost at home and they don't get to go to the Rose Bowl this year. It was a tough loss against our arch rivals. On the way back to Portalnd last night I stopped in Salem to say hight to my friend Adam who was home from dental school in california. I now have 3 busy weeks of school left then winter break.

Whats New

School has been taking up a lot of my time recently. I am learning how to make a denture, I cast a gold crown and have been practicing working with composite resin filling material. I have been seeing patients every other week in the clinic for cleanings. I have patient scheduled tomorrow morning for x-rays. I have also been assisting in the clinic too. We are also just starting to get busy with midterm exams.

Hunting

Went deer hunting near Peedee, Oregon. Did not see any deer but saw a nice five by five Roosevelt bull elk and a herd of cows. We were able to shoot some pictures of the cows and a little bit of video through the lens of my friend Matt's binoculars. We were about 100 yards away. They eventually left after they got wind of our scent but not after a few pictures and about ten minutes. I have an elk tag but it is not open until November 15th. So this is what I did in the morning. I made it to my afternoon classes too.

End of Week One

Week one of School has come and gone. It was a tough week but not because of school. On Monday morning the hard drive on my laptop crashed and I lost everything that was on it. I am still trying to get some files back and reorganize what I was able to recover. I you have any good pictures of me that you think I should have pleases e-mail them to me so I can get them back. I also caught a cold this week which made the whole week a little miserable. On Thursday night the Beavers lost a heart breaking game to Utah. They gave up 11 points in the last two minutes to get the loss. It was really disappointing after such a great showing against USC last week and having the games so close with little time left. Today I did some lab work and bought groceries. Tomorrow, I don't have class unitl the afternoon so I am planning on going hunting down by Corvallis and coming back for afternnon classes.

OSU 27, USC 21

Last night I went to the Beaver game in Corvallis. We left Portland about 1:30 so we could tailgate before the start of the game. OSU defeated the number one ranked team in the country USC. It was an amazing upset and a great game to watch and be at. The Beavers just out played the Trojans throughout the whole game. We had a lot of breaks go our way and we capitalized on them when they happened. Our defence was strong and contained the USC offence well. They could not stop our true freshmant running back who gained over 180 yards in the game. USC made it close in the third quarter but the Beavers held on to win. The picture above is the student section that rushed the feild after the win. What a great sight. It will be interesting to see how the rest of the season plays out for the Beavers and for the rest of the PAC 10.

Back to The Big City

I am now back in Portland and about to start fall term on Monday. I drove back here on Sunday. In the morning I left Boise and headed through Caldwell, Notus, Parama, Roswell, and Adrian to the Owhyhee river. On the river I fished below the dam. I did not catch any fish but I was there at the wrong time of the day. From the river I went through Owhyee and Nyssa to get to Ontario. From there I headed to Pendleton where I made an unexpected stop. It turned out that my cousin David was heading from Terrebonne to Moscow Idaho and was looking for saddles in Pendleton on his way. We met up and had dinner. I headed on my way and arrived in Portland. This week I have been prcticing in the lab, getting back into shape, and getting everything caught up before school starts. Tomorrow, I am going to Corvallis to watch the Beavers play USC. The rest of the week I am going to relax before school starts on Monday. Til next time have a great day.

I have been at the Ranch in Idaho for the last few weeks. On my way here I stopped a few days and stayed with Aunt Mary and Ed. Ed and I fished the Payette river he also helped me do a little work on my .22. I have been working some and also fishing a little. The picture above is me showing a fish to my cousin's son who is 17 months old. The first week I was here, I worked the application for my uncle to be an outfitter in the state of Idaho. I spent a lot of time helping write the application and filling out the paperwork that is required by the state. The last few days I have been helping pack in on horse back some hunters into the North Fork of Lime creek in the Sawthooth National Forest. My uncle Dan is helping guide the on an archer mule deer hunt. Top picture is taken from the ridge we hiked up early in the morning to watch the deer move. We sae a lot af deer anincluding some trophy size mule deer. We aslo saw a sow black bear and her cub, lots of moose sign, a spike elk, and wolf tracks. We packed in on Saturday and set up the camp which will stay there for the remainder of hunting season. On Tuesday I had a wreck while trail riding on horse back. The horse while approaching a culvert panicked and stepped to the side instead of over. It tripped off the side and rolled to the left with me falling off. The pack saddle I was riding came down on the inside of my left leg with the horses weight behind it. The horse jumped up and proceded to cut its leg on the side of the culvert. My leg is severly bruised and very sore. Ill be ok but it will be a few weeks before this one totally resolves itself. After the wreck we tried to give the horse stiches but he would not let us poke him with the suture. All we could do was dress the cut with antibiotics slav and wrap the cut and let it heal on its own. Thats all I got for now.

What's Been Consuming Me.

For the past six weeks I have been in summer session. I finished my last final today and am relieved to be free for six weeks. The pictures above are the simulation clinic where we learn how do all of the dental procedures and my dummy. I unofficially named him Pleasant Bassham after one of my distant Butler relatives. This last six weeks has been long and tough. I have spent at least a little time in the sim lab every day for about the last our weeks inculding 8 hours every Tuesday and Thursday. I performed well in some classes and not so well in others and I am just relieved to have a some time off. During my break I will be heading to Ashland for a few days and then to Idaho for the reaminder of my time. In Idaho, I will be helping on the ranch as well as fishing a lot. I am looking forward to a horse packing trip is September into the Idaho wilderness. Other plans for the break include reading for my own enjoyment, mounting a new scope on my .22, fly tying, reloading, and making a repair to my surgical light and redesigning the light to be more heat efficient, smaller and lighter. I also plan on catching up on sleep. When I get some good picture from Idaho I will share them here.

Cheers

FLUGTAG!!!

Today was the Portland edition of the Red Bull Flugtag. This is an event where teams make "flying" contraptions and try to fly them off of a 30 foot ledge. The teams are judged on creativity and distance of flight. Most of the "flying machines" don't actually fly but they fall very fast. All of the teams have a different theme. When they get to the launch platform the teams answer some questions about thier contraption then do choregraphed dance to their theme. They then load one person in the contraption and the rest of the team pushes like a bobsled. When they get to the end of the ramp the whole team jumps in. You can see the launch platform in this picture with a viking dragon like thing about to go off. The event was held at the Willamette waterfront park in downtown Portland. Some friends and took a break from lab work and went down to watch. There were an estimated 60,000 people at the event. There were people standing on the bridge in the background, people on the other side of the river, people in boats and people packed onto the shore and grassy areas. There were people everywhere.

White Coat Ceremony

Sorry for the bad pic. No good ones came out. Here I am sitting next to my friend Andrew. My class and I received white coats to symbolize us transitioning from a predominantly classroom based education to patient centered training. It was a one hour ceremony that was attended by family and friends. My mother was in attendance as well as here friend JoAnne. After the ceremony, we went out to dinner down town. I was just thankful to be there (read post below) let alone get a white coat. Unfortunately the only time we will get to wear these is during our weekly group practice huddles. The rest of the time we have to wear smocks over our scrubs when seeing patients and working in lab. Above the chest pocket it says: John L. Turner, OHSU School of Dentistry.

Nightmare of a Trip Home(long story)

Last week I spent a few days in Toronto, Canada. The trip for the most part went well with a few minor hiccups but nothing too bad. That all changed when we started on our way back to Portland. It all started on Thursday night when we took the bus to the airport. The hotel concierge who we bought our bus ticket from told us the wrong terminal. When we got the the airport we had to take the sky train to a completely different terminal in order to check in to our flight. While checking in for our 9:00pm flight to Las Vegas, I had to jump out of the customs line a few times to get all my paper work in order. All was seeming fine until our plane pushed away from the gate and the parking brake on the plane got stuck. After an hour of trying to fix it they finally got it unstuck and pulled the plane back into the gate and we all deboarded the plane. After another hour and a half of trying to fix the problem the finally officially canceled the flight. Now that the flight was canceled we could rebook flights for the next day. Since our tickets were officially used we could not call the airline and rebook by phone and still get our flight for free. The there were not enough gate agents to process all of the passengers quickly. We ended up in the line of the agent that did not really know what he was doing. I think he was actually a sky bridge operator. After waiting in line for another hour we finally rebooked a flight on a different airline for the next morning that would get us back into Portland an hour and fifteen minutes before our 2:00pm white coat ceremony. Just enough time to go from the airport to OHSU on the opposite side of Portland. We were issued a hotel voucher and shuttle voucher. By the time we got the the airport hotel and to bed it was 2:30 in the morning. We got up a 3:45 am so we could get to the airport by 5am for our 6:30 flight to Chicago. Before we left the hotel we threw out anything that was unapproved by TSA for carry on. I had to leave my favorite Swiss Army pocket knife that my grandfather gave me when I was eight with the hotel so they could mail it to me. When we got tot the airport at 4:45am we tried to check in for our flights. We found out that we had not been confirmed the night before by the gate agent on our flight from Chicago to Portland. All that was left was standby seats. We decided that in all we could do was try to fly standby if we wanted to make to Portland for the white coat ceremony. They offered to send us through Dallas but we would have missed the ceremony by about and hour. After we checked in we got in the customs line. It turns out that Customs computer system went down and the line was a mile long. They did not have enough agents to deal with the down computers. It took us nearly an hour to get through customs. My friend dan who I was traveling with me got through Customs and TSA first. He went to the gate to find out that they had delayed our flight because of Customs. He got to talking with the gate agent and she was able to take him off the standby list and overbook him on the Chicago to Portland flight. She could not do the same with me because she can only overbook so many spots. If she tried with me and it did not work I would loose my spot on the standby list. I had a very early time on the stanby list which is how priority is determined. We had a good flight from Toronto to Chicago. We made friends with the flight attendant because it was a very small plane and we were nearly the only ones in it. When we landed in Chicago the flight attendant checked the Chicago to PDX flight and found out that there were seven open seats and that I was number seven on on the stanby list. When we found this out we still had three hours before the flight. It was nerve racking because anyone with American Airlines points could get on the standby list and take priority over me who is not affiliated with American Airlines. After sweating it out in Chicago for three hours, they called my name and I got the last standby seat on the plane. What a relief. I called my mother who was already on the road driving from Ashland to Portland to let her know that I was going to make it. I aslo called the student affairas office to let them know that we were going to make but just in time. Now Chicago O'Hare being Chicago O'Hare our flight took of 30 minutes late due to traffic on the runways. The pilot made up a little time in the air. We arrived at PDX and Dan's parents were there to pick us up as we did not have time to go get his car out of long term parking. We were already wearing our suits from the early morning. Leaving the airport there was road construction on airport road and and also early Friday afternoon freeway traffic. We arrived at the white coat ceremony at 1:45 in time to line up for a 2:00pm start time.

This was the craziest travel story that I have ever had. By the time I got to bed that night I had about 4 hours of interspersed sleep in a 36 hour period. I was exhausted and way behind in school from missing several days.

Surgical Light

I made my own glass mounted light source for dental use. I used a lithium ion battery for power and a LED with a 3 degree lens for light. The cord that runs power from the battery pack to the lamp was an old head phone cord that I cut the earbuds off. The lamp housing was a blood sugar test strip container that I cut down to size. the mounting bracket is a hose clamp that I cut and modified. The total cost twas about $175 for all the materials and tools needed to put it together. This is a substantial savings over the $600 student price for a comparable quality light from a dental manufacturer. It was a neat project that I had fun doing, I got to buy some tools and I learned a little about electrical wiring. I got the idea and a parts list from a thread on another message board for dentists. I am really pleased with the quality and lightweigtness of the lamp and if it ever brakes I will know how to fix it. I am considering building some more and selling them to my classmates and professors. If I decide to do this, I am going to file papers with the secratary of state and start an LLC.

Toronto

I mam going to post quickly here. I am coming at you from Toronto Canada where I have been for the last few days. I am here for the american Association of Clinical Anatomists meeting where I presented a poster. I am currently on the bus and am about to arive at the airpot. got to go.

Week One of Summer Term

I just finished up week one of summer term and it was busy. We were inundated with lab work as we moved in the simulation clinic lab. Our new lab stations now have mannequins that all of our procedures will be performed on. Doing it in the mouth adds a whole new degree of difficulty to every procedure. I spent Saturday volunteering at the school teaching a hands on lab for pre-dental students. Saturday evening was a birthday for one of my classmates. We all had a good time celebrating at a local club. On Sunday I spent most of the day getting ahead on lab work because I a leaving for Toronto, Ontario, Canada tonight. I will be there until Early Friday morning.

Independence Weekend in Central Oregon

This last week has been a good one. Early in the week I finished up my poster project for the conference that I am attending in Toronto, Canada the week after next. On Wednesday I headed over to Terrebonne, Oregon where I stayed with my cousin ( in a round about way) Jake Patterson. In the morning I helped him get his farm work done and in the afternoons we fished. On Thursday, we fished the Deschutes and I caught 4 fish but overall the fishing was slow. On friday we fished squaw creek and it was almost completely unfishable. The water was really high and off color because of the snow runoff. On friday evening I stayed with my friend Ryan at Black Butte Ranch in Sisters, Oregon. On saturday I fished the Deschutes again but this time I got skunked. On saturday evenng I went to the wedding of My friends Matt and Brittany which was held in Bend. Today, I headed back to portland. Tomorrow I embark on our six week summer term. Wish me luck.

SO CAL

the first several days of our short summer brake I went to Southern California to visit family and friends. we started off in San Diego, where we stayed with family. While I was there, I got a chance to meet up with my friend Andrew at Mission Beach where we rode the flow rider and hung out along the beach. The flow rider is a man made wave machine that you ride on. You ride a small board like you are surfing but it is on a 2 inch sheet of water. We then took the train to Pismo Beach where we stayed with our old neighbors for a few days. All in all we had a relaxing trip but I am glad to be back in Oregon. When I go to California I always get the sense that there are just too many people and so I am always relieved to be back home.

Memorial day weekend

My weekend started early when on Wednesday at noon I left school and headed to bend where I met my mother and we drove on to Idaho. We stayed in Idaho until we headed back West on Monday morning. While in Idaho I fished a bunch and I caught this beautiful fish. I also Caught lagre mouth bass, yellow perch, red ear and blue gills. In the evenings we would go repelling off clover creek falls. On Saturday, rode for my uncle art and we moved cow off the BLM. On Sunday evening we had a BBQ at Mary's house and Steve Taylor was able to come from his rehabilitation center with Theresa. The D-Butlers also came from bliss and Adam and Lori were there. Overall I had a great weekend. I fished a lot, I relaxed a lot and I even got a little school work done even though I have been playing catch up all week because of my absence.

P.S.

In the previous post.


I shot the pheasant that made the fly, I tied the fly and I built the 4 weight rod that caught the fish.

Owyhee River

I caught this nice 20.5 inch brown on the Owyhee river this weekend. My friends Eric and Ben went on the trip with me. We left Thursday evening and came back Saturday evening. We fished hard for two days and we had a great time. This was a good trip for me because it really made me think hard about fly fishing and pay attention to the minute details that can make or break whether you catch a fish or not. The fish were being very selective about what they would go after. This fish was my first brown trout that I have ever caught and it was a beauty. I am heading over to Idaho tomorrow for a long memorial day weekend. I should have more pictures and new post when I get back. Cheers!

Skiing in May?

Today I went skiing at Mt Hood Meadows. My friend Dan and I went up to the mountain this morning and skied until about 1:30 this afternoon. It was a beautiful warm sunny May day. the snow was slushey and sticky but at least it was soft. This is the latest into the year that I have ever skied and my first time ever skiing in may.

Steelhead

Last week I caught my first steelhead on the Upper Wilson River. It was a beautiful day on the river. My friend Eric and I cut class to enjoy the one of the first warm sunny days of the year. Overall we went 3 for 3 on the day. This week we have been studying for our first test of the term. I also saw my first patient this week for a routine cleaning. I have two more scheduled for the rest of this term. Have a great day.

March

I have been busy the last few weeks. School has been taking up a lot of time but the term is almost over. All we have left is finals. I think we have seven written exams and one practice exam next week. Eight exams sounds a lot more daunting than it will be in reality. For spring break I plan on doing a little fishing, probably some skiing, a trip to Ashland and possibly a trip to Spokane. Also spending a little time on project that I am working on at school.
Thats all for now.

President Weekend

My long weekend started with Aunt Jane and Uncle George taking me out to lunch on Friday afternoon. They were on their way form Yakama to Ashland and they stopped to say hi. I then left Portland and headed over the mountains to Terrebonne, Oregon. At Terrebonne is a cattle ranch that is managed by cousin Josh. They were having a bull sale and need extra help getting ready for Mondays big auction. While I was there I had a chance to sneek away and fish the Crooked River only a few miles from the ranch. I only caught one squaw fish and no trout but I had a nice hike and I took a few nice pictures. On Monday evening after the sale I headed back over the mountains. I was able to take with me some left over BBQ tri-tip roasts. Last nigh I reheated the raosts from my roomate and some of my classmates.

Whats New

So I haven't posted in a while so here is what is new. I went skiing on Saturday last weekend. It was busy but we had a fun day. The rest of the weekend I did not do much. I made every attempt to sleep which was really nice. I was able to watch some football which was nice also. On Wednesday night I went to a concert at the Crystal Ball Room. The band was called the Decemberists. I had never hear of them until 30 minutes before I went to the concert. I went last minute because someone else could not use their ticket. After staying out late for the concert I have been trying unsuccessfully to catch up on sleep. This weekend looks like a little studying and a head and neck anatomy review session on Sunday. Also on tap is sleep.
good night all.

School is back

School started last week on Wednesday and ended on friday at noon. We then proceeded to drive to Sun River where we stayed for the weekend as part of the OHSU all hill ski trip. We partied Friday night and woke up early the next morning for a day of skiing. Saturday on the mountain was an amazing day the powder was deep and the conditions were not too bad. I did end up hitting a rock and needing to have my skis repaired. That night was the more partying and a dance hosted by OHSU. Sunday we packed up and headed back to Portland. Moday we started are first full week of classes. This term does not seem as bad as last term. It seem like we have more lab classes with more lab work and less academic classes and less exams. We have started to learn how to take radiographs and also learning some perio/hygeine techniques. They tell us that next term we will start seeing patients for doing these type of procedures. This term has started of well so far and I hope to continue the good trend. By the way the snow fall this year has been amazing. We have just been getting pounded by storm after storm and it is pilling up high in the mountains. Hoppfull I will be able to get up to the mountains a few more times this year.