My Love Affair

You know how when you go on a first date (a good first date mind you, bad first dates are a whole other story), and you think they are cute? And funny? And you can't stop thinking about them? And you come up with all sorts of fantasies about how your next date will go? That is how I feel about San Francisco. I'm smitten. Despite the rocky start with the pouring rain upon my arrival, Friday was a beautiful clear day. UCSF Medical Center is up on a hill by Golden Gate Park. The waiting room of the clinic overlooks the Bay. The VA hospital is on the other side of town, where the cafeteria has a lovely view of the Marin Headlands. It was gorgeous.

The program is amazing. They see an incredible variety of endocrine disorders,which is very important. Since most of endocrine is diabetes and thyroid disorders, in order to gain knowledge of the more unusual disorders, you need to get your training at an institute that gets a large number of referrals from other hospitals. You have a full year of in-patient consults, with concurrent clinics, which makes for a very busy first year, but an excellent clinical education. The research is also phenomenal. Lots of work in many different fields, and people seem to genuinely enjoy working there.

It's definitely a different program from OHSU. And better in many ways. The cities are very different too. San Francisco is the glamourous, popular girl, who everyone lusts after, but ends up alone at the prom because everyone is too intimidated to ask her out. Portland is the more down-to-earth, one of the guys type, who always gets overlooked in high school, but in the end is the one that the boys end up marrying. Every interview I go on, I'm going to have to rethink my list. My priorities change with each program I visit. But today, I think UCSF has the upper hand.

The remaining interviews have been scheduled:
Feb 15th -- UCSD
Feb 26th -- UW
March 14th -- University of Colorado
April 18th -- Stanford

And then I'm done. I've decided not to interview in Boston. I had offers from Beth Israel and Mass General, two very good programs, but in reality... I love the west coast. It fits my personality. I love the casual way people are out here. I love the mild weather. I love the mountains. And I think Adam likes it too. This feels like home. It's getting to the point in my life when I'm ready to put down roots. I think the next place we end up will be it for awhile.