90210

Hello everyone... I come to you with great news! Abby and I found out today that we will be going to work at LA Children's hospital. Hollywood here we come! We are both very excited to have found a job as time was running out. We will be working on a unit similar to the one I worked on at UNC. We will be taking care of post heart surgery kids, lung transplants, kidney transplants, liver transplants, among others. Should be very challenging, but we are both ready for it. We start on October 20th (and work through the beginning of Feb), so when we get back from our NY vacation, we need to pack and get on the road. We are still unsure about where we will be living, but hopefully somewhere close by the hospital as the traffic, in LA, is horrific! Our doors will be open for visitors!
Well, we are currently in NY having a blast. We have done so much in the few days we have been here. We arrived in Newark on friday night and quickly headed to the racetrack. We went to the Meadowlands racetrack to test our luck. We bet on a few races, but lost them all. The racetrack is actually a lot of fun. Saturday we headed into NYC via the NJ transit to Penn Station. We are fortunate to have a free shuttle from our hotel to the NJ train station in Seacacus, NJ. It is about a 15 minute journey to get into NYC, but well worth the time when we are saving over 1000 on hotel costs for 4 nights. On saturday we went to the Metropolitan museum of Art (Abby pictured above next to a Picasso painting, me pictured next to a formidable statue, and Abby pictured on the stairs leading into the Met), went to Times Square where we ate dinner at the ESPN Zone, and we spent lots of time in the subway (me pictured coming through the gate) trying to find our way around. If you have never been to an ESPN Zone, you have to. It's an adult chucky cheese! Abby and I tested our skills in a hockey game, football game, basketball and horse riding game. Lots of fun I tell ya. After eating and playing, we ended up at the bar to enjoy the UNC football game and the most incredible Warm Chocolate Chip Cookie sundae!

We made it back to the Hotel around 9pm as we knew Sunday was going to be a long day. Sunday morning arrived and I quickly jumped out of bed like a kid on Christmas morning. The NY Giants football game was at 1pm, so of course we had to get up early to get prepared. Abby, however, was not as thrilled about getting out of bed as I was. It took a hot second to get her up, but in all fairness to her, she was up and out of the hotel room on time. We donned our Giants gear (yes, Abby rocked a newly purchased Giants sweatshirt) and headed downstairs to eat breakfast. Much to my liking, there were so many Giants fans all decked out with their Giants gear! Go Giants!! haha.. Sorry for my elaboration on this subject, but I was just so thrilled to have finally made it to a Giants game! We quickly walked to the stadium from our hotel and took lots of pictures. We posted a few, but be on the look out for others. Our seats were incredible once we found them. I must admit that we spent about an hour down in the front row watching the Giants and Seahawks warm-up. We spotted a few legends of the game as we observed warm ups. Carl Banks, Harry Carson, and Warren Moon to name a few! When we were finally kicked out of our seats by the season ticket holders, we made our way to our seats. We were on the first level directly behind the goal posts about 36 rows up (see picture of Abby and I below). We could see everything. We were under the over hang which was awesome because it threatened to rain and we had a review TV directly above us. Great job on the tickets Abby! The start of the game was upon us and I had lots of goosebumps. A kids dream has come true!!!

Saturday night we just lounged around our hotel room watching the other games across the league. Abby is such a sport when it comes to watching football... I sat in a chair with my fantasy football stat tracker in my lap and watched my fantasy team dominant one of Abby's brothers team. I definitely got lucky to win this week, but I will take it. Sunday night we headed to a local restaurant for dinner and to watch some of the sunday night football game. As you can see, our family is quickly becoming a sunday football only kind of family. Gosh I hope I have boys!!! :) Well that is it for now. We spent all of Monday back in NYC, but we did way to much to write on this post. Tomorrow we head to my home town of New Hyde Park, NY to show Abby were little, chunky Hinchy spent his first 12 years growing up. We will add more pictures and write more later this week. We hope everyone is great. Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers. Till our next post....

In his peace,
Michael and Abby Lee...
Please keep those prayers rolling for my grandparents, thanks!
p.s. the last picture was taken on our last morning at Phoenix children's Hospital with some of the other nurses, and other great staff we worked with.

Bad news...

Well where do we start... We were cancelled at the hospital in San Diego. What does that mean you might ask! Well it simply means, Abby and I are out of a job, we are working our last night at Phoenix Children's Hospital, we head to NY on Friday for 10 days, then we have to be out of our apartment the day we get back from NY. What does that mean you might ask? We are jobless come 0730 on Oct 2nd, we are homeless come 0730 on October 14th, we are broke come 0730 on October 20th (rough estimate with our spending habits), and we are now accepting donations. "Abby get off that street corner!" What a whirl wind we have been through the last few hours. Our recruiter told us that there are positions available, but not many. Most hospitals have staffed through the holidays, so only positions open are in January. We only had a few minutes to chat with her before heading into work, so thursday will be a big day of figuring out what to do. We have options, but not ones that we are excited about. LA has positions open, but I'm scared of Britney Spears or Shia Lebuf hitting my car; Dallas has a few positions, but i'm afraid of getting beat up when I rock my NY Giants football gear; we could head home to live in my soon to be vacant house! Who knows really. We are both very disappointed with this news, but we will make it. Thanks for checking in. Will have more informaton soon. Love and miss you all...
Michael and Abby Lee

2 more shifts...

Hello everyone. Do hope this message finds you all doing great. Abby and I are very very excited about having 2 more shifts left at Phoenix Children's Hospital. I know I have mentioned this before, but we are almost done with our time here in Phoenix. I think the best part about that is the fact that we can actually enjoy the outdoors again. We are very tired of having to hide from the sun. San Diego here we come.
I write to you from work where I'm all alone! Abby was fortunate enough to get called off tonight, so she is at home drinking a glass of wine and catching up on laundry and thank you notes. My night is great. I am working with some great nurses tonight. I must say that as much as Abby and I dislike the workings of this hospital, we have been very blessed with our co-workers. The other travel nurses here and several of the core staff have been amazing to work with. We actually had to say goodbye to one of our favorites the other night. It was harder then we thought. What a great experience we have had here. We have learned a lot of new ways to do things, and we have learned a lot of bad ways to do things. The relationships we have established will stay with us forever and we do hope to keep in touch with several of the nurses here and perhaps one day run into them again.

This past weekend Abby and I were able to experience Sedona, AZ. I must say that many of the people we have talked to were getting this place confused with Senoma, CA. Very different. Sedona is a gem here in AZ. We were told by many people to visit there, many of whom recommended Sedona over the Grand Canyon. Now, I must say that we found that hard to believe because the Grand Canyon was amazing! After visiting Sedona, we will agree with the beauty of Sedona being much greater than that of the Grand Canyon. However, the sheer awe of the Grand Canyon was much greater than Sedona. Come on y'all, it's the Grand Canyon! It's 1 of the 7 natural wonders of the world. http://www.bobspixels.com/kaibab.org/misc/gc_7wond.htm I will credit Sedona in beauty though. The beautiful red rock mountains were amazing to view. We tried to capture this beauty with photo's, but honestly you will have to see these in person to understand. The rocks would turn different shades of red depending on how the light hit them and certain viewing angles would offer different looks as well. An experience we will always remember. What made this trip amazing was the fact that we went on an ATV tour of the canyons. The ATVs were old, but the mud slinging, scenery, and tough terrain made up for it. Abby rode on the back with me, so I did my best to cover her with mud (it rained the night before) and jump as many hills as I could. We were led and followed by guides, but lucky for me (not so much Abby) we were in the middle. There were many trails where we weaved in and out of bushes so the front and back guides couldn't see us. This is when I would hang back from the people in head of us and then fly through puddles, jump jumps, fish tail, and whatever else I could think of to up the excitement of this tour. Good times I tell ya. I wish we would have taken a picture of before and after. My plan to get Abby muddy back fired as I was the one who got soaked. We had to wear something to cover our faces because it was so dry along many of the paths that the dust being kicked up from the people in front of us was very thick. Supposedly there is a ton of wildlife living out on this terrain, but unfortunately we didn't see any of it. The Javelina is a very common animal in these parts. http://www.azgfd.gov/h_f/game_javelina.shtml Check them out. They are ugly jokers who are very aggressive. I was hoping to spot one, but no such luck. Very similar to wild boar, but actually part of the rodent family. Interesting stuff I tell ya! We did this ATV tour on Saturday morning. Friday night we just went for a walk on the streets of Sedona and ate Buffalo at a local Cowboy saloon. They had rattlesnake, elk, and cactus on the menu. We thought about trying these, but they were actually very expensive items. We also caught a couple of jazz bands at this one strip mall. Here they had several galleries offering wine and finger foods. After dinner we ended up in the hot tube chatting about life and observing the beautiful clear sky. We were trying to hunt down Abby's first falling star. How romantic I know! Then you know what we did on Saturday morning. After showering we ended up at "Sedona Jazz on the Rocks, 2008." It was a neat event. Here we sat on the lawn (picture shown), listened to some good Jazz music, and enjoyed people watching. We stayed there for about 40 minutes or so, then headed to Javelina Cantina for dinner. We made a dinner reservation for 5:45 so that we could catch the sunset. Supposedly this was the place to have dinner and watch the sunset as they have a neat little patio that overlooks the west side of Sedona. We arrived on time, sat down on time, then much to our dismay a storm was approaching. This pretty much canceled the sunset, but we really enjoyed the cool breeze and the delicious Mexican food. After dinner we drove back to Phoenix, The End!







Sunday we were pretty lazy. Like I mentioned earlier, we really don't like to do much during the day. We watched the second season of "Lost." For those who haven't ever seen the show, it's Awesome! We hope to start season 3 when we get to San Diego. To be honest, I don't know how people keep up with this show weekly. The show does such a great job leaving you hanging after each episode, that I would go crazy waiting until the next weeks show. We started to talk about what we needed to pack up and ship back home (because we have accumulated a lot of stuff over the past 5 months. Mainly clothes). We work tuesday and wednesday nights, then leave on Friday for New York. On sunday I will attend my first New York Football Giants game. I have been such a huge fan for such a long time, and I finally get to attend a game. Thanks Abby (my Bday present). Don't worry, we will take a lot of pictures and post them when we can. We will be in NYC for about 4 days, then we are heading upstate NY to visit my grandparents, aunt and uncle. Should be a great time. To explain the pictures posted here. The picture with Abby's back to us was where Javelina Cantina was. The picture of just the mountain view was from outside our Hotel room. The rest of the pictures are pretty self explanatory. We posted more pictures from our trip on facebook. Well, that is about it from here. It is 0400 and time to check on my kids, give meds and start to think about charting. Hope you enjoyed the post. We love and miss you all... till the next time...


In His peace,
Michael and Abby Lee

p.s. keep the prayers rolling for my grandparents... thanks

6 more shifts...

Hello everyone... Do hope this message finds you all doing great. Things are wonderful in the life of the Hinchy's! Abby and I are extremely excited to head to San Diego. I think the anticipation is making the last few weeks seem much longer then should feel. We are still waiting to hear from our travel company regarding where we will be staying when we move to San Diego. We should know in the next week or so. Will update you to our new address as soon as we find out. Abby and I are both working tonight, tomorrow night and Wednesday night. We then have off until next Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, then we are done! Abby just came over to me and told me that she booked a room at a Best Western in Sedona, AZ. She was able to get a special rate combined with an ATV tour of the Sedona Canyons. Check this out. http://www.sedonaoffroadcenter.com/ATV1.html Abby will be riding on the back with me. Hold on tight Abby! Should be a lot of fun. We are only going to be heading up for one night, but hope to also catch an art/jazz festival either Friday or Saturday afternoon. Would love to stay up there longer, but the funds are limited these days. Why you ask? Well lets just say that we have been to a lot of expensive football games, we are going to NYC and upstate NY for 10 days, Abby has new diamond earrings, then we will have a couple of weeks without work. Add these up and you will understand why we have to cut down on our fun activities for a little while. Don't worry, they will resume once we become established in San Diego.

This past weekend was very relaxing. We were invited out on Friday night with a few other nurses (pictures will be posted later). We had a blast. On Saturday night we were invited over to another nurses house for dinner. David is his name. David wanted to thank us for being team players, and for being so easy to work with. It was a very nice offer and that is always nice to hear. As a traveler, you always wonder if you are fitting in and if the core staff like you. Glad to hear at least one person likes us! haha... It was a great home cooked meal. He had twice baked potatoes! Enough said! Sunday was a guy day for me. I met up with a couple of male respiratory therapists at a local sports bar to watch football. We met up at 11am (1pm East coast time) to watch the early football games. We ate some great food and enjoyed a few cold beverages. Abby had a personal training appointment at 1, then went to Target. After Target she met up with me at another sports bar (because I was dropped off there due to not having a key to get into our apartment) to watch more football and to get some food. Sunday night Abby watched the Emmy's and I watched the Sunday night football game. BOOOOOO DALLAS!!! We went to bed around 11:30 Sunday night. I woke up around 8am, went and worked out, then we had to pee in a cup for our new travel assignment at 2pm. Funny story about that... Abby gets there and she was called in first. 5 minutes go by, no Abby. 10 min go by, no Abby. 15 min go by, no Abby. 20 min go by, no Abby. I'm thinking to myself, "what in the world is she doing? Is it just that crowded back there? Why haven't I been called in to pee in a cup?" 25 min later, "Mike Hinchy." "Finally," I said to myself. I walk through the door and guess who I see sitting on the bench next to the water fountain? Yep, you guessed it Abby! "Hey Abby, what are you doing?" haha.... Abby was unable to pee enough for the specimen needed. She was sitting there this entire time drinking water. I would venture to say that it took her about an hour of drinking water to finally get the urge to pee enough for the test. I can't forget to mention that this waiting area was freezing. Her legs were loaded with goosebumps and she was wrapped up with her fleece. Her nose was ice cold and she was shivering. I had to leave a couple of times to pee myself and to head outside to warm up. Oh Abby.... haha.. She makes me laugh. The ladies in the lab office were extremely nice and constantly asked her if she had to pee. We arrived at the Lab office around 2pm and left a little after 3pm. The waiting room was packed out when we got there, and was completely empty when we left. We finally made it home after getting Pei Wei and a few things from the grocery store. We took a nap from 4 to 5:30, then headed into work.

So there you have it... A weekend and a day in the life of Abby and Mike. Sorry for boring you, but this is the most exciting stuff that has happened since our last post. Good times here in Phoenix. The weather is actually cooling down. We only have 2-3 days of 100+ weather a week. It's funny because you can honestly tell a difference in air temp when the high is 100+ compared to high 90's. Crazy I know. Well, it is 5:15am and it's almost time to finish up my duties for the shift. Be right back, patient calling out.... Okay I'm back. I was just called into a patients room so that he can tell me that he pooped and peed. We measure everything going in and measure everything coming out of our patients, so think about that when I say he pooped and peed. Good times. The beauty of being a nurse! YUCK! Okay, signing off for now. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and have a wonderful week. We love and miss you all....

In His peace,
Love,
Michael and Abby Lee

p.s. Please keep praying for my grandparents! Thanks

We love some football...

As you can see i'm trying to get the hang of displaying pictures with my text. I kind of figured it out last week, but this week is a new story. For some reason they are clumped together. Oh well, you can still view them! Moving right along...

To start with, Abby and I went to the Arizona Cardinals vs. Miami Dolphins game this past sunday! As you can see by the pictures, I was a Cardinal fan for the day. Partly because we currently live in Arizona, but mainly because I had the Cardinals defense and a cardinals wide receiver on my fantasy football team. I have $110 invested in this league, so I was cheering hard for the aforementioned. The defense played well yielding 1 field goal and a late touchdown, but my wide receiver didn't get much love on the receiving end. Having players on different teams allows you to be a general football fan and pull for many teams as long as they aren't playing my beloved Gmen! Abby was quite embarassed during the game because I constantly cheered for the defense and constantly yelled to throw Breaston (my receiver) the ball. Oh well, it was fun to cheer for the home team and my players! This stadium was incredible. Right when you walk in you are in awe of how massive this place is. Our seats were awesome for $60 a ticket. I had an aisle seat which is especially nice. The picture with Abby and I and the picture of the Arizona end zone were taken at our seats. Not to shabby... There is a company I went through to get the tickets. www.ticketexchangeusa.com They actually have fair prices for many games. The guy I went through told me that he will beat the lowest price I find on my own. He will probably get lots of business through me as I continue my quest to attend every major sporting event and every major college football event in the areas we live. A great goal that Abby is very willing to support. We were going to try and attend the Arizona State vs. Georgia football game this weekend, but since ASU lost I am not as excited about getting to that game.






















Okay enough about football and sports... The countdown continues! Only 8 more shifts at PCH and then we are heading to NYC for 1 1/2 weeks! Then it is off to San Diego. We googled the temps in San Diego and the average temp year round is 70 degrees! Hot damn! Get us out of this HEAT!!! So, interruption for a second.. I just had this lady (a patients mom) come up to me cursing and yelling because we just placed a patient in the same room as her kid. What the heck? Why do parents think they can curse and yell at us! I told her to not curse at me and then I proceeded to ignore her! I'm tired of being abused when I care for your kids! Just flat out rude. Anyhow, enough with my soap box. Back to the happy thoughts by Mike Hinchy... Football... haha... Na, I think I was talking about San Diego... We are waiting to hear about our apartment living. We decided not to rent a place on our own because it is way to expensive for a half way decent place. Hopefully we get a nice place with lots of room because we are hoping to have many visitors! Hint Hint...
Next weekend we are planning a trip to Sedona, AZ. We hear the country up there is beautiful. There happens to be a Jazz festival going on in Sedona at that time, so we are also going to attend that. http://sedona-attractions.10-best.info/sedonaparks.html Check this site out to see what we will be enjoying. Slide Rock is suppose to be lots of fun, and taking jeep tours of the canyons is also suppose to be amazing. We will take lots of pictures, so be on the lookout. Well, I guess it is time to check up on my 3 babies. Let me tell you, 3 babies is not fun. I have changed so many dang diapers tonight. Let me tell you that working as a Pediatric nurse is excellent birth control. Abby and I joke all the time about never having kids. We have 3-4 different kids every night we work. Plus, we are having so much fun traveling all over and enjoying this amazing country. Who has time for kids, right? Na, we will most definitely have kids, but not for a while. Thank God I married young... haha... Thanks again for reading. The nurse manager on the floor is talking w/ that rude lady right now. I hope I don't get in trouble for telling her to chill the heck out... haha... who cares right.. 8 more shifts! :) Anywho, ya'll be good and please don't forget about us! Remember to cheer hard and loud for the GIANTS and the PANTHERS!!!!!!...
In His peace,
Love to you all,
Michael and Abby

p.s. please continue to pray for my grandparents...

One more month...

The title refers to our time left in Phoenix. Abby and I are both ready to get out of here and venture into California. Things have been pretty boring since we last spoke, well I should say until this past weekend. We got back from the Grand Canyon and it was back to the grind of working, sleeping, sweating, and running from scorpions. Work is work. Not much going on there. We are both really tired of Phoenix Children's Hospital. We have come to learn that this hospital is more about the paperwork and JACHO, then their interest in the sick kids. A sad but true realization. Kaiser Permanente here we come! Once again Abby and I found ourselves in need of a break from the daily grind that only Phoenix has to offer. Like I mentioned in my last blog, I surprised Abby with the tickets to go watch the Panthers take on the San Diego Chargers. We left Friday afternoon and arrived in San Diego around 9:30pm. It was a nice drive, and a bit lonely at times. Abby tried to stay awake after working the night before. She went to get a pedicure, went shopping at ULTA (for the guys out there, ULTA is a girly girl store; full of makeup and girl products). She made it home, showered, then fell asleep on the couch for about a half hour before I came in trying to wake her up to get on the road. She figured it would be easier to just get everything done before leaving and just sleep in the car.

She slept all right, but a sacrifice I was willing to take for her to get packed and on the road in time to miss the afternoon traffic. About half way into the trip we arrived in Yuma, AZ. Have you seen 3:10 to Yuma? If you haven't, see it. If you have, that is what Abby and I were expecting. Silly us for thinking that because it was closer to a hillbilly town in NC then what we had envisioned. You are not missing much my friends. After getting lost in Yuma, trying to find dinner, we made it the rest of the way to San Diego. Needless to say we crashed early that night trying to rest up for a fun filled day of touring San Diego.
We tried to wake up early on Saturday because we knew we wanted to try and visit the city and also tour the possible apartments that we could potentially live in when we head there in October. To make a long story short, we made it to Ocean Beach, CA around noon. We were amazed by the beauty of the Pacific. The sand was soft and pure and the air was actually cool and fresh. There was a dune right where we parked. On the right side of the dune was a dog park. We were amazed by the number of dogs and their owners having the time of their lives. The dogs were running up and down the beach, splashing in the water, and chasing each other all over. On the left side of the beach we found countless beach volleyball courts, surf boards and people laying out. Abby and I quickly moved down to the water so that Abby could step foot in the Pacific Ocean for her very first time. The water was cold but tolerable. We then decided to toss the football around for a bit. What is a trip with me without throwing the football?

We stayed and took in the sights for a bit, then heading to Newport Ave to look for surf shops in hopes of buying something cool. No luck there, but it was neat to just walk around this neat little surf town. After enjoying Ocean Beach we decided that it was time to check out all the apartments. I won't bore you with the details of that, so moving on....

That night we decided to get dressed up and head downtown San Diego. Before getting dressed, Abby cut my hair. My genius brain thought it would be a good idea to use the towels as a catch all for the hair, then wash the hair down the drain of the shower. You probably know where this is going. After I took a shower, I noticed hair backing up. Yep, you guessed it, I clogged the shower. Knock Knock, Abby frantically tries to hide (due to the embarrassment of my feat), it's the repair man for the hotel. Yep, I had to make the call to the front desk because I could not fix the problem myself. It was an easy fix, but embarrassing as I watched this man pull clumps of my hair out of the drain. I'm not the brightest man. Come on now, I know you all have tried that. I thought if you washed bits at a time, it would easily flow down the drain. Let's just look at this as a learning lesson for all those reading. It kind of reminds me of Petedude's story of flushing Q-tips down the toilet. If you haven't heard this story, 1. try to hear it, 2. don't ever do it. Enough said. Abby quickly got ready and we headed downtown. From the area we will be living, downtown is about a 10 minute drive. Very pretty downtown and neat to walk around. We headed to the Gaslamp district and ate dinner at this quaint Italian Restaurant. Incredible food, but still not as good as Casa Carbone! We stuffed ourselves, walked around a bit more, then headed home because Sunday was shortly upon us.

As you probably seen from the picture above, we made it to the Chargers vs. Panthers game. Abby was decked out in her Peppers Jersey and as you can see I tried my best to dress as a tried and true panters fan, but we all know where my allegiance lies. We quickly heard boo's and shouts about our choice of team. We arrived at Qualcomm Stadium about an hour before kickoff. We walked around and watched the panthers warm up. We were surprised with how good our seats were, but we were still surrounded by Chargers fans. The game was the most incredible football game we have ever witnessed. An instant classic and a shot to the egos of the chargers and their fans. We left quickly, watching our every move. Everyone was yelling at us and the other panther fans, but we simply smiled and moved on. The stadium was extremely loud, and a very fun atmosphere to experience. We hope to catch a few more games when we move out there.

We made it home around 11:30pm. Now we are just sitting on the couch watching TV. What are we watching you might ask? Well, let's just say it's unfortunately not ESPN. (our apartment is like living with the cavemen. Since Jay thinks I'm a direct descendant, I guess that analogy is only that much more fitting. Only basic cable, a constant cat pee smell, the most uncomfortable couches, and extremely grumpy neighbors) As you can see, we are ready to get out of this place. We work tomorrow night, then Wednesday and Thursday, then 3 more weeks left. We are heading to NYC come the beginning of October for another football game. This time, we are heading to East Rutherford NJ to watch the NEW YORK FOOTBALL GIANTS!!! We plan to spend about 4 days in the city, then head to upstate NY to spend some quality time with my grandparents, aunt and uncle. Should be an incredible vacation before coming back to Phoenix to pack up and move to San Diego. 4 more weeks people, that is it! How exciting. I guess that is it for now. Thanks for reading. It is about time to head to bed. We hope you all had a great weekend, and we hope you all have a wonderful week. We love and miss you all.... Till the next post...

In His Peace,

Love to all,

Michael and Abby Lee...

A breath of Fresh Air...

Hello to everyone... Do hope this message finds you all doing well. Abby and I are both back at work. I guess we can't be to disappointed because we have only worked 1 day since July 29th! Much to our dismay we both became sick the night of our last blog. I had a pretty nasty sore throat with a head cold and Abby was feeling more malaise with an on again off again sore throat. We definitely attribute our sickness to the lack of sleep over the past couple of weeks. I know I know you are probably saying, well dang they have been on vacation for the past month. This my good friend is true, but unfortunately we have been working night shifts for the past 3 months, so trying to adjust to day shift and to Eastern Standard time kicked our butts! If you have never tried to orient, un-orient, then reorient to night shifts before, you just don't understand. Okay, enough of the pity party, to the good stuff. After a weekend of being sick, Monday morning rolled around.



Around 11am on a beautiful HOT Monday morning here in Phoenix AZ, Abby and I were sitting on the couch watching the Olympics and discussing how much we hate the desert, I brought up the fabulous idea to head north. "Let's go to the Grand Canyon today." So we did. We left Phoenix around 2pm and made it up to Flagstaff, AZ around 4pm. Much to our enjoyment, Flagstaff was beautiful. The first thing we noticed was that it was in the low 80's. There was a nice cool breeze and there were trees all around us. (We honestly watched the thermometer in the car the entire way up, enjoying seeing the temp drop and drop and drop) We were saying that Flagstaff reminded us a lot of Boone, NC. A nice little college town surrouned by green mountains. NAU, Northern Arizona University, sits in downtown Flagstaff. We went into an Embassy Suites to just pick up brochures on where to possibly stay (since our trip up was being made without hotel reservations), and the first question I asked was "where do the Arizona Cardinals practice." The lady quickly responded with "right next to the dome on the campus of NAU." "Do you have a practice schedule?" "Why yes I do." she replied. I looked with great excitement... Why I'll be, they were actually practicing right at that moment. Abby and I rushed over to the practice field and watched about 30 minutes of practice. There wasn't a whole lot going on, but I was able to spot many of the players. Matt Leinert, Anquan Boldin, Edgerrin James, and Kurt Warner were a few of the players spotted. I have pictures, so will try and get them up ASAP. The practice was very chill. They only had on shoulder pads, helmets and shorts. I guess when you get to that stage, there isn't much to do in the way of learning how to tackle, etc... they were basically running through plays. #11 Larry Fitzgerald made an amazing catch down the sideline to beat the DB covering him. It was then that I was able to witness my first ever NFL trash talk session. Larry definitely let that DB know that he was beat. Good times! Dark clouds were rolling over head so they cut practice short. I said "what's up man," to Anquan Boldin #81, and he said "what's up" back! I also said hello to Kurt Warner. I tried to get Abby to take a picture with Matt Leinart, but she chickened out. All this after saying to me "you know Matt Leinart is going to want to marry me when he sees me right?" What a chicken. I have to admit, I'm not sure what I enjoyed most. Was it watching the quarterbacks compete in their end of practice passing challenge, or the cool breeze coming in from the storm, the beautiful plush scenery, or taking my flip flops off and feeling the cool GREEN GRASS between my toes? Tough to choose.





After watching all the players exit the field, we headed back to the Embassy Suites to get a room. After getting all settled in we headed to the lobby for a managers cocktail session. We enjoyed some free adult beverages and some popcorn while watching the Giants romp the Browns. We were referred to this one bar/restaurant for food and to watch the Olympics. After dinner we headed home and were in bed by 11pm. The next day I quickly woke from the sounds of a nearby Train motoring down the track. I think it was around 6am when this train decided to lay on it's whistle like if they were trying to scare Hancock off it's tracks! I mean seriously, 6am?!?!?! Ridiculously loud! We got out of bed around 8am and went for the delicious breakfast offered by Embassy. A full breakfast, made to order omelets and all, the USA today outside our door, and the night before cocktail hour made Embassy Suites a must stay. Then it was off to the Grand Canyon...





We arrived at the Grand Canyon around 11am. We ran into the Village for some lunch and to get some postcards, then it was off to the trails. We stopped at many overlooks to catch a glimpse at one of the seven natural wonders of the world. It was incredible. I have been there once before but back when I was 10, but I really didn't remember much. I will not try to describe in words what we saw, you will just have to wait for the pictures to see for yourself. We headed down the road to this place called Grandview Point to hike one of their "steep" trails. 40 minutes down we looked back and realized that we better turn around because it was practically straight up! We probably hiked about a mile down into the canyon before heading back up. Honestly, 1 mile down wasn't getting us anywhere near the bottom of the canyon. There were signs for other trails warning people that a hike to the river and back in 1 day is strongly NOT recommended. There was a poster hanging by the entrance of this trail talking about a marathon runner getting stuck on the trail because of shear exhaustion and lack of supplies. Not the kind of stuff you want to read before venturing down into the Grand Canyon. Abby and I were stacked with water and Fiber One bars, but honestly we knew our limits and only went down a short way. We were able to take many amazing photos all of which we will try to post (once again our Internet is horrible where we are staying). To our surprise it only took about 35 minutes to hike up. We then headed back to Flagstaff to eat dinner and to check out more of their downtown area. The drive to Flagstaff from Phoenix was about 1:45. The drive to the Grand Canyon from Flagstaff was about 1:30, so it really wasn't a bad day and a half trip. We got back to Phoenix around 9pm Tuesday night. To be honest, we were contemplating staying in Flagstaff Tuesday night and then heading to Sedona on Wednesday morning, all because we really didn't want to head back to the desert!



This trip was a great refresher for us. We both are ready to get out of this hospital and the area. A new scene is definitely needed. We both discussed how this trip has reenergized our desire to be travel nurses because of great opportunities like this one. A much needed trip to say the least.