Island Med Student

It’s official. The first blanket of snow in 2009 is coming down upon New York City. Micah and I caught the first bit of it on our way home from the grocery store today. It stopped for about an hour, and then started again in full force. It’s calling for 12-18 inches in our area in Brooklyn. I can’t wait to see how much accumulation we actually get. (I’m hoping for 3 feet!)

A little while ago I took my doggies Scope and Molly for a walk and secret playtime in the park (please don’t tell the park authority). It’s been many months since I’ve seen snowflakes and I had almost forgotten how magical they are. I really, really do love the snow. There is something so wonderful about looking up into the sky and watching the sparkling white flakes coming down. I love the “smell” of the snow, the cold feeling of it against my cheeks, and the sound of the crunching of it under my feet.

As much as I do love warm weather, I don’t think I could live my life without at least the occasional snowfall.

Please enjoy the crappy (sorry, it was dark, and I had two crazy dogs on leashes) video I took about an hour ago on my doggy walk. It surely didn’t capture what I was feeling at the moment, but perhaps you get the idea. Let it snow!!

I’ve been converting very, very old VHS video footage from my family’s home movie collection for the past few weeks. I thought it would be fun to share two short clips from my childhood. The first one is me trying to look cool while rollerskating (and wearing tight-rolled jeans!). And the second is me attacking my younger sister, Briana. Yes, I did torture her from time to time. But she forgives me now.

Enjoy!

This is the very bestest.

Kendra Sings in Auto-Tune from Micah Walter on Vimeo.

Do you believe in life after love?

What happens when:

Kendra has time on her hands +
She has access to a for-real recording studio +
She has an auto-tune plug-in +
She has professional video editing software

?

=This video, that’s what.

My original intention was to prove that with tools like auto-tune and digital processing, one doesn’t need to have any singing talent these days. I have absolutely the WORST singing voice, ever, so I recorded my version of “Believe” by Cher, and then processed it through auto-tune. The result is truly painful. I don’t think my idea is necessarily proven wrong, though. If we had worked on it for days and days, I think we could have turned even my frog throaty voice into something you’d here on the radio.

Next up, Kendra does a T-Pain song.

“People ask the purpose of life when life is not going according to their way. Otherwise, life is so exuberant that if a person is living each moment to the fullest, this question does not even arise. Life is so enormous, that life itself can be treated as a purpose.”

-Sadhguru

Today was supposed to be the first day of my emergency medicine rotation. Of course, in true medical student rotation fashion, I ended up waiting around all morning for a secretary who turned out to not be coming in. I’ll be going back tomorrow to get my actual schedule. I’m pretty darn excited to be back in the hospital. I’ve truly missed it the past two weeks. It’s strange how walking down the halls and smelling that cleaning chemical plus feces smell made me nostalgic for the “good ole days” of surgery.

I then came home and worked on my personal statement for a while. This stupid essay is proving to be the bane of my existence. It’s looking a lot better than it did before, but it still needs a ton of work. I can’t decide how much stuff I should include. I mean, it can be up to EIGHT pages, but that doesn’t mean the admissions committee is actually going to read eight pages of boring crap. Right now, it’s around 5 pages.

I received my final letter of recommendation and completed the rest of my ERAS application. So, as soon as I get this stupid personal statement finished up, my application will be ready to go.

After writing for a bit, I went to the bank and then ate at Taco Bell. Can someone please remind me to never eat again at Taco Bell? I always think it sounds okay, but after I eat it, I feel like there is a rock in my stomach that won’t go away.

Anyway, after letting my stomach settle, I took a long walk with the doggies to Maria Hernandez Park. It was, as always, very refreshing. Scope played with some kids for a while. Scope is a total kid magnet, and he’s so friendly that they always try to steal him from me.

During my walk, I saw about 10 different opened up fire hydrants with tons of kids splashing around and playing in the water. I even jumped in with a few of them. I really love this about Brooklyn. I even saw an entire block party, with a BBQ and music and all the fixins, surrounding a fire hydrant. If that’s not the coolest thing, I really don’t know what is.

Please enjoy the photos above which I took during and after my walk. I would have taken more, but my iPhone is hard to hold steady with 2 dog leashes in my hands and a bunch of kids jumping around. Also, below is a video I took of some kids playing in a fire hydrant’s water. Sorry that it’s so far away. I will try to get a better one next time!

Made from footage taken at our holiday shindig in bmo. How awesome are my friends?!

Click the pic to watch the grooves!

Micah and I just made a grammy award winning music video of “Don’t Dream It’s Over” for Miranda July’s art project, “Learning to Love You More.” I encourage you to read more about it. Also, she directed, starred and produced one of my fave movies (poop back and forth) “Me and You and Everyone We Know.”

And now for the long awaited music video made from the footage shot at Ghazel’s party on Friday night.  Many thanks to Micah, who was the behind-the-scenes man who shot all of the great videos.  I love all of you, Group D!  Click the pic to watch. Enjoy!

I finally made a movie of my much loved Surgery Group D folks. It’s not exactly what I had planned as I am missing a bunch of video footage and photos that other people (I’m talking to YOU, John!) were unable to send me or I couldn’t find. I also had another song planned out to use, but (ah hem, Farrah) was unable to get the song in time.

So, please check out this lovely music video for Group D. Hopefully if I ever get the other videos, photos, and song, I will make yet another video which conveys my obsession with Group D!

Click the photo below to view. Enjoy!