Things are going well here in Soldotna. I’ve focused my time on learning to read echos and trying my hand at endoscopy. Each day I also do a few consults or admissions in the hospital and see a few patients in clinic. There’s a lot of freedom to vary your clinical experience, which has made this a laid back, but valuable experience for me. The docs here are great; many of them were UW residents. John Bramante has had me down to his place several times to see his sled dogs; I even rode in the sled briefly. I’ve been skate skiing almost every day up at the highschool, where there is a great system of trails that is free to use and lit at night. The trails are about five minutes away from the apartment. I’ve seen a few moose carcasses but no live moose yet (which the locals can’t believe), a snow bunny, and about a thousand bald eagles. The bears are asleep this time of year. The medicine experience is great. I’ve seen an abundance of interesting cases. One lady came in with a calcium of 18 secondary most likely to milk alkali. I did another consult on a lady with MRSA pneumonia and found out that she had a huge buttock abcess; we got an echo and found that she also had a right atrial abcess. Taking care of folks like this in this rural setting is a unique and invaluable experience.