YEG

Hey good lookin'. Long time no see.

After graduation I spent most of the summer job hunting. At the end of July I began a research position (one-year contract) in Edmonton working on improving walking in people living with Parkinson's Disease. Here is a VIDEO (made by the original pilot program in Calgary) that will give you a general overview of what we're doing. There are four different sites in Canada and multiple sites around the world working with this technology and contributing to a central database. Each Canadian site has a different focus - ours is cognition. Our participants go through a thorough clinical and cognitive assessment before, during, and after their participation in the program. So far the results have been really positive!

Concurrently, I've been working on an application to the U of A's Master of Public Health in Health Promotion degree program. Applications are due January 15th and I have everything ready to go - just waiting on one of my professors to submit a reference. The program is extremely competitive. Last year 800 applicants applied for 80 spots and the competitive GPA for successful applicants was 3.8.

Edmonton has been really good to me so far. Still though, I'm itching to visit my best friend in St. Maarten and my brother in Taiwan.

Soon...

- JB

January 2013: T-Minus 3...

Hello All,

I am already a month into my final semester... only 3 more to go until I have a degree to my name. All that stands between me and that fancy piece of paper are the following 5 courses:

1) Drama - Exploring Creativity
2) Music - Music in Recital
3) Music - History of Jazz
4) French - Advanced Language I
5) Kinesiology - Physical Activity and Health

If a four year degree program ends up taking five years to complete, the fifth year is cheekily referred to as a "victory lap". Usually a victory lap is like any other year in course load and difficulty. I however, have finished my core degree requirements and now need only to acquire more credits to graduate. As such, I wound up with an entire semester of interesting electives mostly outside of my major. I am very thankful that I don't have any core courses left. Maintaining motivation near graduation is one thing. Maintaining motivation near graduation in a victory lap year almost deserves another degree.

Things I have going for me:
- The new roommate isn't crazy! Yay!
- My first three classes all have reputations as interesting and GPA boosting
- I scored awesome groups for my huge French and Kinesiology term projects

Things I have going against me:
- I'm struggling to focus on the here-and-now knowing that the post-graduation transition phase is looming
- Everything I own is on the verge of breaking down (i.e., computer, car, sanity) but must last until May
- Poor-weather and classroom induced cabin fever

Wish me luck! If all goes well and my life gets more interesting after graduation, I will have reasons to blog regularly again.

Cheers,

Jacqueline


 

 

September 2013

Hello Friends,

September is already drawing to a close - indicative of my descent into madness with school work. Actually, most of the madness stems from the ever-looming graduation in the spring. I have heard it referred to as senior-itis and usually it doesn't hit until second semester, but the longing to be done school has taken an early hold on me.

Unfortunately, this means planning for post-school has also hit and it is probably more difficult than anything my teachers have thrown at me. I have changed my plans about 12 times in the last 3 weeks alone. Everything from Finland to Toronto to Montreal to Edmonton to Vancouver to Calgary to staying in Lethbridge... and I'm no closer to figuring it out. Well, I must admit I have a leaning. But as those who spend any amount of time with me know, that is likely to change in the very near future.

Highlights of September include attending a potluck held by my religious studies professor. There's nothing quite like watching sober on the sidelines while a whole faculty slips into the realm of drunken shenanigans. I also met a lovely lesbian couple with an adorable infant. It was an interesting night to say the least. Other highlights of the month included being recruited by my chiropractor to work his booth at student events and getting paid to do so and attending a birthday party that was comprised of people who wanted nothing more than to play Yahtzee around a fire. I yahtzee'd on my first roll.

October promises to be cold, windy, but really just more of same.

FYI: Today's wind was 74 km/h and I walked home from school. Never again.

Cheers,

Jacqueline

PS: If you want to read the entertaining blog of my brother's adventures of teaching in Taiwan, I would highly recommend it. He updates more frequently which is another bonus! Click here!

One more go around...

Hello Everyone!

Back in the bridge and back to blogging!

School starts on Wednesday. I have 8 courses left in my degree and will knock four off in each semester. This first semester will consist mostly of night classes which will be strange to get used to after a summer of 9:00 am - 5:30 pm work days.

Summer highlights included: family trips to Virginia, Missouri, and California, hiking with friends, lots of time out at the farm, lots of hot yoga, biking, getting last second passes to the international fireworks competition finale, and time with my brothers (incoming and outgoing).

There are two major factors that are going to make this year particularly interesting.

1. I finally sucked it up and bought a car. Or rather, a car was practically given to me. The bf got a new car and is selling his old one to me for next to nothing. It is going to be quite a different experience having such mobility and freedom after 22 years of being restricted to wherever I could walk, bike, or bus to.
2.  The bf is moving down to Lethbridge. He's finishing one more work tour and then will join me for 8 months here before we decide what our next move is. 

My goals for this post-secondary victory lap are to maintain my GPA, get a good gig volunteering, get heavy into the Lethbridge hot yoga scene, and make lots of time for my family down here - because after this, I'm outta here!

I'll keep you posted.

Jacqueline

Summer 2013 Part 1

Hi Crew,

Summer is half over already!

The last two weeks have been one graduation ceremony after the next. Steven, Justin, and Ryan all graduated within 5 days of each other. So what's next for our heroes? Steven has moved back down to Calgary to start his residency at the new South Calgary Health Campus, Justin leaves for Taiwan in August to teach ESL, and Ryan has decided to move to Lethbridge with me in the fall.

In other fun news, Jason just got back from a trip to South Korea and Japan. It started as a work/school conference in South Korea where he presented a poster of his research and snowballed from there.

All this travel makes me jealous... which is why I have jumped on the invitation to go to Virginia with my dad and step mom this year. I leave in 8 days and will be gone for just over a week. In August, I will also be doing an annual camping trip with friends and then attending a family reunion in Missouri before spending a few days over in California. It's not Europe but it'll do :-)

In the meantime, I've just been working away. As always, nothing inspires returning to education quite like temporary summer jobs. I've been filling my evenings with my latest addiction: Hot Yoga. Ohhhhhhmigosh. Who would've thought sweating it out in a 35C room would be not only enjoyable but addictive? I went once, took the next day off to see how I was feeling, and then went the next three days consecutively. It is the single most incredible workout I have ever experienced in my life. The whole holistic approach to exercise, incredible teachers, a great facility near my house, solid results, and an enthusiastic partner in crime has made this one of the greatest physical activity opportunities I have had to date. If I had to pick right now, I'd say the discovery of this studio has been the greatest part of my summer so far and will be the thing I miss most when I'm back in Lethbridge where hot yoga is extremely limited.

Of course, summer is filled with lots of small things to look forward to. This weekend there is a housewarming party, a graduation party for a friend who just finished optometry (and was super lucky and got to do a practicum in Stockholm), an anniversary, and hot yoga before hosting a friend of mine who is in town for Sunday night.

Now if only the rain would stop. The only thing missing this summer has been the sun.

Cheers,

Jacqueline

At Justin's Grad: Some things never change :)

Summer Kick Off 2013

Hi Friends,

I have settled back home in Calgary for the summer and really look forward to spending the next four months with family and friends in the city. I'm working as an optometric assistant this summer and have had my first 5 shifts already. Lots to learn but should be quite manageable. The fantastic news is that it is close to my house, the hours are steady, and the pay is good. Unfortunately, that means that my days off are a little wonky  and not always consecutive but that's okay. It just means my work weeks get broken up a little more :)

I've been back in Calgary for a total of 6 days and already managed to get out on a 5 hour hike in Kananaskis country and been walking and biking through Fish Creek Provincial Park. My goal is to be outside and active as much as possible this summer. The boyfriend got a new canoe as a grad gift and we're already planning some pretty neat trips. Apparently there is an island in the middle of a nearby river that is a campground. Pretty tempting! Sounds like the annual camping trip with my high school friends will happen too. Otherwise, the only big trip planned this summer is a family reunion in Missouri.

Booo. I was going to upload some pictures from the hike yesterday but apparently I have left the connector cable for my camera in Lethbridge. I'll figure something out later.

As for the semester... finished up great. Got marks that far exceeded my expectations in every subject. Quite a little ego boost as I head into my final year.

Cheers,

Jacqueline

March 2013 Update

Hello Crew,

March is sure a busy time of year, isn't it?

Only 5 weeks of school left. I'm done all exams except finals, only one more lab, 3 more assignments, and one term paper left. I'm starting to feel the crunch of the semester coming to a close. If I get a good head start on things now, I should be okay. Motivation, come to me - please!

The last couple weeks have been mostly dominated by my independent study. Which I realize I never really explained to you in any detail. The official purpose of the study is determine baseline physical activity rates in full-time employed women over the age of 55. This demographic is of particular interest to us because not only do they have the lowest physical activity rates of any other but they also happen to be the most rapidly expanding demographic in the labour force. Coincidence? Who knows. It is quite possible that retaining employment past the traditional retirement age may contribute to keeping people active. Although retirement is commonly thought of as a time when people will be more active, enjoy their leisure time, and so on, it is often not the case. So anyway, how it works is that my professor spearheads a big research project and creates little mini projects within the big project for students to do as independent studies. My study is what I described above. In her study, my study is just a tiny piece. She's looking at functional fitness levels, job satisfaction, how much physical activity and sedentary time these women are engaging in, general health, field of employment, and functional balance. Myself and another student doing an independent study do all the testing for everything and just select what we need for our studies. Basically we've become lab rats. We're testing about 8 women twice a week for hour long appointments each. We send them away with accelerometers which record all their physical activity (like hypersensitive pedometers), have them do questionnaires, record some anthropometric measurements, and test them on the dynanometer and the neurocom machines.

The dynanometer is a functional strength test. They do leg extensions using the knee as the rotational axis on this machine and it controls how many degrees of flexion or extension that they can move through per second. It is a fixed rate so the harder they push against the machine, the harder it pushes back on them to maintain the speed. Here is a picture:

Fun times in the Physiology lab.

We get to buckle and strap them all in so that they are only producing the motion from their knee and not their hip, back, abs, etc. It often really intimidates the women before they know what to expect which can be slightly entertaining for us.

Another funny point that is entertaining is that the lab next door does sprint-interval training for metabolism research on self-propelled treadmills. These things are the noisiest lab equipment you've ever heard. If our participants hear trials going on in the other lab they often get concerned and nervously ask if they will be put through the same high-intensity testing :)

Here's a picture of our lab:

This is only half of our space. There's actually another room off to the left but it wouldn't fit in the picture.

Because I have keys and 24-hour access to the lab, I end up spending a lot of time in there. It is quiet, private, has a bathroom, sinks, tons of counter space, and only my prof and the other independent study student have access. Not going to lie, I feel pretty VIP whenever I'm in there.

Anyway, other than school work I've been trying to do lots of reading lately. Been working on classic authors that I've never had any exposure to but feel I need to be familiar with. In particular, I read "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac and "Old man and the Sea" by Ernest Hemingway.

Also, I ran the 10 km Moonlight Run on March 9th. The weather was much worse than last year and I saw that reflected in my time. I ran 2 minutes and 15 minutes slower than the previous year for a time of 54 minutes exact. I'm still happy with that time though. Running with 2500 people in pitch black through mud and ice isn't exactly the time to be trying for a personal best. The fun thing was that both my independent study prof and the other independent study student in my lab were running it too. The three of us had fun joking that it would count towards are grade at the end of the semester :)

Well, hopefully you were able to understand a bit more about my study and what I've been up to.

Cheers and take care,

Jacqueline

PS: Check out the beautiful flowers a friend of mine sent me. The timing was impeccable - I was really needing a pick-me-up and less than 24 hours later, these showed up on my doorstep despite the fact that I hadn't said anything. I am SO grateful for the people in my life :)

When I first got them...

...a day or two later when they opened up :)