No place like home.

Philosophically, there are multitudes of different opinions on what constitutes "home".  People, places, things, states of mind or combinations of these.  For me, it's difficult to describe how I view "home" because it's more of a feeling I get.  I feel a comfort, familiarity and warmth with floods of old memories and excitement for new ones.  For me, home is not necessarily where I live, though places I live do often become home.

I knew October in LA was going to be difficult for me- the weekend I moved into my apartment is the only weekend I have had and will have in the apartment all month.  To top that off, all of my weekends would be spent with many old friends in all of my favorite places.  This past weekend was the motherload.  First stop:



Sweet Home Chicago
I was only in Chicago for approximately 15 hours, but I have been in love with this city since I was 7 and 15 hours was plenty of time to feel nostalgic and miss my city.  Having just lived there, I really missed the ease and familiarity of getting around- a huge struggle for me in LA.  Because of my limited time (I flew in Thursday night to give a talk at an ALS Nursing Symposium at Northwestern on Friday morning), I couldn't do much or see many people.  I did manage to grab lunch with Gnat after I rocked my presentation and spend some quality time on the El before my afternoon flight to:

Where the Buffalo Roam
This past weekend was Homecoming at Colorado and alumni from across the country, including myself, flocked to Boulder with the hopes of reliving fleeting moments from their college experience and cheer on the Buffs in one of the most un-even and ill advised Homecoming matches of all time.

Posted in Boulder's Daily Camera on game day.

Despite the brutality of the game (we lost 45-2 and 29 of those points were scored in the first quarter) Boulder is a town that never disappoints.  Our stadium looks like this:

Folsom!

We have a live buffalo that leads the team on the field at the start of the game and after halftime:

RUN RALPHIE RUN!!!!!!

And any loss can be medicated with a pitcher of long island from Half Fast:

Joni, Laura, and Me attempting  to forget the game

Boulder also had AMAZING weather and GORGEOUS fall colors:

Landing at LAX on Sunday night was a big let down.  Going home is not as easy as clicking your heels, for me it involved three carefully orchestrated and timed flights, 2 shuttles, 1 cab, 2 car rides, 2 trains, and at the end of it I was back in a city where I'm still not officially working and have yet to establish close friendships.  When I found out I passed my boards last Thursday, I celebrated alone on my couch:

I mean, I'm really not mad about any of this...

And this week has been unseasonably gloomy with a "persistent marine layer" (sidenote: that link just came from Beachapepdia.org- I may have a new coastal survival guide). I've had a few ups and downs with the job this week and I'm just feeling a little down myself.  I know that this is just an off week and that I haven't had much time here and things will get better but right now, if "home is where the heart is" my heart is definitely not in LA right now.