Nice Day at the Park

Today we went out to our local park, which is probably the nicest park I will ever within walking distance of.  As we approached the swings I saw a man with three young kids, the youngest a baby in a stoller.  "Poor guy, having to deal with all that I thought."  JT wanted to go on the swings by them and we struck up some small talk and it turned out that the man was a Transplant Cardiologist, visiting from Australia while his Heme/Onc wife did some training!  He is on a sabbatical for the next three months and it sounded like this was the first time was going to be the primary caregiver.

In hindsight, I probably should have had a ready made pamphlet, entitled "How to be a physician and Dad while taking care of your children full time."  Or something better titled, you must understand that this is maybe my specialty!

One thing he mentioned to me that struck me as a very good logical place to start was this: "I've decided to divide my days into thirds, one third we spend outdoors doing something, one third inside, and then the last third my wife comes home and she gets them!".  I think this is a good idea, however the problem I think he will run into after a while is that that final third might cause some difficulties with his wife, who is probably tired from her full day and may want some time with him as well.  I sometimes struggle with the ever increasing amount of "me" time that I can spend on things like this, or probably more commonly wasting it on Reddit, reading the news, or the occasional Minecraft binge.

The second interesting point about this encounter was I had recently read a Reddit post of a young doctor asking for advice on whether/how to tell strangers/first dates/barbers one is a doctor without it affecting the interaction too much.  In this case I'm glad he asked me what I did because it gave us an opportunity to connect, and I think it being honest about it is always the best policy.  I do try and take the focus off of being a doctor somewhat though, by usually framing it as:  "I work for ____ hospital as a hospitalist/nocturnist/doctor" (the last word depending on what I assume the listeners familiarity with medical speak is).  I like this way because it puts the focus more on the hospital system which allows them an easier follow up question.  Just saying "I'm a doctor", usually leads to: "what kind?"

In reading news, I should upgrade my assessment of JT's progress.  I think he can read GRL C-E books without issue on the first try, probably almost 80% of an F or G book too I would reckon.  We are overdue for a library visit (pun intended, and yes we owe them money) to get some new books.