Valentine's Day

Ellen came to visit this weekend, and we made the most of our time together. On Saturday we went to see Niagara Falls. Part of the Falls is in the United States and the other part, Horseshoe Falls, is primarily in Canada but visible from both sides of the border. We didn't have our passports with us, so we confined ourselves to American Falls. I'd never seen Niagara Falls in person, and I was duly impressed.

One thing that struck me, apart from the spectacularism of the Falls themselves, was the smallness of the surrounding state park. A display inside the visitors' center said that Niagara Falls State Park is 400 acres, 300 of which are underwater. 100 acres is a lot, but the parking lot, viewing area and observation tower were not spacious. Ellen and I didn't feel overly crowded, but there were only a handful of other people in the park since it was the middle of February. Things may be different during the summer!

Erie CC is on its Presidents' Day break, so I have today and tomorrow off. My stroke unit clinical, rescheduled twice by the hospital, is a go for Wednesday morning, and then the PALS written and skills exam is on Thursday. Next week begins geriatrics, I think, and then we start International Trauma Life Support in early March. Once ITLS is over, we'll be only six weeks or so from the end of the didactic portion of the program. It's hard to believe we've come this far so soon!

In other news, Nate Robinson of the Knicks became the first three-time winner of the NBA Slam Dunk Contest on Saturday. I was pleased about Robinson's victory, but overall the contest was a disappointment. Consider the 1988 contest, in which Michael Jordan defeated Dominique Wilkins, Clyde Drexler, Spud Webb and four others. Where was the star power this year?