Our First Visitor in NYC!

Before Brandon headed out to England for his clinicals, he came and spent a few days with us in NYC. It was his first trip to New York! Unfortunately Richie had to be at the hospital during the day, but luckily Cesar was available to hang out with us and put up with us. We had a fun time! We spent one day just hanging out and showing Brandon around where we live and one day we went into the city. It was really cold the day we headed into Manhattan! We rode the bus and subway the entire way....which is a big step for me! Before this, I hadn't been on the bus or subway yet since we moved here. Richie takes the bus to his hospital daily but I hadn't had the experience yet! Thank goodness Cesar was with us! We had a fun time with Brandon in town! I was the photographer of the day...as you can tell by the pictures! I made Brandon take some of these pictures as he was refusing...LOL! I couldn't believe that part of the Hudson was frozen where there was no current. It made me even more sympathetic for all of the airline passengers that were standing in the water several days ago waiting to be rescued.

We took the subway all over the city! We went to Ground Zero, Battery Park to see Lady Liberty, NYU campus, Grand Central Station, Bryant Park, and Times Square. We had a BUSY BUSY day! We ended up having lunch at Juniors in Times Square. They have the best cheesecake ever! Bobby Flay did a throw down with the original Juniors in Brooklyn. It was yummy!
Hope everyone is doing well! We're slowly but surely finding our way in NYC! Richie is busy in the hospital and I'm working again. We are both busy and loving it! I'm so proud of Richie...he's learned so much in just a few short weeks. Keep in touch! WE MISS YOU!
Love,
Candace and Richie

Candace Meets the NYFD...

Richie had his first day of call on Saturday so he was gone EARLY that morning! I luckily had a day off from work so was just resting up and relaxing. All of a sudden I heard a fire alarm going off. I wasn't sure if it was from the upstairs apartment or not. I quickly checked for signs of fire but none were present. Then I heard water....lots of water. I opened our closet door and there was water leaking from the ceiling, LOTS of WATER! It came rushing out all over me and our clothes! I called my building manager first. At first, I thought that the neighbors upstairs had a tub or toilet overflowing. (Lets just say that they are new to this country from Africa and are still finding their way around!)

I called 911 and tried to explain to them that it was "raining" in my apartment and our fire alarms were ALL going off. After several attempts, they dispatched the fire truck. As I was waiting on them, I wanted to keep as much as I could dry so I started throwing down anything I could find to soak up some of the water that was now coming through the kitchen, over the dining table, and closet. I quickly placed trash cans, buckets, Tupperware all over to get the fastest leaks.

Then I went outside to join my neighbors and wait on the firemen to come. It was freezing and I was in crocs with holes because in an attempt to grab other shoes, it was raining on them and all of my socks were soaked! I was also soaked because I had been drenched trying to keep all of our clothes and bedding from getting wet. It was not snowing at the time, but it was FREEZING outside! I didn't feel so retarded when my neighbor had on flip flops...LOL. I texted Richie at the hospital just to let him know that I had called 911 and it was "raining" in our apartment but that I was doing okay. I also called Cesar hysterical since Richie wasn't home.

The firemen showed up and busted down a couple doors, shut off the water valve, and quickly figured out that there was a busted pipe on the 3rd floor in the attic. I was blessed that Richie's resident let him come home for the day so he was there to be with me! And of course, Cesar came over too! So, it was a PARTY! The manager of our building was great during this mess! The electrician, plumber, and builder showed up within minutes. They came with buckets and mops and quickly started helping us get the water out so the wood floors wouldn't be damaged. They checked all electric outlets before they turned the breakers back on. Reggie was out of town so Richie kept checking on her place to make sure it was okay and it was. They took all of our soaked clothes, blankets, and towels and sent them to the cleaners for us. They came over yesterday to check on this and today they are coming to fix all of the problems (repaint, fix the sheet rock, etc.) Lets just say that I am very impressed with them!

If medical school isn't enough to "wrap our heads around" we always seem to have more things going on in our life. I know its just to keep us on our toes!!! Just thought I'd share another one of our adventures! I of course went from crying to laughing hysterically that this actually happened to us. I had to take a few pictures to share! Fun times in NYC!
Love,
Candace and Richie


P.S. My neighbors upstairs thought it would be a great idea to take the buckets of water and dump them out to help. The only problem is they felt it was another great idea to dump it down the stairs in 15 degree weather. Richie was cracking up about this. Our manager Steve then had to shovel the ice off of the stairs and salt it. But there were icicles left as proof!

A New York Disaster...

I was working at a hospital in Long Island when I was told that there had been a plane crash in the Hudson River. We were immediately placed on disaster diversion by administration. All in about 5 minutes we were told that all patients in the ER had to be moved out in preparation for this disaster. So, of course, in perfect ER style, it was complete chaos (as it usually is). It was announced on the hospital intercom that disaster preparations were taking place. About an hour later, we were then told we would not be receiving any of the patients from this accident. I am thankful that there were no deaths in this very traumatic accident! These pictures were found on yahoo news online. Its amazing to know that there were no major injuries in this accident.
During times of disaster, I really appreciate and respect all of the EMS personnel that risk their own lives every single day to help save another. That is what its all about, especially in Emergency Medicine! That is why we all do what we do in the medical profession....to help save and protect others because we truly care.

The Hamptons

There are many things that Richie and I are planning to do on our weekends off. We have always heard of the Hamptons and decided that we would take a ride out to Long Island to check it out. The Hamptons refers specifically to the towns of Southampton and East Hampton on the east end of Long Island, New York. It was about an hour and a half drive from where we live. Cesar came along with us. He used to work in the Hamptons, but hadn't been there in such a long time. It was nice to see. Most things were closed for the season. There were apple orchards, wineries, lots of shopping, and dining restaurants. We loved seeing the different style homes and beach houses. This area was a far cry from NYC....Much Much different! There was actually lots of grass and land...and compared to NYC, its very different! We found an entrance to the beach so that we could check it out. It was cold and we were the only people around. This town surely does "close down" during the winter months, which is totally understandable. We will definitely go back again during the summer to spend the day at the beach and test out the wineries in East Hampton.
This past week was very exciting for us. Richie completed his first week of Internal Medicine clinicals! He was supposed to be on call Friday night but luckily got out of that because his resident trader with another. This phase of medical school so far seems much easier than when we were living in St. Maarten. I actually get to see him daily! Its great! We hope everyone is doing well! We miss you guys and will keep you posted on our life in NYC!
Love,
Candace and Richie

Our New Apartment...

We love where we are living. We are in Fresh Meadows and its less than 10 minutes from where Richie is doing his clinicals. We lucked up and found this apartment on Craigs list! I love it! It is SO nice living in the USA again with real sized appliances and oversized furniture!

The Move to the Big Apple...

Richie and I left home for New York on Saturday, December 27th. Its weird because when we first left for St. Maarten...we left on the same day only 2 years earlier. We first went to spend the night with my grandmother in Tallulah to attend one of my best friends wedding in Monroe, Courtney and Jorge. The wedding was fabulous and she looked like a princess! We are so excited for them! They are actually in New York for their honeymoon! We left Tallulah early the following morning to begin our 22 hour drive to New York. The drive was not as bad as we were expecting. We decided that we would go halfway and spend the night but ended up going further so we would only have about 8 hours of driving time the next day. We spent the night in Roanoak Virginia. The hotel was beautiful and a very nice and much needed break from the car!We left Roanoak early the next morning (before 7 am) so that we could get to our new apartment at a reasonable time. We had a quite boring day of driving, lots of interstates and not much traffic until we hit Jersey. Wow, did things change. We were using our GPS the entire route because it told us exactly what lane to be in and for how long we would be in that lane. We waited and waited and waited and went through a couple of tunnels that was to bring us into Manhattan and then we would take another bridge to Queens to our apartment. Well, it brought us to Manhattan and "spit" us out right into the city, which by using our GPS we thought would be no big deal...WRONG! Our GPS couldn't pick us up because of all of the tall buildings so we were completely lost. Luckily for me, Richie is smart and we finally found our way out of Manhattan and into Queens!We spent the rest of last week shopping with Cesar and trying to get settled into our new place. We can't thank Cesar enough for what he has done for us this week! We love our place! It is starting to feel a little like home, but will never be the real deal because we don't have all of our friends and family, BUT...we will adjust. The location is perfect for Richie's hospital, Flushing Medical Center, and very close to where I am going to start working next week, Long Island Jewish in Long Island. We are both only about 10-15 minutes away so its perfect! It snowed two days last week but nothing stayed on the ground yet, thank goodness! I have been freezing and Richie is loving all this cold weather! Below is a picture of Richie in front of our apartment and the other is just our place! I'll show more pics when its clean...ha ha ha. We'll keep you all posted on our adventures!