Student Blog
Living in LA

Warrior Dash and CICLAVIA ⟩
April 16, 2012, by Chris

Living in LA School/Life Balance

Man, this semester has passed rather quickly. It seems like it wasn’t so long ago that I was just entering the program and now I’ll be graduating soon. I’m in the process of trying to find a place to live in San Diego for my upcoming fieldwork experience at California Children’s Services. Aside from that, a few weeks ago my friends and I completed the Warrior Dash 5K obstacle course. Crawling through mud, swimming in extremely cold water, scaling walls, and jumping over fire was the perfect was to punctuate the weekend. Yesterday, my roommate and I attended the bike festival in downtown LA called “CICLAVIA.” The city closed streets throughout downtown and let cyclists from all over LA ride without the risk of getting hit my a absent-minded driver. Next up, I really should start studying for COMPS, I can’t believe it’s almost here.

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March . . . ⟩
March 1, 2012, by Kimberly

Living in LA School/Life Balance

. . . is awesome. Since it is the first of the month and school is not providing me with blog material, I thought it would be good to discuss why March is such a great month! First, our spring break is in March (and in California that means beach days 😊. Second, for us sports fanatics, March is both the time for March Madness and spring training. Third, there are lots of holidays in March, the most popular being St. Patty’s Day when we all get to wear green, my favorite color. And to top it all off, March is officially the first month of spring. I love spring, mostly for the flowers. East-coasters get to experience the seasons for real, but here in Cali we still get to see all of the winter bulbs finally bloom. Walking the neighborhood becomes a colorful display . . . sigh. So Happy March Everyone!

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Everyday I’m Jugglin’ ⟩
February 27, 2012, by Chris

Living in LA School/Life Balance

This past weekend I put off studying for my upcomig midterm in the name of work-life balance. On Saturday I ventured up Figueroa to Staples Center to watch the Los Angeles Kings face the Chicago Blackhawks. The majority of the group was cheering for the Kings, but my roommate from last year and Chicago native was cheering for the Blackhawks. Needless to say that when the game ended in a 4-0 victory for the Kings, he didn’t stop hearig about it. On Sunday I went to the beach for my weekly flag football game, but this time I decided to workout beforehand. I looked up a Crossfit workout to do in the sand and found a brutal one. It consisted of as many rounds as possible (AMRAP) in 20 mintues of 50m bearcrawls, 50m walking lundges and 50m broad jumps. Needless to say, I felt great after the Crossfit workout and beach football. Today’s plan involves working followed by preparing for my upcomig midterm. It’s definitely a tricky juggling act to maintain that balance.

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Dog Park! ⟩
February 21, 2012, by Kimberly

Community Living in LA

I dog-sat for my friend’s terrier mix this past weekend. On Sunday I decided to take him to the dog park so he could get some energy out and hopefully enjoy playing around. I had never been to a dog park, or taken a small dog in my car anywhere before. The first challenge of the outing was where to put the little guy. I grew up with large dogs who always were very content and could only fit in the backseat or the bed of my family’s truck. So I at first put him on the front seat floor where he stayed for all of about 2 seconds before jumping up to the seat. Before I knew it, as we drove, he was climbing farther and farther into my lap. I tried to continue focusing on the road, but by my second turn he was sitting contently in my lap in front of the steering wheel. Since he’s so small I decided to let him stay and just continue driving (I still want to ask my friend if this is his normal riding routine or if I spoiled him a bit) . . . it was kinda cute, I’ll admit.

We arrrived at the dog park and walked up to the entrance gate. There was an area for large dogs and one for small dogs each with nicely manicured running space and benches for the owners. I followed other dog-owners in and let my new friend off his leash into the open space. I watched in humor as the dogs found each other, started chasing games, elicited pets from other owners, and ran incessently in the gated area. I was surprised by the stark personality differences between the dogs and what some enjoyed doing over others. My friend’s dog was very content on his own but would seek out other dogs occasionally. He wouldn’t initiate play, but seemed to like meeting all the other dogs and just being in the open space. Though the dogs were very at home, I found it a challenge to figure out what to do myself. The other dog-owners were either standing or sitting around the dog-park. Should I talk to them? Simply focus on my dog’s play? Walk around? Sit down? Run with the dogs? I had been so focused on getting the dog to the park that it didn’t occur to me to think of my own role during our time there. In the end conversation was struck up with some of the other owners over dogs as they came up and elicited pets from us. I can see how this could easliy become a community of people and of dogs if is was a place that you frequented. Definitely a new occupational environment, but a very fun one to experience.

About 20 mintues later, my little guy was tired out and we headed home. This time he climbed right onto my lap from the beginning and I had to work keeping him from jumping up onto my fore-arms to look out the window. I love dogs, I really do . . . but I have to say it was nice to pass him off to his owners at the end of the weekend. Maybe after grad school a pet will become more feasible. But for now, I am completely happy with the occasional chance to dog-sit!

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Renewing an Occupation ⟩
February 14, 2012, by Chris

Community Living in LA School/Life Balance

Before beginning the Occupational Therapy program at USC I started playing beach flag football. Well, once I moved to the west coast I didn’t have a league to play in anymore. I’ve played football for almost as long as I can remember and not having a league to play in was bothering me. Last week I began searching for leagues throughout Los Angeles and I found one that meets in Santa Monica. I quickly informed a few classmates of this league and built a solid group to start going weekly. The first weekend only three of us went, but more people have expressed interest in playing. Once we got there the games were great. The teams were pretty much even and the organizers try to keep groups of friends together. Finally after playing for about 3 hours we finally called it quits, with me leaving with a pretty sweet sunburn. Next week should be even better as more people should make it out.

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