Georgia

Hello again!

As promised, this week's post will be about some of things I love about my hometown Lawrenceville/Suwanee, Atlanta and Georgia in general. This is more of a multi-part post since I have way more to talk about than what I'll say today so I'm sure I'll re-visit the subject again later too.

Lawrenceville/Suwanee:

I grew up right on the border of Lawrenceville and Suwanee so I really consider myself from both areas. I really love it here, and there are lots of reasons I never moved to far away. I live about five miles from the PCOM-GA campus and from school you can reach three different malls within 10 minutes. I love sports and will always make time for a baseball, hockey or football game. About 10 minutes away from school is the Gwinnett Braves stadium, a newly built stadium for our AAA team. We are also just a few minutes away from Gwinnett Arena where you can catch a Gwinnett Gladiators game for cheap or see a great concert. The Arena is huge and so it attracts a lot of big name acts. For example, this March Eric Clapton will be playing there.

Here is a picture from one of the Gwinnett Braves games I went to last summer:

Atlanta:

Atlanta is my home away from home. It's my place to go for anything and everything fun. If we have a "night out" it almost always means a trip to Atlanta. Atlanta is about 30-40 minutes away from campus and that means it's really no trouble at all to hop in the car for dinner or a show. Atlanta is also a great place for sports. We are crazy about the Falcons and I've been to more Braves games over the years than I can begin to remember. I've even seen a few good concerts after Braves' games down on the field. Last summer, Ludacris (who is from Atlanta and a big Braves fan) did a big show after a Braves' win that ended with his biggest hit "Welcome to Atlanta". It's the random things like that that make me love this city so much. 

I also love Atlanta for its concert venues that make for great shows and its visiting events. I always make an effort to go downtown for festivals and street fairs. They can be a lot of fun and make for some awesome shopping. I also try to make it every time Cirque du Soleil comes to town. This tickets can be expensive but Atlanta's Atlantic Station has an area set up specifically for them to set up their tents when they come through. 

Here are some pictures of Atlanta!

Centennial Olympic Park after a light summer shower.

Turner Field

Cirque!

Georgia:

I am big into "outdoorsy" stuff and Georgia is an amazing place to live if you like getting out into nature. The winters are very mild and the summers are hot which make swimming a blast. I love to rock climb so in the spring summer and fall I love to drive to Lafayette, Georgia to visit Rock Town. It's acres and acres of tall granite rock faces that you can climb plus the park contains multiple cave systems that you can explore.

This is one of my favorite rock faces to climb at Rock Town:

Katie

Holiday Break

Hello everyone!

I hope your are all having a wonderful holiday! I am currently on break so today will be a short post. I am spending my time with my friends and family, wrapping presents and putting up the tree. I wish everyone a great season and I will post more very soon.

Lots of love and holiday spirit,

Katie

PS. Expect a good post this coming week about Atlanta and Suwanee. I want to tell everyone about my hometown and why you'll love it as much as I do!

It's beginning to look a lot like PCOM

December is in full swing and that means it's beginning to look a lot like the holidays at school. I love this time of year and it's so fun that my school really gets in the spirit. PCOM is really big on giving back and our students always make a big effort to live up to the task.

This is our school Christmas tree with donated toys and clothes:

There are so many toys it makes our tree look tiny!

It's awesome that there are already so many presents and we're still two weeks away from Christmas. It really makes me smile to see how much we all can and want to give. Pharmacy, Biomed, and DO schools are really an investment of time and money so a lot of students don't have excess spending money to throw around. That's why it's so great that so many people still found it in their hearts to pull together enough to make our communities' holidays a little brighter.

PCOM also had a big event this week for the students. Every year in December the school has a big holiday luncheon. It is always so much fun. They cater the whole thing so the food is amazing and the staff from Philly flies down to serve the students. This year and last the President of PCOM, Dr. Matthew Schure, served all of us (and yes the line was long... students do love free food) with a warm greeting and a smile on his face.

Side Note: I really appreciate how much he gets involved with us here in Georgia. I often see him around campus and he always takes the time to talk to me and ask me about classes. He always makes me feel like he really wants to know and be directly involved with how our students are doing down here.

Anyhow here are some more photos from the luncheon:

Hope ya'll have a great week!

Katie

Study, Study, Study!

Hello everyone!

It's been a busy day and I'm currently studying up for my first test of the term (Integrated Therapeutics II) but I wanted to take a few minutes to give you all an update about my week. The winter term here at PCOM started the week of Thanksgiving but since we were off a few days for the holiday this was our first full week of classes. It has been a long one since we have been covering so much material but everyone is looking forward to Christmas break and that makes things much easier. 

We also had a few fun events going on this last week. When a new term starts the School of Pharmacy socials committee always plans different things to do in the evenings so this week we had karaoke night and bowling night. I didn't get to go to karaoke but I went bowling and had a blast. I am a terrible bowler but it was great to relax and laugh with my friends and one of my favorite professors who came out to join us. 

Here's a picture of some of my friends deep in discussion about the next frame:

Alright it's time for me to get back to studying. Have a great night!

Katie