scott, PharmD

Well how about that? I’m alive after all!

To start- I’m sorry that it’s been so long. It wasn’t any ONE thing in particular, just a mixed bag of studying for my pharmacy test (NAPLEX) and my law test (MPJE), moving into a new house, going to Bonnaroo, adopting a new cat, and starting a new job. Looking back at where I left off, I have NO idea where to pick it back up. This blog will be mostly informational to catch you up on what has actually happened. Once we’re all up to speed, I’ll tell you how I feel about it. Sound good?

I’ll be updating you on what music I’m currently listening to while I type just for fun- now? David Gray: ‘This year’s love’

So I graduated. Mom, Dad, Todd, Gma, Gpa, uncle Paul, aunt Rose, Josh, Jesse, and my cousin Kevin were all in attendance and took some pictures. We had a fancy dinner at a country-club the night before and my family got to meet many of my teachers and preceptors. It was a colliding of two entirely separate worlds, but it was good. They called me up to the front the next day at graduation: “Doctor Scott Allen Burka”. It was a weird feeling to say the least. It’s almost like in that very moment I went from fighting to achieve my dreams to thinking “now what?”… Todd, Brent, Josh, Jesse and I sat out on the back porch at the PDC house talking about life for a good few hours the night before- we probably stayed up till 2-ish (Jason Mraz’s new song: ‘I’m yours’). After it was all over the next day, we all went out to eat some BBQ at a local favorite that we had actually visited as a family back in the summer of 2005 (August 1^st, actually). I think if someone had asked me my favorite moment of the entire trip, that may have been it, don’t get me wrong, I really liked graduating- I’ve just never liked being in the spotlight. I don’t think I’d be a very good celebrity. (David Gray: Babylon)

We had a great party that next evening at Charlie Daniels Park- there were a great many well-wishers there and we had a good time—I was having a difficult time just making it around to spend some 1 on 1 time with everybody… aside from the regular close friends/family, Mr. Cox showed up, David Shannon, John Cordell, Dale Sawyer, Wiser, Rachel Spires and her mom, Jordan Hunter and his new girlfriend, Sarah lots of people from church… it was really nice to see so many people that I cared about there in one place—I particularly enjoyed watching HG intermingle with several of the girls from church—and I’ve really enjoyed how he and I have been able to be closer friends now… we were always close, but I think we had different ideas about friendship back in the day that have somewhat aligned in the last couple years. (Coldplay: ‘Death and all his friends’ from their amazing new CD- love it)

That MONDAY I started “Business College” with Target. As I joked with my parents, this consisted of us sitting in a room talking about our feelings all day- and if you know me well enough you know that I can talk about my feelings until the cows come home- so I actually fit in pretty well in the group… my district boss later told me that the people who were teaching the classes had labeled me “the smart one” which I think was mostly because I spoke up and asked questions… our group consisted of 6 new pharmacy graduates and they rotated out teachers in this one room with a big table… this room also had a fully-stocked fridge and snack cabinet- so we didn’t stay hungry… these training days went Monday-Friday, 8am-5pm- though we often were able to get out by 4:30… just sitting and talking…crazy, huh? And to think we were getting paid the entire time! After this initial training, we went around to different stores and worked with different pharmacists going through the training book… this whole time I was also studying nightly for my boards (Coldplay: ‘Lost?’)… I took those on the 19^th and 23^rd of June. I actually felt pretty crummy about the main pharmacy test- I could give you about a 30-minute lecture on the NAPLEX… it’s actually somewhat complicated. It’s a linear (can’t go back after you answer each question), computer-adaptive test… basically the test asks questions about areas you are weakest in- if you get a topic right you don’t get any more questions on that area… if you miss questions in an area, you get more and harder questions on that same subject… I actually didn’t sleep all that well the 4 nights after the test… when I got my grade back, I was actually blown away. I got a 116 with a national average of 100 (what did you get Aryan??). You need a 75 to pass and be a pharmacist- and it felt really good to know that I wasn’t only qualified, but had out-performed the average pharmacy graduate!

Same deal for the Law test several days later—thought it was rough and got my grade back 84 with an average score of 80 (different scale)… (Lights: ‘Last thing on your mind’)—after that test result I got my license number and I was allowed to practice that very afternoon by myself! It was cool… they upgraded my pay scale and title and all that good stuff from “graduate intern” or “executive in training” to “Executive Pharmacist”- (Target is all about calling jobs fancy names to make them sound cooler… it’s funny)

I moved into my new house several days later (pictures coming—I can’t find my stupid camera battery… I might have to resort to using my phone’s camera)—(Jim Sturgess: ‘Across the Universe’)… the house is great- I’m VERY happy with how it all turned out. I learned a TON about the whole process and I feel like one day when it’s time to move I’ll be ready to dive into the process with a much better understanding of all the real-estate terms and what-not. If you’re in MJ I’d love for you to come over sometime and let me show you around- I don’t have an excess of furniture at the moment, but I have enough to function on my own- and the living room is fully functional for watching movies… and I’ve got several. So tell your friends, bring some pop-corn and come on over…

That brings me to the job. So I’m a pharmacist. I have worked in a pharmacy since the summer of 2001 (M.I.A.: ‘Paper Planes’) and I had a very good idea of what I was getting myself into. The functions of a pharmacist were very familiar to me, but there is absolutely no substitute for experience. Being ‘the pharmacist’ is really just pretty wild… people talk to you differently, look at you differently, expect different things from you, show you parts of their body that they wouldn’t have before (rashes and bug bites)… all of these things I KNEW but had not experienced. The pharmacy on my first day was very busy and we were short a technician for several hours that day vs. what they usually staff. It was just a little hectic… and on top of that I was checking prescriptions for the first time (you tend to be a little more deliberate/methodical in verifying the accuracy of something that YOUR initials go on- trust me)—I had just never felt that pressure. I had felt something close to it- but always with a pharmacist with me to take the ultimate responsibility for the quality of service being offered… I could always say “I’m just the technician”—even when I was in pharmacy school when someone called in and said “I need to speak to the pharmacist” I had to put them on hold and get him/her. Now- that’s me. That first day I arrived at 8:15 AM to get my pharmacy key and get an early start on the day. During that first day we got a visit from one of the TOP target pharmacy leaders in the country- he inspected my store and told me what he thought about it, asked me a few questions and then gave me pointers on how to improve our performance in key areas. The whole thing took 10 minutes but it felt like an eternity… he liked what he saw and had a lot of positive feedback. I did some talking and we discovered that we knew some of the same people in Knoxville (he used to work for KMART, small world…) so he liked that. 30 minutes later my tech told me “Kevin’s on the phone” (Kevin is a pharmacist at another store who does all the scheduling- we had talked that morning about a computer problem). I pick up the phone “hey Kevin, what’s up, man?” in an upbeat way—“It’s Matt” said the voice on the other end… Matt is my bosses boss and the person who had a large say in my performance reviews… he told me that I should always answer the phone “this is the Pharmacist, how can I help you?”—I apologized and told him that I had thought it was Kevin and he just told me that it could be a learning opportunity for me- and he asked me to type up a summary of the visit from the visit earlier that day and email it to all the pharmacists in the district (about 30 of us)… that evening was really busy and I was stressing out. My tech left at 7 and we were still really busy. I had to bounce back and forth between the register, phone, and computer… at that point my grandparents from down the road showed up and I had to tell them that it wasn’t a good time and that we’d have to talk later—I got 5 calls from other people in the district asking me how my first day was… todd came in at 9 when I was about to close the gate and I still had a ton of work to do back there… he went home to get some things for his trip back to Knoxville and at 10:30 when most of the work (filling scripts, paperwork, cleaning, organizing, putting up the day’s delivery of drugs) was done the security guard told me that I had to leave and that they were about to close the store—I met Todd out in the parking lot and we got some Taco Bell and went to Kroger to get some essentials… I actually gave him a big hug because, basically, I really needed one after that day… that first day actually happened to be the first day of the month, which is always the busiest day of the month… every day since has been much better and honestly I’m really looking forward to working this weekend when things will be SLOWER… somehow I missed that “Mt Juliet is the busiest Target pharmacy in Nashville”- who knew?! I was going to target to get a lower work-load but ended up getting a pretty full plate… there are other targets in this area, and I’m not making this up, that will do less than 1/3 the number of prescriptions we fill at MJ… isn’t that nuts?

Ok I need to go to bed soon… I’m forgetting a lot of stuff- BONNAROO for starters… I’ll just have to cover that one later… you saw my pictures from that, right? (see below)

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST- please consider these fine DCI videos from this season. I’m very much looking forward to July the 25^th as it may be only 1 of 2 shows that I’m going to make it to (MTSU)… I’ve got 2 of my favorite pharmacy underclassmen making the trip from Memphis that day to go to the show with me- should be awesome… and we’ve got the best seats we’ve ever had for this one… the top row of the bottom section, right in the middle middle… couldn’t pick any better seats if the stadium was completely empty and I had my choice of any 6 seats…

the last 30 seconds of both of these videos= awesome. Crown is doing really well this year so far- bluecoats beat them at their last head-to-head meeting, but I've got a feeling crown might pull ahead- the show just has lots of GE... dang... and 1812 overture for the last part of their closer- that's just cool.

The bottom (bluecoats) is my favorite minute from any corps this year... I'm still not that into the first half of their show ("The Knockout"), but this part to the end is great in my book... I'm really glad they are finally letting the brass play out some more- not to mention them going from a 64-member horn line to a 72 complete with the (now standard) 12 tubas. They are singing at the end "I am leaving, I am leaving, but the fighter still remains. Ahhhhh...." I really like that part!