{"id":1910,"date":"2013-11-12T09:10:44","date_gmt":"2013-11-12T14:10:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/updates.xephalon.net\/?p=1910"},"modified":"2013-11-12T09:10:44","modified_gmt":"2013-11-12T14:10:44","slug":"decisions-decisions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/2013\/11\/12\/decisions-decisions\/","title":{"rendered":"Decisions, Decisions"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"2013.11.12.a\"\"2013.11.12.b\"<\/a>“This is the moment.” Mike the photographer gestured to me to look at my watch. It was 9:10am, November 12, 2013 … 9-10-11-12-13. Clever. There are moments in life that can forever define your future – the forks in the road, the branch points, the decision trees. My past two weeks have been a long, agonizing process of self-reflection, as I juggled the decision to pursue one of two job offers in Sacramento. To clarify, there were no “wrong” answer, as both positions were incredible – one a well-funded clinician-scientist faculty position in a collegial academic department; the other a premier, lucrative retina-only private practice with smart, friendly, and highly-motivated partners. A year ago, I would’ve been happy to have any job in NoCal to be with my wife. Yet, the two options I now face span two ends of a spectrum that straddles the ideal balance of research and clinical work that I had envisioned. I found solace in long discussions with friends, family, and colleagues from various stages of my career. I know in the end, I will have to just go with my gut and follow my heart, and take life as it comes. I felt the stress somewhat relieved at our fellowship interviews last week over drinks<\/a> with the applicants and snacks<\/a> with classmates from residency. In the meantime, I also completed round 4 of my instant noodle competition. As always, scores are for soup base, then noodles.<\/p>\n

1. Weichuan Miso Vegetable Flavor<\/a> (7, 5) – Good fermented soup with lots of goodies, but boring sub-par noodles reminds us of Weichuan’s mediocrity.
\n2. Vifon Instant Porridge Chicken Flavor<\/a> (5, 7) – The well-textured porridge smells just like the real thing, but tastes more salty than chicken-y. Also, not technically a noodle.
\n3. Sapporo Ichiban Miso Ramen<\/a> (6, 5) – Salty soup and floppy noodles reiterates the disappointment that is Sapporo Ichiban. Two thumbs down for such a promising name.
\n4. Nongshim AnSungTangMyun<\/a> (8, 8) – The amazingly hearty, subtly-fermented broth is paired with noodles with just the right texture, inching past their tried and true Neoguri.
\n5. Good Bean Vermicelli – Artificial Minced Pork Flavour<\/a> (6, 7) – Little rubbery meat balls slightly elevates the spicy-salty soup, and is paired with above-average bean vermicelli.
\n6. JML Artificial Spicy Hot Beef Flavour<\/a> (4, 5) – The bowl was so spicy that I could barely taste the soggy noodles, or my tongue, after the fact. Not for the faint of heart.
\n7. Vina Acebook Mi Lau Thai Seafood Flavor<\/a> (5, 4) – The somewhat umami yet ambiguously-flavored soup does little to complement the soft, rubbery noodles.
\n8. Six Fortune Broad Instant Noodles<\/a> (7, 8) – A flavorful broth with just the right amount of kick pairs well with a nice, springy broad noodles that stand out from the rest.
\n9. Mama Hu Tieu Nam Vang<\/a> (4, 6) – Mama makes pretty solid rice noodles, but all their broth seasoning seem to taste the same.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“This is the moment.” Mike the photographer gestured to me to look at my watch. It was 9:10am, November 12, 2013 … 9-10-11-12-13. Clever. There are moments in life that can forever define your future – the forks in the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1910"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1910\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.xephalon.net\/updates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}