ok, bone-jock's egotistical post REALLY got me riled up. the fact that you all would put a JOB ahead of everything else in your life is utterly ridiculous. as for relocating, if this is the one time when someone would have a chance to be near someone they care about, GO FOR IT. there are tons of orthopedic residencies; 85% of applicants get into one of them. with a 253 on the boards, g-dax, you WILL get into one of them.
but, if the love of your life is in california, good grief, by all means try and move there, and if you insult her by claiming your life is more important and she should move, then your a** ought to get kicked out of her life. california residencies are currently in high demand because of location. the programs are searching for good students. these places seem state resident selective, but are often merely forced to do so because they really only see local students rotating. plus, doing a rotation at a given institution instills in their mind that you really are interested in being there. and when your personal life is there, it's an added incentive - don't think that they don't like that fact as well. there is no reason you need a rotation at your home school if you truly have no desire to stay there. if you're hesitant, there's no reason not to try and schedule a cali school for july, along with a home school that same month, and drop the one you don't want to do. good programs that will be hard to get into include ucla, ucsf, and ucsd. stanford has a solid program, probably not top tier, but a good back up. that, and there are about 6 others including usc, uc irvine, uc davis, and loma linda. start researching early and try to get information on the programs so you don't apply to them quite as blindly as the rest of us seem to.
an additional tidbit that someone once told me and i took advantage of: see if you can move one of your third year requirements into fourth year, and do an ortho elective in june. i did that, and wound up with an awesome experience because at that point the two's are almost three's, and they will let you do TONS of stuff, partly because they're sick of the "mundane," and partly because they've already done it a million times. that, and your interns are at the end of their rotation, too, so you generally wind up with a fabulous experience. june rotations are a well-kept secret that i think work highly in an applicants favor.
good luck in third year, and keep in mind that the time frame for applying for away electives is relatively early.
