100!!!!!

Well, Happy Early Thanksgiving!!! And happy 100th blog post to me! For a while there I didn't think I'd ever keep it up this long, but I'm glad I have.

Well, I don't have any cool pix today, but we are heading out to the great white north on Thursday and we'll be sure to bring the camera with us. Hopefully we'll have some pictures of our adventures.

I am also super excited that in a few weeks I'm heading east to see my friend D and her adorable little daughter! It's going to be great. I"ve never seen Boston and I have never seen her daughter (in person of course) and so I can hardly wait! Most of all I'm just excited to see D. She's the one friend I've met throughout the years that is always just a phone call away and always, always keeps in touch. She's so much better at that than me! (Thanks for always calling D!)

Tomorrow morning, though, I have my last excursion into biochemistry (until the weeks before the boards) so good riddance to that. I am pretty worried about that test, there's waaaaaaaaaay too many lysosomal storage diseases. I have a chart that's 9 pages. Ouch. The really great part of this test, though, is that there's loads of stuff about obesity. We had 4 lectures yesterday and 3 today on obesity. Yes, this is a big problem that needs our attention. Does it need my attention the week of Thanksgiving? I think not.

Well, I better get back to it. Less than 12 hours from now and I will be in the thick of it, better shove as much into my little head that I can!

(I already have a bucket of fun getting ready for me in the freezer for after the exam. I am always prepared.)

Things

So I've had some time to think lately and that's gotten me nowhere with school, but it's let me put some things in perspective.

First, I've decided that people hold onto their angst with every bit the tenacity they hold on to their dreams and hopes. Even though things might not be as bad as they make them out to be, very few people want to be told otherwise. They'd rather have the angst to keep them company than to give it up and look at the flip side of the coin all by their lonesome. I find a lot of my classmates in this position right now. We are an angry group. Overall, at the end of the day we are all angry because we have to work hard to end up as doctors, really not such a bad thing. But don't tell anyone that...

I've also been spending more time working on my project with my old boss JW. We do a lot of waxing philosophical about what it takes to really reach students these days. Why can't students see how intrinsically cool this stuff is and let that be their motivation to soak it all up? We go around and around about it, and what I've decided is that the longer you're a student, the more bitter you get about being taught. Likewise, the longer you're a teacher, the more cynical you get about the mental capacity of those you are teaching. I feel kind of lucky that I get to see these things from opposing perspectives. Now if I can just temper my bitterness with cynicism...wait, that might not be the greatest combination... But in all seriousness, I think if I can remember how great it was to see students who were truly interested in the material for the sake of just being interested, it might help take the edge off that stuff that just doesn't seem too "clinically relevant."

Speaking of working with my old boss, I have some exciting news! He's asked me to not only edit the figures in his electronic text book, but write a chapter. That's right friends, LG is gonna get published. I'm super excited. Did I mention its the reproduction chapter? Yep, Birds and the Bees by LG. Cool. I'm excited to do it because I think the hormones involved are really quite cool and I took a fair amount of graduate course work on the subject, so it's definitely something to look forward to!

And in news of looking forward, I completed my registration for the Untied States Medical Liscensure Exam (aka Step 1 of the boards). Yikes. The countdown begins. April 8th. Lots of beer that night. You're all invited. Yes, it's a Wednesday, yes, you still need to come. But in the event you can't make it, I think we'll be trying to get some sort of party together that following weekend so long as we're not out of town on vacay. Something to keep in mind.

Last night we got to see some friends from the college days when one of my college friends was celebrating the receipt of her MBA! Congratulations KV! It was good to see everyone again, I'm glad we made it. And in honor of KV and her husband C:



SuperMugs says hi.

Slacker...

Well, I've been slacking. There's no doubt about it. Although I have had 2 exams since I last checked in, so I've been at least a bit productive. We also had Halloween. J and I just stayed in, but it was a nice night and to get in the spirit I dressed up the dogs! - Before you ask, no I didn't go out and buy them costumes, I'm not that kind of girl -





Unfortunately, them being boy dogs and all, everytime they have to go out the costumes have to come off. Oh well.

Mugs and I have been bonding lots lately. He's a cuddler. Still drives me completely insane when I want to study in the afternoon, but he's pretty cute. He likes to crawl up into my lap and make himself comfortable.



Last week we had a little excitement as J got his windshield smashed by some sort of unidentified flying object on his way to work. We ended up both staying home last Thursday after it happened, he was fine and the rest of the car was fine, but we had a good day anyway.



The next morning I had an exam which was good, then we got to spend a whole weekend hanging out together without any (well much) studying from me. This week is really busy with school stuff, and it will undoubtedly fly right by, then next week we're off to the Great White North for Thanksgiving. To all those already up there, wanna get sick? It's 70 degrees and sunny today....

Personal day

So, sadly I overslept so much today that I actually had already missed the first hour and a half of lecture by the time I rolled out of bed. I blame benadryl. I had an allergy attack last night and had to take some, but I guess I need to start actually measuring the dose of the kiddie benadryl, because this whole gulp and hope it's right approach didn't work out so well. Alas, it's nice to take a personal day! The dogs are sound asleep, I'm working on some school stuff and catching up on some blog reading. Also, I have the TV on. Not great for productivity, but I saw the most entertaining thing. There was a commercial for 7news where all they did was show a video of people riding up the ski slopes on the lift and in the bottom corner they had a countdown; 30 second break from political ads. I thought that was pretty clever. Not to mention appreciated. Seriously, my ballot is already in the mail. I'm over it.

Throughout the last week J and I have been catching up on our netflix movies, which we had been very behind on lately. The reason for that is the fact that we had Atonement. I was underwhelmed. I knew it would be a sad movie, but there are lots of sad movies that are so good you can't help but like them. This one was not in that category. We powered through it, but I don't think either of us were blown away. The great one, though, was Run, Fatboy, Run. I love Simon Pegg. He's fantastic, and really funny. This was not a letdown at all. In fact, we don't buy a lot of movies, but this one might just have that much potential. And if you're looking for even more Simon Pegg goodness, check out Hot Fuzz. Also fantastic. Of course, I'm in love with all things British, so I may be biased.

I'm completely in denial that it's already almost November. I love the fall, and I despise, loathe, abhor, the winter. The good news, we're flying back to the great white north to see the fam for Thanksgiving, the bad news, it's still winter. Gross. Oh well. The Thanksgiving trip will be great. I'm excited to see everyone and get out of town for a little while. It's always good to shake things up. I love it here, but I've been itching to go out of town for a while now. Luckily, I also have a trip planned in December to visit a good friend from college, so I have some fun sprinkled in among the drudgery of med school, and yeah, right now that's pretty much what it is.

Well, I better get some work done, but hopefully I'll be updating more often these days. I really need to take some more pictures of the little guy before he's no longer little!

Thinking Positive

So, yesterday I had a bit of a funk going on about med school and how it has taken over my life. In a way, it has. I can't relax without thinking about studying, I can't look at people without thinking about what they might have wrong with them, and I can't help but think, with almost everything I do...how will this help me get a better residency. All ridiculous for the most part. So, I took the little monster dog for a 4 mile run to think things through. I think I will never need antidepressants so long as my knees hold out for running. And I also think that not working out is tantamount to going off my meds.

The run worked, I calmed down and actually got some studying done. Furthermore, I got an email from my old mentor at CSU today. Last week, as I neared the very end of my fraying rope, I contemplated the idea of taking a year off after boards to do research. I am actually not all that into research. I did, afterall, quit a PhD program because it isn't what I can imagine myself doing in the long run. So, although I'm not overly excited about research, I thought by taking a year off to work for my mentor up at the Fort would do me good, recharge the batts and of course...look good for residency. In his email today he said he'd love to have me in the lab, but that it's just not a really productive lab these days. He does a lot of teaching, and that takes most of his time. I kind of expected as much, but I had hoped. But, rather than leave me hanging, he offered me work on a project editing the impending publication of an e-book of his physiology lessons. It's something I could work on from home, and I'm pretty sure I could wrap up this whole mentored scholarly activity quite nicely in this project. Which means I could get it done before 4th year, which means that 20 weeks of vacation time is looking like a real possibility. All good things...very good things. And best of all, it's an MSA to do with teaching. Since I really am holding out hope that a large amount of my career can be wrapped up with teaching, this is a step in the right direction. Did I mention I'd get paid...

Overall, I think I need to remember a couple of things...noncompliance is bad, and just like I don't want my patients off their meds, I don't want me off running. Also, thinking positively really can help. It's better than feeling so stressed that I can't even concentrate, which is where I was last week. And last, but not least, always keep in touch with those people who have meant a lot to you. Keeping in touch with my mentor not only always makes my day, but often times, good things will follow.

I'm back

Well, we're in a new block, and I'm sad to report I completely neglected to take any pictures last weekend. But, Beer Fest was the greatest! We had such a great time, and it was exactly what I needed after that brutal neuro final on Friday (good thing for that cushion...). We tried some good beers, and some really bad beers, but my favorite discovery of the day was that there is a microbrewery less than 2 miles from my house. Awesome. Even better, they did not have the bad beer. So, I'm definitely looking forward to paying a visit. Check out the website at www.drydockbrewing.com. Turns out next weekend is their 3rd anniversary party. Sounds like a good time to me!

So this week has mostly been about getting into the swing of a new block. Harder than it should be I think. I just want to have a good time this year while I can, since we had a class meeting about 3rd year that convinced me life as I know it is about to end. It's hard to make yourself work so hard in the face of all that. But, I'm going to have to get it done somehow. That and studying for the boards. Yuk.

It was a great day today though. Lecture was so-so at best, but I finally got some stuff off in the mail (which I've been meaning to do for way too long!) so I feel like I at least accomplished a little bit. And then I got to talk to my friend DO for a long time, for the first time in a long time. So, I have to say that, you know other than waiting for the Comcast guy for what is now 4(!) hours, it's been a good day. Now if only our house phone was working...

One more day

Well, I am sad to see it go, but neuro will be over tomorrow. It's a lot of work, this class, but it's been by far the best run block of med school and I've learned more in this block than any of the others. This is a big deal to me because I've already taken 2 years of this stuff, but I still learned more than I have in any other block. So, it's not been easy, but it's really been worth it.

Tomorrow morning is our final exam, and I pretty much have to fail it to miss the mark I'm shooting for. I won't let that happen, but it takes a lot of pressure off for today to allow for some daydreams about....

Beer Fest!

That's right, the Great American Beer Festival is tomorrow (well it starts tonight, but it's tomorrow for me!). I am so excited. Tomorrow after the exam, as I had planned, I will be making pretzel necklaces and watching Beer Fest the movie! I also have plans to go for a (long) run...we'll say that tomorrow I'm doing a bit of carbo loading.... And I plan on stopping for a (hopefully) celebratory lunch at the brand new Sunshine Market that's opening up by us. I'm really excited for that place. So, it should be a busy day. After the necklaces are made and I"m all set to go, I'm meeting J and his sister at their parents' house and we're leaving from there. I think we're all going to stay downtown with J's sister's boyfriend. It'll be nice to not have to pay for the light rail or have to worry about who will pick us up. We're going to meet some of my college friends and med school friends at the fest, and I'm so excited to see everyone out in celebratory mode! It should be awesome.

Well, just to make sure I don't fail this exam, I suppose I should get to it. The school has kindly given us this one day off for preparing for the final, so big of them. So I better take advantage of it. Can't guarantee another post for a little while, big weekend plans you know!