One Hundred and Eighty-three, Two Days

I joked with my friends before starting the Pediatric rotation on how long I'd go before I came down with something.  The results are in!  I went a paltry two days before getting feverish, having extreme cold chills, a headache, and some muscle aches.  In my defense, I do believe this is related not to the kids I saw yesterday as much as to the flu vaccine I received yesterday at noon.

One Hundred and Eighty-one, Everyday Doctoring Stuff

Last week Wednesday I received an email from the Beatnik.  He'd recently done 129 questions to see what Dungeons and Dragons character build he would be and was curious what our friend circle would get.  This was in the morning.  I set aside this task since I was heading into the hospital and decided to confront this monster of a quiz later on that day.

Wednesday continued and I learned that I would be participating in a big surgery starting at 2 PM called a "free fibula flap" surgery.  If you Google it, the second hit that comes up does a good succint job of describing it.  I describe it below in brief.  Anyway, we didn't finish the surgery and I didn't get back to the apartment until 1:00 AM Thursday morning from the hospital.  I had a pounding headache from lack of food and liquids but I had just seen an amazing surgery.  I saw a slew of emails from all of my friends who had replied their character builds throughout the day as they completed the 129 question quiz.  The last one was from the Beatnik again, addressing all of us.  Here it is, and pardon any language that might be offensive to you.

The Beatnik's question to the world:

"Well our party is pretty varied.  We have Drock as the all powerful wizard.  I'm the tree hugging hippy druid.  Crazy Blonde is the know it all Wizard.  Woodwind is the touchy feely Cleric and Lord Chaos is our soul devouring Fighter/sorcerer.  The Engineer is our totally not gay Bard.  And I know you are all wondering the same question I am,

 

WHAT THE FUCK IS DAVE!?!? TAKE THE GOD DAMN TEST!

 

Our group make up would put Lord Chaos in the front.  Me and Woodwind in the middle with the Engineer close behind (Dancing or doing whatever the fuck bards do), Crazy Blonde and Drock as our artillery in the rear (tee hee).  And I know you are all curious about one thing,

 

WHERE THE FUCK IS DAVE?

 

I know me too.  Kinda fun, maybe we should all cosplay sometime (shudder) 

love,

The Beatnik 

p.s.  TAKING THE FUCKING TEST DAVE! "

Reading this at 1:00 AM, I quickly sent out a reply to everyone:

"I just saw a guy’s left jaw taken out, then a bone from his leg taken and put in with a metal bracket to work as a jaw, then his pec from his left chest pasted over the bone, and then multiple skin grafts.  This morning I briefly read your email at 6:00 AM before running off to the hospital.  There I have been until 1 AM right now.  I don’t think I need a test to tell everyone that I’m some type of good cleric

I’ll take it one day. 

-Dave"

I felt that while this might be harsh, it helped explain why I hadn't replied and that I'd get to it when I had a chance.  Little did I realize but in the couple of hours of sleep I got, the Beatnik had responded:

"Lol, now was that so hard?  I kind of realized your crazy schedule after a little while.  You're doing something right now that I could never do.  I know that you're in a world of doctors and people who do this shit all the time.  But, those of us who don't have MD in front of our names are pretty impressed by what you're doing right now.  Just thought you should know. 

Keep up the good work Cleric Dave,

The Beatnik"

This was 6 AM Thursday morning after a 4 hour nap.  I paused.  

and continued to pause.

I have become so inundated with cholecystectomies (gallbladder removals) and hernia repairs (fixing weak areas of bellies and groins) and other surgical terms that I was missing out on the simple fact that the majority of humanity never sees the things surgeons and the OR staff do.  Yeah, during the surgery I wondered who the hell thought up taking someone's bone from a leg to rebuild a jaw, but the actual procedure never amazed me because it made sense.  To laypeople though, it's practically magic.  The patient sees the difference between what they used to look and feel like compared to how everything is after a surgery and it's amazing.  

That's what my two months on Surgery have boiled down to: Amazing.

One Hundred and Fourty-five, A Poem Reading

"Our love began with a glance across a parking lot.
You possessed me in just a few days.
I remember long drives through the countryside,
And long weekend getaways.

But the years passed, and like upholstery in the hot sun,
Your love began to fade.
And now in a time when I need your care the most,
You hit the blinker and turn away.

And while our gas tank of love may be running on fumes,
I still have plenty of love to share.
So if you have a quart of tenderness left for me in your heart,
Take me back to Firestone Complete Auto Care."

Roommate received the above poem signed, "Love, Your 2000 Neon." Yeah, corny, yet strangely hilarious!

One Hun'red and Twenty-four, Texan-speak!

As my travel partner pointed out in the previous entry's comment section, we learned some new words while down south thanks to the Engineer. We had fun with them so here they are in no particular order!

doing = durin'
ex. How you durin'? How's your Momma* durin'?

Texans are always "fixin" to do stuff.
ex. I'm fixin to go to work and my Momma's* fixin to take care of my dog!!

dumping = tumping
ex. Well, I'm fixin to tump your Momma* dear son/daughter/offspring.

poke/ticklish jab = joog (spelling is approximated)
ex. You'd better not be fixin to tump my Momma* or I'll joog you!

hundred = hun'red
ex. This'll be the last time I ask how yer Momma's* durin' because I'm fixin to live through a hun'red lives before I interact with that woman I'm tumping, joog or no joog!



*always ask about Momma!

One Hundred, 100 - Actually It's 101

I just felt an urge really to number these. I tried it out using digits but "0" just didn't look that impressive plus some people would inevitably wonder why I typed "o" or "O" without the actual letter next to it to compare. Some organized part of me enjoys a linear or proper pathway for things I interact with regularly. Thing A happens and that causes Thing B to occur. While I try my mind isn't able to keep track when Thing A makes B, C, & D happen. Each of which, in turn, cause E, F, & G; H, I, & K; and Orangutan, Bubbles, & Somatotropin to happen. You see how confusing it can get?

Three digits now. My titles will be nice and long thanks to just the number. Depending on how it makes everything look when I post longer titles, I might modify the look/layout of this place to better accommodate the new length. For those who've been reading since Entry Zero, I hope you've had an interesting ride.

I went to an improv show tonight for the first time in something close to a year. I almost volunteered for one of the skits where someone from the audience provides the details of their day so that the improv group can act it out onstage. Granted I was going to use Monday as my day rather than what actually happened today. Monday, if you glance back at entry Ninety-six, was the day where I practiced a male genital/rectal exam. Hilarity would have ensued!

Ninety-one, Boom Booms!

"Me likee teh esplozions. They were like, BOOM! O_O And I was like woah... O_o Then they like, skating man! *_o i like it.. I watchez again"

It's good that the Internet makes me laugh so much. From one point of view, BebopJelli could be raised on English like this. From another, more optimistic, point of view, she/he was being very creative in the description of this video. If you care to look for it, BebopJelli's comment is still there, 16 pages from the last page of comments. As for the video, while it's neat, not having been a skateboarder myself (or one blessed with much balance at all), I have little to relate to in the video other than liking the explosions in some of them. (thanks dooce for pointing out the comments)

Eighty-two, Life Doesn't Stop

I've been reading a new book I borrowed from a friend.

Soon I Will Be Invincible
by Austin Grossman

An excerpt:
"I'm not a criminal. I didn't steal a car. I didn't sell heroin, or steal an old lady's purse. I built a quantum fusion reactor in 1978, and an orbital plasma gun in 1979, and a giant laser-eyed robot in 1984. I tried to conquer the world and almost succeeded, twelve times and counting."

I read that and see pure comic genius.

Aside from that, I've been keeping busy with school. Big exams coming up this semester ranging from cumulative pathology exams to microbiology exams to the big one: Boards, USLME Step 1. And of course, I do my best to keep up with friends far and near. How about you? Staying sane in this crazy world?

Sixty-five, Balding

"Why do you keep rubbing my head?"

"You have hair!"

Yup, kids do say the darnedest things. My uncle is heavily balding and keeps his head shaved clean. I'm lightly balding and still keep hair on my scalp. My baby cousin can tell the difference!

Fifty-eight, Yodeling Pickles!

Figuring out what people want for Christmas is always an interesting experience. Some years it comes naturally and some years you have to go on eighteen different shopping trips to eleven stores until you come up with something passable. So I came upon an article penned by Dave Barry which made perfect sense to me: blame the women! Ok, ok, so that's his solution to a lot of stuff but you have to admit, it makes for good reading. If I'd known about it earlier, I would've just shopped online for novelty stuff for all the guys and left the women hanging. But, as it stands, it looks like no one will be getting a pickle from me this Christmas.