Random things

I was tagged a couple of times in the last month with the random things meme, but given the sporadic nature of my posting lately and the uninspired state of my muse, I'm not sure I can reach eight facts. We'll see.

1. I'll start with the fact that I am now a homeowner. It's a surreal state, to be sure, but a regular paycheck with the promise of relatively certain financial solvency in the future makes me a fairly good candidate for lending money to, apparently. This new purchase actually accounts for much of my silence on the blogging front lately, since there are a myriad little things to be done in a house which can be (and were) safely forgotten in an apartment. My concerns over how to afford a house are somewhat assuaged by the fact that it is an investment, and additionally I won't be around enough to spend any money these next three years anyway.

2. As a continuation of #1, I am inordinately proud of the fact that I managed to put up a respectable set of shelves in my garage, without instructions, manuals, or advice.

3. I meet most of the criteria for obsessive compulsive disorder. Go figure.

4. Despite #3, I still have difficulty closing cabinet doors. I figure, I'm going to open them again anyway, so...

5. This vacation thing is getting old. I may rue the day I said that eventually, but I haven't done anything really taxing in three months. Once residency starts, I plan to work until the day I die.

6. Despite what my mother says, having a good stereo system is more important than having a good dining table.

7. Ditto a TV.

8. I write about two blog posts for every one that ends up being posted lately. Mostly because the lack of inspiration keeps the quality down, and the beautiful weather outside keeps the volume down. Here's hoping I can get back into regular posting despite residency starting (at least the orientation) in about two weeks.

Nathan, MD

Trust me, I'm a doctor.

Pleasant diversion

In this, our penultimate week of medical school, the administration has planned for us a variety of classes. Nothing serious or stressful, just refreshers on medical-legal ethics, lectures on how to give appropriate feedback as interns teaching med students, cap and gown distribution, etc. Everything is done by noon, and I think it's mostly a way for our faculty to pull everyone together for one last moment of bonding before we scatter to the winds.

The highlight of the morning came from the feedback/basic educator lecture, in which our learned teacher put up the following slide regarding learning environments, which he called the Starling curve of learning climate as it affects medical students, particularly in lecture:


Then this evening a group of us went to a local pro baseball game, and I was struck with how odd it is to have a classmate from California tell you, gesturing with one hand while the other holds a beer, in between cheers as he tells a story in his very relaxed, almost surfer-dude accent that "this lady had like a lymphogranulomatous vasculitis or something." I realized, again, that all of us are just human, and though we've crammed a ridiculous amount of information into ourselves over four years, and we've changed a great deal in some ways while doing so, we still take that information and apply it with the humanity we brought here, accents and all.

Little to do, little to say

I'm shockingly unproductive in the blogging sense lately. I think Medstudentitis put the reason quite succinctly in her latest post. If you don't do anything, you haven't got much to say. This is obviously even more true when your blog is ostensibly about one topic and you haven't had anything to do with the topic in weeks.

I have managed to do a lot of reading though, getting through all twenty of Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin novels in the past three weeks. When I think how many pages that is, I stop wondering why my eyes have seemed to burn at times lately. But they are absolutely some of the best books I've ever read. I got to the end and wanted to start over. I think I'll read the rest of O'Brian's books first.

And I found a new band, called "A Fine Frenzy", and since they haven't come out with a complete album yet, I'll postpone writing a real review. I'll just mention that going to her website and listening to a few tracks is worthwhile. And if you have iTunes, she has four songs available for download. I have them all.

So that's all for now, hopefully with my last two weeks of classes and graduation coming up I'll have something to write about soon. 15 days to go.