Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Mentor tip of the week

Mentor tip of the week: keep your sleep schedule CONSTANT, even on the weekends. If it is off by 1 hour, it's no good. This is from someone who has scheduled residents for 20 years, and would know something about sleep deprivation...



Two big tests coming up soon. Time to know cardiology and heme/onc COLD.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

What my roommate left me

I am typing this out in my brand new bed! My roommate moved out today, and left his bed for me. It's one of those fancy Tempurpedic ones. Me likey so far.

But you know what else he left me? A friggin half of a skull. (More specifically, the foramina at the base. The top and the mandible are gone. There. Happy, Ali? haha) I was helping my roommate's girlfriend pack the last of the his stuff while he was busy setting up his new place back on campus. While she was cleaning out the fridge, I flung open his closet hoping to find it empty. It was, mostly. Some books on the floor, but near the ceiling...sat a brownish remnant of a human skull.

Any hope of the skull being fake evaporated when I picked it up; wisps of memories of anatomy lab floated back into view. I remember when our tank received our own human skull to study every nook and cranny. It was a precious gift, but the shuttle driver did not think so later that day. I had to walk home instead of taking the air conditioned shuttle since I was carrying "biological goods without departmental consent." Bureaucratic speak for "get that f'ing skull off of my bus." Of the dozens of skulls dispersing from my medical school that day into the homes of my fellow classmates that day, mine had the pleasure of bobbing up and down to the beat of Daft Punk as I slowly froze on the cold walk back to my apartment.

I put this older, more fractured yet pristine skull gently on my roommate's table. Should I call the police? Or maybe I should first wipe my fingerprints and blame it all on the girlfriend? One thing was for sure though. I poked around EVERYWHERE in the apartment and could not find drugs, cash, or diamonds. Only then did my roommate's girlfriend walk into the closet and see the skull.

Instead of screaming, she just said "oh, so you found it."

Was there something she should have told me a long time ago?

"Yeah...kind of creepy, no? I think it's Cliff's dad's, back when he was in med school. We just kinda put it up there because...well...yeah..."


Faaantastic.


Other news- I helped out with our med school's White Coat Ceremony yesterday. The speeches were inspirational, and luckily the ceremony went pretty smoothly. I think the dean of admissions and the guest speaker have some kind of 30 year grudge/rivalry going on though, because they keep making fun of each other every time they are in front of hundreds of medical students.


On a final note, it was my friend's birthday yesterday as well! She is a recovering Diet Dr. Pepper addict, so naturally I had to make this for her in case of emergency:



I even threw in a set of gloves, but I made sure not to put in a line kit. Didn't want to make it TOO easy...