The past 2 weeks have been madness. On saturday, I had my medicine end-of-posting test and since then I have finally been able to breathe a few breaths of calm, fresh air. Saturday itself was a rather momentous occasion for me, and I feel I must recount how it was the culmination of many things:
1. Harriedly (and at times, sneakily!) approaching patients, and not leaving until we have all at least examined 1 different system each 2. Shamelessly stalking house officers, medical officers, and registrars for their patient lists, and being met with surprising niceness and/or curt hand gestures 3. Lingering around the case files and being told to leave them alone by not-so-savoury characters 4. Swiping alcohol hand wipes and stuffing them in our lab coat pockets 5. Percussing and auscultating everybody and everything 6. Arranging for tutorials, and getting into trouble because the appointed patients had left their beds 7. Not picking up 1 million highly obvious physical signs 8. Obsessing over what we were going to have from Mr Bean / Yami Yoghurt
In TTSH at least, the divide and conquer method appears to be superior as far as examining patient goes. I really enjoyed working with my cg mates, as most of us were quite resourceful in procuring patients with good signs and temperaments. And of course, I must emphasize that contrary to whatever you might have heard, all asking of favors was done by the booKs! No *ahem* unconventional methods were employed in any of the above activities.
I also feel that Lifeng deserves a list all of her own, in order to appropriately remember how she cycled to TTSH, still had bicycle marks on her legs THREE DAYS LATER, made her myriad of constipated facial expressions, and exclaimed "uncle bu yao zuo bi!" when her patient didn't understand her instructions during her cranial nerve examination. But I suppose I can keep those as private jokes for now. Haha :P
All in, I think I really enjoyed my med posting. It was tiring, and left my feet aching and sore, but I really felt I accomplished things at the end of almost every day. I cannot say the same for my psychiatry posting, which has so far started off on poor footing. Especially because psych patients are not always in the right frame of mind to talk to us, and because I am pretty much tired out from med and taking a self-designated break. Yes, I shall allow myself to slack till the end of this week. Or maybe next week. Or maybe even next next week. We shall see! How much we can get away with, that is.
That being said about med in TTSH, my test on Saturday did not go quite as well. For starters, I could really have done with more presence of mind during my long case. And for my neuro short, I was examined by the same CSFC tutor who witnessed me in my gloriously incompetent and psychomotor-ly impaired state 4 months ago. I am DAMN SURE that she was not impressed at all by me. Which is why I just hope to pass and get the hell on with my electives. Fingers crossed then!
Apart from that, Saturday night was also Ian's birthday celebration. It was fun to finally be able to hang out with everybody, stress free. I actually overslept a bit and had to rush through getting ready and getting there. Oh well, not like you can expect people to look their best after a grueling test. Especially if they had massive anxiety attacks the night before and were unable to sleep!
Following that, we had a lavish TWO DAY break before our next posting. In two days I was barely able to get myself out of my comatose exhausted state and back up to hit the ground running for psych. Plus on monday, mark wanted to go swimming. But then it rained! And we had to go gymming instead :P In fact, we have started quantifying exercise time in terms of calories from eating Pocky sticks. For example, I have to cycle 6 minutes to burn off 2 Pockies. As in 2 STICKS. Mark was totally like "No more ******* pocky forever and ever!" afterwards. I kinda agree, but then again I just ate a box while typing this post. Looks like I'll be cycling until I die to try and burn those persistent calories off. Or not!
On a sidenote, I fear that mark is turning manorexic. These days he seems to eat less than me, and exercises more too! I will have to watch him more closely in the coming days and weeks and see what becomes of this. Hmm.
That's all for now. I'm working on a Palin hate post. Soon!
mental activity was detected at 10:04 PM
the word on Saturday, October 11, 2008 is:
WOMANIZER! (uncensored)
Britney's new video for her single Womanizer came out this morning, and it's THE SHIZZ!!! It finally features britney dancing to choreography that actually seems well-rehearsed, and suited to the vid. Remember how she was literally covered only in diamonds for parts of her Toxic video? Well, she basically did the same thing for Womanizer, albeit withOUT the diamonds! It was so steamy it had to be digitally altered for its premiere on ABC!
No surprises about the vid's controversy though, as it's directed by Joseph Khan, who shot Toxic and Stronger. I am not quite sure who choreographed the dancing, but I think it's possible that Britney did so herself. The head swinging definitely looks like the kind of thing she's been into a lot recently.
Anyway, do enjoy the video. Britney looks amazing and I LOVE BRITNEY!!
