This morning at the Dan and Whit's I bought three huge bags of candy. Now I'm ready for my first adult Halloween ever. Of course, I'll probably just stick the candy in a bowl on the front walk, turn on an outside light, hide upstairs and study. With a costume on, don't get me wrong.
Saturday night Ten and I are going to Brattleboro, home of Vermont's strongest and proudest nudist movement, to meet Gollywobbler and her new girlfriend, who just happens to be a physician, for dinner. (God, I love commas.) I can't wait to pass judgment on Dr. New. Neither can Ten.
A week from tomorrow I am going to New Orleans for my grandparents' 80th birthday party. I'm looking forward to seeing my parents and brother. Also sharing a bathroom with them, since the house is being worked on. (Since on the house is being worked?)
I'm 24 and Ten is now 30. This rocks. She is old. Gray. Wrinkled. Wears a shawl. And she must also be getting senile because yesterday we had this conversation:
Ten: Achoo, sniff, sniff, achoo, cough, sniff.
EFC: Did you say something?
Ten: I hab a cold, EnubFibCookies.
EFC: I'm too tired to be sympathetic. And my name isn't EnubFibCookies.
Ten: Yes it is. E-n-u-b-f-i-b-c-o-o-k-y-s.
Without ruining my bloganymity, you can imagine what an errantly placed "y" can do to my (real) name. Also my mood. I asked Ten if she was joking about the misspelling. She laughed nervously.
It's been 1 year 8 months and 7 days. I don't think it's unreasonable for me to expect my name to be spelled correctly at this stage in the game. If Ten can prove to me that she has a DMS-IV diagnosable learning disability, I will start talking to her again. (Probably.) But first she's going to have to cut out all that hacking and sneezing.
Thursday, October 30
Tuesday, October 21
Photos From Montreal
Ten, beating me at pooliards
Ten, beating me at drinking
Our hotel
Ten, making friends with the French-CanadiennesMonday, October 20
I didn’t vote again until 1976, when I was nineteen and legally registered. Because I was at college out of state, I sent my ballot through the mail. The choice that year was between Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford. Most of my friends were going for Carter, but, as an art major, I identified myself as a maverick. “That means an original,” I told my roommate. “Someone who lets the chips fall where they may.” Because I made my own rules and didn’t give a damn what anyone else thought of them, I decided to write in the name of Jerry Brown, who, it was rumored, liked to smoke pot. This was an issue very close to my heart—too close, obviously, as it amounted to a complete waste. Still, though, it taught me a valuable lesson: calling yourself a maverick is a sure sign that you’re not one.
- David Sedaris
- David Sedaris
Travelling, And Some Updates
Brilliant Word of the Day is having a week of words that "appear to have been coined after the 2008 US presidential candidates." Today's word is Obambulate: to walk about.
Speaking of the election, did you see this?
Ten and I traveled internationally this weekend. We went to Montreal for two days and a night. We walked up and down St. Catherine's Street, shopped, went to a history museum, walked around Chinatown, walked around Old Port, got massages (!), and finished off the trip by going to Ikea.
Because Ten allowed me to make the reservations for our lodging, and because I am cheap, we wound up staying at a "hotel" that was sketchier than a drawing pad. The rooms reeked of smoke, our fellow lodgers stayed up until all hours, and the furniture in the room was (quite literally) folding chairs and folding tables. Ten asked if she could make the reservations next time, and I whole-heartedly consented.
We spent a Hellish one hour at the Ikea looking for a bookcase for me after a Hellish two hours trying to find the place. We found a bookcase I liked, and we went down to the ground floor to pick up the box of parts. "Is that going to fit in your car?" asked Ten. "No, it's not," I replied, pushing the box back into place. Then we quietly left.
In other news, I just found out that I can vote in New Hampshire even though I'm a Vermont resident. Hello!
New classes start today: neurology, psychiatry, hemotology.
I leave Wednesday for Seattle. I'm going to the GLMA conference with a fellow classmate. I've never been further west than Austin, so it should be a worthwhile experience. At least compared to the rural health conference I went to last year which was garbage in a can. We're staying with my godfather Peter. He's a newlywed and a bit of a hippie.
Speaking of the election, did you see this?
Ten and I traveled internationally this weekend. We went to Montreal for two days and a night. We walked up and down St. Catherine's Street, shopped, went to a history museum, walked around Chinatown, walked around Old Port, got massages (!), and finished off the trip by going to Ikea.
Because Ten allowed me to make the reservations for our lodging, and because I am cheap, we wound up staying at a "hotel" that was sketchier than a drawing pad. The rooms reeked of smoke, our fellow lodgers stayed up until all hours, and the furniture in the room was (quite literally) folding chairs and folding tables. Ten asked if she could make the reservations next time, and I whole-heartedly consented.
We spent a Hellish one hour at the Ikea looking for a bookcase for me after a Hellish two hours trying to find the place. We found a bookcase I liked, and we went down to the ground floor to pick up the box of parts. "Is that going to fit in your car?" asked Ten. "No, it's not," I replied, pushing the box back into place. Then we quietly left.
In other news, I just found out that I can vote in New Hampshire even though I'm a Vermont resident. Hello!
New classes start today: neurology, psychiatry, hemotology.
I leave Wednesday for Seattle. I'm going to the GLMA conference with a fellow classmate. I've never been further west than Austin, so it should be a worthwhile experience. At least compared to the rural health conference I went to last year which was garbage in a can. We're staying with my godfather Peter. He's a newlywed and a bit of a hippie.
Tuesday, October 14
Not Only Am I A Vegetarian, But I Am A Meat-Eating Vegetarian
In five hours I will be completely done with lungs. Well, in a way. I suppose I'll still have to listen to them from time to time. And then there'll only be one exam left: a pharmal affair.
My word of the day e-mail this morning included one of the most inane quotes I've ever read.
I am not only a pacifist but a militant pacifist. I am willing to fight for peace. -Albert Einstein, physicist, Nobel laureate (1879-1955)
Al, that sounds like something W would say. Other than that, I've heard you were a pretty smart guy.
My word of the day e-mail this morning included one of the most inane quotes I've ever read.
I am not only a pacifist but a militant pacifist. I am willing to fight for peace. -Albert Einstein, physicist, Nobel laureate (1879-1955)
Al, that sounds like something W would say. Other than that, I've heard you were a pretty smart guy.
Saturday, October 11
The Good, The Bad, And The Disgrammatical
One of the good things about having a cold during finals is that you are completely justified in using stimulants, a feel-good forestallment to the admission that you have a drug problem.
One of the bad things about medical school is that you keep getting new information right up until the weekend before finals. So you'll be at your desk thinking, "Why am I such a slacker? Why didn't I study this before?" and then you remember that you just got the information yesterday.
In other news, I wrote the phrase "pulmonary articles" in my cardiology notes no less than three times. This is perhaps a sign that I should stop reading nytimes.com during class. Or, more likely, that I should have followed my true passion and become a righteous and feared grammarian.
One of the bad things about medical school is that you keep getting new information right up until the weekend before finals. So you'll be at your desk thinking, "Why am I such a slacker? Why didn't I study this before?" and then you remember that you just got the information yesterday.
In other news, I wrote the phrase "pulmonary articles" in my cardiology notes no less than three times. This is perhaps a sign that I should stop reading nytimes.com during class. Or, more likely, that I should have followed my true passion and become a righteous and feared grammarian.
Friday, October 10
Go, Connecticut! I haven't been paying much attention, so this caught me off guard.
I have a cold. More like a "coowwwwwllllddddddd, son." The environmentalist in me tried to stick with the Seventh Generation tissue, but in the end, it's go aloe Puffs or go home.
Anyway, back to this:
I have a cold. More like a "coowwwwwllllddddddd, son." The environmentalist in me tried to stick with the Seventh Generation tissue, but in the end, it's go aloe Puffs or go home.
Anyway, back to this:
Thursday, October 9
Insert Frowny Face
There was a time during my sophomore year at Mount Holyoke where I thought about transferring to another school. Fortunately, this misguided and lugubrious period passed pretty quickly. I think I'm going through something similar right now. Except transferring is not an option. Also, I've gotten way better at being lugubrious. Also, I'm six years older and cognizant of how embarrassing this moodiness is. Anyway, here are some things I've been thinking about in my depressive ponderings of the last couple days:
1) Sometimes you just have to acknowledge that someone you don't like/respect can do something much, much better than you can.
2) Weak muscles fatigue more easily. (This Deep Thought is care of a recent respiratory lecture.)
3) Life is not just about who you are.
4) John McCain has a 1 in 6 chance of dying in office.
5) The Death Clock pegs my Big Day as November 24, 2044. That's the same day that On The Origin of Species was published. Believe me, when I'm ascending into Heaven I'll be having a good laugh at old Chuck Darwin.
In other news, S-Deck burnt me the new Dar Williams CD. It's really good.
1) Sometimes you just have to acknowledge that someone you don't like/respect can do something much, much better than you can.
2) Weak muscles fatigue more easily. (This Deep Thought is care of a recent respiratory lecture.)
3) Life is not just about who you are.
4) John McCain has a 1 in 6 chance of dying in office.
5) The Death Clock pegs my Big Day as November 24, 2044. That's the same day that On The Origin of Species was published. Believe me, when I'm ascending into Heaven I'll be having a good laugh at old Chuck Darwin.
In other news, S-Deck burnt me the new Dar Williams CD. It's really good.
Friday, October 3
Thursday, October 2
High-Lighting: An Outline
A) It's weird.
1) No one can spell it.
a) Hi or high?
b) Lite or light?
2) Some people abuse it.
a) Respected peer, do you really need four different colors on your desk during lecture?
b) Sniffers.
B) It's optimistic.
1) You think that if you highlight you're actually more likely to remember the information.
a) You're not.
2) You think you'll actually return to those highlighted notes/books sometime in the future.
a) You won't.
3) The markers are hot pink and neon yellow, colors that scream optimism.
C) It's messy.
1) Look at my fingers.
2) Look at my cheek.
a) I'm embarrassed.
In other news, in my notes taken during class yesterday I typed the phrase "cranial lungs." Really have no idea what I meant by that. But I'm going to highlight it.
1) No one can spell it.
a) Hi or high?
b) Lite or light?
2) Some people abuse it.
a) Respected peer, do you really need four different colors on your desk during lecture?
b) Sniffers.
B) It's optimistic.
1) You think that if you highlight you're actually more likely to remember the information.
a) You're not.
2) You think you'll actually return to those highlighted notes/books sometime in the future.
a) You won't.
3) The markers are hot pink and neon yellow, colors that scream optimism.
C) It's messy.
1) Look at my fingers.
2) Look at my cheek.
a) I'm embarrassed.
In other news, in my notes taken during class yesterday I typed the phrase "cranial lungs." Really have no idea what I meant by that. But I'm going to highlight it.
Wednesday, October 1
Lend Me Your Ear! No, Really, Please?
Happy October!
The ear drama continues. Monday morning I woke up with an ear infection, and the pain was incredible. I couldn't chew fully, and it felt like someone had punched me in the side of the face. The pain woke me up in the wee hours Monday night and again last night. I guess I complained about it so much that Ten had flowers delivered to my house. So nice! Except that having flowers delivered to you because you're incapacitated by an ear infection triggered by your efforts to eliminate your ear wax build-up in the company of an older gentleman in a navy blue sweater vest feels sort of... oh, I don't know... pathetic?
Anyway, said man gave me antibiotics, oral and otic, so things are looking up for my ears. My bowels are a different story. (Aren't they always?)
Here's the Palin-Couric interview on SNL. This is funny; just make sure you're laughing because Sarah Palin is in over her head and unprepared - not because she's a woman. Women are too hard on women. (Not Ann Coulter, though. She deserves everything she gets.)
Tonight I have a prospective student stay with me, something I do not generally look forward to. I've decided to host one student per trimester. Let the lying begin! "Medical school is actually way funner than I thought it would be! Oh, you're not in anatomy lab all that much. No, really, your professors really care about you here. Don't worry: most people don't gain weight. I'm the most popular kid in my class!"
The ear drama continues. Monday morning I woke up with an ear infection, and the pain was incredible. I couldn't chew fully, and it felt like someone had punched me in the side of the face. The pain woke me up in the wee hours Monday night and again last night. I guess I complained about it so much that Ten had flowers delivered to my house. So nice! Except that having flowers delivered to you because you're incapacitated by an ear infection triggered by your efforts to eliminate your ear wax build-up in the company of an older gentleman in a navy blue sweater vest feels sort of... oh, I don't know... pathetic?
Anyway, said man gave me antibiotics, oral and otic, so things are looking up for my ears. My bowels are a different story. (Aren't they always?)
Here's the Palin-Couric interview on SNL. This is funny; just make sure you're laughing because Sarah Palin is in over her head and unprepared - not because she's a woman. Women are too hard on women. (Not Ann Coulter, though. She deserves everything she gets.)
Tonight I have a prospective student stay with me, something I do not generally look forward to. I've decided to host one student per trimester. Let the lying begin! "Medical school is actually way funner than I thought it would be! Oh, you're not in anatomy lab all that much. No, really, your professors really care about you here. Don't worry: most people don't gain weight. I'm the most popular kid in my class!"
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