becoming the most boring person you know...

i think there's something to be said for it--i think that intensive medical training probably does quite a bit towards turning you into the most boring person in your peer group... nothing like studying near 24/7 to slowly sqeeze all of your awareness of pop culture, current events and popular topics... the normal, quirky anecdotes you used to amuse your friends and familiy with about that time at the bar, ballpark or beach will soon be replaced with clincal "pearls," which are likely to only be of mild interest to your professional colleagues, and some sort of negatively-scoring interest with people living in the real world who have free time, and the hobbies and interests to go with it...

orientation is over, and tomorrow begins the descent into a medical black hole, and i've got to wonder:

will i be anywhere near as interesting (in my own high esteem) as i used to be?

probably not...

anyway, school starts tomorrow, so i guess i'll just have to settle being valuable to society and economically productive as the trade off for having to watch my friends roll their eyes back into their heads when i start into a conversation with something about that "cool thing i saw the other day at the hospital..."

nothing to do about it now though...

oh, and if i'm lucky, hopefully i'll get to post some of the career couneling and psych stuff from orientation... it's pretty interesting... gotta sign off though--i've got a lot to read about the back...

IAS, anatomy and the end...

i was almost late today.

last night's exploits were almost sufficient to overcome three alarm clocks, but at 7:55 I finally awoke with the realization i had an 8:00 a.m. orientation meeting, on career planning specifically...

but living five minutes from school has its advantages, and with a minute to spare, I found myself sitting in a careeer counseling workshop--haven't even really begun any training, and we're being urged to think about our careers... not a bad thing at all, i imagine...

infamy... or famy...

orientation has been going quite well, and I really like my class.... people are coming together rather nicely...

anyway, yesterday was a fairly long day, but it was capped off by a social event that a couple of the guys hosted at their place... a keg, the class, a couple of crashing second years = really excellent event... as i said, we're coming together as a class i think... i really do like just about everybody... hopefully, anatomy doesn't blast us all apart.... small, weird group dynamics i imagine might be able to play an unfortunate wedge role against the unity of a small class...

tonight, i rode a wave of influence and peer pressure and achieved infamy, or "famy," depending on your perspective, as well as a great prestige for my class by being victorious in a beer drinking race.... basically, a second year held the title and challenged all comers in a single beer pounding race... unfortunately, he met the 7-foot wall, and it was me... and my mother said living in a fraternity wouldn't get me anything in life... au contraire...

Midwest Clinic Class of '09 for life, man...

oh, and the party was great... we love to dance... ;)

g'night...

slept-in and got a computer...

that pretty much sums up the day...

slept-in, but I couldn't even make it until eight a.m...

got my laptop from IT... it's sweet...

and i'm trying to sort out a very annoying set of financial issues that have arisen because, i suspect, i've just changed my address...

and that's a day...

later...

the first day...

today was the first day of orientation!!!

and despite the fact that it wasn't much more than a whole lot of administrative info transfer, it was quite exciting... it's a bit surprising how little things like an official nametag or warm welcomes from some of the more notable members of the community (those people who only a few months ago held your very professional fate in the palms of their hands) can make you feel like you're on your way to becoming a physician... i can't imagine how giddy i'll be when i pick up my first stethoscope... my head might explode...

anyway, i should say (in case they're reading this--no, i really mean what i'm about to say) that i rather like my class--it's small, but really full of interesting people and for it's size, the diversity is pretty amazing... it'll be interesting getting to know them over the years... i feel like i've come as far as anyone else, although there are some notable exceptions.

the highlight of the day (other than finally getting insurance coverage again--i've been fearing some sort of ironic personal bankruptcy inducing accident during the last few weeks of having no coverage) was having a distinguished physician, dr. posterior who trained with one Man's Clinic's founding personalities, Dr. Bill. this guy was absolutely hilarious. his presentation about the mission of the clinic and his anecdotes about the exceptional nature of the clinic and how its ideals were derived from the founders were just the sort of inspiring things a med student wants to hear on their very first day of training... it was great...

having just finished kidder's mountains beyond mountains about dr. farmer and his work with PIH last night (which i thought was a particularly fitting for me for the night that b.m.s. time was coming to an end), some of dr. posterior's stories i thought were really interesting, and i'm recording these anecdotes here mostly for my own memory. as a resident, dr. posterior trained for three months with dr. bill, and his role was mostly that of a personal assistant. one of his main tasks was to provide dr. bill with patients--and dr. bill only wanted to see "the sickest and the poorest patients," so dr. posterior had to get up everyday a four a.m. to check all of the hospitals to find these patients. for one particular patient--a farmer in his mid-50's suffering from severe cardiovascular disease--dr. bill sat and spoke with him, and after he was done, he pulled four hundred dollars out of his wallet and had a private room arrange and an old-skool air conditioner... ice in a bath tub with fans blowing over it...

anyway, i had struggled over this decision to come here, and after today, i really feel that i've made the right decision... i think it'll be tough out here, and school will be hard, but i think it'll be, as the dean put it this morning, a "positive and life changing experience..."

scatch one day of training... actually, it can't really count... not until anatomy starts on friday--then we're really underway...

oh, what the heck, one day down... seven, nine, twelve? more years to go....

passing on the lifeboat...

just a remark about living here without a car...

as i said, i returned my rental car tonight. basically, i've spent the last week pulling together my apartment--getting furniture, kitchen stuff, etc. knowing that i'm not going to have a car around here for awhile, i've been stocking this place up like a bunker, semi-dreading returning this rental...

i did it tonight, and i thought that it would be like pushing a lifeboat back out to sea, and staying stranded on the island...

actually, it was a bit liberating... i'm stuck with what i've got here, and with the huge amount of work coming down the pipe, i think i'll be okay...

but check with me in another 48 hours... i'll probably already be pining for a set of wheels...

there's always the bike option, i guess...

the end of b.m.s. time...

tonight, i returned my rental car to the msp airport that i've been using to get my apartment together... in order to get back, i took this shuttle service--it's similar to any airport shuttle service that picks you up at home or your hotel, or drops you off somewhere respectively--anyway, i took this shuttle from the airport back, and i found myself jammed into a modified fifteen passenger van...

i was sitting in the back seat between a young kid (eight-year-oldish brandishing a gameboy advance), and a woman clutching a yellow manila envelope, and, if you've been a patient or around medicine at all, you would quickly recognize it as containing x-ray files, and make the leap that she, or potentially the kid, is a patient at Man's Cinic...

incidently, she wasn't with the kid (no one was, interestingly enough, and by the looks of the hotel he was dropped off at, he's probably running away in style having pilfered his parents platinum amex card)... but we got to talking a bit, and, as it turns out, she happened to be a returning patient to Man's Clinic, and she was obviously comfortable talking about her condition given the volume of the voice and the other ten people in the van. she had been suffering with symptoms of an unknown autoimmune disorder for nearly two years, and suspected that she might have MS triggered by a severe respiratory infection that immediately preceded the onset of her condition...

and she asked about me and my move and starting medical school, and i talked a bit about my interests and my background, and she was especially pleased to hear about my interest in infectious disease and immunology, which relate to her condition...

as I was getting out, we said goodbye... and the last thing she said to me was to study hard, because in a few years, i might be her doctor...

at that moment i realized that tonight was the last night of before medical school time (b.m.s. time), and starting in the morning, i'll be training as a physician... i'll be the junior-most member of this professional guild... and maybe there's no going back...

i thought it was kind of a momentous moment...

anyway, tomorrow at 8 a.m., everything fires up, and i'm officially a med student...

i'm excited, and a bit daunted...

i'll let you know how it goes...

online...

the internet is finally up and running, which means i'm finally plugged in and this blog can finally get off the ground...

it's too bad it took so long, because there have been some interesting and funny anecdotes that have happened during my boston-rochester move and setting up my place here... maybe some retrospectives are in the cards in the near future...

anyway, i made it without incident, and things have been going smoothly--so don't worry about me... i'm fine...

and with that, i'll sign off...

cheers,