A little while ago, SR-F emailed me the following YouTube vid:
Final Countdown - cellos and orchestra
The 3 cellists look ridiculous, but don't let them fool you - it takes a lot of skill to do what they're doing. The cello is an instrument meant to be played seated, so to play it standing and still be in tune and achieve the technical skills in the upper register is something I can't do. So while they look a bit ridiculous doing their headbanging and standing solos, it's quite a feat.
Now on to the "real" stuff while you let that vid play. Block 3 exams coming up this week. It shouldn't be as bad as last block. I've discovered that I suck at nerves and the nervous system compared to other organs. Identifying nerves gives me the most trouble unless they're super-obvious nerves. Blah. :-/
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Yesterday I spent 6-7 hours with 2 of my labmates studying lung and heart development. Omg, heart development is so complex; it took us several hours just to get through 23 pages of notes!! But I think we've got it down now, finally. I think we were starting to lose our sanity partway through as parts of heart development began to look . . . phallic. That was Leslie's doing, not mine, lol. I was able to approximate development drawings more accurately. :-P
In anatomy lab we've had this odd tendency this block to ascribe animal characteristics to body parts. For example, we call our cadaver's right lung "tiger lung" because it has black stripes across it. Presumably this is "normal" for anyone who lives in/near a city - so for all of us living said area, our lungs will apparently become striped.
The lab table across from us has an excellent heart dissection. But it looks like a snail, so we call it "snail heart." It's their coveted body part because it's such a good specimen (for the most part). We've actually opened their humidor when they weren't around, reached into their cadaver's body, took out the heart, and brought it back to our table for examining. Once Leslie tried to give them our tiger lung as collateral as well as "transplant" snail heart in our body. That didn't go over so well.
And just yesterday morning, we came across "T-rex heart" from the other cadaver in lab who died of congestive heart failure. They cut the heart across its entire length, so if you held the heart sideways and opened and closed it where it's cut, it looks like a T-rex opening/closing its mouth.
So this is what becomes of us in anatomy lab . . .
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Anyway, I've a theory about academic physician lecturers (pseudo-tangent, I know).
The pediatrics department provide our classes with great guest lecturers. They're so engaging, know how to communicate, are able to grab one's attention, and even instill enthusiasm about the subject. By contrast, surgeons and radiologists suck at explaining anything (but radiologists are the worst).
Yesterday I sat in a radiology lecture for anatomy. The radiologist just clicked through slide after slide after slide after slide without pausing long enough for anyone to really process what they were seeing. AND he was talking to the screen the whole time - didn't look at us or really even address us. I HATE that. I mean, if you're going to show me an ultrasound of the aorta and have it zoomed all the way in so that I don't even recognize it as an aorta, at least give me 10 more seconds to figure out for myself what's wrong on the slide. I seriously sat through the entire lecture and the only thought I had was how bad it was and how I could so do a better job.
This kind of reinforces my psuedo-stereotypes of the different specialties, or rather the kinds of people who go into them. As Leslie said, "You don't choose to go work in a dark room if you want to interact with people."
---TANGENT---
I (finally) got a haircut today. I hate getting haircuts. I hate my hair, I can never get it to do what I want or make it look good.
So I went to a place nearby to get my hair cut. The only Asian woman there "singled" me out to cut my hair, haha. She's Vietnamese and even I had some trouble understanding her thick accent, though her talking in a quiet voice didn't help any. At one point she randomly busted out Spanish because she had taken some Spanish courses. I just kind of sat there and was like, "Seriously?" She was skilled with cutting Asian hair (or so she says), because mine turned out decent. A tad shorter than I wanted it but that's okay, it'll grow out. She also gave me the name and address of a good Thai place. :-D
Lastly, it seems that I've gotten some new Followers lately! I don't know who you all are, but thanks for liking my blog enough to follow. ^_^
---END TANGENT---
Final Countdown - cellos and orchestra
The 3 cellists look ridiculous, but don't let them fool you - it takes a lot of skill to do what they're doing. The cello is an instrument meant to be played seated, so to play it standing and still be in tune and achieve the technical skills in the upper register is something I can't do. So while they look a bit ridiculous doing their headbanging and standing solos, it's quite a feat.
Now on to the "real" stuff while you let that vid play. Block 3 exams coming up this week. It shouldn't be as bad as last block. I've discovered that I suck at nerves and the nervous system compared to other organs. Identifying nerves gives me the most trouble unless they're super-obvious nerves. Blah. :-/
-----
Yesterday I spent 6-7 hours with 2 of my labmates studying lung and heart development. Omg, heart development is so complex; it took us several hours just to get through 23 pages of notes!! But I think we've got it down now, finally. I think we were starting to lose our sanity partway through as parts of heart development began to look . . . phallic. That was Leslie's doing, not mine, lol. I was able to approximate development drawings more accurately. :-P
In anatomy lab we've had this odd tendency this block to ascribe animal characteristics to body parts. For example, we call our cadaver's right lung "tiger lung" because it has black stripes across it. Presumably this is "normal" for anyone who lives in/near a city - so for all of us living said area, our lungs will apparently become striped.
The lab table across from us has an excellent heart dissection. But it looks like a snail, so we call it "snail heart." It's their coveted body part because it's such a good specimen (for the most part). We've actually opened their humidor when they weren't around, reached into their cadaver's body, took out the heart, and brought it back to our table for examining. Once Leslie tried to give them our tiger lung as collateral as well as "transplant" snail heart in our body. That didn't go over so well.
And just yesterday morning, we came across "T-rex heart" from the other cadaver in lab who died of congestive heart failure. They cut the heart across its entire length, so if you held the heart sideways and opened and closed it where it's cut, it looks like a T-rex opening/closing its mouth.
So this is what becomes of us in anatomy lab . . .
-----
Anyway, I've a theory about academic physician lecturers (pseudo-tangent, I know).
The pediatrics department provide our classes with great guest lecturers. They're so engaging, know how to communicate, are able to grab one's attention, and even instill enthusiasm about the subject. By contrast, surgeons and radiologists suck at explaining anything (but radiologists are the worst).
Yesterday I sat in a radiology lecture for anatomy. The radiologist just clicked through slide after slide after slide after slide without pausing long enough for anyone to really process what they were seeing. AND he was talking to the screen the whole time - didn't look at us or really even address us. I HATE that. I mean, if you're going to show me an ultrasound of the aorta and have it zoomed all the way in so that I don't even recognize it as an aorta, at least give me 10 more seconds to figure out for myself what's wrong on the slide. I seriously sat through the entire lecture and the only thought I had was how bad it was and how I could so do a better job.
This kind of reinforces my psuedo-stereotypes of the different specialties, or rather the kinds of people who go into them. As Leslie said, "You don't choose to go work in a dark room if you want to interact with people."
---TANGENT---
I (finally) got a haircut today. I hate getting haircuts. I hate my hair, I can never get it to do what I want or make it look good.
So I went to a place nearby to get my hair cut. The only Asian woman there "singled" me out to cut my hair, haha. She's Vietnamese and even I had some trouble understanding her thick accent, though her talking in a quiet voice didn't help any. At one point she randomly busted out Spanish because she had taken some Spanish courses. I just kind of sat there and was like, "Seriously?" She was skilled with cutting Asian hair (or so she says), because mine turned out decent. A tad shorter than I wanted it but that's okay, it'll grow out. She also gave me the name and address of a good Thai place. :-D
Lastly, it seems that I've gotten some new Followers lately! I don't know who you all are, but thanks for liking my blog enough to follow. ^_^
---END TANGENT---
8 comments:
Spanish in the northern part of the midwest? That lady bursting out into Spanish is so random. I would have been cracking up.
Hi, from one of your new followers; I'm new to blogging. In a previous life, I wanted to be a doctor. You seem to have some common interests that I have and I look forward to reading your posts. =)
You cut your hair? :( *does not like* You keep it too short anyway.
Maybe I should put myself down to be a cadaver when I die; I could make people laugh in the hereafter as well. ^_^
I got my haircut too and James gave me the same reaction... it's a short hair conspiracy!
Good luck on the exams
oh tell me about the hair! asian hair is quite annoying sometimes and getting a decent hairdresser who knows how to handle it is an even bigger challenge! i totally understand!
Yummy, a new thai place to eat. Sounds good to me. Glad you got a somewhat nice haircut you liked today. It's tough with hair. I prefer might short enough I don't have to comb it most of the time...sometimes not. Very interesting writings about your medical exploring as well. Hope all is going well for you Aek...have a great week!! Look for a new update in mine very soon!!
I think this Vietnamese hairdresser might have a crush on a certain med student! LOL. You didn't say if she happened to be young or old. Also, the reason she told you about the Thai place was to get you to take her to dinner there!
Duh! Think about it!
Its been a LONG time since we last chatted. We gotta catch up soon.
Take care!
Mike: Hehe, there are actually quite a number of Latinos living in parts of the Midwest.
Jacob: Hi! Thanks for following! I'm following your blog too now. :-P
James: Yeah, my hair's all short now. I was getting annoyed with it getting in my face and neck.
Aaron: Oh I know right?!
Dave83201: She was older. Like, about my mom's age, lol. So I think your point is moot. :-P And we so DO have to chat up again, missed ya.
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