I Kinda Hate Myself . . .

. . . for procrastinating half of Saturday away, especially since my biochem exam is on Monday. o_O

My motivation to study is at an all-time low. I did 2 lectures on Friday, 4 on Saturday, and that means there are 5-6 left to do all on Sunday (today, I guess). *Sigh* Truthfully, I loathe studying biochem. I enjoy learning, I appreciate what I learn, I just hate trying to memorize it all because there's just so much.
That's a biochem "map" of most/all of the biochem pathways. Now, of course we don't need to know all of it (especially for this exam), but we do need to know a good chunk. For a more detailed look at that picture, go to the ExPASy site here.

On my Facebook status, I have: "[Aek] kinda wishes biochem had a physical form so he could stab it with cadaver-blunted scalpels. o_O"

From that, a friend linked me to the follow YouTube vid:

U of Pitt Med School: Lord of the Rings parody 1

When I watched it, I couldn't help but laugh. It was soooo bad, but so hilarious. Particularly apt was where "Gandalf" declares "You shall not pass!" to a med student who accosts him. Here's an excerpt:

"It began with the forging of the great bling-blings. 3 were given to the anesthesiologists, fairest, most rested of all physicians. 7 to the renal lords, great managers of electrolytes and craftsmen of the Foley. And 9, 9 were gifted to the administration, who above all else desired power and research . . ."

U of Pitt Med School, Lord of the Rings parody 2 (the sequel)

Short excerpt from it here:

". . . There is a union now, between the two biomedical science towers. BST1, fortress of UPMC research; and BST2, stronghold of cheap foreign labor. And now a third tower rises, a third BST constructed solely to hoard NIH funding . . ."

And I'll end this post with a song linked to those parodies:

'On Call' - Med School's That Way

So Gross

Wednesdays are always rough - 8:15am until 9pm. Yuck. Anyway, the title says it all. Today was so high yield in terms of material to blog about! You thought the last post was bad, but today's anatomy lab was one of those we've been dreading. Proceed with caution, this stuff is NOT for the faint of heart. There's stuff at the end too, so if you want to skip the explicit dissecting details, don't feel like a wimp for jumping past it. BUT please read the first paragraph blurb so you know what the details are all about.

Abandon all hope ye who enter here . . .

---EXPLICIT DETAILS---
Today's anatomy lab involved the dissection of the perineum region. For my lab group this involved 2 things: removing the sigmoid colon and rectum (this part's unrelated to the perineum), and cutting off the scrotum and penis (because our cadaver's a guy).

1. On Monday the lab professors bisected everyone's cadavers axially (horizontally) such that the lower half of the body was disassembled from the upper half. The small intestines and colon were also cut. But they left part of our descending colon, our sigmoid colon, and rectum in. Unfortunately . . . it was full of poop.

So we have to remove as much of the colon and rectum as possible. I tied up the free end of the descending colon, but I must've missed some poop because as I was tightening the string, poop oozed out of the open end of the colon like gross brown toothpaste. I grabbed more string and tied it further down and we lopped off a good chunk of colon filled with poop.

Later a lab professor came by and told us that we still needed to remove more, as much as we possibly can. So I got more string, but we had to tie it now so close to the rectum/anus that it was hard to get the string down there. My labmate (future surgeon guy) deftly used 2 tweezers/foreceps and tied knots around the lower rectum, just like a surgeon would tie a knot or suture. We then had some difficulty cutting between the 2 strings we tied to ensure poop didn't leak out of either end. Unfortunately . . . we accidentally cut our last string. Thankfully his rectum and anus were mostly clean of fecal matter. I quickly threw away the second poop-stuffed colon "pouch."

2. The perineum region is the area (on a guy) below the penis and above the anus. Basically, the "taint." Future surgeon guy and I took a side and began cutting off his scrotal skin, all the while wincing. One of the girls had to leave early so we quickly "recruited" the only girl left in our group, Leslie, to "help" us. See, we had to cut around and under the penis, and it was just sticking in the way. So we had her lift the penis straight up as we cut away the scrotum under it.

The moment she held the penis up, several guys came by and commented on that, lol. It was quite amusing. I had remarked something like, "I wish we could induce an erection in death, because his penis is just in the way." That somehow became the quote of the semester in our lab group, lol.

So after we cut away the skin of his scrotum (of which he had lots - his balls were rather large), we cut deeper into the fascia until we could pull out the testicles. Again his testicles were pretty big. o_O We then tried to cut away and find the small thin muscles at the base of the penis. But the penis was in the way. So . . . future surgeon guy decided to bisect the penis at mid-shaft. I protested vigorously, but to no avail. So now we had a disembodied penis tucked somewhere elsewhere in the body. The look on both our faces must've been priceless, because this is just not something any guy would want to do.

Later we also bisected the penis ventral-dorsally (top to bottom), so now the stub of penis left connected to the body is bisected in half. We "had" to do that because sometime soon the lab professors are going to bisect the pelvises of practically every body down the midline.
---END EXPLICIT DETAILS---

P.S. If I ever discover that the above is against HIPAA or something, I'll of course have to delete it. I don't think it is because there aren't any identifiers, just the "procedures" we did on this cadaver.

Now I have two convos I'd like to share briefly. The first I found interesting, the second I found hilarious.

1. Background: our cadaver guy is uncircumcised. This is (mostly) the convo between the 2 girls (the 3rd girl was home sick . . .) in my group about it. Girl #2 is Jewish.

Girl #2: Why does his penis look bent like that?
Girl #1: I think it's because he's uncircumcised.
Me: Of course he's uncircumcised, that's obvious.
Girl #1: Well, I've never seen an uncircumcised penis before.
Girl #2: Really?! Wow, really? Never?!
Girl #1: Yeah. I mean, I've seen my fair share of penises, but none of them were uncircumcised.
Girl #2: I can't believe you've never seen an uncircumcised penis.
Girl #1: Well, my sample size is pretty limited to just [insert Midwest state here].
Girl #2: My first bf for 5 years is uncircumcised.
Me: Wasn't that the guy you would've married?
Girl #2: Yeah. I probably still would.

2. Background: I went to a patient care panel in oncology dinner thing tonight. One of the guys had pretty aggressive prostate cancer (he's in his late-40s to mid-50s). He's obviously alive and well, surgery and chemo went fine and all.

Him: "The surgeon gave me this little blue pill [Viagra]. And I told him it just wasn't working. He then referred me to this other doctor."

*goes to see this other doctor*

Doctor: "You need penile rehabilitation."
Him: ". . . What does that mean?"
Doctor: "You need to masturbate every day."
Him: "o_O Where were you during high school?!"

---TANGENT---
There are a couple blogs that have closed recently, and a few more that haven't updated in a while so I going to assume they're abandoned/closed, at least for now. I still follow all the blogs, but I follow anonymously if they're not currently active.

So farewell to:
Just me
MSTP Bound

And I hope to see the following blog again soon:
A Popular Dude's Secret Life
fictional

Lastly, I'd like to welcome a new blog on my blogroll by a blogger who's no stranger here. Head over to Welcome to Inglewood to see what that's all about.
---END TANGENT---

Up The Ass

It's not every day that you can say you had your hands shoved up someone's ass (muscles).

Yes, Block 4 has begun - perineum and lower extremities. First things first, the professors bisected all the bodies at around the level of the kidneys (bellybutton area-ish) so now everyone's cadavers are in 2 pieces. o_O Then we had to flip over the lower half and dissect the butt to get to the pelvis.

Proceed not for those with weak stomachs beyond this point . . . you've been warned.

After removing the skin from the butt, we had to clean off the fat and fascia over the gluteus maximus. That was gross. Fat is just so . . . yellow, and squishy, and greasy, and gross. Our guy has been generous to us - the lab table across from us has a woman bordering on obesity and she had inches of fat. Once we found the border of the gluteus maximus, we had to shove our fingers under there and find the ligaments, hence shoving my fingers up under his butt muscles. Those were some tough ass ligaments (pun intended)!!

And of course, the highlight of the lab. We had to insert a tampon into the anus, to "provide support" to the soft structures bordering the anus. We think it was just to plug up the hole so poop doesn't leak out while we dissect. The other guy in my group and I were quick to say "Not me" with regards to that.

So I gave Leslie the tampon which she so skillfully put in. Then she removed the applicator and had this look on her face, exclaiming "Was I supposed to take it out!!" The applicator had poop all over it. We all then kind of proceeded to "freak" at the grossness of this lab. Minutes later, we hear a lab group in the near distance freak at something. We concluded they also inserted a tampon into their cadaver's butt.

You know, it's good to know that despite cutting up the bodies and supposedly getting desensitized to it all, we're all still able to become utterly grossed out. Anatomy lab is also a great motivator to get one to at least consider losing weight.

---TANGENT---
I started watching this new TV show, V. It's about aliens, the Visitors, who come to Earth. It's a remake of a show way back when (that I've never even heard about until now). It looks like a good show, so I'm excited to see what happens next.

Also, it doesn't hurt that some of the main characters are hot. ;-)
---END TANGENT---

Final Countdown

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. :-/
-----
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---

Regression in the Service of Sanity

The title comes from something else that the psychiatrist who teaches our "Foundations of Human Behavior" class called "regression in the service of the ego." I liked it and thought it was fitting.

Anyway, when I study I often like to listen to classical music because lyrics distract me. Music helps me pace myself and limit how I sometimes read the same things over and over again without it going in. Last week while studying hardcore for exams I listened to quite a bit of classical music. I came across the following:

Beethoven - Symphony No. 7, Movement 2 - Allegretto.


This was the best recording I found on YouTube. The beginning is a bit too legato and it's a tad faster than my recording.

The moment I heard the opening to this piece I had a flashback moment to high school (I think sophomore year) when I played it. I was 6th chair then. I missed playing pieces like this - I missed the feeling of the strings under my fingers and the vibrations of the cello body against my legs. I missed how the subtle layers of the piece build on top of themselves, ever-gradually crescendo-ing. I missed the focus, the concentration, the intensity that music brings. It's what people would call "being in the zone," and it's been a long time since I've felt in the zone.

Hearing and smell are powerful triggers. Even though sight dominates our senses, it betrays memory the easiest in my opinion. Things visually change - houses, plants, people - all things subject to age. But smells and sounds can remain fresh. The sense of smell has the more direct tract into the brain via cranial nerve I (olfactory). There are smells that will bring back memories of when I was 3 or 4. And for me, hearing is the second most powerful memory trigger. I'll hear a song or piece and either associate it with something or be transported back to when I played it. There are very few things I truly missed about high school, but orchestra was something I dearly miss.
-----
For a total change of subject, a friend linked the following on Facebook:

Scrubin'


Lyrics found here.

I totally lol'd at this when I saw it. I found it hilarious!! There are subtle inside jokes there, hehe. This will be in my head when we start dissecting the thorax . . . tomorrow. Note: Rollin's and Netter's are anatomy textbooks. And my anatomy lab doesn't look anything like the anatomy lab in there.

And the following was created by med students somewhere in Canada:

Piss in my Scrubs


Oh Canadians. :-P

The Sensitive Soul

I took this "What type of med student are you?" quiz on Facebook. My result: "the sensitive soul." In an odd way I'd say that's accurate though I would've never pegged myself as such a few years ago. The source of the quiz comes from this comic below (please click on it to enlarge and absorb the full hilarity):
My roommate got: "the questionable admission." I'm sorry to say but sometimes I feel that's an accurate description for him - not that he can't do the work (he definitely can) but that he doesn't care about medicine as much.

Another hilarious comic is the "12 Medical Specialties Stereotypes." I particularly like the ones for dermatology, ob/gyn, and radiation oncology. See here below (again click to enlarge):

Both of the comics above come from scutmonkey, who's also the author of the blog the underwear drawer.

Anyway, studying is going along alright. I had a mock anatomy lab practical exam last night. Nothing like spending an hour with about 100 of your peers staring at dead bodies in the night. I kid. I got 43/50 right, which isn't bad. I'm having trouble distinguishing arteries from nerves in some parts of the body (shut up, they all look the same in a cadaver - white and stringy - that probably sounded bad). It kind of sucks that we're not allowed to touch the bodies during the exam, as that's how many of us can definitively distinguish some things from others. Ah well, spending more time in the lab today with my group to get that sorted out (hopefully). People are beginning to freak out, maybe I should study more . . .

Oh, M4 Guy will no longer be helping us in anatomy lab. He's now doing his next rotation in I don't know what. Le sigh. :-(

The Lizard-Spock Expansion

In my efforts to combat boredom I apparently watched the entire Season 1 of The Big Bang Theory. It's a hilarious show principally about a physicist (nerd) pursuing this hot girl across the hall. His 3 friends are also main characters. Episode 8 of Season 2 is called "The Lizard-Spock Expansion." It's basically an expansion of rock-paper-scissors to rock-paper-scissors-lizard-Spock. The rules are as follows:

Scissor cuts paper, paper covers rock, rock crushes lizard, lizard poisons Spock, Spock smashes scissors, scissors decapitates lizard, lizard eats paper, paper disproves Spock, Spock disintegrates rock, and rock crushes scissors.

Apparently these are valid rules as an expansion of rock-paper-scissors. A helpful diagram is shown below:
Anyway, yeah, all that to keep my mind distracted. I've been feeling off lately. Unmotivated, lazy, depressed, lonely, etc. It took a bit of effort to prevent myself from eating ice cream earlier today. I'm not going to vent about it here - not yet, not now.

Last night I chatted a little online with my best friend from uni, JW-M. I'm not exactly sure if he considers me the same way I consider his friendship, but truthfully that matters little to me. He suggested that I should visit him on the other side of the state (about 3.5 hours' drive away). Sadly I don't have a car as both my parents need to work and my brother's using my car to get to work. So I might take a train out there and hang out with him for a couple days. On the weekdays it's about $26 each way.

I don't know, the more I think about it the more I want to go - the more I need to go. To get away, be somewhere new, etc. My trip to China was denied and the more I think about that it hurts. I'm not really in a position to be complaining, I guess. But still. :-/

---TANGENT---
I've gotten a couple responses to my challenge question. To those who've answered, thank you so much!!

To anyone wishing to answer or wishing to add more details to their current response, you have until Wednesday of this week (July 15th) to answer in a comment or email. Again, your responses will be posted anonymously so no one else would know who you are (except me >.>). Don't forget to say if you're cut or uncut - unless you're uncomfortable declaring so. While I understand everyone experiences orgasm (and the process of) somewhat differently, it'd still be interesting to know.

Alright, so if you haven't answered, please please please send me your answer! Again, the post is here.
---END TANGENT---

Please Hold

. . . while I get a few things sorted out. I'm going to take a break from posting (and thinking about posting) for a week because I spend WAY too much of my day sitting on my ass in front of my laptop; and really, life's been a bit meh and boring lately. I have to kick start myself into doing some things instead of letting myself turn (quite literally) into a blob. I will, however, still be on AIM and MSN as well as reading and commenting on blogs - so it's not like I'm going anywhere.

Dear readers, in my absence I invite you to do something I've seen on other blogs. Feel free to ask me any question about myself between now and June 13th, and I'll post my answers some time the next day. A couple of ground rules though:

1. Don't ask identifiers that'll give away my (limited) anonymity - e.g. name, pictures, address, etc.
2. You may ask me via email or as a comment to this post.
3. However you choose to ask, you may only ask up to 5 questions total, so choose wisely. ;-)
4. Please look at my 100th Post, though some things may have changed.
5. Other than that, seriously ask anything about me. Amuse me. ^_^

To entertain you all in my absence, look below:

I came across this health/medical blog, EverythingHealth, a couple days ago. I found these two posts quite interesting:
Matrix 101: The Medical School
New Doctors - New Culture

Nifty NPR article: The Sims 'Legalizes' Gay Marriage

Hilarious website: This is why you're fat. Where dreams become heart attacks. Honestly, 95%+ of the food on there looks disgusting. Suffice to say, looking at that makes me want to eat healthy.

Hilarious pic at this site:

Lastly, I bought 3 T-shirts from www.threadless.com because they were on sale and the shirts are pretty funny.

This one I bought for myself (I'm totally wearing this into anatomy lab):

And these two I bought for my brother (he still owes me $5).

Alright, that's all. :P

P.S. I saw the movie "Up" today. It's great, you should all see it!! ^_^

Only Trying to Help

Things (paraphrased) I've said earlier today to help out a friend . . .

"Look! It's leaking out!! You've got to clean that. Suck it up! Stop squeezing it, the more you squeeze it the more it comes out. Now you've got to suck it clean. Gah! Just stop squeezing it and suck up what's out already."

I said this in a coffee shop to my friend. Her coffee was too full and the foam was coming out of the hole in the lid. It was getting over the counter and she needed to clean it up.

What did you think I was talking about? ;-)

Apparently, she's purging this convo from her mind. XD
-----
2 final exams down, 1 final paper/project due tomorrow and 1 final exam to go on Friday. If only I had seen that last page on my biostatistics final this morning before I turned it in. Well there goes 8 points out of 65. Fuck. Maybe people will do poorly and keep the average down, so I can still get an A-/A in the class. If I get a B+ or lower, then I'll know exactly where things went wrong.

Charts & Graphs

Yesterday my friend, AG-F, showed me this website called http://graphjam.com. It is hilarious! I found the following - highly useful - flowchart for myself (please enlarge):

This clear version was found at this blog.

Here are some more amusing ones:
Found here.

Found here. You know, that's pretty accurate for me (the second pie chart) - hard-on first (cuz I play with it automatically all the time), then wanting to go back to sleep, etc . . .

Found here. For all the Aussie bloggers out there. :P

AG-F also gave me the following song. It's the credit song "Still Alive" from the game Portal. The science geek in me fell in love. :D


"Still Alive" lyrics here.

I Refuse This Dark Mojo

There seems to be some kind of "dark mojo" going around the blogosphere. Bloggers are breaking up left and right, getting depressed, becoming over-stressed, and just all-around down. While I too have plenty that can bring me down, I will have none of it! I refuse this dark mojo, I refused to be brought down. Instead, I shall report on some things that may (or may not) tickle your fancy.

So when I was young, I used to talk to myself. A lot. My mom told me to stop because it'd make me look like a madman later, so I did stop. Sometimes I still mumble out loud to no one in particular when I'm trying to figure out a difficult problem.

Recently I've begun talking to inanimate objects. For example, over Spring Break when I was on the China trip, DY-M noticed that I addressed inanimate objects fairly often and my voice raised ever so slightly when I did. For instance, I would say something like, "Hello dragonfruit, I'm going to eat you now" or "Hello bathroom, I'm going to use you now." He thought it was a little weird at first but just chalked it up to my personality, and then he just chuckled inside whenever I did it (I would personally give me the o_O face). When I talked to JW-M briefly, he found that habit to be new and strange, lol. Note to self: suppress self.

One of the blogs I follow, MSTP Bound, had the most hilarious post today. I thought he was embellishing the translation at first, but when I read the original Chinese, his translation was pretty spot on! And thus, hilarity ensues. Read that particular post here. ^_^

Other things of note, two blogs have returned!! I'd like to welcome back:

Happy to be in my skin
Life of one gay/bi boy

Go over and say hi! :D

Happy Chinese New Year!!

Happy Chinese New Year!! :D

新年快乐，恭喜发财，身体健康！ (xin1 nian2 kuai4 le4, gong1 xi3 fa1 cai2, shen1 ti3 jian4 kang1!)

The above means: Happy New Year, may your year be prosperous and full of good wishes, and may your body be healthy!

I went home for the weekend for Chinese New Year. Ate. So. Much. Food. It's going to take a while to work all this off, oh well. I said the above Chinese to my grandparents before I left for school again. It was nice hearing my grandparents' laughter - it's so full-bodied and full of life, just ripples through and puts a smile on your face. I truly mean the words above when I say it to them.

One of my primary life goals is to be like my grandparents - to be healthy (my grandparents have VERY few health problems, *knocks on wood*) and happy in my old age, and surrounded by family. All else is pretty secondary.

Oh, and I got the traditional red envelop (see example below) with about $100 inside from my parents. I'll put this in the bank in a couple days.

---TANGENT---
So, my youngest brother is getting a B/B+ in his English class. My parents are annoyed that he got C's on two of his essays. To which my other brother remarks, "It doesn't matter if he gets a B or a C, it's failing anyway." This obviously refers to the Asian benchmark that if it's not an A, then it's failing. We got a good laugh out of this. My youngest brother already got into the school of engineering here, so my parents don't actually care that much about this class (unless he gets less than a B).

To be fair though, my youngest brother is only one of 3 guys in his English class. And his teacher is apparently a huge feminist and they have to read feminist books, short stories, and articles all the time. In all honesty, if I had to read what he reads, I'd be bored out of my mind and probably get a B as well.
---END TANGENT---

2009 Resolutions

It's that time of the year where we all commit ourselves to the "honored tradition" of declaring our resolutions for the year, and pray to God we keep or meet them. I sincerely hope I achieve all of mine. Many of them are on-going ones that'll probably carry over until next year and years after.

2009 is a year of change, not only for the US and the world, but also for me. A lot of things will be changing this year. I intend on taking it all in stride. My 10 resolutions for 2009 are:

1. Lose 20-25 lbs from my lowest weight in 2008. It should only take me 2 weeks or so to get back down to that 2008 weight from what I currently weigh (though I'm not sure I want to know). Hopefully I can go to the gym (almost) every weekday. If I can lose 10-15 lbs by Spring Break (end of February) that'd be ideal, but I want to lose all the weight by August and maintain my weight thereafter. Any tips and/or suggestions?

2. Update my wardrobe. I've been wearing most of my clothes since the beginning of undergrad. I've lost weight since freshman year of undergrad, so I went from an XL to a L and now to somewhere between an M and L (shirt size). A lot of my clothes are loose on me, so I need to get new clothes. The problem is that I hate shopping and I don't know what's fashionable, stylish, and will look good on me. Help?

3. Learn to cook new things! This is one of my on-going resolutions. Foremost amongst things I want to try are steak, various soups, and desserts. Got any recipes?

4. Get better grades in grad school. This may be a bit challenging, as I got 3 A's, 1 A-, 1 B+, and 2 S's (aka, pass for my pass/fail courses). I suppose I could get all A's . . .

5. Be a kick-ass GSI for Genetics. :D This one will be intense, but it might be fun as well.

6. Rekindle some old friendships, maintain current ones, and make new friends (both online and in real life).

7. Not let med school consume or destroy me when I start in August.

8. Begin to explore a romantic relationship. Don't care too much if it leads to sex or not. I just want someone to cuddle with and talk to at night.

9. Make progress in coming out. A resolution in progress, this one is.

10. Live by my philosophy for the year: Whatever happens, bring on the day.

I suppose there is one more resolution . . . but it's not one I can do much about. I would like more Followers on my blog (points to the 3 current Followers in the sidebar to the right). I want some blog love. :P So if you read my blog regularly, please Follow it (especially if I'm following your blog, ::wink wink::).

Now, to look back to my 2008 resolutions. Hmm, it actually seems like I've met most of them to some degree. Go me!! I hope I can do the same (if not better) for 2009 as well. :D

---TANGENT---
I don't know why, but I'm in a rather happy and silly mood. For your entertainment, I've provided the following.

Found at this link.

Hamster on a Piano (Eating Popcorn)


Kevjumba - Girls are like m&m's

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Cuttlefish, eh?

Found at this link.

Hmm, maybe this is the branch of biology I should've done research in, and not fiddled around with the E. Coli genome or cancer cells. Cuttlefish are certainly more interesting to observe than colonies of bacteria growing or cancer cells on a slide (or dish).

I've kind of been lethargic the last few days, and my head feels cloudy for most of today. It's late and I'm going to bed. I'll post something more substantial later.

---TANGENT---
So I remembered this JUST before I went to bed last night. I caught up with two more blogs! :P I think my eyes are going to assassinate me for trying to catch up with a blog each day/night. Left a bunch of comments as well (so to Razz and gatechguy1, sorry for the sudden influx of comments if you find that annoying!). Their blogs are:

Doin' me head in
Thoughts of a College Boy...

As always, if you haven't done so you, head over, check out their blogs, and say hi! :D
---END TANGENT---

Winter Break!!

ZOMG, I'm done with exams and Winter Break has finally arrived for me. I don't even care what I get on those exam, haha. Now that I'm home, it's going to be a pretty chill break with me not going anywhere really. This break I hope/plan to (in no real particular order of importance):

• hang out/catch up with a few friends in town
• catch up on several blogs and link them
• sort my blog list
• sort my pics on my laptop
• sort my music on my laptop
• sort my bookmarks on my internet browser (I've way too many bookmarks)
• watch TV shows, anime, and movies I have on my USB
• watch, sort, and delete porn off my laptop (too much that's just there and that I don't watch)
• finish reading The Spanish Bow by Andromeda Romano-Lax
• read The Life of Pi by Yann Martel
• watch all of the Planet Earth series on DVD
• draw the pic "commissioned" by my friend, SA-F (like 2 years ago, lol)
• draw the pic "commissioned" by Hish of Minding the Heart
• draw the pic(s) "commissioned" by James of Just me
• play my piano
• master DDR (or at least get to 5-feet/5-star solidly)
• finish the game story plot for the Neverwinter Nights module my friend JW-M and I are making
• write 2 chapters of my story (I'm not the only blogger out there writing a book, though this story's not meant to be a published book)
• do my "homework" for public health (I know, right?!) and other online "errands"
• come up with a workout plan and "diet" that I'd actually follow next semester (and hopefully lose 20 lbs - I only went to the gym like 4 times between Thanksgiving and now)

I think that's about it . . . If I can get through all that it'd be pretty amazing, honestly. And now, some Lolcat. :D

Must Be Productive . . .

So . . . I had my epidemiology final today. It was EPIC. Epic in the sense that it was literally impossible to finish. I guess the 2nd-years weren't joking when they told us that, haha.

Here's the breakdown of the exam. 2 hours. Open notes/resources (as long as it's not with another person or utilizes technology). 30 questions. Each question has its own page. Most questions had multiple parts to them.

I got through like, 2/3 of all the questions (so I finished like 20 questions). I skipped most of the questions I didn't answer not because I couldn't (eventually) figure them out, but rather because they take a long time to figure out how to do. When time was called, I just drew smiley faces on those pages I didn't answer. At least there's (hopefully) going to be a MASSIVE curve, because very few people (if any) actually finished that exam.

It's snowing hardcore outside and I'm procrastinating. I have one more exam to go - pathophysiology - tomorrow. I figure, I might as well post and get some of the procrastination out of my system.

And here's an entertaining YouTube vid: Tetris with lyrics.


Enjoy. Now I'm off to study the nervous system, skin, muscle, gastrointestinal tract, and liver for tomorrow.

Last Day of Classes!

I thought this day would never come. The semester dragged on and on until Thanksgiving, then suddenly it's all over now.

I went to work (research) today. I won't go into the details here, but my experiment epic failed on me and I lost 3 hours of my life. I want them back. I did nothing wrong! Stupid buffer. This exemplifies why I hate research sometimes.

I got my anti-pharmacy grade back from the exam I took last night. 24/28, the mean was 22.9/28. Not bad considering I studied for less than 2 days. This'll probably end up as a B+ or A-, or maybe an A if I'm really lucky. So as long as I don't get lower than an A- on the final, I should get an A of some sort in this class. Oddly, I don't find myself caring much.

It rained today, which sucked. It melted most of the snow. As much as I hate the cold, I hate cold icy rain even more. I would take the snow over icy rain any day.

A clothing store in town was going out of business. So I went with SR-F and we each bought a T-shirt for $4.22. That's a pretty damn good deal. It took me FOREVER to find a medium-size shirt; most were L, XL, or XXL. I mean, honestly, an XXL can almost fit two of me.

JW-M sent me an email today with the subject line as "oh yes, they do exist." Refer to the pic below:
This was in Xi'an. Those are the "famous" biang biang noodles. Notice how ridiculous the first two characters are (the two large characters on the left and middle)! I mean, "biang" isn't even a legal pronounciation in Mandarin! Anyway, the old Asian man icon thing is pretty badass, as well as that super-char composed of very common component-chars.

Thanksgiving Thoughts

A belated Thanksgiving thought. I went to bed a couple nights ago with a random smile, as I thought of how my grandpa will be 80 in about 3 months and how he's still so ridiculously healthy (no medication of any kind). I'm thankful that he's in amazing health, that he wakes up with a smile almost every day, that he's still enjoying what life has to offer.

In a different vein, I'm thankful for all the e-friends I've made through this blog. I'm thankful for the (seemingly) handful of readers that come my way. While it hasn't felt like I've changed much or grown since I started this blog, I know that to be false. The bigger question is, what's the next step?

I want to make a massive overture to a particular subject that I'm thankful for. Those with access to it probably don't think much on it, but rather, just expect it. My next post, the one on this, may be a while from now. I'm considering taking a mini-hiatus for a week or so (somehow I don't think I'll be misssed) to finish my term paper and study for my 4-5 exams. In the mean time, I hope these random thoughts below amuse you.

1. So, for the last few days, I kept thinking I had an appointment with my adviser at 2pm tomorrow (Monday, Dec. 1). But I knew that I'd have to miss my pathophysiology lecture about 30 minutes early, and that's my favorite class. I agreed, and she was meeting with all her advisees at once I think, somewhere on the 6th floor. I realize now that it was all a dream. There is no appointment meeting. Now I wonder how much of my other scheduling events are the result of a dream. Hmmm.

2. I had a dream last night where I was traveling to Beijing, China. My dad was with me for some reason. We drove to the airport, where we got on a plane but we had to transfer to another plane for some reason in Chicago or something. My dad got in a fight with the pilot and was then handcuffed to his seat. So we're on this plane to San Francisco (my dad handcuffed to his seat), where we stop before arriving in Beijing. For some reason I was really anxious and/or apprehensive about flying, which I rarely am. There were storms expected ahead and I wasn't sure if the pilot was going to attempt to fly through them or go around. Anyway, I woke up mid-dream and I tried forcing myself back to sleep to finish the dream. I hate waking up mid-dream. Anyone else do that?

3. Some Lolcats pics. From this site, of course.

I love this site, haha. It's the most addicting distraction I've come across in a while. My friend and I just kept sending each other links for about an hour.

4. Last, but not least, I'd like to introduce (who haven't come across it yet) the blog Equal Eight. It's rather hilarious, so go over and say hi! :D

The Bug Genocide

Because I'm too lazy to post something of real substance, here's a transcript of my IM convo between my friend JW-M and I tonight (he's in Beijing right now, sadness) to entertain you all:

JW-M: niiii haooo
Me: dude!
Me: what's up?!
Me: :P
Me: a centipede just crawled up my wall in front of me
Me: i deftly dealt with it
JW-M: good
Me: aka, I smushed it against the wall and disposed of it in the toilet
JW-M: /eat
JW-M: oh
JW-M: alas
Me: though, there's a centipede-smear on the wall now =/
Me: i refuse to eat anything with an exoskeleton
JW-M: i see
JW-M: crunch crunch
Me: ugh
Me: ::twitch::
. . .
Me: did i tell you about the suspect-cockroach in my apt?
JW-M: lol no
JW-M: was it like scurry scurry
JW-M: and then did you kill it good
. . .
Me: JW-M
JW-M: what
Me: i need to break into the chem building
JW-M: wat
Me: and steal all the insect pheramones
JW-M: wut
JW-M: lol ok
Me: so i can lure all the bugs away from my apt
Me: where they'll mate themselves to death
Me: far away
JW-M: sounds fun
. . .
Me: i suspect rollie pollies hiding in my plant's soil
Me: eeeee!
Me: i felt a gnat crawling down my arm
Me: stupid creatures
JW-M: they prolly do
JW-M: what is your bug problem today
. . .
JW-M: its only like one month until the bug genocide anyway
JW-M: thank god
Me: OMG
Me: THE BUG GENOCIDE
Me: i can't wait

For those wondering, the "bug genocide" is the day when it suddenly gets cold (also the first day of frost on the ground). Since the bugs don't usually see it coming, there are like NO bugs after that day for a few weeks at least, because they've all died. It's wonderful. *waits patiently*

The Crushing of Souls

I feel like we grad students have such a bleak look on things academic, especially my friend AG-F (and I, to a far lesser extent). She's getting her Master's in genetic counseling here and that program here is one of the most intense in the nation.

So you'll pardon us when we walk by the diag and see freshmen sitting there, playing on their guitars and singing. And when I'm on an overly-crowded bus to central campus and I hear a girl recount how she ate some nachos that didn't agree with her and threw up in her dorm room. Or when there are way too many girls who are way too dressed up for no reason in the middle of the day.

And our response to all this? Just you wait, you'll see. Once classes are in full swing they will crush your souls. No longer will you have time to play your guitar and sing on the diag. No longer will you have the time nor energy to put on make up, select your tightest fitting outfits, and sling your purses rather than your backpacks over your shoulders. And to you, girl-who-talks-about-throwing-up, I'm sure your friends don't want to hear about your exploits with the trashcan. And I'm positive the rest of the bus doesn't want to hear it either.

Oh, and while I was at the library printing and filling stuff out, there was this freshman girl at the table over. And she was on the phone with her boyfriend for almost 2 hours straight. And she kept sobbing and telling him how she loved him, and how he shouldn't be doing whatever he's doing to her. It was kind of pathetic really, I had to fight the urge to go up to her, close her phone, and tell her to just forget about him and study. I hope that never happens to me, in a very full library of all places.

Ugh, I can feel myself detaching from central campus and all the undergrads. And in 2 weeks, grad school will hit me full force. I can feel my social life slipping away already . . .