Tales of a Brown-Haired Freak

Dear Terms 1, 2 and 6,

Congratulations on successfully (or not so successfully) completing your semester! I wish you safe travels home and hope that, while you're enjoying being amongst your friends and family once again, you spare a thought or two for us 4th termers still stuck on this island, slaving our way through 6 more weeks of path, nutrition, and CPD.

Love,
R

PS - I hate you all.

So I studied, and then I called the taxi driver to double check our 8:00 meet time to head out to see the turtles.

"Uh, yes - didn't I tell you? We're going at 10 instead." "No, we're not. 10 is too late. In that case, we can't go." "Okay, then. My cousin will take you up at 8, and I'll take the rest of the group at 10."

Score! But I'm ahead of myself. You see, it happened like this:

S's fiance is in town for 2 weeks. She wanted to see turtles. I wanted to see turtles. S didn't really care one was or the other, but was willing to come with. I called up taxi man, and he said he had another group of 9 going at 8 and that we could join them. All good, until the mysterious 7pm notice of departure change (it's a 2 hour drive to the beach where the leatherbacks nest, and a friend of our had one last week and said it was better to go early. That combined with the need to meet people at 11am to practice CPD stuff meant that there was no way in christian afterword that we were leaving at 10).

We ended up driving in a car with L, another well-known taxi driver, who regaled us with stories and general info about the island until we got to the beach. The very large, long beach. The very large, long, empty beach. Where were all the people/turtles?

We decided to hike to the other end of the beach where, low and behold, we found a small group consisting of marine biologist, marine biologist trainee, and 2 vet students doing a turtle selective. They seemed confused that we were there (no one had told them we were coming), but pretty cool about the whole thing and patiently spent the next half hour teaching us everything they knew about leatherback turtles (not much, seeing as how they're ridiculously endangered and spend most of their time in deep ocean).

Every half hour or so, the biologists hike to the other end of the beach, checking for turtles laying and if they find any, checking flipper tags. If the turtle picks a bad place to lay (too close to the tide, too much water in the hole, etc), they'll catch the eggs as they're laid and relocate the nest somewhere safer. They also take extreme care not to bother the turtles, so no lights, cameras, or walking into the leatherback's line of sight on pain of being sent away. All in all, it's a pretty civilized event other than the millions of blood sucking insects.

The process itself is fascinating - the turtle will come up on land and wander around for awhile before eventually choosing a spot. She'll then hunker down and push the sand around for while before using her back flippers to dig a hole that's surprisingly narrow and deep considering that she only has flippers to work with. They actually use them like spoons, scooping up the sand and chucking it a distance away, alternating flippers and occasionally resting. It's certainly a better hole than I could dig, at least.

Around 1 - 1:30ish, the other group of people finally arrived, chattering, flashing lights, and being generally irritating to the turtle (not to mention, us) we were watching at the time until the biologist went to tell them to stop, They were also a bit miffed at us for not going with them (apparently it ended up costing them a bit more, but that was hardly our fault) I think they were just cranky about getting there so late. Did I mention that it started to rain within 15 minutes of their arrival?

The rain was the end of it for us - satisfied with the adventure and not wanting to get soaked or listen to inane chatter any longer, we headed back to the car and spent the ride home learning about the rampaging cocaine use on the island.

studystudystudystudystudystudy food.
studystudystudystudystudystudy facebook.
studystudystudystudystudystudy post this.
studystudystudystudystudystudy walk.
studystudystudystudystudystudy read the news.

rinse and repeat x 30.

studystudystudystudystudystudy turtle watching!

who says you can't just drop everything and head up island in the middle of pre-exam week? It's laying season!

(I'd originally planned on going right after exams, but S's fiance is visiting this week and it seemed like a good distraction on a long weekend when there won't be too many other students there with us).

The nice thing about having entire mornings devoted to micro group presentations is that it means we don't have to learn anything new before the weekend starts. This is especially appreciated this week, when we have several dozen leukemias and lymphomas with identical presentations to memorize, hepatitis A through G to figure out, and a CDP quiz on Monday.

The not so nice thing about having entire mornings devoted to micro group presentations is that we have to sit through entire mornings of micro presentations. The topics aren't so bad, but listening to person after person liberally embellishing their powerpoint with "ums", "uhs" and "hmmms" can get a bit grating after awhile. But it's not all bad - as a whole, we appear to have dropped the "likes" of our undergrad years.

( And then there's all sorts of other things going on right now. )

Sandblast makes me ashamed to be an SGU student.

( Let me explain. )

And that's why I killed him, you honor.

Oh, wait. Never mind that. Damn! I meant to say something profound and satisfyingly closure-inducing, but the moment's gone now. Sorry.

Yesterday I got to play Dread Pirate Roberts in a boating race. Sometimes I operated a rope that dealt with the mail sail and the boom and occasionally I operated a rope that dealt with the front sail. Mostly, I was ballast because that's what I do best. I was not allowed to touch the steering wheel, as much fun as it looked.

We did 2 races. We came in second in the first, and managed to win the second using a last-ditch strategy that involved tacking before they did in order to steal their wind, then zooming to the finish buoy while they frantically tried to re-set their sails so they could start moving again. Now I know why so many people like to sail! It was a lot of fun and the weather was perfect. I want a boat, and someone to teach me how to sail it. Oh, and some free time - that would be nice too. I also want a pony and a rocketship...

Today of course, I woke up after roughly 11 hours of sleep to find that 75% of my body is covered in rather painful sunburn (not a continuous 75%. This one includes the tops of my feet, a strip around my back just over my kidneys, and my knees, but doesn't include my back, my scalp or my shins. Weird). Yes, I wore sunscreen. Yes, I reapplied sunscreen. And yes, I burned even so. Stupid sun/ocean! Also, I hurt. Pulling on ropes and scrambling around the boat while it's cornering so that the sail is actually touching water are not apparently the best activities for someone as coordination-challenged as I am. Who knew?

Today, of course, I make up for having fun yesterday. Luckily, since we still haven't gotten our path packages (no comment), that's pretty easy. Micro is on the menu, and then I can come home and nap. And make a crockpot full of delicious lunch foods, because we'll be needing them this week. And finish my laundry. And email the CPD department about their failure to schedule labs that don't conflict with path (why would they even bother to make the schedule before the path groups are finalized?). And get groceries. Oh, and contact my landlord about getting a refund for the 2 months that we haven't had our cleaner (she's sick, but that's not OUR fault). And...okay, maybe not as easy an afternoon as I'd hoped. But better than studying all day. Anything's better than that. Except getting tortured by evil ninjas - but that's another story.

Dear term 3,

You weren't really what I expected, though I should have expected that, I suppose. I was promised easy; I was promised fun; I was promised the beach. Instead, I got mostly easy, occasionally fun, and the beach (but only once). For the most part, I enjoyed your classes. Your stories about legal precedent and ethical issues were interesting, and your movies were an educational treat to anyone who enjoys public access television. I did not enjoy your health systems, nor did I find your epidemiology to be particularly easy, but I can't lay all the blame for these at your feet - some of it was due to my own laziness.

The way I see it is this - third term, you are wasted on students by occuring in 2nd year. By now, we're all seen much of the island. Fish Friday is no longer cool and exciting so much as a long queasy drive to get tasty fried fish and breaded stuff and ice cream. We've realized that the beach is only fun if you're going there to get away from studying; it loses its savor when you're going for lack of anything better to do. And most importantly, we've discovered exactly how much we spent in 1st year, and REALLY don't want to do that again. Thus, we're living cheaply, and it's you that has to suffer.

But don't despair, 3rd term! You will always have a special place in my heart, one I will hold precious when I recall my med school days. When I remember you, I will remember House marathons, hours spent watching Wife Swap on Lifetime, and occasionally catching Star Trek reruns on Space. I will also remember the rum factory, the AMSA fair, and various hash runs. I will probably remember seeing dolphins in the rain, but you probably shouldn't count on it, as I don't like remembering being seasick.

And so I bid you a fond farewell, third term. Be nice to your next class,

R

I present to you now for your enjoyment, the lyrics to Queen Ifrica's "Daddy" (unabridged and untranslated).

Intro

stop it daddy
daddy stop it nuh
a going to tell on you enuh
Chorus:2X
daddy don’t touch mi there
i’m gonna tell on you one day i swear
can’t you see i’m scared
you suppose to be ma father

Verse:1
everyday a wonder why ma daddy had to be di one to take away my innocence
oh sometimes a wanna die feels like no one cares for me and it’s evident
that something must be wrong with me
i’m not as happy as i seem to be
the long showers i take don’t wash away the memories
why do i have to face these tragedies
we go thru struggles in life i’m aware
but to have ma daddy touching me that’s just not fair
stop him from destroying ma future
believe me he’s behaving like a creature

Rpt. Chorus:
Verse:2
to all you mothers out there
give a listening ear
pay attention even if di man a pastor
yuh affi mek sure before yuh trust him wid yuh daughta
plus him will even try fi tek yuh son as brawta
watch it mek mi duck him wid some dutty watah
yuh cyaah hide nuh more now yuh affi meet yuh karma
if yuh know seh it a gwaan and turn a blind eye

den yuh judgment ago pile up bout a mile high
get suicidal if yuh tink it ago save yuh
because mi sure seh yuh naah guh get fi si di saviour
mi just cyaah find a name fi yuh behaviour
is a lucky ting wi got a nosey neighbour

Rpt. Chorus: Verse 3
when yuh feel like giving up
just shake it off and live it up
di most high will deliver you
cyaah jump di rope if yuh nuh try
suh wipe da tears deh from yuh eye
get di wings of confidence fi mek yuh fly
tribulations a just fi mek yuh stronga
love yuh self and it will help yuh fi get ova
any flesh weh hurt a likkle yute will neva prospa
a passing on di message from di masta
Repeat verse 1, chorus 1

It's been a rollercoaster few days in the wonderful world of behavioral science. First, a shiny new (to SGU) prof with a not-entirely innocent love for goats. But she uses people she knows for examples, and seems perfectly happy to start rumors about herself ("please please PLEASE don't tell anyone I'm actually a man. This is only for Example purposes."). More importantly, she made it all the way through 2 hours of paraphilias and sexual disfunction details without crackng up more than once or twice. (Speaking of which, what in sweet zombie jeebus's name is S&M doing in the DSM as a paraphilia? And transvestism? Maybe it's a northwest thing, but I was under the impression that they were pretty mainstream.)

Anyway, today was all about the drugs, and how they were bad...mmmkay? Except that sometimes they aren't. And medical marijuans is a good thing, even if it's illegal. And heroin's just great, as long as you can afford it and it doesn't lead you into a life of jazz and liquor. I will admit to being amazed, however, at how little my classmates know about various aspects of various drugs. It's not just lack of knowledge about such things as what whippets are (hint - not a type of dog), but actually belief that marijuana is addictive and makes you psychotic. War on Drugs brainwashing or something more sinister?

So yesterday, J and I were walking home, keeping an eye on the woods for any of her things (and for thugs). Needless to say, we didn't find anything...or did we? Walking up the road to our apartment, we caught a glimpse of blue in he bushes, and there, directly across from our apartment, was her backpack and lunchbox, neatly placed where we would be sure to see them.

I kept watch for ninjas while J clambered up the hill and rescued her belongings, and then the real question surfaced...how did he know where we live? We went down to our apartment with all the stealth we could muster (admittedly, not very much considering we were accompanied by 3 barking dogs), but our house was safe. so we opened the backpack and did a quick, no hands tally of the insides. Laptop? Check. books? Check? Sweater...hey, where's the sweater? That was the best sweater ever! Oh - there it is. Check. Wallet? Present, but empty. We should leave it for fingerprinting. ID? Present, but no house key. So he knows where we live, AND he has the key? Quick, call landlord!

Anyway, the landlord got our lock changed, the police investigator came by and took some things for fingerprinting, and we went out for a celebration dinner. (The policeman assured us that we don't need to worry that the guy knew where we lived, and that there's no chance of him coming back for revenge if he's caught and spends some time in jail - all students look the same to most grenadians anyway.

The good news - I went to the cell phone place and got my number transferred to a new sim card today. S is an amazing person who gave/lent me his old phone, which is actually better than the old one. AND...when I checked my balance at the phone place, I discovered that there is $20 MORE on it than before; not only did they steal a worthless phone, they actually put more money on to it for me. Idiots.

The bad news is that my roommate was mugged today. 5ish, walking home from the bus stop, was assaulted by an older man who took her backpack. I'm not going into any details, but she's in worse shape than I am/was, and rightly so. I spoke to out landlord, who is going to talk to the police tomorrow and arrange for us to rent a car for the next while, at a price that we can afford (hopefully).

The irritating part is that I KNOW our street isn't any more dangerous than it was before, and I know that the chance of this happening to both of us over 3 days is next to nothing (no one else around here has been so much as shouted at), but it's hard to be rational when there's NOTHING either of us can do to be any safer. We don't walk alone at night, we call if we're going to be out later or at an odd time, and we deliberately chose a safer neighbourhood to live in. The only thing left is to start carrying weapons, or to never go ANYWHERE alone. The first is a really bad idea (it's too easy to take a knife away from someone, especially since neither of us knows anything about using them), and the second is just entirely unfeasable for more reasons than one. So what are we supposed to do?

Fighting off would-be muggers is hard work. My entire body hurts and is covered with bruises, scratches, and plain old ouchy bits. And I have a headache - apparently I hit it harder than I thought on the ground. Have to go visit the cell phone office tomorrow to see about getting my card cancelled, though I expect it's too late to get any money off of it. Sigh.

You never think it'll happen to you. And then it does, and you're so pissed off that you still can't believe it has happened to you. There's no justice in the world.

Today, in broad daylight, on a fairly well-trodden path, I was mugged. Sort of. I prefer the word "jumped," because it feels more accurate, but whatever - it's just semantics. Anyway, I was walking along, happily listening to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (hey, it was the first book I found) on my ipod, when I heard running footsteps behind me. I spun around just in time to get knocked to the ground by 2 guys (kids really - neither could have been even as old as I am) and partially roughed up. Long story short, amidst a lot of profanity and more than a little anger (they were wearing bandanas on their faces, for christ's sake - and honestly, it didn't even occur to me to be afraid), I managed to kick one guy in the junk and jab the other in the eye with my finger, then jumped up when they grabbed my bag and ran off a bit.

There was a lot more profanity involved on my part as they dumped the contents of my bag on the ground (I was ranting somewhat hysterically at this point - I vaguely recall saying something uncomplimentary about their parentage), realized it contained only ingredients for delicious pad thai (I don't carry my wallet here - only money if I need it and my ID), and ran away like the stupid fucking kids they were. Honestly, what were they thinking? It was 5:30 in the fucking afternoon. You could see the peanut butter sticking out of my bag. And they didn't even take my ipod! They took my $5 phone! That I need! Idiots.

Anyway, I picked up my stuff and jogged to campus, filed my report, headed to the police station (with 2 friends), filed another report, and headed back to A's dorm to make delicious pad thai (it was delicious). I also drank a shot or 2 of frighteningly strong rum, but it was strictly medicinal - I was so pissed off that my hands were shaking. Probably some reaction in there too, but mostly anger. Really - they tried to mug me? They didn't even have weapons! They didn't even ask for my ipod - they just knocked me down! It's not like I wouldn't have given it to them - I'm not completely stupid. Somewhere in my ranting, I think I offered it to them, but the fuckers couldn't even get that part right.

And now I've got scratches and cuts on my arms from the gravel on the road and a headache from whacking it on the group when I fell, and I'll never be able to take that route to school alone again, and all because these fucking kids thought they were clever. The entire business probably took less than 2 minutes all told, but it was enough to ruin my day. The fuckers.

What's a good way to celebrate the end of second term? How about with the Best. Dive. Ever? i thought so too.

Okay, it probably wasn't the best dive in the history of diving, and it may or may not have been the best dive I've ever been on, but it was still pretty damn good.

M was feeling a bit delicate this morning (to say the least), but her dive package was about to expire so she transferred the last one to me - free dive = woo! It ended up being just me and a pack of polish sailors (5, who had sailed here with 15 of their friends, all male, on a tiny boat. That's right - 2 weeks + all guys + hetero = crazy. But they were nice enough). Anyway, visibility was decent, Shark Reef was positively teeming with life, and there was a nice little current that ensured that I got to see as much as possible for minimal effort.

The highlight of the dive was definitely the small army of sea turtles that were hanging out on the reef, doing important turtle things. It seemed like we'd barely lose sight of one that another would wander over to say hello! There were also a couple of ginormous sting rays, a bunch of porcupine (adult puffer) fish (according to the divemaster, they're really good eating), and a few giant (a couple of feet in size) rainbow-hued angelfish that I want to take home and keep in my bathtub.

Now I'm home and vaguely considering reviewing for BSCE, but I'll probably just put on House instead.

With SGA, that is. After getting home close to midnight last night, I did what any sensible monkey would do and slept late, skipping both my one hour of interesting class and my one hour of I-have-no-idea-what-it's-like-anymore-because-I-haven't-been-since-this-particular-prof's-first-lecture class. Now I'm working up the bother to actually get to campus and do some of that studying thing, though part of me just wants to sit and hit Refresh over and over again until my immuno grade gets posted.

But back to SGA. Things I like - working at events (much more fun than attending them, really), knowing what's going on on campus, being able to bring up topics of issue at meetings and see results happen (well, sometimes). And at least some of the people in the club.

Things I don't like - dealing with the other people on SGA (well, some of them). Long, pointless meetings where nothing really gets accomplished. Not actually have any power (as a whole) to make any meaningful changes on campus on in administration. Being part of an organization who's primary role is to throw parties (or to enable other clubs to throw parties), whereby students end up giving yet more of their limited money to this island in exchange for enough alcohol to drink until they throw up and fall over (not necessarily in that order). Yes, I understand that charity is a noble thing and that we're all fabulously wealthy by island standards, but don't we already give this island enough? We get fleeced on everything from housing to groceries to arriving and leaving the island. The school gives the island tons of money, and sets up programs (undergrad, nursing) that they subsidize by raising OUR tuition. Half of the blood donations here come from students, and locals use everything from our buses to our laundry facilities to our medical clinic freely. So why is it so important that every club become a "charity organization?" This entire medical program is a charity organization, alight an involuntary one.

So sure, SGA gets students new printers and signs (misspelled) on the buildings. The island gets $50000 of money out of the student's pockets every 6 months. Fair? Not really.

Wow - that turned into a longer rant than I'd expected. Sorry about that - I suspect a big part of it is end-of-term irritation, probably combined with missed sleep. (btw - no, the pizza/sandwiches before meetings doesn't play any part in my SGA membership. They're not good enough to do so). Long story short, I like the club, I hate what the club does. Maybe I should switch to AMSA or something next term instead.

I'm fairly (read - 99%) certain that our new physio prof is a vampire. Or at least from transylvania. Or maybe related to Cruella De'vil. Yes, she claims to be from South Africa, but I know my accents, and her's is most definitely not from SA. Possibly not even from this planet, but that's a bit more farfetched than I want to get right now. My proof? She's older than any legitimate human being should be, she got oddly dreamy shile discussing the role of the bloodstream in endocrinology, and she says the word "human" like I say "Northern Haiy-Nosed Wobat, ie, I'm familiar with the species, but have no relation to it and find it interesting only in abstract. Also, I've never seen her out in the sun.

5 words into the lecture, half the class broke out in somewhat hysterical giggles at the thought of 14 lectures of listening to this particular child of the night mangle her way through various hormone names and the other half began packing up their stuff (quietly, so as not to draw her attention) before she could get to the whole blood-sucking thing. I left somewhere after the 6h mention of the hyypo-thaaaaaahhlamoose and, well, here I am. No wonder Dr H was grinning so hard as he left Bell, the bastard.

I definitely needed a laugh and I suppose the universe has obliged me rather nicely, but I'm beginning to suspect I know where the campus dogs have been disappearing to. If I see her walking around in a new fur coat in the next few days, I'm investing in garlic and crucifixes.

I think I've hit my usual 3/4 slump.  I look at my calendar and see 35 days left, and any thought of studying completely flies out of my head. It's not a purposeful thing, just lack of motivation; really weird when you think of it - 4 week from finals is when you'd expect the most enthusiasm for this sort of thing.

But nope - as far as this weekend goes, I'm a med student failure.  The plan was to go to the orphan art sale friday, get to bed at a reasonable hour, study sat, study sun, and finish up the weekend with a delicious mac n' cheese dinner, reasonably confident in my abilities with respect to physio and neuro, immuno pending.  Instead, I went to the orphan art sale (got outbid on all my paintings!  Boo, but some people are willing to pay a ridiculous amount for paint smeared on canvus by an orphan.  I'm not one of them.), and drank far too much wine (they had a lot of varieties), then took my wine over to the dodgeball tournament, where I ran into M, S, S and A.  And of course, you can't just up and leave in the middle of something as entertaining as a dodgeball tournament, so we all stayed until the end.

Then, of course, M recalled that we were overdue on our promised Obama shots, so we all trooped over to his place where we dutifully created and then comsumed a number of Obama-shots (triple sec, gin, and orange juice.  Delicious, in honour of his taking florida).  And, well, one thing led to another and the next thing I knew, it was 1:30am (hey, that's late for me! I get up early) and A had arrived, looking for advice for his girl troubles and I had no buses available to take me home.  So A (other A) and S gallantly agreed to walk me home and fight off any potential rapists (there weren't any, but there could have been).

And then I slept till noon and woke up painfully hungover.  Needless to say, not much got accomplished on saturday, though i did get out to a delicious dinner at True Blue Inn - grilled marlin, milkshake and live music really does do a body good. 

At least today I did manage to get up early and study on campus, so the weekend wasn't entirely a catastrophe.  I now feel moderately knowledgeable about neuro (even if I still don't know what's going on in the cerebellum), fairly ok with immuno, and decent with physio provided no one asks me anything about any of the graphs.  Delicious mac n' cheese is still on the menu when i gt back from my run.

Last day at the hospital, and it's been fun. On monday we spent a bit of time in the OR (general surgery, nothing terribly exciting but we did get to poke at a lypoma when it was taken out (felt like a very small sack of pudding), and then moved down to the wards to practice our venipuncture on the poor, hapless patients.

( Cut for blood and gore and needles )

And that's the end of my hospital time. I've learned that I'd gnaw off my own foot before going into obgyn, but I still like surgery. Dammit. In other news, 35 days till I get to come home!

Grenada Thanksgiving, that is. I'm celebrating by heading to Margarita Island (Venezuela) in about an hour. Ciao!

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