As you might have gathered from the last entry, I had a great weekend. casibeth came up from ATL for the weekend. I had a blast hanging out with her and giving her a little taste of Nashville! (Seriously... most of the weekend involved eating.) And then, of course, there was the concert Saturday night. I found it amusing that I got to hear two of the staples of the mediocre cover band from Flying Saucer trivia*. Needless to say, "Chasing Cars" is much better as performed by Snow Patrol, and "Yellow" is much better as performed by Coldplay.

*Recent upheaval in my life: as of two weeks ago, trivia no longer happens at the Flying Saucer. It's now at a different place with fewer beers on tap, more items on the menu, fewer waitstaff (longer waits for food), fewer people (no need to tablesave), and fewer mediocre cover bands. It's taking some getting used to.

Moving on, I'm now on my last rotation of third year, Child Psychiatry consults. The team consists of two attendings who work on alternate days, a first year fellow, and me. One of the attendings has been one of my small group leaders since day 3 of med school. (I have a distinct memory of her welcoming my Ecology group to Vandy, introducing herself, and then telling us "I'll be your Master Clinical Teacher when you're third years." Third year seemed so impossibly far away, I couldn't imagine why anyone would have us look ahead that far.) Anyway, it's great, because she really really knows me. It's not so great, because she really really knows me. As in, if I'm not on top of things tomorrow, she'll know darn well it's because I spent two hours at trivia tonight.

Highlights of last weekend...

Sunday morning, I went with 7 other people to Monell's, for family style, all-you-can-eat, down-home Southern breakfast. It was very tasty, but it wasn't really anything I couldn't get any time I wanted at home. Grits, eggs, bacon, sausage, and biscuits has pretty much been my default breakfast every single morning for my entire life. Seriously, when I was home for spring break this year, I had to warn my mom ahead of time when I didn't plan on eating that for breakfast. It has only been fairly recently that I've realized that not all my friends, even the Southern ones, have had similar upbringings. Now I'm not dissing Monell's, because I'm not at home now, and I'm certainly not cooking all that food for myself every day. I would definitely recommend it to people who aren't used to giant southern breakfasts. And I would bring my parents there, since they like to go out to eat at places with familiar foods.

On Memorial Day itself, I was mostly a waste of space. In the evening I went over to Centennial Park with Paige and Jo for a blues festival. It was an all day event, but we only saw the headliner-- Bobby Blue Bland. Or "Bobby Blue Bland and the Bobby Blue Bland Blues Band," as I said repeatedly throughout the day. That was probably annoying... anyway, my mom and most of her siblings love blues music, so I was quite familiar with Mr. Bland. I sent my mom a text message about the concert, and she texted back, "I am so jealous that is wrong i am the blue person in the family have fun". She's still working on punctuation, and capitalization, but she's getting better at the whole texting thing every day!! Also, she's apparently blue in color. I hadn't realized that.
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So at the end of the long weekend, I had more days off Psych than days I'd worked on the rotation. It kind of felt like the rotation only just got started this week. I really like it so far. Still trying to tease out whether that's because I actually enjoy psychiatry, or because I enjoy it when the resident says "Bye! See you tomorrow!" shortly after noon. Maybe a little bit of both.

High point: The other day, one of my patients told the attending, "I was feeling bad, but then I talked to Laquita and I feel a lot better now!" She pointed to me as she said this, so I feel pretty confident that I am in fact the Laquita she meant. That felt really good, and not just because my attending gave me a huge beaming smile and approving nod. However, I later realized that if that patient comes back to the hospital relapsed or, God forbid, post-overdose or suicide attempt, my heart would break into tiny pieces. Reason #1 why I don't think I'm cut out for a career in psychiatry.

Low point: I recently had a vivid nightmare about being shot in the face after a different patient discussed his previous suicide plans in exquisite detail. That pretty much ended all my future sleep plans for that night. Reason #2 I'm glad my resident let me go home early, and reason #2 I'm not a future psychiatrist. (Also reason #17894823934634832 why I might need to see a mental health professional myself.)

This morning, I got to hear a lecture on disclosing errors. The same lecture that I thought was so awesome on the first day of medical school orientation. The same lecture that I'm starting to have memorized after hearing it at least four more times before today. I NEED to do my residency at another institution, if only to save myself from a future in which I hear that exact same lecture seven more times!

Liz was out of town this weekend for her sister's college graduation. That left me alone in the apartment with Guinevere and Percival. Since I believe that one becomes a Crazy Cat Person the moment cats outnumber humans, it was my Crazy Cat Lady weekend!! Wheee!

As soon as I had the apartment to myself, I tried really really hard to study Neuro. I ended up sleeping on the floor while the Music Choice 90s channel played in the background. Luckily Johanna saved me from my own lack of willpower by coming over to hang out and study. If I hadn't chatted with her on Friday night, I probably would have spent the whole weekend going from my bed to the couch without leaving my apartment or speaking to another human.

Instead, on Saturday I went to Whole Foods to study, but ended up spending more time thinking about fourth year stuff. Like my personal statement for residency applications, which is refusing to write itself. And trying to figure out just where in the country I'm interested in going. (It's a big country!! I'm taking suggestions.) I eventually gave up, and went to check out the local Latin American Street Festival with a couple of people. It turned out to be not that awesome (in fairness, we only caught the very tail end), so we went to dinner instead. Followed by giant ice cream cones at Maggie Moo's. Good times.

Sunday, I went to brunch to celebrate my friend Lindsey's birthday. You might think that Mother's Day brunch would be a madhouse, but the place we went to wasn't super crowded. It was one of the slowest brunches I've ever had. I think it took over half an hour just for our drinks to come. So it was well into the afternoon when I got home. After a workout and a few hours of The Food Network, I did a bit of Neuro studying.

(You know, if I actually bomb this shelf, I'm going to feel real bad about broadcasting just how little I studied.)

I am very happy that I'm not the only person doing posts in honor of national poetry month! Keep sharing your favorites, guys.

Pediatric neurology continues to go well. In clinic I tend to see about 6 patients a day. I've seen a wide assortment of seizure disorders, in addition to developmental disorders, movement disorders... and a few good old fashioned headaches. Trying to puzzle out diagnoses for the new patients is pretty cool. So is trying to figure out the best medication plan for the return patients. Overall it's been much more of a mental challenge than general peds clinic. Tomorrow, I switch over to the inpatient consults side. Although whenever there aren't any consults to be seen, I'll be right back in clinic.

I just got home from Nashville 4 Africa, a benefit concert featuring the African Children's Choir. I haven't been talking the concert up because I didn't even know it was happening until Monday. That's when one of the residents I'm working with offered me an extra ticket that she had. I thought it might be awkward to go hang out with a bunch of residents, so I considered being antisocial and claiming that I had something else to do tonight. I'm so glad I didn't. The concert was amazing!! I'm not a country music fan, but even I could appreciate seeing Keith Urban, Dierks Bentley, and Faith Hill all performing with the children's choir. There were also appearances by Jars of Clay, Third Day, and Brad Arnold (the lead singer of Three Doors Down)-- all bands I did my fair share of listening to in the mid-late 90s.

But even with all the music performers, my favorite moment might've been the brief appearance by Hasheem Thabeet, who played basketball for Connecticut and will be entering the NBA draft this year. As soon as the host announced that the next guest was from "Tanzania by way of Connecticut," I basically squealed "HASHEEM THABEET IS HERE??!!" like I was the biggest Huskies fan in the whole building. It's not that I like UConn that much; I'm just a college basketball fangirl.

Bedtime!!

Saturday morning: Went to get my hair done, spent the entire time convincing another customer that I am not in medical school to become an xray technician. No offense to any xray technicians out there, but now that third year has started I am especially sensitive to anyone thinking I'm going through all this for anything other than a freaking Medicinae Doctor. Especially when they argue with me about what is and isn't medical school. Honestly, this woman said I must be mistaken about getting a doctorate, since I don't have a Masters degree. Yes, three years in I'm still confused about the requirements of my program. Thank you for enlightening me.

Saturday afternoon and evening: football, football, football.

Saturday night: Out to a couple of bars, to celebrate a classmate's birthday and just hang out with people. I had a ton of fun, because I don't ask for a whole lot from my bar scene. All I really need is the ability to walk around without being constantly jostled, and a reasonably good cover band playing songs that aren't country. It was a good night.

This morning: Brunch with Liz, Lindsey and Caitlyn at The Copper Kettle. The restaurant sometimes caters noon conference at the VA. Those lunches were always delicious, so when we found out that they have all-you-can-eat brunch we were sold. It's pretty expensive, about $10 bucks more than DUC brunch (my standard for brunch buffets). We might make going there an end-of-rotation celebration type of thing.

Now: after several hours of food coma, I'm attempting to study some Cardiology. When I get tired of doing that (real soon), I'm going to hit the gym to try and cancel out brunch.

Tomorrow is the first day of my two outpatient weeks!

Went to a concert with three friends last night.

Opener #1: Umbrella Tree. Not really my kind of music, but they were certainly lively. I appreciated the French Horn.

Opener #2: The Spinto Band. I liked them. I liked them a lot. Their song "Brown Boxes" features kazoos! My friends and I mocked this at first, but by the end of the song we were all about the kazoos. I also enjoyed the song "Oh Mandy." I've added both to my playlist (and you should too!).

Headliner: The Whigs. I liked them, but the crowd didn't seem at all excited to see them. The venue held 500, but there were only about eight people singing along or reacting to the music in any way. That sucked, but the music was good. I recommend the songs "Technology," "Need You Need You," and "Right Hand on My Heart."

After the concert, we met up with some other friends downtown, where there was a cover band playing the classics: Bon Jovi, John Mellencamp, etc. There was also an abundance of sweet potato fries, which made me very very happy.

Now, it feels like I'm trying to get a sore throat/earache. A Eustachian tube ache, I guess. I think I've sufficiently recovered from the events of last night to drown my sorrows in TheraFlu. I'm going to go get started on that.

I forgot to mention that on Thursday, we practiced the chest exam on standardized patients. It went wonderfully. I don't mean that I did everything perfectly and in the right order, because I most definitely did not. (At one point the patient asked me, "Don't you need to do the thing where I say 'Ninety-nine?'") It was wonderful because I wasn't nervous or hesitant! I just did it! I'm starting to think I might not be terrible at the whole medicine thing.

I went out and partied last night, for the first time in what felt like forever. It was pretty fun! Went to a charity date auction and ended up buying two of my classmates. Then I tagged along with a group that was going to one of the honky tonks. I usually hate the honky-tonk scene: the places all reek of smoke and beer, the crowds are so thick you can barely move, and country music is the suck. Last night, I actually had fun! I guess it was because the cover band played very little country. Journey, AC/DC, John Mellencamp, The Black Crowes, Bon Jovi... that I can get behind. Good times in Nashville!

Week 1 is done! The material we've covered over the first three days has been pretty basic and easy to handle. I have to keep reminding myself that it's going to get a lot harder very soon. Actually, it already has been harder than it should be. Remember that massive amount of information I crammed into my brain last year? Turns out I was supposed to retain it. Why wasn't I warned about this?? I might've paid a little more attention! Trying to appreciate diseased organs in Path lab without remembering what healthy ones look like wasn't very fun.

The world premiere of High School Musical 2 was last night, but I decided to go see Shakespeare in the Park instead, and then do a late dinner afterwards. The play was The Merry Wives of Windsor, set in 1940s New Orleans. The language was Shakesepeare's, but the costumes were 40s, and there was a lot of jazz. It was better than that description makes it sound. I'm glad I decided to go. Besides, I knew that HSM 2 would be airing at least five more times this weekend. I actually just finished watching it. Not quite as good as the original, but still entertaining.

Yesterday afternoon, I turned in the keys to my Bellevue apartment, ending that stage of my life. As happy as I am to officially be out of there, turning out the lights for the last time brought a tear to my eye. (Because what doesn't bring a tear to my eye?) After all, it was my very first apartment, and the place I called home (albeit grudgingly) during first year.

Yesterday evening, a group of us went to see the Gin Blossoms play at the Wild Horse Saloon. I had a lot of fun. It was like the mid-90s all over again! The lead singer kept throwing the 'rock on' hand sign, asking for shots of whiskey, and generally acting like he was such a hardcore rocker. I'm pretty sure that even at the height of their popularity, the Gin Blossoms were Pop Rock at best. I have nothing against Pop Rock, I just don't think it merits throwing the devil horns.

I was also amused when the mood of the audience instantaneously morphed from lukewarm during songs from the new album, to absolutely fucking batshit crazy during the first chords of their old hits. Honestly, they could have gone up on stage, played "Hey Jealousy," and left, and I would have considered it well worth the ticket price. I think a lot of my fellow audience members felt the same way.

I volunteered at ShadeTree, our student-run free clinic, yesterday. Beth was there too, and as always she's a lot funnier than I am, so go read what she has to say about learning to draw blood.

I did not do any blood draws yesterday, because I collapse under pressure, and even the thought of practicing on a friendly fellow med student fills my heart with terror. Not just fear, but terror. I'm going to see if I can be that one person who makes it through four years of medical school without having to perform any sort of task in which I may harm someone.

After ShadeTree, I chilled at my second home for a while, then went out and was social and had a great time. I won't go into details because nothing monumental happened, but it was awesome all the same. There was hanging out with ChemE grad students at a barbecue, watching Vandy's 10th-inning victory over Ole Miss (awesome) at Eli's, then going downtown to a brand-new piano bar (amazing). A classmate out with her bachelorette party met up with us there, and her drunken-last-hurrah antics pretty much made my entire night. Then to an Irish pub just in time for last call, then to the Stage (we didn't get kicked out this time!!) and then to Paradise Park for sweet potato fries, before finally turning in around 4 this morning. Beautiful.

The end-of-first year celebration started right after I posted that last entry. Yep, at ten in the morning. The day involved a champagne brunch in the student lounge, lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, a bar crawl, and a trip downtown. The night ended at about 2:30am. It was basically the best day/night ever.

I spent most of Friday packing for home, and hanging out with Jojo for the last time until August (sadface). Yesterday, I flew home. My parents picked me up from the New Orleans airport and we basically went straight to a graduation party being thrown for one of my cousins. Today was church etc., and now I'm super super tired.

While I'm home, I only have access to what is basically dial-up internet, on a computer I have to share with my dad. Which is okay, because I plan to spend this break catching up on my reading.

Yesterday was pretty fun. The day started relatively early for a Saturday, with two shoots. Both went well, although we didn't have as many members of our IM football team show up as I would have liked. That meant I had to appear in the scene. Booo. However, the skit is currently on pace to be 14 minutes long, so when we have to get rid of entire scenes, I might do the selfless thing and cut my own screen time first.

Anyway, after shooting I headed over to Light Hall to study. I didn't do this out of any sense of motivation. It's the first weekend of the semester, after all. No, I spent the afternoon with my books because everybody I would've hung out with was at CB dance practice. So I looked over Micro, getting through a whopping one lecture in about four hours. Not because it was hard, but because of distractions like the interwebs. I wanted to quit after hour one, but like I said, I had nothing to do and nobody to do it with. I usually crave alone time, but for some reason I was desperate for human contact yesterday. Not desperate enough to start calling people and open myself up to rejection, but... almost.

Then, finally, all the dance practices ended. I was so happy to have friends again that I agreed to go out to a country music place, something I've resisted since moving here. My one previous experience with a honky-tonk place was pretty bad: horribly crowded, loud bad country music, and drunk tourists in their 60s stumbling into me left and right. The place we went last night, however, was excellent. There was plenty of room, there weren't any drunk stumbly people to get in the way, and the line-dancing was actually... dare I say... fun. We'll be going back again.

After leaving the country place, we played some "Friends" Scene It, and all got a sound asskicking from Erin. If only I could convince that kid to use her powers for general trivia... I do believe she'd be unstoppable.

I was going to study this afternoon, but I think I'm going to go see "Stomp the Yard" instead. And then tonight, there's some show on Fox that I think I might want to watch.