Done done done done done done done done done. Done done done done done, done done! Done done done. Done... done done done? Done done!!

The Path final started out great. I started with the last page, as usual, so the first thing I saw was a Neuropath question covering a concept that we've had drilled into us since first year. Softball! It was a nice boost of confidence, which I needed as I took the rest of the test. Every time I felt like I could rattle off four facts about a disease, they asked for five. I knew three risk factors, they asked for four. It hurt my brain. But, I'm confident that I got my P. So I'm 3/8 a doctor, with only one semester and a little test thing standing between me and the wards. SCARY.


P.S.- to celebrate, the roomie and I are going to crack open a bottle of In Situ wine. How appropriate.

As of this week, I should have a working knowledge of all human disease. Scary, huh?

Friday night: Studying.

Saturday morning: Studying.

Saturday, 12pm-2pm: Watching Vanderbilt men's basketball swat the Yellow Jackets.

Saturday afternoon, evening and night: Studying.

Sunday morning: Studying.

Sunday late morning: church.

Sunday afternoon: Studying.

Sunday evening: Party at the house of one of our Deans. Good food, slightly awkward small talk.

Just now: a quest to find the most awesome Christmas light displays Nashville has to offer. I learned several things on this journey:
-Giant inflatable snowglobes are the latest trend in yard decorations.
-Four polar bears, three Santas, two snowmen and a penguin are NOT too many inflatable figures.
-"Trees" made of lights strung from a pole will never go out of style.
-Just because you already passed an Ennis Street, it doesn't mean there's another Ennis Street two blocks ahead.
-"Away in a Manger" has one more verse than you think. Really.
-What's a roundyon?
-"Simply Having a Wonderful Christmastime" is the type of song that divides families and tears relationships apart. (I'm firmly in the 'love it!' camp.)

I think that about sums up my weekend.

Path exam was fine. The image-based part of the exam was set up differently than any we've had before. We got a packet with the questions already typed out for us, and the images were on a Powerpoint show that was set on a timer. Usually, we just get a sheet of paper with blank spaces, and the professor manually advances the slideshow, reading the corresponding questions out loud. This new way threw me off a bit at first, but now I think it's far superior. Mostly because it meant we didn't have to deal with people asking ridiculous questions to stall for more time.

Instead, the new trend among the second years is to ask for a bathroom break during the image-based exam. I don't get it!! Assuming you take care of business before heading in (because the 8am start time isn't exactly unannounced), what physiologic process could possibly be going on that would make you need to pee again at 8:41? Somebody help me understand. (Note: I'm a tea drinker and still able to maintain, so that explanation won't...er...hold water.)

ANYWAY. Midterms are done. I discovered that mild burnout before exams is a lot better than extreme distress during exams. So I guess I'll stick with the consistent review during the second half of the semester. And now I get a break, during which I have to put together a Pathology presentation, write up a Psychiatry patient interview, and do a lot of Emphasis stuff. We'll see how much of that actually gets done while I'm visiting people in ATL, reliving the glory days of DUC brunch (for $$ instead of free), and seeing MAROON 5 on Wednesday!!!

Dr. Fogo did a heck of a job teaching me the kidney. I don't know how she did it, but she magically transformed me into an auditory learner, at least for this unit. I'm going over the lecture handouts for the first time (whoops) now, and I recognize so much of the stuff, it's crazy. Usually, even if I go to lecture and actively take notes, when I get around to reviewing it's like I've never encountered the material before. But not now. This is honestly the most I've ever learned from lecture alone. EVER, in the history of my life. I can only imagine how comfortable I'd be with the material if I'd been previewing and reviewing the lectures as we went along.

Since my last post, Heart Week has finished and we're halfway through Lung Week. Midterms will be here before I know it. How am I even surviving this??

Last night, we had our third (I think) first-place finish in trivia. It was especially awesome we were only a three-person team. It felt like there were a lot of questions where we didn't know the answer, but were able to stumble upon it. That's always nice.

Mach 9 period is here for sure, in Path at least. By the time I finished studying immunopathology and was ready to start neoplasia, we were finishing up the neoplasia lectures and about to start on the heart. So at the moment, I'm pretending neoplasia didn't happen and I'm trying to stay caught up with heart stuff. Despite knowing that I've missed a whole unit so far, I'm not panicked. Our Neuro prof claims that the pace will really pick up soon, but that's not making me panic either. I'm already too far behind in that class to even feel the acceleration.

Since my rant about the giant run-on sentences in the handouts for one of our classes, my classmates have decided to point out every single typo in all our handouts from other lecturers. People, people. This is not the same thing as spelling a word wrong occasionally, or typing "[singular object] are" from time to time. And really, if I notice the semicolons, do you think I'm not noticing the other typos? That stuff makes the baby Jesus cry, too, but they're just mistakes. Mistakes are forgiveable. Twenty pages of putting semicolons where periods should be is not a mistake, it's a dysfunction. Besides, I understand that being bothered by it is a dysfunction on my part. I never claimed to be normal.

It looks like from now own, I'll be posting less frequently, with only the highlights of the previous few days.

On Sunday I wrote this whole entry about going to Vandy's first football game of the season. I talked about the tailgating, this weird game called Cornhole, and what it felt like to attend my own school's football game for the first time ever. And then I accidentally deleted it. So much for that!

Saturday was quite a full day for me. It was so full of activities that by about 10 that night, I was having some serious crowd anxiety. Yet I still let people convince me to go to the all-school party that night. Mistake. I only stayed for about half an hour. Then I left and had as little contact with others as possible over the next two days.

Percival is getting fat. I need to play with him and make him run around more.

Today's review of our Immunopathology unit did not go well for me. I've not yet gotten to the point of learning specific autoimmune diseases. Just from sitting in the lectures, I can hear 'lupus' and spit out 'anti-nuclear antibodies', but that's about it. Based on the review session, I'm going to have to learn a few more specifics. I'm going to go work on that now.

I didn't sleep very well last night. I dreamt that if I tripped over anything and fell down, I'd die. If it's possible to be nervous while sleeping, I was.

It's August in Nashville, and I'm wearing a fleece pullover. Why? Because it's freezing in the office where I work. I don't get it; the medical center is supposed to be making efforts to cut down on energy usage. They can turn off every other light in the hallways, but we can't put the thermostats above the "Anchorage" setting?? (My freezing too cold office is on the hall shown in that picture, by the way.)

(Bonus points to anybody who knows the origin of the phrase "freezing too cold." Think TV.)

Second year continues to go well. Last year felt like med school, this year feels like learning medicine, and there's a huge difference. It's all thanks to that wonderful class called Path. Memorizing all the branches of the abdominal aorta was part of the necessary foundation, but now we get to see what happens when stuff goes wrong. Even better, we're starting to learn how to figure out what to do when stuff goes wrong. I realize that on Day 6 of second year, to say we're scratching the surface would probably be the understatement of the century, but it's cool all the same. Today, after organ recital (where we see, touch, and discuss pathologic specimens), one of my classmates said, "That was my favorite hour of med school so far." For me, the favorite hour title probably goes to the day I fell in love with Peds GI, but I understand the sentiment.

What do "Dead Poets Society," the New York Yankees, and Yoknapatawpha County have in common? They all came up in today's Path lecture on chronic inflammation. ("Anybody ever see 'Dead Poets Society'? Well, TB is what made most dead poets dead.") The lecturer is really funny, and as you should all know by now, any professor who drops enough random trivia into their lectures instantly becomes my hero. The only problem is, after two lectures from this guy, I'm not exactly sure what I've learned about Pathology. (Cytokines...do things?? Complement...exists??) Maybe med school has ruined my brain, to make me freaked out by someone who doesn't throw hundreds of incomprehensible facts at me in an hour.

Part of the Pathology course includes observing an autopsy. We're divided into groups of six for this, and I ended up in the group scheduled to go first. Since they aren't planned for ahead of time like elective surgeries, we have Autopsy Call. We got pagers today, so we could be on call, ready to drop whatever we're doing and head to the hospital. Last year, second years talked about how inconvenient this was, because you had to pretty much avoid making any plans until you were paged and did an observation. My group ended up only wearing the pagers for a few hours; the call came this afternoon. So we're all done. The only thing I'll say about the autopsy itself is that I'm pretty sure I don't want to do them for a living.