The Instrument, Part 1

Here she is: 

That was a few weeks ago; there's a bit more dirt now. Attachment... is a dangerous thing, but it's good to remember that you end up taking care of things that are important. 


I hadn't taken a drive in a few weeks and when I went to dimsum this evening, I remembered how much I missed the feeling. These days I drive almost exclusively in sport mode since I do so little driving anyway, I might as well. 


It's important to become a part of your vehicle, to feel its beat, to notice and accept her seemingly minor rhythmical imperfections. Like a sprinter at the starting line, you wait silently, looking at the other lights. Sometimes the light turns green after a few seconds of a dedicated green left turn. Sometimes the gun goes off with the left turn. 


And once that sea of electrons marches across those diodes, you take your foot off the brake. And in that half a second where you're abducting your right leg, she takes a breath. She takes a breath and she knows. While every muscle in your body is tensing up, as you hold your breath and put your foot down, you and her become one, and the flushing is simultaneous - one with blood stained hydrocarbon, the other, with hydrocarbon stained blood. In that second of unity, your pupils dilate and your vision blurs and you take what seems to be an infinitely long blink  and you're still choking, holding in that breath. The needles rise, and with the days and weeks and months that you've been together, you know when her ECM is going to throttle back to take on a new level. And that's where you get your reprieve, for you're already at 40 and you still need to breathe. Once you do, you start to hear the growing sounds from the speakers: 

Do one thing for me tonight

I'm dying in this silence

The last star left in heaven

Is falling down to earth and

Do you still feel the same way

Do you still feel the same way

Meaningless, you think to yourself. There's not a song or post or saying or haiku or tanka in the world that could encompass what you just went through. Still, you appreciate their effort. Some would cringe at the next red light, but you don't. She needs it. Rather, you both need it. You feel a light smirk coming on. It won't be long now.

It's that time of year again

It comes every year, but I never really have an opportunity to talk about it. Now, if you've been paying attention, you know I love RHCP. 90% of my "move to California!" pangs are solely because of this one band.

But everytime, around Easter, something else comes around. Something magical. Of which I only bought 4 of last time.

It's always the simplest things that bring the greatest amount of peace. Physics, Medicine, RHCP, and Cadbury Creme Eggs. There's something about the gooey innards. A few weeks ago, I was just minding my business when I saw the stand, and I froze.

Sweet. So, I say this now. These eggs forgive all. 

D ORDERS INTERNET LOLCAT STYLE.

You'd be working at a call center,
and your day is hard enough.

Then some ass wants cable internet
and only speaks in lolcat.

[click through to see the entire transcript!]

A lolhaiku:

"Welcome to Comcast!"

can yoo giv me gud raite plz!

"You are most welcome!"

On another note, thank you Comcast for that deal and for putting up with me. I'll be sure to give him a good review.

MEDVAMC

I'm done with C-sections for a long, long time. It's a little sad, but I was getting bored of them near the end. Maybe I should have clamored to do more.

So why hasn't anyone seen me online/anywhere recently? My sleep schedule is incredibly f***ed up. Let me provide a short summary of what happened today. I don't even know where to start, since "today" started at an aberrant time.

Monday 1150pm - Woke up from a 430pm to 1150pm nap. Beginning of trouble.
Tuesday 6am - Free Grand Slam at Denny's. Possibly the most ghetto situation I had seen/been in forever. All kinds of colorful people showed up there. I was expecting shots to be fired, but it was uneventful. Line was short, I guess. 
Tuesday 830am - Clinic
Tuesday 1pm - MEDVAMC. Patients are more compliant, but probably a bit more combative / openly defiant. One lady told me she was never going to take any medicine a doctor prescribed because "the army fucked her up." 
Tuesday 430pm - Clinic ends
Tuesday 440pm - Arrive in apartment, began sleeping.
Wednesday 1200am - Woke up from nap. Aaannd here we are.

We had mid-clerkship evaluations last week. It was largely disappointing. Not because of a profound # of complaints or criticisms, but of a lack of really, anything good or bad. "Needs to communicate better with Spanish speaking patients" and "needs to read more" (everyone gets that). What makes you think [improving Spanish skills] an overnight/week kind of thing? Disa-fucking-pointing.* I finally just asked my preceptor for an evaluation.

Evaluations should consist of almost all criticisms. It makes no sense to me to start with a list of strengths. What, you pussies need an ego boost? You should know your own strengths. And even if you don't, bfd. Don't drastically change anything that wasn't criticized. Ask if you need to improve on anything.** If your mentor has been watching you very carefully, take that list and assume everything else is more/less ok. I'm glad my preceptor agrees with this, tacitly.

That's a philosophy I stick to as well. Admittedly, it causes some tension here and there. It's a lot more tough love than love. Probably no love at all. I know most people's strengths, though, and I'd never tell it to your face.

Some people though, love the frosting. (It makes me sick.) They want as much of it as you can pile on, and then some. And maybe then can you sneak in a critique or two. Really? You can categorically never expect that out of me. Go fuck yourself***, I might say, and definitely think it. If you knew me well enough, you might pick up the "GFY" face, followed by a very disaffected look.

Back to my preceptor. So she thought about what I asked her and wrote me a long email, which I only had to read once. It's great to have something to work on. It's even better to have these resolved the next week, with maybe a morsel of praise, followed by more things to work on. Preceptor-win. Improvement-win.

Sayonara, bitches. I got surgery in 5 hours.

*: cf. last post.
**: Be careful asking insecure colleagues. Some might take the opportunity to begin the rippage. Kind of a dick move, but most people are disappointing and boring anyway. And I'd never tell it to your face. :P
***: No, don't. Maybe go sit in the corner and think about what's best.

Never eat brownies before a pap smear.

It sounds like I have a pretty revolting story, but it's not that great. They were passing out brownies at the VA today and I was waiting around waiting for my patient to finish prepping and NOM NOM NOM on this brownie, except recall that I have a few cavities. (= brownie bits getting stuck)

Also, the brownie had a lot of powdered sugar on it, a lot of which ended up on my lips. So what do you do when you bust into a room, a young woman all in the stirrups, with powder on your lips? I'll tell you what I did. I'm almost certain I licked them. Worry not, I don't think she saw (she was staring at the ceiling). Still. Don't do it.

I also had to fight the urge to pick out pieces of brownie from in between my teeth while doing a pap smear.

The other day I was told I had a dirty mouth. I swear, I only curse for comedic effect. Let's take a look at a few situations.

For example, this is dinner fail. After a month of eating (seriously) healthily, I busted this out for tonight out of sheer laziness. If you had asked me what I had for dinner, I would have replied with:

Yaki-motherfuckin-soba!

(y-mf-s!)

You can almost see the horribly concealed grin on my face. I'm also lactose in tolerant, so when I told someone I might be going out for dessert and they asked "Oh, ice cream?", I replied with: 

No. Frozen fucking pussy yogurt.

Again. Grin (well, not so much with that one). These are extreme examples, but you get my point. Does this really count as cursing?* 

Back to MEDVAMC tomorrow. I like it there. Some of the equipment there is better than the posh Baylor Clinic.

I be on it.

*Not really?

Never eat chinese food before surgery.

Life lesson. Trust me. Especially when you know all that greasy business is going to give you some pretty strong gastro-colic reflex. Sure, it feels awesome in the 5-10 minutes after you eat it and you feel like you're going to slip into a food coma, but don't.

Says my resident:

"We're going to be taking her to pre-op in less than an hour, be back then, ok?"

And I think, Oh God, what have I done to myself. I could go into all sorts of detail, but I'll summarize: FML. I got lucky and they realized my patient got hungry too and ate at 3PM, so they pushed the C-section to 11pm instead of 9pm. Quick! Drink lots of water!*

This is not the emergency c/s I was watching yesterday. I would post details about that, but they're sort of rare so I'll wait for a few weeks to pass until divulging. Half of the Ob/Gyn clerkship is over. Gyn better be just as fun as Ob. Although, I will say, it's not all fun and games. There are definitely a few difficult people. More on that later, too.

*: Cure.