This isn't a knock on my ex-bf necessarily (but it kind of is, sorry). A while back, my friend RR told me that you shouldn't get too wrapped up in having the same interests as someone you're interested in dating, that hobbies and pedigrees and professions are not what you should be seeking in common with your significant other. And I still think he's right.
But I do think an exception should be made about certain music choices.
And now that a lot of time has passed and I'm very nearly back to full strength, I can say, slightly tongue-in-cheek, but also meaning every last word of it- I probably should have known things were not going to work out with my ex-bf when he revealed that he really liked Nickelback. That one is going to go in my Parks & Recreations Knope playbook, in which I am going to cheer up some heartbroken friend of mine with: "once I dated a guy who liked Nickelback."
Speaking of Nickelback (Haha! It's hilarious to even speak of Nickelback in my opinion. Okay, but seriously, no offense to Nickelback fans, except, really? You're a Nickelback fan? Isn't fan too passionate a word for a band like Nickelback?), I have to confess that the Lost and Walking Dead recaps on Videogum are one of my favorite time-killers ever. I like them especially because I guiltily watch these horrible shows even though they often drive me bonkers, and the recaps reflect this dichotomy perfectly. And I have to admit that the first time my ex-bf asked me if I liked Nickelback (hahahahaaha, that somehow doesn't get any less funny regardless of how many times I mention it), I immediately thought of those Videogum recaps, because characters are frequently telestrated with "Nickelback lyrics" thought bubbles (for the quintessential example, see here.)
Just a lesson that some misgivings are probably worth heeding. Maybe. Just kidding. Sort of (but not really).
*titling this post almost caused me to drop to the floor
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
when I'm 64
All week, an elderly gentleman had refused to let his wife go. She was on a breathing machine, she had a bad pneumonia, then her heart failed, so fluid built up in her lungs making breathing more difficult, and then her kidneys failed, making it impossible to remove the fluid from her lungs. This is not a new story. This is a common story of an elderly woman in her 80s who finds herself in the ICU.
I talked to the old man a few days ago, asked him what his wife would have wanted. He would not say, but he did tell me, "I hope she makes it to Valentine's Day." I found that cute but not necessarily a good reason to prolong the woman's life.
Today, I discovered that Valentine's Day was their 60th anniversary. Today, the elderly gentleman listened to his daughters, and agreed to take his beloved wife off the breathing machine. Her husband was so upset that the moment we removed the tube from her throat, he said he did not want to sit there and watch her die. As if she knew that he could not handle very much, she passed away about 10 minutes later without the slightest sign of distress.
It's weird- the amazing things like this which you see in Medicine, and how, regardless of all of these life lessons you see around you, you can't figure out how to apply them to your own life.
Anyway, I spent the rest of the afternoon getting everyone else home to celebrate. The first goal was my fellow intern, who had to run out and buy his wife a present before he got home. Then the other residents who had significant others. Maybe it's good karma or something. Maybe I'm more of a romantic than I think I am. But don't say that out loud, or I'll deny it to the end of my days.
I talked to the old man a few days ago, asked him what his wife would have wanted. He would not say, but he did tell me, "I hope she makes it to Valentine's Day." I found that cute but not necessarily a good reason to prolong the woman's life.
Today, I discovered that Valentine's Day was their 60th anniversary. Today, the elderly gentleman listened to his daughters, and agreed to take his beloved wife off the breathing machine. Her husband was so upset that the moment we removed the tube from her throat, he said he did not want to sit there and watch her die. As if she knew that he could not handle very much, she passed away about 10 minutes later without the slightest sign of distress.
It's weird- the amazing things like this which you see in Medicine, and how, regardless of all of these life lessons you see around you, you can't figure out how to apply them to your own life.
Anyway, I spent the rest of the afternoon getting everyone else home to celebrate. The first goal was my fellow intern, who had to run out and buy his wife a present before he got home. Then the other residents who had significant others. Maybe it's good karma or something. Maybe I'm more of a romantic than I think I am. But don't say that out loud, or I'll deny it to the end of my days.
Monday, February 13, 2012
and when I think that I'm alone
Yesterday, the other intern and I were waiting at the grill to get our sandwiches. The guy behind the counter turned around to grab some bread, and somehow revealed a front and center view of premium butt crack. The other intern happened to look over at me and I could see that he had just noticed the same thing I had, and we both burst into hysterics.
It's so dumb, and I can't even tell you why we thought it was so funny. When the med student and the senior resident demanded to know what we were in cahoots about, I mumbled that I'd developed ICU delirium. Maybe I had. It wasn't that funny, but we were in stitches, and I think it was just about release. Things are starting to calm down in intern year, but we still work some pretty hard hours, and in the ICU we see a lot of sad things. So maybe, as a result, we have to laugh at stupid things like someone revealing a bit of their backside.
It's so dumb, and I can't even tell you why we thought it was so funny. When the med student and the senior resident demanded to know what we were in cahoots about, I mumbled that I'd developed ICU delirium. Maybe I had. It wasn't that funny, but we were in stitches, and I think it was just about release. Things are starting to calm down in intern year, but we still work some pretty hard hours, and in the ICU we see a lot of sad things. So maybe, as a result, we have to laugh at stupid things like someone revealing a bit of their backside.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
sooner or later, the fever ends
In the ICU last week, the attending physician, who was a bit of an eccentric, sang the first few bars of Toto's Africa. I was the only one who recognized it. I always forget that I'm frequently surrounded by those much younger than me. The attending pointed at me as if he'd found me out, and accused me, "you're an 80s kid!"
And let it be known that being an 80s kid is quite different than being born in the 80s. No offense to you younger folks.
Being an 80s kid means that you knew Whitney Houston. I'm sorry. I know it's played out, and everyone's got the same story, and there's nothing particularly unique or special about mine. But I think that's exactly the point. That's what all of us were doing. We were all dancing along to I wanna dance with somebody and How will I know in bedrooms and bathrooms and basements. We were all so young and innocent, and her harmless, pure pop songs back then became our soundtrack.
I didn't think until yesterday how weird and dissonant it is to consider now- but Whitney Houston was really a role model for a lot of us when we were young. She had a squeaky clean image, she was a woman of color, standing by herself and holding her own. While her songs were often about teenage complaints (will someone please dance with me or am I going to get stuck sitting on the bleachers? and does this boy like me?!?), they were never desperate, never encouraged girls to be stupid. In her videos, she just seemed overwhelmingly happy. She wasn't necessarily the embodiment of female empowerment in those early videos, but neither was she some doormat. I know it's probably considered some sort of musical sin to be considered safe, and sure, there is something to be said for those other women who pushed the envelope and made people uncomfortable.
But consider this, when comparing to musicians of today. Whitney Houston's songs were not celebrating getting so drunk that you don't know the name of the club you walked into. They were not talking about getting caught in the midst of incriminating acts you didn't remember on a Friday night. They were not talking about brushing your teeth with a bottle of Jack. Sometimes harmlessly catchy is much preferable to dangerously misguided.
Also, Whitney Houston, in her heyday, could sing. No disputing that.
*
I know no one's really reading anymore, but then let's just say I am talking to myself. In an effort to force myself to write a little more, but recognizing that my ability to come up with much of interest is limited, I am going to start dropping very short posts, hopefully on a daily basis. There will probably be a lot of hospital-related stories, and gripes about television shows, in equal measures.
We'll see how it goes, stay tuned.
And let it be known that being an 80s kid is quite different than being born in the 80s. No offense to you younger folks.
Being an 80s kid means that you knew Whitney Houston. I'm sorry. I know it's played out, and everyone's got the same story, and there's nothing particularly unique or special about mine. But I think that's exactly the point. That's what all of us were doing. We were all dancing along to I wanna dance with somebody and How will I know in bedrooms and bathrooms and basements. We were all so young and innocent, and her harmless, pure pop songs back then became our soundtrack.
I didn't think until yesterday how weird and dissonant it is to consider now- but Whitney Houston was really a role model for a lot of us when we were young. She had a squeaky clean image, she was a woman of color, standing by herself and holding her own. While her songs were often about teenage complaints (will someone please dance with me or am I going to get stuck sitting on the bleachers? and does this boy like me?!?), they were never desperate, never encouraged girls to be stupid. In her videos, she just seemed overwhelmingly happy. She wasn't necessarily the embodiment of female empowerment in those early videos, but neither was she some doormat. I know it's probably considered some sort of musical sin to be considered safe, and sure, there is something to be said for those other women who pushed the envelope and made people uncomfortable.
But consider this, when comparing to musicians of today. Whitney Houston's songs were not celebrating getting so drunk that you don't know the name of the club you walked into. They were not talking about getting caught in the midst of incriminating acts you didn't remember on a Friday night. They were not talking about brushing your teeth with a bottle of Jack. Sometimes harmlessly catchy is much preferable to dangerously misguided.
Also, Whitney Houston, in her heyday, could sing. No disputing that.
I know no one's really reading anymore, but then let's just say I am talking to myself. In an effort to force myself to write a little more, but recognizing that my ability to come up with much of interest is limited, I am going to start dropping very short posts, hopefully on a daily basis. There will probably be a lot of hospital-related stories, and gripes about television shows, in equal measures.
We'll see how it goes, stay tuned.
Sunday, February 05, 2012
I don't want to talk about it
So that was horrible, and I am done professionally with both Tom Brady and Madonna. That's all I really want to say about that.
I thought I would bake a lot during my vacation, but I didn't. So many things I thought I would do during vacation, I didn't. I had no concept of how spent I was. Things catch up to you. When I hiked the Inca Trail, the day we reached Macchu Picchu, we were all fine and euphoric. We were tired and wanted a shower, but we didn't feel it all until a few days later when we were waiting to board the plane home.
It took me about three days into vacation to realize that, of the 8 weeks previous, I had spent 5 of them working night shifts (and not consecutively, which would actually have been better). It's not that working nights is so hard. In some ways, the skeleton crew working at nights allows for some more independence and interesting learning that is useful around this time in the year. However, working nights will mess with your body. After a while, I did not know whether it was morning or night. Sunlight meant go to sleep, darkness meant wake up. I was drinking obscene amounts of caffeine. But I didn't really think about it at the time.
Then suddenly, I was sleeping the day away. I was walking around in a fog. I felt submerged. I did not feel like doing anything; actually, I couldn't seem to bring myself to do anything.
In addition to my body needing a long stretch of time to readjust to living, I found, for the first time since I've started internship, I did not want to even think about medicine. I didn't want to have anything to do with it. Usually, I will start to hunger for reading the latest journals. Usually, I am unable to resist the temptation to check on my patients on my computer. Not this time.
I don't view it as some worrisome sign that this is the wrong profession for me or anything so extreme. Residency training, despite all the work hour adjustments and attempts to improve wellness, is still just fundamentally exhausting. There are the hours, which are numerous, but also the work just takes its toll. It sucks you in, at first, envelopes you- you submerge yourself willingly. Until you start to drown.
Luckily, just about then, vacation comes along. So all in all, I am still tired. I sometimes feel disillusioned. I sometimes worry where health care is heading, and where people's attitudes towards their health are heading. I sometimes wonder if I'm learning enough, or if I'll be in a position to teach in a mere six months. It turns out I like this work. It's just that I've now realized that once again, I need to reinvent to allow for a life within this life, if that makes sense.
I thought I would bake a lot during my vacation, but I didn't. So many things I thought I would do during vacation, I didn't. I had no concept of how spent I was. Things catch up to you. When I hiked the Inca Trail, the day we reached Macchu Picchu, we were all fine and euphoric. We were tired and wanted a shower, but we didn't feel it all until a few days later when we were waiting to board the plane home.
It took me about three days into vacation to realize that, of the 8 weeks previous, I had spent 5 of them working night shifts (and not consecutively, which would actually have been better). It's not that working nights is so hard. In some ways, the skeleton crew working at nights allows for some more independence and interesting learning that is useful around this time in the year. However, working nights will mess with your body. After a while, I did not know whether it was morning or night. Sunlight meant go to sleep, darkness meant wake up. I was drinking obscene amounts of caffeine. But I didn't really think about it at the time.
Then suddenly, I was sleeping the day away. I was walking around in a fog. I felt submerged. I did not feel like doing anything; actually, I couldn't seem to bring myself to do anything.
In addition to my body needing a long stretch of time to readjust to living, I found, for the first time since I've started internship, I did not want to even think about medicine. I didn't want to have anything to do with it. Usually, I will start to hunger for reading the latest journals. Usually, I am unable to resist the temptation to check on my patients on my computer. Not this time.
I don't view it as some worrisome sign that this is the wrong profession for me or anything so extreme. Residency training, despite all the work hour adjustments and attempts to improve wellness, is still just fundamentally exhausting. There are the hours, which are numerous, but also the work just takes its toll. It sucks you in, at first, envelopes you- you submerge yourself willingly. Until you start to drown.
Luckily, just about then, vacation comes along. So all in all, I am still tired. I sometimes feel disillusioned. I sometimes worry where health care is heading, and where people's attitudes towards their health are heading. I sometimes wonder if I'm learning enough, or if I'll be in a position to teach in a mere six months. It turns out I like this work. It's just that I've now realized that once again, I need to reinvent to allow for a life within this life, if that makes sense.
Saturday, December 31, 2011
don't wave no goodbye
The end of the year arrived with little warning. I do not feel like celebrating, though I should. The year has been momentous, in good and bad ways both; it has been an extreme year. So I am ending the year tired, just uncertain of whether the intensity of the past year is something sustainable.
It is tempting to wallow because I am so tired, to breathe a sigh of relief, and be glad this tiresome year is over. But maybe that is what age has taught me, to be a bit more measured. I don't try to keep tally anymore, I do not try to calculate a balance sheet, whether the year was a good one or a bad one. It was another year. It was another year that makes me who I am.
Maybe residency has been the ultimate lesson in realizing that nothing is black and white. There are so many exhausting and terrible things about residency, so many problems with it, and there are maybe just a few truly amazing and magical things about it. But I'm not sorry to be a resident. Which is some tricky math.
If there was another big lesson I learned this past year, it was that you never stop learning new things about yourself, and about others. I really thought I had a lot of things figured out the year before, but I can see now that I still have so much to learn. And that part is not exhausting, not tiring. That part fills me with a sense of wonder.
Anyway, the year is nearly over, and I have been much remiss when it comes to blogging, writing. I hope, now that I've passed the halfway mark of internship, I'll have a bit more of a chance to breathe and reflect. But I know better than to make a bunch of resolutions.
In the meanwhile, here are 11 random things about 2011:
A Happy and Safe New Year's to any of you reading. Since I am working in the ICU these days, a special emphasis on the safe part.
It is tempting to wallow because I am so tired, to breathe a sigh of relief, and be glad this tiresome year is over. But maybe that is what age has taught me, to be a bit more measured. I don't try to keep tally anymore, I do not try to calculate a balance sheet, whether the year was a good one or a bad one. It was another year. It was another year that makes me who I am.
Maybe residency has been the ultimate lesson in realizing that nothing is black and white. There are so many exhausting and terrible things about residency, so many problems with it, and there are maybe just a few truly amazing and magical things about it. But I'm not sorry to be a resident. Which is some tricky math.
If there was another big lesson I learned this past year, it was that you never stop learning new things about yourself, and about others. I really thought I had a lot of things figured out the year before, but I can see now that I still have so much to learn. And that part is not exhausting, not tiring. That part fills me with a sense of wonder.
Anyway, the year is nearly over, and I have been much remiss when it comes to blogging, writing. I hope, now that I've passed the halfway mark of internship, I'll have a bit more of a chance to breathe and reflect. But I know better than to make a bunch of resolutions.
In the meanwhile, here are 11 random things about 2011:
When I broke work hours (>80 hrs/week or >16 hrs in a shift by the new rules), I listened to Helena Beat by Foster the People to keep me going, and it was like rocket fuel.
My 4-year old, adorable godson came to visit and his father taught him to call me Doctor, which is both annoying and comical.
Even though there were probably better movies out there, I really loved Drive and would gladly watch it again, gore and all.
It turns out I sort of like yoga, except that I took it up at the height of allergy season and found the breathing-through-your-nose part really tricky.
Amy Poehler, Melissa McCarthy, Tina Fey, Martha Plimpton and company all bum-rushing the stage for best comedy actress was probably the best thing that has ever happened on an awards show, and definitely the only inspired awards show moment of last year.
I sort of knew things weren't going to work out with S and I when he failed to find Ron Swanson a) the most amazing and b) the most hilarious man on television.
Though it was published much earlier than 2011, I finally picked up The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga after failing miserably at trying to read those stupid Girls with the Whatevers books (I'm sorry, I tried and tried, and I am sure the plot is fascinating but I could not get past the blah prose that did not engage me though I tried time and again to read the books). I don't get to read novels too often, but that was a good place to spend my reading quota, that's for certain. His writing is new and fresh and just what I want to be reading these days.
Months and months later, the FNL series finale's closing moments remain burned in my memory- what a gift it was to have that show for so long. Justified and Terriers were so amazing last year, and sadly only one will be back (but at least that one happens to have Timothy Olyphant on it!). The Walking Dead was infuriating in wasting such initial potential, and The Killing was just infuriating.
The bro-seph officially entered permanent grown-up-ville, and went and got himself married at an over-the-top destination wedding, which was, all told, quite lovely.
Das Racist's Michael Jackson is mesmerizing- how something can seem both so profound and nonsensical at once is modern art at its purest form in my opinion.
I nearly purchased a home this past year, but then realized what I really wanted was space. Now I live in a comfortable (rented) house with a spacious kitchen. Unfortunately, that resulted in a major war with ants at one point last month, but I triumphed. Chocolate ganache, macarons and marshmallows in 2012!
A Happy and Safe New Year's to any of you reading. Since I am working in the ICU these days, a special emphasis on the safe part.
Saturday, November 05, 2011
I read again between the lines upon the page
The bro-seph is getting married next week, and I really should be making preparations for that. But frankly, given time off from internship, I've found that instead all I keep doing is tucking myself into a cocoon. It's one of the good and bad thing about my new abode. I love the place, which is great because I am happy when I am at home, but slightly less great because it increases the activation energy required for me to leave the house. I am on the verge of needing an intervention.
It has not helped much that it has been raining, announcing the onset of winter in this neck of the woods, encouraging me to put on warm slippers and drink a glass of red wine. Or that some drama got kicked up in my life just when I was starting to feel even-keeled about things.
Today I've been distracted by other thoughts. Like the very serious question of how it is possible to take two hilarious people, put them in a movie together, and make a wholly un-funny film. I never went to see Due Date when it came out because the trailers did not seem very promising, but it's amazing how humorless it turned out. Galifianakis, who I still enjoy watching when he visits Conan, maybe needs to take a break from all the movies. And I don't even know what to say about RDJ, who if I'm being totally honest with myself hasn't really been charming since Iron Man (not 2). Maybe the movie just revealed the problem with these two actors.
Anyway, you won't believe it, but this actually beats pondering other questions in my life.
Sometimes I wish I was wired a bit differently. I wish I were more casual about things, that I didn't take so much so seriously. I wish my feelings were a bit more transient, a bit more pliable.
But the problem, of course, is that I don't actually wish that. I think what I really wish is that this characteristic occasionally served as a blessing instead of a curse.
It has not helped much that it has been raining, announcing the onset of winter in this neck of the woods, encouraging me to put on warm slippers and drink a glass of red wine. Or that some drama got kicked up in my life just when I was starting to feel even-keeled about things.
Today I've been distracted by other thoughts. Like the very serious question of how it is possible to take two hilarious people, put them in a movie together, and make a wholly un-funny film. I never went to see Due Date when it came out because the trailers did not seem very promising, but it's amazing how humorless it turned out. Galifianakis, who I still enjoy watching when he visits Conan, maybe needs to take a break from all the movies. And I don't even know what to say about RDJ, who if I'm being totally honest with myself hasn't really been charming since Iron Man (not 2). Maybe the movie just revealed the problem with these two actors.
Anyway, you won't believe it, but this actually beats pondering other questions in my life.
Sometimes I wish I was wired a bit differently. I wish I were more casual about things, that I didn't take so much so seriously. I wish my feelings were a bit more transient, a bit more pliable.
But the problem, of course, is that I don't actually wish that. I think what I really wish is that this characteristic occasionally served as a blessing instead of a curse.
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