Friday, November 21, 2003

It would seem that life in medical school has become rather routine lately. We've all gotten used to the endless CAs that ominously punctuate our weekly timetables at opportune intervals (or maybe inopportune, in our opinion) with that much-dreaded dark blue box. Debatable is the policy of having frequent CAs, suffering as we are from the effects thereof, for as they say, it does have its pros and cons. Oh well, I shall not bore you with the details, for as I'm sure any medical student has become more than a little tired of the debate. Suffice it to say that while I am a supporter of the current system, I do strongly resent being deprived of my precious free time, which though I do not use for extraordinarily enriching activities like giving tuition or learning driving (after all, it is called free time) contributes greatly to my quality of life as I see it.

Take reading, for example. It only seems that my reading list is increasing at a rate following an arithmetic progression, far surpassing my ability to reduce it by any appreciable amount in the tiny window of a week or two before I have to start studying for the next CA. You might wonder what contributes to my expanding list, and even if you are not I am quite inclined to rant about it. Firstly, books that pertain to the medical curriculum. I try to read up on subjects before we have lectures on them so I can have a general inkling of what is going on (not to mention impress others with haha) but that approach began to fail after about two months or so, resulting in a massive backlog of academic material (like cardiac failure - causing oedema in the brain) that I only got around to reading when I was studying for the CAs. Disastrous.

Considering that I am actually quite able to catch up on this curricular exploration in the windows between CAs, this brings me to the next item on the list, which I must say I much prefer to boring textbooks. That would be fantasy novels. I do think I could go on forever on fantasy novels, but all that is quite irrelevant. So. I do prefer to read novels in the "free" time that I get between CAs, and of course if I have time I will also try to finish the monthly issue of Discover that I subscribe to. Looks like I really have a lot of reading to catch up on in the upcoming 4 week holiday.

Well, as I told hope, it's very much like having your head held under water and only being allowed to surface for a quick gasp of air before being pushed below the water surface yet again. At least we're surviving...looking forward to the hols.

Talking about fantasy novels, though, brings me to a thought I've been mulling over. I've been really craving to write narratives and descriptives recently, after leaving that wonderful vent of expression behind after leaving secondary school. And I'm toying with the idea of writing a fantasy short story or even a novel, for fun if for nothing else. But so far it's only been a thought since I can't seem to find a plot that is entirely coherent and original as well as interesting at the same time. As I said, it's just a thought.

MQ is getting more and more disastrous. Only one person turned up for training yesterday. I can only pray that things will start to improve before long. I must say we had some rather interesting discussions on the rather unique and more than a little detectable olfactory stimulation provided by certain pedal portions in the seminar room yesterday, though. That provided a good laugh.

Oh yes, I remember that I wished to thank everyone who has praisably made good use of the comment functions that I went to some lengths to set up. So thank you hope, wm, em, and msf. I'm sorry you had to read so much crap to get here and start feeling appreciated and gratified. But if actually did read all that text above, you deserve another thank you for being so patient with my compulsive verbosity. Many thanks. And that also leads me to point out that my chatterbox is very pointedly collecting dust there on the left column of this webpage. I would be much gladdened by any kind soul that takes a minute of his or her valuable time to say hi. So please, gratify my craving for some form of acknowledgement. Please?

I seem to have been a rather fractious mood for the past few days, which I feel I should accord to my lack of rest in both parameters of quality and quantity. Due to the short fuse that I have been carrying around, I have naturally had a few detonations here and there, and so I must apologise to the people I have blown up at, namely wm. Sorry. =) (But in all truth, wm, sometimes you can give me an apopleptic fit)

I could not help but notice, in addition, that many people have become inferiorly related to the weather recently. The weather is exceedingly trying on health, I must say, fluctuating from blazing sun to gloomy downpour in a matter of moments. It certainly does not help that the lecture theatre has a very efficient air-conditioning system that makes it a beautifully lighted and carpeted industrial-grade freezer warehouse and us very much frozen and looking for the winter wear that we've packed in some dark closet somewhere after that last trip to Siberia. I wouldn't be surprised if snow falls in LT 29, at the rate the thermostat setting is falling.

I just found cg's blog a few days ago and I must say it's wonderful that he revived it. I've really missed his cunning wit. That entry on rugby was really quite hilarious, I say. Genius!

You might have noticed that I did not start off with my usual rambling prelude in this entry. Well, here it is, more an epilogue than a prologue. I'm just playing with the structure for the sake of change. Oh well. Anyway, enjoy.

Avaris / 11/21/2003 09:31:00 PM

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