You want to know one of the best parts about moving somewhere? Having a whole slew of new facebook friend requests. Yes, it's petty and unbelievably superficial, but that's what makes it awesome. Go ahead, and tell me you aren't immediately intrigued and excited when you see that '1 new friend request', or better yet, the '2 new friend requests' icon at the top right corner. You are. We all are. We all like to know that people find us interesting and that people would actually like to get to know us. Of course, saying that sending out a friend request implies both or either of those is a stretch, but I don't care. I like to stroke the ego and take the opportunities that come to do so.
However, it does bring me to some of my more hypocritical moments. If you are my facebook friend, which I'm sure you must be because I have no clue how else you would even find this blog, then you know that the only things in the "Boxes" tab I have are lexulous, scramble and wordtwist. That's right. Three scrabble-esque, how many words do you know, games. And yes, I'm pretty good at all three. I still don't know how I lost that one game of lexulous, and truth be told, I think the other guy cheated (Sitterud beat me. Tell me he's not above using some website to come up with the best word possible from his tray. Go ahead. Don't mind my laughing. Continue.).
The point is, my profile beyond the interests tab, is about as blank as it can be. But I will tell you this. Whenever I get a new friend, the first thing I do is check out if they have bumper stickers and/or flair. I simply can't get enough of them. They kill me. And I have to look through all of them. Friend request from someone with 85 stickers and 75 pieces of flair at 12:45am? Guess I'm busy until 1:10 looking through them all. So what if I have a midterm tomorrow morning? I've got new stickers to look at! I'm busy here!
But you'll never see me put either of those up on my account. Ever. Mostly because I will likely add every single one that they have onto my profile. I would make an add-on that would simply stream the new ones onto my profile as soon as they were available. I would have them sent to my email and cell phone so I could see them as soon as they were hatched. And it would be an all-consuming activity for me. I simply can't afford it. It's the same reason I'm abstaining from reading the Harry Potter series. I know they're good. I simply don't want to sign off on a month or so of my life to knock the collection out. It might even be worth it, but I can't justify knowingly spending a month on a kid wizard.
Plus, it opens the door for the Twilight four-peat. I'll have none of that. Not now, not ever. I watched that first movie, and all I could think was, "Wow, this is some poor acting", "This seems horribly low budget" and "I'm so glad I'm never reading this". (It turns out that while the first and the last are subjective, the middle one is completely objective. The entire cost for the first film was about $37M, not including the sketchy marketing figures. To put that in perspective, 'The Devil Wears Prada' was $35M and 'Sweet Home Alabama" was $38M. And neither of those movies had special effects, and both had A-list actors and came off much more well done.)
So even though it is more than a tad bit hypocritical, I love the opportunity to see other people's favorite bumper stickers, but refuse to collect all of mine for others to enjoy. I just can't afford right now to start going down that road. There are too many time-dependent activities in my life that are marginally, if not substantially more important (e.g. med school). I'm sorry, but I just can't do it right now. Maybe in four years. Maybe.
Word.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Friday, October 2, 2009
I'm Gonna Muster Every Ounce Of Confidence I Have And Cannonball Into The Water
It's taken me about a month, but I've determined that a large part of being successful at medical school is realizing what not to learn, in addition to what you should learn. For example, right now, there is some guy showing us how to do a field test to check on cranial nerve damage. It's somewhat interesting, but mostly irrelevant at this juncture. We have studied the cranial nerves, and do need to know their purpose, however, we don't need to know how to verify functionality. Hence, I've taken the time to run this post up, especially considering it has been almost a month since last updating.
A lot has happened in the past month. We've already taken one mid-term and are getting ready for the second one in about a week and a half. I've dissected more muscles and structures than a lot people could handle hearing about before lunch. (You never look at a face the same way again after peeling the skin off, yanking the brain out, and then cutting the skull into quarters like and apple. Same with arms. I don't see forearms, I see a group of muscles and how they interact to flex the fingers.) I've learned that the church can function relatively normally, even when there are only active 30 members. I've dealt with not having vehicular transportation at my fingertips. And I've missed The Girlfriend dearly.
Beyond that, life has been great. I'm enjoying my time here (as much as you can while studying ridiculous amounts). Right now, I'm getting ready to sign a lease for the upcoming year. I found a place that is really safe, nice and new, and only a six minute walk away. Pretty ideal. However, I was talking with an agent and they said they had one for $300 less a month in an area called Point Pirouette. This area is beautiful as it is surrounded by the lagoon on three sides and a the golf course on the other. But it's that golf course that is a problem. Around here, that is the most dangerous place to be at night. In orientation meetings, we were told that the first, second and seventh rules about going to school here were to avoid the golf course at night.
So living there would be a big problem if I had to walk through there. However, it is only about a 100 yards by water between the tip of the area and the school. I was genuinely debating whether it would be worth it to get a canoe and row back and forth between class, or spending a little extra for a motor. You figure saving $300 a month should offset those costs quickly. And worse comes to worse, I can swim that distance in a matter of minutes. Sure, I would need to bring a change of clothes as well as my books in a water proof container, but $300 a month?
It was very tempting, but I just didn't want to have to deal with that hassle. So I'll go to the nicer
place down the road.
Also, ask me how excited I am about the new RW/RR challenge "The Ruins" that premiered on Wednesday? Tremendously. My love for these shows is well documented, and this season does not seem likely to disappoint. I do have a dilemma with this one. I've been an Evan fan ever since he and Coral were dominating Fresh Meat. I still am, but part of me, the part I don't like to talk about at parties, secretly enjoys watching Wes try to wrest control from him and the others. And the fact that Kenny stole his fiancee (or is it fiance? What's the rule on this?) adds a whole new layer of awesome to everything. I'm very excited to watch this.
Well, that was all over the place.
Word.
A lot has happened in the past month. We've already taken one mid-term and are getting ready for the second one in about a week and a half. I've dissected more muscles and structures than a lot people could handle hearing about before lunch. (You never look at a face the same way again after peeling the skin off, yanking the brain out, and then cutting the skull into quarters like and apple. Same with arms. I don't see forearms, I see a group of muscles and how they interact to flex the fingers.) I've learned that the church can function relatively normally, even when there are only active 30 members. I've dealt with not having vehicular transportation at my fingertips. And I've missed The Girlfriend dearly.
Beyond that, life has been great. I'm enjoying my time here (as much as you can while studying ridiculous amounts). Right now, I'm getting ready to sign a lease for the upcoming year. I found a place that is really safe, nice and new, and only a six minute walk away. Pretty ideal. However, I was talking with an agent and they said they had one for $300 less a month in an area called Point Pirouette. This area is beautiful as it is surrounded by the lagoon on three sides and a the golf course on the other. But it's that golf course that is a problem. Around here, that is the most dangerous place to be at night. In orientation meetings, we were told that the first, second and seventh rules about going to school here were to avoid the golf course at night.
So living there would be a big problem if I had to walk through there. However, it is only about a 100 yards by water between the tip of the area and the school. I was genuinely debating whether it would be worth it to get a canoe and row back and forth between class, or spending a little extra for a motor. You figure saving $300 a month should offset those costs quickly. And worse comes to worse, I can swim that distance in a matter of minutes. Sure, I would need to bring a change of clothes as well as my books in a water proof container, but $300 a month?
It was very tempting, but I just didn't want to have to deal with that hassle. So I'll go to the nicer
place down the road.
Also, ask me how excited I am about the new RW/RR challenge "The Ruins" that premiered on Wednesday? Tremendously. My love for these shows is well documented, and this season does not seem likely to disappoint. I do have a dilemma with this one. I've been an Evan fan ever since he and Coral were dominating Fresh Meat. I still am, but part of me, the part I don't like to talk about at parties, secretly enjoys watching Wes try to wrest control from him and the others. And the fact that Kenny stole his fiancee (or is it fiance? What's the rule on this?) adds a whole new layer of awesome to everything. I'm very excited to watch this.
Well, that was all over the place.
Word.
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