Hey, check out my finger!

This amuses me. Stupid I know, and likely written like a fortune teller's patter, designed to make anyone think it applies to him/her, but I'm still amused by the detail it presents after such simple questions in the quiz. As much as I hate to admit it, parts of it are quite accurate. At certain times of my life, anyway.

You Are the Middle Finger

A bit fragile and dependent on your friends, you're not nearly as hostile as you seem. You are balanced, easy to get along with, and quite serious. However, you can get angry and fed up with those around you. And you aren't afraid to show it! You get along well with: The Index Finger Stay away from: The Pinky

What Finger Are You?

Everyone hold onto your @sses ^H^H^H^H^H^H health, it's almost July 1!

So, anyone who knows anything about medical education knows this -- FOR MULE'S SAKE, DON'T GET SICK/HURT IN JULY! That's because people like me, new interns, are about to be unleashed upon the poor defenseless (well not entirely) inhabitants of teaching hospitals around the country. Now, it's not that we're stupid. It's not that we don't care. It's not that we're not trying, or, in other words, scared sh!tless that we're going to do something wrong. It's just that there is no way in hell we could have been fully prepared for the responsibilities that are suddenly thrust upon us. And, our predecessors have just been bumped up a notch to their own new responsibilities, and are also so eager to bug the hell out of internship that there is really no room or time for the handholding we might want or need. It may not be as bad as it sounds -- in some places and situations, I might argue that you're safer in July than you might otherwise be, as your intern's work is being checked more carefully than ever -- but that depends on who has time to do the checking.

So we prepare for exhaustion, frustration, terror, sadness, joy, responsibility, power, powerlessness, and more -- while trying not to kill anyone. We're actually all trying to do better than that, trying to heal and comfort everyone -- but after a few hours (or many more), no matter how high our aspirations, we are reduced to the former effort. You see, in addition to trying to recall and USE all of the medical knowledge that fried our brains for the last four or more years, we are trying to learn a half-dozen or more cryptic computer systems, figure out which consults need a fax/phone call/computer entry/or combination thereof, figure out which drugs are on formulary, find the "good" bathroom/ the call room/ the call room combination/ the locker room/ the locker room combination, how to work the scrub machine, AND SO MUCH MORE -- all while all we REALLY want to do is save a life, relieve pain, and basically make our patients better. And, mind you, this is all going on while we are still secretly saying to ourselves "holy crap, am I wearing a LONG coat?! Damn, I just wrote a prescription, and signed it myself!?" and each time we introduce ourselves as "Dr. So and So" we dance between pride and fear. Terror even. Or at least, I do. I don't know about the others, because, you see, they're all good at acting like they know it all and/or nothing bothers them. Or maybe they do, and nothing does. Maybe *I* just don't belong here -- but I'm told that we all feel that way. And now, I must do some laundry and unpack some boxes from this palace of cardboard that surrounds me, because starting tomorrow, I have no full weekends off for weeks and weeks. Remind me to tell you about the bastard stepchild that is the Transitional Intern, some other time.

BEHOLD, for I have graduated!

Shockingly, I now have a new set of letters behind my name ... M.D. !

I have almost completed 2+ weeks of the-world's-longest-check-in-process now, and on Sunday will start my first day as a real live intern, doing intern things. Scarey, no!?

Oh, and by the way, I DON'T RECOMMEND HST for Medical School!

Oh, and by the way, I DO NOT RECOMMEND GOING TO THE HST PROGRAM OF HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL!!!!! Unless they have some fantastic mentor doing exactly what you are interested in for your required MD thesis, or unless you are damn certain you need no mentoring, and have no desire to offer any constructive feedback, EVER, to the administration -- then, and only then, maybe, you could consider thinking about considering it very verrrrry carefully.

If you came upon this post via some search and you are actually considering the Harvard-MIT HST MD Program -- feel free to send me a message/comment and I'd LOVE to make sure you get another perspective. For the sake of all that is happiness and sanity and a good education, etc etc. And, I'll even connect you with some people who aren't as bitter as I am, in an attempt to be fair and all that.

Misbegotten-Devil-Stitch Almost-Non-Slanting Single Decrease

So today I am occasionally (ha) taking breaks from my evil useless thesis by knitting a hat for a friend. Well, it's not for him anymore, because I think it will end up being small-child sized. So it's practice. Anywho, it's mostly like this Olive Cable-Knit Hat but of course I got obsessive and decided that when it came time to the decrease section where you drop from a k2 rib to a k1 rib, I wanted a non-slanting decrease. But I couldn't find any non-slanting single decreases, so I wasted plenty of time figuring this out -- what I call the Misbegotten-Devil-Stitch Almost-Non-Slanting Single Decrease. I'm sure someone else has already figured it out, or more likely, something much better, but I'm writing it here so I don't forget it, at least until I find the better way that someone else figured out!

So I worked until I arrived at the two stitches that I wished to become one -- that is, the future single decrease. I then temporarily slipped the first of those stitches to the R needle. Then I created the Misbegotten Devil Stitch simply by lifting the bar to the right of the next stitch (which was between the two that were destined to become one), and placed it onto the left needle (either way, front to back or back to front -- one ends up making a little bit of a hole, the other looks a little odd in its own way, and I can't remember which is which). Then I returned the temporarily slipped stitch from the right needle back to the left. Now everything was basically set up to do a non-slanting pretty center stitch double decrease by slipping two sts knitwise at once, then knitting one, then passing the two slipped stitches over. Depending on how tightly you knit and all, the slipping and the passing can be painful. But anyway, you more or less seem to get a non-slanting single decrease out of it all. Or then again, maybe in a few rows I'll notice that it makes my whole hat self-destruct. I'll let you know later. After thesis of useless PITA doom is done. With pictures. (Of the hat, not the thesis of crap).

And, in slightly shorter steps so I never have to read that babble again (I'm sorry if you did):
Step 1) work your pattern until the 2 sts you wish to make into 1.
Step 2) sl 1 st pwise (temporarily, so it doesn't really matter where you hold the yarn, just don't end up wrapping it around like a crazy person)
Step 3) as though you were going to M1 (but without the knitting part!), insert L ndl through horizontal strand between the two stitches destined to become one (that is, between the one on the right ndl and the one on the left).
Step 4) return, via slipping, the temporarily slipped st on the R ndl back to the L ndl
Step 5) Now embark on somewhat standard non-slanting double decrease: sl2tog kwise, k1, p2sso.

Depending on which way you inserted the left needle to make the Misbegotten Devil Stitch, you may have a slight hole beneath your new, relatively non-slanting single stitch, or it may just look a little funky. I forgot which does which. I have now decided that the one with the small hole looks a little better -- more symmetric -- but I imagine that a larger hole could be undesirable, so if you knit loosely it could look untoward.... And I still can't remember which way to put the left needle in. I think it might be front to back. I'll let you know if I ever get around to doing it again! (As for who "you" are, I don't know -- I'm pretty sure no one reads this but me!)

Ahh look, one of this morning's time-wasting, thesis-fighting breaks:
I confess that at first I was told I as scary, and that I scare even scary people sometimes. I had hammed it up a bit in my answers though, and went back and adjusted them, mostly because I wanted the damn kitten pic. That must take away from my scary-ness score in itself!

You Are a Little Scary

You've got a nice edge to you. Use it.

How Scary Are You?

And, in the spirit of certain current events, more blog-quiz stupidity that makes me feel like some MySpace-ing idiot teenager:

It seems that I'm somewhere between Dr. Weird and Master Shake, depending on my mood:

I am Dr. Weird from Aqua Teen Hunger Force!!
OR



I am Master Shake from Aqua Teen Hunger Force!!


Which Aqua Teen Hunger Force character are you??

Apparent CROOK on Ebay

I suppose that after 27+ purchases, I should expect to have encountered at least one crook on Ebay, but it still makes me angry.
Don't buy from barginhousepa! Of course there's no way she'd still sell under that userid with half a brain, but I still had to say something to the void here.
This person took my money, failed to respond to numerous requests for contact in various forms, never sent me the item, and failed to own up to her behavior via the PayPal dispute resolution service. PayPal even found in my favor, but "failed to recover any funds."
I'd put the [apparent] crook's name here, but that would be a violation of EBay policy.
I can't even post venomous negative feedback on EBay because it says that user no longer has a valid account. Yet daily I am taunted by a message on MyEbay telling me I need to leave feedback for that item. That item I paid for and never received. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

Who shears the possum?

Did you know there's yarn made from possum fur? You probably did. I did not. Now I do. I LOVE the thought of it. One queston though -- who harvests said possum fur? Have you ever tried to lay hands on an adult possum? Even a baby possum? I have. They're fierce creatures. Does someone RAISE possums for yarn? How amusing. Or do they have secret dens where they rub on something and deposit their fur, and some dedicated yarn spinner sneaks in and steals said fur (thereby probably freezing a possum in the winter who counted on it for bedding or something)? I really want to know, where does this possum fur come from, and how is it acquired!? Maybe there's a sheep/goat-possum cross out there. Now THAT would be good.