Six months to go!!!

Big Brother

I had been treating this blog as if it were mostly between friends -- I've only posted the link on my Google talk away message and only people whom I email personally can see that. But, I've always tried to write knowing that anyone could read it. It is public, and at the very least there's a "Next Blog" option at the top that takes you to a random blog. They're usually in another language, but I'm sure people have gotten taken to mine. So I thought it was close friends and random strangers, two parties you can say mostly anything in front of. Or even be completely boring in front of.

However, this week I discovered that if you google my name, my blog is the top hit. This is a new thing. It really bugs me out. We had a discussion at our staff retreat in September about how googling is now the most common way to find out about another person even in the business world... and we talked about how you should be aware of what comes up when someone googles you and how you can attempt to manage and manipulate what Google will rank highest.

I google my friends, family, coworkers all the time just out of curiosity. I figure their achievements are most likely to be posted on the web and I want to see what they're famous for, what got them published per se. But now, it's not that I was a National Merit Scholarship Finalist in 2001 when I graduated from high school that's the top hit anymore, it's this blog... my boring ramblings to my closest friends when I don't have time to contact them directly, or when I need to get something annoying out of my system or share an interesting or outrageous article. That is what is getting presented to all the world as the best match for me. Haha, kind of deep I guess.

(I'm actually not even sure how this is matched to my name because I don't have my last name in my profile and I try to hardly ever use my last name in my writing. I guess because Blogger is a Google feature and this account is registered under my gmail which is registered under my name. Google is scary. I wonder if I used a different blogging service if it would still come up...)

So now I have to go back and reconsider whether I've really been writing as if anyone might read it. Would I want one of my bosses reading this? I wrote a little bit about stuff at work and although I didn't use any names, if you worked in our office you would obviously know who I was referring to. I might take down the picture of myself in a bathing suit from my vacation to Florida in June. I feel embarrassed about all the whiny stuff I've written -- I don't think a potential employer would hire me based on these ramblings. This blog could be a professional liability.

We might be going offline for a while. I'll keep you posted. Probably not here.

AAHHH!!!

Less than 200 days until the weddding!!!!!!!!!!


An interesting tip from Brides.com:

Let perfume dry on its own after spritzing—rubbing it into the skin changes the scent.

Two of the three of my bridesmaids who I'm "friends" with on Pandora, have the same most-recently-added radio station -- Justin Timberlake Radio.

Just an observation. Bringing SexyBack, ladies?

Finals period + craziness at work means I have my full range of stress symptoms back:

heartburn
GI trouble
heart palpitations
shortness of breath
hiccups
hives

I feel like my old boards-studying-self again!

As soon as I re-develop dermatographic urticaria, then it will be like being back in my clinical rotation. Oh, memories...

Stand back - you don't want to catch my CV.

The way I wrote, "because of my CV" in the last entry makes it sounds like some sort of chronic illness.

I think CV might be used more in the sciences, I'm not sure, but it stands for curriculum vitae, in case you didn't know. It's a résumé.

Wikipedia just taught me that curriculum vitae is Latin for "course of life" and résumé is French for "summary."
That makes CV sound pretty deep.

A rose by any other variety of its name?

A coworker just called me "Al!" and then added "-yson" because he didn't know if he could call me that.
I introduced myself as Alyson at work because that's what everyone was calling me before I got here because of my CV.
When I started med school I decided just to introduce myself as Aly to everyone because a lot of people end up calling me that anyway and at least it would be homogeneous then.  But now Mindy's at Jeff and she calls me Alyson so that mixes everyone up, but it would be weird to me if she called me anything else.
I never introduce myself as Al, but it works.  My sister calls me that much of the time and Lisa called me that through most of high school.  I also had a friend in the 6th grade named Maxxzina (a teacher asked her if her parents were playing Scrabble when they named her) who called me Al out of the blue.
I think of myself as Alyson, I think because that's what my mom calls me (when she's not calling me Gee, Scooch, or any of a variety of other nonsense words).
So Glen starts work in the office tomorrow and it takes a lot of work for him to not refer to me as Aly, so we'll have to see how the distribution changes over the next few weeks.

Now that it's December, time for a some Christmas decor on the blog.

I also bought some Christmas lights at CVS for the apartment... 20 lights that were supposed to be over 7 feet long, actually only have 4 feet with lights on them -- there's another 3 feet of just cord. So those aren't enough to decorate around the fireplace; I might bring them to work and light up our window. It would be nice to have something there when I gets completely dark out at 4pm.

Spent

When I first made my blog, it was because I was spending all day reading, studying, taking in as much as my brain could handle, and I needed an outlet and some place to generate something instead of just absorb. I needed to use my creativity.
Now, I spend almost all of my time writing and filling in spreadsheets (with enough reading to fill up every other free moment, let me assure you). But when it comes to the end of the day, I just don't have any more to give, writing wise. I often stay as far away from my computer as I can when I get home at night just because I'm sick of staring at a screen after 14 hours, which is very unusual for me. And whether it's trying to write an interesting introduction to entice someone to read the most boring article ever or just trying to remain social in my shared workspace, I am exhausting my creativity too.
I've been posting more of the articles I'm reading to the facebook because it's easier -- at least with the NY Times, there's a simple button. I think there might be something like that with Google Toolbar for blogger... If I can find that, more might start going up here.

I so want to live in a retirement village.

Coffee Crotch

This morning I had to go up to the hospital and bring Glen something so I stopped at ABP (that's Au Bon Pain, but Glen and I can't pronounce it even though he took like 4 years of French so use the abbreviation - thanks Mindy!) and got some coffee.  Back at my desk, I go to take my first sip and all of a sudden it's all over my pants.  So I figured a little must have spilt (I think that's a word) on the lid so I wipe it all off and try again.  AGAIN before the cup reaches my lips, I have coffee on my lap.  So I went to the sink and tried pouring some and low and behold, before it reaches the little sippy hole, it pours out from between the lid and the cup!  Even though it's tightly secured!  So I gave up on the lid and it's all good.
Then twenty minutes later my coworker comes back into our cubicle area and complains that she spilled coffee all over her pants this morning, there was something wrong with the cup.  I say Me too! and then all of a sudden she points over at my desk and says That same cup!  She had also gotten a large coffee from ABP this morning in the same Christmas themed cup.

So, beware of the large Christmas cups at ABP!  They will give you Coffee Crotch.  Or I guess Coffee Feet if you are standing.  The end.

Here's a map of honeymoon possibilities I've been working on... it should be interactive:


View Larger Map

216 days until 6/21!

http://www.attwheredoyoulive.com/index2.html

So disappointing...

How the Democratic Presidential debate last night in Las Vegas ended:

MODERATOR: Maria, would you stand, please?  Give us your full name.
AUDIENCE: Maria -- (inaudible) -- and I'm a UNLV student.  And my question is for Senator Clinton.  This is a fun question for you.  Do you prefer diamonds or pearls?
CLINTON: Now, I know I'm sometimes accused of not being able to make a choice.  I want both.
MODERATOR: Do we get to ask any of the other candidates or, I suppose, just Senator Clinton?
AUDIENCE: It's the only shiny thing up there.
MODERATOR: Okay, thank you so much.
MODERATOR: All right, so on that note, diamonds and pearls, I want to thank all of the Democratic presidential candidates for joining us here this evening.  Let's give them a big round of applause.

oh sorry, I should probably follow up to that Widener post...

I actually don't know very much, but it seems there was an anonymous threatening message written on a bathroom wall in one of the dorms.

Later that evening, they re-opened the campus with no explanation.

Glen thinks it was staged so they would have a reason to try out their new notification system where they email and text message everyone. My text message read:
SUBJ: EMERGENGY WARNING --- THREAT OF VIOLENCE
MSG: Report all suspicious individuals and activity to Campus Safety at 610-872-1392. Check email/web.

I'm not sure that was super helpful, since I would have to make it to a computer to find out I was supposed to stay where I was. But I guess it was a step in the right direction.

How do you get to be the artist in residence at a resort on St. John, in the U.S. Virgin Islands???

http://www.caneelbay.com/activities_watercolor.cfm

www.caneelbay.com

Main Campus of Widener University is closed Friday afternoon, November 9, 2007

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Public Relations Office <proffc@mail.widener.edu>
Date: Nov 9, 2007 2:08 PM
Subject: Main Campus of Widener University is closed Friday afternoon, November 9, 2007

All classes and activities scheduled for Friday, November 9, are cancelled.

Resident and commuter students should go home or stay in their rooms until further notice.

All non-essential personnel should go home or remain in their offices until further notice.

Widener University has closed the entire Main Campus on Friday afternoon, November 9 due to a threat of violence against university studetns and faculty.  The university issued an e2campus alert to the entire campus community.

Chester police are conducting an investigation including a sweep of campus.

I had some really odd dream about that chrome kaleidoscope.
It showed you something if you pointed it at... a light?  I can't remember :(

Addendum

also,
a tape measure
and 11 cents

Home Sweet Home

my new cubicle came with:

a stapler
a staple-remover
a box of staples
some dilbert magnets
a new umbrella
a drawer of full file-folders for me to sort through
out of which i gleaned six black clips and eleven paper clips of various colors
a weird hands-free phone thing with some sort of microphone stand
seven empty binders (that's got to be worth $100 right there)
two extra copies of the department handbook
a chrome kaleidoscope (seriously)
and at least four years worth of dust (i have something dated from below the dust)

i took my awesome ergonomic foam wrist support from my old cubicle :-D

I spent my lunch hour at work today writing a mini paper for one of my business school classes about the importance of data analytics. Then I went back to cleaning out my cubicle to move and make room for the department's new data analyst.

I've been missing the clinical part of school and today I got to get a little bit more of it in my life in two ways. First, I signed up to be involved with a clinical trial of a new automated blood pressure cuff and some of the primary care docs involved suggested that I have responsibilities on the clinical side, so I'm excited about that. I'll have to drag the white coat out of the closet again.
Second, I gave a physical exam in my cubicle today! One of my co-workers hurt her knee in her Thai kick-boxing class and it had only gotten worse over the past almost two weeks. I palpated and did the valgus/varus test and we decided it was most likely a tear in her LCL. Contrary to everything our department stands for in regards to conservation of medical resources, she went over to the Emergency Room and they confirmed our diagnosis. It was fun! Well for me, anyway... she has a torn LCL.

I have to move cubicles!
I'm getting bumped because we hired a new statistician.  He's getting my super awesome huge private cubicle, and I'm getting moved to the area behind the kitchen that's kind of like one huge cubicle to share with two other people.
This is definitely the end of my facebooking at work.
Hopefully, it will make me a lot more productive.... :(

Reuters.com -- Family Values Party Dumps Candidate
October 29, 2007
"'But that's not my penis,' Quah told the Sydney Morning Herald..."

wow.

we didn't start the fire

The top headline from the NYTimes on my google home page is
"California Fires Force 300,000 from Homes".

The top headline from CNN is
"Fire affects TV Shows, Celebrities".

CNN obvious knows how to get the public to care about important issues.

Reuters.com
Looking for attractive people? Don't go to...
Mon Oct 22, 2007 10:55am ET

"The city of more than 1.5 million people was also found to be among the least stylish, least active, least friendly and least worldly, according to the "America's Favorite Cities" survey by Travel & Leisure magazine and CNN Headline News."

a lot of good stuff happened today. i had my first starbucks out in the new greenspace in front of the Hamilton building, and i discovered i can't tell the difference between a skim latte and a whole latte. while i was out on the greenspace i was reading this awesome article which really sets the course for the rest of my research for the UAW/healthcare/election article that i'm writing. i was getting really discouraged about writing this article and now i'm excited.

meanwhile, my Health Policy professor sent out an email postponing the take home exam one week, from this wednesday to next wednesday. this is excellent because with all i have to do, i was going to squeeze that in to tuesday night. i haven't even looked at it yet so i don't know if that's actually feasible -- now i have a whole week. then my Data Mining professor sent out an email that we didn't have to do any of the reading for this thursday's class. so in two emails, my weekend got moved up to tuesday night! as soon as we finish this group marketing project and present it tomorrow afternoon in class, i can breathe a little sigh of relief and start cleaning the house before people come over this weekend.

[edited]

also, my experiment with faux hemming my new pants by using medical tape worked, and my pants looked good all day. well the hems did... when i bought them i had to choose between a size and the petite version of that size which fits a little smaller. it really depended on whether they were going to shrink in the wash or stretch out the first time i wore them. i went for the larger size, because if the petites got any smaller they would just be uncomfortable. of course, my luck, the larger size did all stretch out when i wore them and now i have an extra couple of inches everywhere... they just look baggy. i need a belt. i guess it's better than too-tight pants, but i went shopping particularly so i'd have clothes that fit right. maybe i can purposefully shrink them in the wash. i washed a shirt that i fixed the hem on with medical tape, and the tape lasted through the wash, but i decided not to try the dryer... sounded melty. maybe i'll actually hem the pants with thread and everything... but then if they do shrink like i want them too, they might be too short. sigh.

i also got a wedding magazine in the mail today and that brightened my commute to school (thanks selene!).

now if it weren't going on 2am with the project only half finished, i could call this an A+ day.

funny: " Earlier this month, the court awarded full custody of the couple's sons to Federline, Spears' former backup dancer."

GOOG-411 Graduates from Labs

cool and free!

8 months to go!

ESPN.com -- Walk of life for Lost Boy runner
By Joe Santoliquito

a Widener student!

Come fly with me, let's fly, let's fly away

I've now earned one day's paid vacation!
(I've never had paid vacation before :-D)

Frog Legs

Just because you'll probably never see this sentence again:
"Although radio tracking of the arthritic toads shows they keep moving..."


Discovery News -- Invasive Toads Getting Arthritis
Oct 16, 2007

Bride sues over flower color

CNN.com -- NEW YORK (AP) -- The wedding was lovely, except for the flowers: They were the wrong color.

So says the bride, Elana Glatt, who was so upset that she sued the florist and alleged breach of contract.

She says Posy Floral Design in Manhattan substituted pastel pink and green hydrangeas for the dark rust and green ones she had specified for 22 centerpieces.

Not only that, she alleges that the hydrangeas were wilted and brown, and arranged in dusty vases without enough water.

"The use of predominantly pastel centerpieces had a significant impact on the look of the room and was entirely inconsistent with the vision the plaintiffs had bargained for," Glatt, a lawyer, said in the lawsuit, filed on behalf of herself, her husband, David, and her mother-in-law, Tobi Glatt, who paid for the flowers.

The flowers cost $27,435.14. The lawsuit asks for more than $400,000 in restitution and damages.

Stamos Arakas, the florist, said that he and his wife, Paula, tried to match the color of the hydrangeas with a picture Glatt had given them, but explained to her that the colors might not look the same.

"My father used to tell me, 'Don't deal with the lawyers," Arakas said. "Maybe he was right, God bless his soul."

Stephen Colbert just announced that he's running for President in the state of South Carolina.

oops... really didn't mean to leave my full name and contact information posted there for 8 hours.

I meant to write that yesterday was 250 days until the wedding!

We're off to double class again tonight -- be back after 10p. Sigh.

Op-Ed Columnist

A Mock Columnist, Amok

By MAUREEN DOWD

Published: October 14, 2007

I called Stephen Colbert with a dare: if he thought it was so easy to be a Times Op-Ed pundit, he should try it. He came right over. I had staged a coup d'moi.

My Favorite Candidate

U.S. / Politics

Candidate With an Eye on Edging Up to No. 3

By LESLIE WAYNE

Published: October 11, 2007

Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, who is campaigning for president with a strongly antiwar message, has not overtaken any of his top three Democratic rivals, but is edging closer.


Can anyone who is not a white protestant guy from the south win swing voters? No, probably not.

Op-Ed Columnist

Generation Q

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

Published: October 10, 2007

Generation Q may be too quiet, too online, for its own good, and for the country’s own good.

CNN.com: Noose Found at Columbia University
NEW YORK (CNN) -- A rally Wednesday afternoon at Columbia University was held to protest the discovery of a noose on the office door of an African-American professor

CNN.com: Sniper says he feels shame, guilt for murders
Can you believe it's been five years??


In more sad news, I got blue pen on my new white sweater.  Not really the same scale as the above, but still stinky.

:-)

Woohoo!  Finished my proposals!!!

anyone who wants to talk about hetergeneous vancomycin-intermediate staph aureus, let me know!

Notes from my "light" year...

My life is too crazy right now -- hence the lack of posts. I've started taking Tuesdays off to get school work done and today I spent all day preparing to lead discussion of an "article pack" with Glen, and of course class went too long and we don't get to go until next week. This class is constantly like this... we spend all weekend preparing 4 projects and the professor decides that's too many to go over so he makes one due the following week -- after we already prepared it to hand in!

My silver lining all day was that at least Tuesdays are our early day and I would get to come home and have some time to do the laundry and work on this project for work that was technically due today (even though I DON'T WORK TUESDAYS). But I had forgotten that this week our Thursday night class got moved to Tuesday night, so we had class from 3:30 to 9:10pm! BOTH classes handed out take-home tests.

To make up for my lack of blogging, I'm sharing some things I've been reading online.

I actually think crows are pretty cool... here's the latest evidence:
Discover Channel
Crows Bend Twigs Into Tools
Randolph E. Schmid, Associated Press
Oct. 5, 2007 — Mounting tiny video cameras to the tail feathers of crows, researchers discovered that the birds use a variety of tools to seek food, and even make their own tools, plucking, smoothing and bending twigs and grass stems.

Squirrels are, of course awesome. I'm a little torn about the content of this article:

New York Times - Magazine

The Squirrel Wars

By D.T. MAX

Published: October 7, 2007

The red one is cute. The gray one is taking over. England is going nuts.

Regarding the following, we suck.

Op-Ed Contributor

Save the Gnostics

By NATHANIEL DEUTSCH

Published: October 6, 2007

If Iraqi Mandeans are allowed to enter the United States in significant numbers, it may just be enough to save them and their ancient culture from destruction.

Op-Ed Columnist

Conservatives Are Such Jokers

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Published: October 5, 2007

If you’re poor, if you don’t have health insurance, if you’re sick — well, today’s conservatives don’t think it’s a serious issue. In fact, they think it’s funny.

I haven't seen "Sicko" yet, but I believe that a main premise is that healthcare doesn't belong in private hands because, by law, publicly held companies are required to make as much money as possible for their stock-holders. In summary, Medicare Part D is terrible:
National

Medicare Audits Show Problems in Private Plans

By ROBERT PEAR

Published: October 7, 2007

Medicare recipients have been victimized by private insurers that run the drug benefit program, according to a review of federal audits.

I just found out that it's not actually illegal to drink alcohol in New York if you're under 21, just to buy it. You can even drink out at a restaurant as long as your parents pour it from the bottle into the glass. If you're not in public, it doesn't matter. http://alcoholpolicy.niaaa.nih.gov/stateprofiles/StateProfie.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_drinking_age

Did you know that Dennis Kucinich is a vegan and recently married a red-haired girl from England who is 31 years younger than he? She's his third wife. I think he has a worse chance of getting elected President than Guiliani with his marital history.
http://vegnews.com/wedding_2006_ED.html

I'll end with on a funny note and then head to bed... or go work on my proposal for work. UGH!!!...

There's a digital billboard on our drive home from Widener on 95 -- basically a big TV screen. It automatically cycles through ads. I find it to be really distracting while driving. The last two night it's been especially distracting...

We looked up and there was a huge photo of a mean looking guy, with his name and WANTED FOR ATTEMPTED MURDER. As we stared, the billboard changed to: Philadelphia, Have a Pleasant Evening! Pretty funny.

The next night as we drove by, there was an even meaner looking guy with WANTED FOR MURDER. This promptly changed to: Philadelphia - The City of Brotherly Love. We almost crashed from laughing.

New Heart Device Allows Cheney To Experience Love

sticky fingers

i just spilled coffee-mate on my keyboard.

Quick post because I'm not sure how much time I'm going to have this week...

Friday I was trying to calculate if I'd save enough money by switching to the employee health insurance to make it worth it since I'll have to switch back to the school insurance in 8 months anyway (as an aside, I'm going to save over $1,500 in just the 8 months, sooo worth it). I needed to know how much I spent on the school insurance but of course part of the Jefferson website was down (not at all uncommon); I realized I was actually in the same building as the financial aid office so I ran downstairs. I was wearing a pair of my dress shoes that I just got back from the cobbler (he did an amazing job repairing every little thing that was wrong with my old shoes, so I love him even though he was MIA last Friday). I was walking through the basement which has tiled floors and the loudest echo anywhere in the world; Glen has been embarrassed just to walk next to me in dress shoes down there. I was approaching the ancient lecture hall down there, remembering last year how Glen and I for the first time ever had overslept our alarm on a test day and walked in late. There weren't any seats left so the proctor stopped the exam and made people get up and rearrange themselves so we'd have someplace to sit (with an empty seat on either side). I was horrifyingly embarrassed for disrupting the entire test. Luckily for me and Glen, that was the very same test where a mysterious pipe broke at the very back of that steep lecture hall and some sort of black liquid came pouring out over the top of a doorframe and down at us, causing everyone to grab their tests, stand on chairs, and run for their lives (no one remembers that Glen and I made everyone stop at the beginning). I was thinking this just as I passed the first door to the hall and trying to remember its funny name -- Herbut!

As I remembered it, I flashed back to that very morning, about an hour earlier, when I bumped into Chris on the corner who explained to me that he had thought he had his shelf exam in Bluemle, but when he got there he found out he was actually assigned to Herbut so he was running over there. I had this realization just as I was in front of the second door to the lecture hall and I looked up and there were 100 of my classmates taking a very important test, half of them looking up at me clip-clopping loudly by their room. UGH. I felt sooo bad.

On the way back I had to walk by again, so this time I took off my shoes and walked by in my stockings, only to discover they had closed all the doors to not be disturbed twice.

My apologies to all of the Herbut kids x2.

I'm walking in a spiderweb..

I have a sneaking suspicion that I left my home phone number as my contact number on a voicemail a few calls back...

my pen needs a "backspace" option

how frustrating is it to hand write an entire letter and then write your wrong phone number at the bottom?

p.s. i'm getting business cards!

I'm leaving on a freight train...

I haven't been writing mostly because it's been way too busy. School is getting crazy and is going to get worse for next week. That'll be combined with my day-off-to-study, Tuesday, being replaced by going to Harrisburg for a conference with the head of my department and a couple of the other fellows... I'm not going to present or anything like that, just observe. A 'ROADTRIP' as the e-mails have been labeled.
This past Saturday Glen and I put aside a few hours to go through the wedding stuff and figure out what should be a priority. We decided that we need to start looking at stationary if Save-The-Dates are going to go out in December, so we made an appoint for Paper On Pine the next day. Saturday night was the last night of summer so I went and sat out on the front steps for a little while to enjoy the weather. I could still sit there in a tank top pretty comfortably, but that was nothing compared to the heat wave we got this week. Anyway, we went over to the stationary store on Sunday and we looked through books of invitations for three hours. I think we have a pretty good idea of what we want now, and happily our ideas are spreading to the rest of the wedding. We're thinking there's going to be a lot more green involved and a leaf/leaves are going to be featured to emphasize the summer season. I'm actually starting to see it all in my mind's eye and that was lacking before. It's fun to be excited again.

This morning, I had my last cup of ginger peach tea from the canister I bought at Everything But The Kitchen Sink the day that we bought my wedding dress. I'll have to buy another one when we go back to visit it at the end of October!

And now, for your procrastination pleasure,

The Campaign to Abolish the Apostrophe

CNN.com - Telemarketers: they have your number
Phone numbers will begin dropping off the Do Not Call list in June when the five year re-registration date is reached...(click for more info).

first of all, Nine Months To Go!!!

second of all, all of my good shoes are at the cobbler to be resoled and they were supposed to be read to pick up at 10am.  I just went over there and he's closed!!  He was supposed to open at 8am.  I am wearing sneakers with my dress pants because I thought I would get to switch to my nice shoes in the morning.  We're going out after work and I don't want to wear sneakers and dress clothes.  I guess I'll go back to the cobbler this afternoon, or run home and get shoes if that doesn't work.  Sigh.

one more quick article. I can't believe this one was published.

CNN.com -- Signs you may be misdiagnosed

First, look at these pieces of advice... if your symptoms don't match your diagnosis, it might not be the right diagnosis. I don't know if that's the most overly-obvious thing I've ever heard or the most ignorantly simple.

Second, I'm pretty sure a good chunk of people diagnosed with cancer refuse to believe it and go to find a second opinion -- they just found one of the few people where the second opinion disagreed. In her case, the original labs came back positive twice and she had the symptoms... but by some very unlikely chance, the labs were wrong twice in a row and the symptoms were due to something else; and yet all this is presented to make the doctor look like an idiot somehow. Yeah, we doctors are always jumping the gun to diagnose our patients with a rare fatal cancer. But imagine if the doctor had insisted her tumor was benign and her symptoms were due to menopause and actually she turned out to have cancer -- that doctor would have been painted a fool too.

Finally, I love that they give you the signs so you can diagnose yourself with misdiagnosis.

Somehow, this is not an Onion article:

CNN.com -- 'God' responds to legislator's lawsuit


Also, could this guy look anymore like God? Some might claim that's a rotary fan, but I believe it's an awesome halo.

Exhausted Doctor To Wake Up Early, Finish Surgery In Morning

LOS ANGELES—Just moments after successfully stopping his patient's heart at 10:30 p.m. Tuesday, bleary-eyed surgeon Dr. Dennis Kelly called it a night...

Oh! and I got a shiny name plate to hang on the outside of my cubicle.
I'm so official!

Smoooooooth

I was talking to my friend at the copier, opening and taking my first sip of a coke when Dr. Nash who runs the whole department (my boss's boss) comes up out of nowhere (maybe I should have seen him coming but I didn't have my glasses on) and says Hey! Alyson! and I promptly spill soda down my blouse as he begins to tell me a story.

A great way to impress your superiors.

I'm Useful!

I just made a tangible contribution to the research project.

We've unfortunately sent out our letters about our study during the middle of the summer, so our response rate has been pitiful.
So, as Plan B we've been calling each blood bank director individually to ask them if they got the letter, if we can send them more information, etc.

We leave a lot of voice mails, and basically no one ever calls back.
So I tongue-in-cheek suggested that we stop explaining so much in the message and instead just say something like, Hi, this is [name] calling from Jefferson Medical College.  We're conducting a study in which I believe you'll be interested.  Please call me back at 555-555-5555.
Basically, be as mysterious and intriguing as possible.

My coworker tried it and it worked!  We're 100% in call backs with the "act like a secret agent" technique!  I mean, it's only 1 for 1, but that's still 100%.

CNN.com -- Deadly amoeba lurks in Florida lakes
By John Zarrella and Patrick Oppman
ORLANDO, Florida (CNN)-- Something in the lakes around Orlando, Florida, has claimed the lives of three boys this summer.

I had to post this because N. fowleri was one of the scarier things we learned about in med school, and everyone should know about it.

If you've talked to me in the past two days, I've complained about tonight's class and how we had three week's worth of reading and 5 written assignments due today. In class he realizes it's way too much to talk about in one class (yeah, duh, and too much to accomplish in 6 days) and he decides not to collect two of the assignments and cancels all of the reading for next week so we can catch up with discussion. You know this means that eventually weeks of reading are going to get scunched (a real word) together again.

I finished my awesome Health Policy Survey presentation (thanks to all, copies will be distributed) and now I'm going to search for an article to do my article summary on for Information Systems... we have several articles to read each week, but we have to find a unique one to read and analyze for our homework.

On the bright side, I'm not currently studying for a shelf exam (sorry guys).

Wedding stuff has gotten totally pushed to the side, except for a colossal to do list that I made up. Nonetheless, I've been extra excited about it lately -- it's nine months from Friday! I got to show a new co-worker my wedding dress pictures :)

I feel like I'm leaving something out, but it's impossible for it to be important.

I remember!
I'm buying this:
Cookie cutters for 3-D cookies! Awesome!

CNN.com -- :-) turns 25

PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (AP) -- It was a serious contribution to the electronic lexicon.

Carnegie Mellon professor Scott E. Fahlman was the first to use the :-) in a computer message.

:-)

Twenty-five years ago, Carnegie Mellon University professor Scott E. Fahlman says, he was the first to use three keystrokes -- a colon followed by a hyphen and a parenthesis -- as a horizontal "smiley face" in a computer message.

Discovery Channel--
Medieval Diaries Shed Light on Climate Change
Bradley S. Klapper, Associated Press
Sept. 17, 2007 — A librarian at this 10th century monastery leads a visitor beneath the vaulted ceilings of the archive past the skulls of two former abbots. He pushes aside medieval ledgers of indulgences and absolutions, pulls out one of 13 bound diaries inscribed from 1671 to 1704 and starts to read about the weather.

I got paid for going to orientation!  Awesome!

If you have trouble opening a banana, does that mean you're stupider than a monkey?

Sigh. I'm afraid the blog is going to die because whenever I have any free time I've been staying as far away from my computer as possible, because I feel like I'm on it the rest of the day. That plus I also haven't been hanging out on GTalk, where the link is posted, so I don't think anyone is reading it anymore anyway. I guess towards the end of last week I started sending in a lot of little one line posts via e-mail, whenever something hit me at work, so maybe it will survive in that way.

I have this really funny story about orientation, but I don't have the energy to retell it here... it might go the way of the story about me watching someone's butt catch on fire -- just never made it on to the blog.

I will briefly say that last week I was wikipedia-surfing and discovered that the IP address at my new work computer has been blocked from editing Wikipedia!! At first I wondered about the guy who had my cubicle before me, but then I made it to a page that said that my IP address is registered to Jefferson and may represent more than one computer. So I still wonder if it's like the University as a whole or just the Department of Health Policy. My IP address has been cited with many infractions, but here's one that was particularly funny -- these are the inappropriate additions "I" made to an article about a town in Pennsylvania:

• Zip code: 17545
• Area code: 717
• Most apt description: Cesspool
• Political leanings: So right they should start handing out brown shirts any day now
• Cultural activities: Whatever was popular in 1987
• Gratuitous wastes of money: The high school football team
• Most prominent figure who will never realize that high school football means nothing: Coach Mike Williams
• Most popular trends: Getting married at 19, never leaving, getting preggers real young

OK, time to give Glen a haircut and then cram in a few more articles of business school reading before bed. I miss you guys!

Eagles Fans Give McNabb Three-Week Deadline To Win Super Bowl

I just figured out what's going on.

I kept hearing all this yelling from outside, and I don't even sit next to a window.
I went into the conference room and looked out that window, and there are cops everywhere.  The emergency room is right outside.
I started to actually get worried.
Then I finally saw two youngish people wearing fluorescent pinnies, and I realized it must be a disaster drill like the one I participated in first year of med school.  That explains what all the yelling was slightly theatrical.

OK, back to my phone calls and my brownie (not actually a very good combination).

P.S. I am so excited we don't have class tonight!

Now, that I'm working in an office, I think watching The Office is going to be even more hilarious this year.

crap, Ann Taylor wasn't already high end enough?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070914/bs_nm/anntaylor_line_dc

Alliterative Hurricanes

Humberto is a real name?

I have a lot to write, but no chance to write it.  I don't want to go on blogger at work, so I'm sending this via the e-mail option.  Hopefully I actually have a free moment this weekend.

At home for lunch during my orientation today -- kinda thought lunch would be provided, but it was nice to skip home and get to eat soup in front of the TV.

I tried to watch E! weekend update or something for a while (for a real lack of anything else), but they stay on each story for about 45 seconds and then cut shots with flashes of light and crazy colors and I thought I was going to have a seizure. I switched over my college staple, The Young and the Restless. Too bad I didn't get home in time to see who's hosting The Price is Right. But, if anyone wants to hear the latest dirt on Nicole Kidman, call me.

For some reason, I can't stop sneezing! And everyone at orientation is so nice, I get about a dozen "bless you's" every time. And then I forget to say "bless you" when someone else sneezes and I feel bad. Wish me luck this afternoon.

Tomorrow is our first day of work at our respective jobs; I just go to Jefferson orientation all day. It's also our first day of figuring out how to fit dinner in between work and school -- a big meal at 4:45pm before we leave? a snack and then a big meal when we get home at 9:45pm? a small meal both before and after? I think I'm going to work for the big meal before, because no one likes a huge meal right before they go to sleep (except the huge meals that make you fall asleep). There just might not be enough time if I'm getting home at 5 and we should be leaving at 5:40pm. We'll see over the next week or so!

For your procrastinating pleasure, I just found this website of the waterfalls of the Blueridge Parkway. Glen and I drove most of the length of the Parkway when we drove to Florida last summer and it's so beautiful; I'd love to get back.

Time for bed so I can be fresh and lovely to have my PPD read first thing in the morning!

I had two good phone calls yesterday. First was Bank of America trying to get me to sign up for some kind of $13/month identity theft protection. The girl said they would send me three versions of my credit report and she'd like me to overlook them. Sure! That'll be easy.

Then last night I finally responded to Hopkins' requests to update my alumni directory information. Every five to seven years they publish a compendium of every alum back to the 1880s. Because the list won't be released until March and then will be the official copy for at least five years, Glen and I had some decisions to make. We decided to put our occupations down as students at Jefferson because even after we graduate in three years, as residents we'll still be students so that'll stay pretty true. We put our careers down as Physician/Surgeon, which was kind of exciting. But then the really excited part came when decided to take the leap and list ourselves as married, with my married name going into the directory! (I'll be searchable under both Liedy and Quigley) Our names are crosslinked. The woman verified my information and said, so you're listed as Mrs. Alyson Shannon Quigley... and I just laughed.

Finally, check out this awesome wedding bingo. The more things go wrong, the bigger chance that you're a winner!

We're back in Philadelphia, and slowly settling into civilian life. First and foremost on the news front: my mom got a puppy!He's a lhasa apso and his name was most likely going to be Murphy until my grandmother got upset that we always celebrate our Irish heritage but ignore her Scandinavian roots... so now we're working on a compromise. Fritjof is currently in the lead.

Going back in time a little bit, we spent the last two weeks on vacation. First we were in Chincoteague, Virginia (where the wild ponies live) with my mom, my sister, and a small pirate kite named Kitey who ruled the skies like Blackbeard ruled the seven seas.We had two pirate-themed kites, a big one and small one, and spent the better part of an hour flying the kites at each other, trying to knock the other out of the sky (much to the chagrin of the people seated around us). The little kite (Kitey) always won... Glen will claim it was his skill as captain of Kitey, but I maintain it had something to do with the odd wind patterns.Us with wild pones.

Speaking of wild ponies,oh my!

The three of us above, and Amy looking lovely:
And, we also rented scooters!

Then we left for Disneyworld with Glen's mom for one week.
Me and Glen our first night, after the Epcot fireworks.

The three of us before the Magic Kingdom fireworks show our second-to-last (penultimate??) night (we saw a lot of fireworks). There is Mickey-shaped confetti sprinkled on the table. I had one stuck to the middle of my forehead for most of the rest of the night, but not in this picture, thankfully.

Me, with my Almost Just Married button getting a call from Mickey and Minnie congratulating us on our engagement while waiting on line for the safari in Animal Kingdom.

Glen chillin out in the Norway exhibit at Epcot with a troll.

Us trying our hardest to emulate the late, the great, Thomas Jefferson (this was take 18 or so).

And finally, the coolest attraction ever, the Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground! We both climbed through this when we each first visited Disney over 15 years ago when it had just opened (just after the movie came out) and were so excited that it's still there! Unfortunately it's recommended for kids ages 10 and below, so we had to enjoy its splendor from outside the eight foot fence. That SuperSoaker really squirts!!!

Well now it's time for me to get to bed because I have SCHOOL tomorrow! It's weird to be starting this whole year that we've been talking about so long. I can't believe it's here. I don't start work until Monday so I have a little more time to adjust to that idea.
We'd love to get to Quizzo tomorrow, but we probably won't be back to the city until closer to 10pm, missing the first round or so :( But at least this week, we don't have anything to wake up for the next morning. I don't know if we'll be able to go every week, but I hope we can start having people over Friday nights to relax, because that's our early day -- get home after work at 5 instead of after class at 10 :)

Hasta manana!

We're back in Philly for about 48 hours, catching up on errands and laundry. Oh, and I should really water the plants. Tomorrow we're heading south to rendezvous with the college crew for a BBQ (that rhymes if you say it aloud). And tonight we may be hosting some of the sojourners in our apartment before we all head down to Columbia MD in the morning... early afternoon? We'll see when we wake up.

It also seems like getting the heck out of Philly is a good idea because the lady at our package store told Glen that American Idol is holding auditions in Philadelphia on Monday... registration starts tomorrow morning. Everyone within two days' driving distance of Center City who would like to make a fool of themselves on national TV is going to be pouring in starting tonight. I hope our house guests can find parking.

On the wedding news front, we may have a band picked out.

And Amy finally got to see me in my wedding dress, and she got to try on bridesmaid dresses. This is our current favorite, but in a periwinkle color.











I also found a cool idea for wedding rings. This artist engraves your partner's fingerprint onto the inside or outside of your wedding ring.I've also starting getting into the idea of asking couples to list their own first dance song on the RSVP card. This might make the reception more personal, and encourage people to get up to dance. However, if the band can't play it or the DJ doesn't have it, I wouldn't want the couple to feel neglected.

Lastly, check out this awesome article celebrating everyone's favorite computer game,
The Oregon Trail.

Whew. Done with the pediatrics rotation. It's very weird now that we've been in the clinic that we won't be donning our white coats and poking people while they sit naked in a paper robe for an entire year.

As an aside, when the doctor asks you to open your mouth, stick out your tongue, and say AAHH, please do ALL THREE of those things. It's not just a cutesy expression to get you to open your mouth wide like 90% of the kids seem to think. We need to see your tonsils and the back of your throat and sticking your tongue out gets it out of the way, and saying AHH lifts your soft palate and uvula to widen the view. All of the kids, 4-year-olds to 17-year-olds would just open their mouths. Then again I would ask, please say AHH, and they would just sit there. "Say AHH" doesn't mean, "open your mouth;" it means actually say AHH.
OK, I'm done ranting, until next year.

Glen, my mom, my sister and I are all on vacation in Chincoteague, VA right now, enjoying a crazy thunderstorm from our hotel rooms. I want to post some photos, but I haven't used my own camera yet.

Glen, Amy and I just finished another rousing game of Apples To Apples, a new favorite. We always end up making up rules to mix it up a little. This time we also discovered that the combination of cards thrown out can give you great inspiration for a screenplay or other such endeavor. We are going to start drafting the script for Spicy: John Travolta Goes to Bollywood; it's going to end in a dance-off, of course.

It's obviously time for me to head to bed. I'm exhausted from fighting the waves today, and we're waking up early so we can all rent scooters before lunch.

One more thing -- Glen and I finished Harry Potter 7 today! Everyone can start speaking freely to us again; I won't have to give the disclaimer that I haven't finished at the beginning of every conversation.

I hope #1 emailed headline on CNN wasn't a freudian slip:

Rescuers Hear Noise in Mind

Napoleon's Sister's Breast Cast in Plaster
Rossella Lorenzi, Discovery News
Aug. 15, 2007 — Expert male hands applied plaster to the young breast of Napoleon's sister to create an actual mould, according to a new investigation into the marble portrait of Pauline Bonaparte.

Created by Antonio Canova (1757-1822), Italy's most celebrated neoclassical sculptor, the statue is known as Venus Victrix, or "Venus the Victorious," and depicts Napoleon's favorite sister lying half-naked on a couch. [...read more]

In case you were wondering, I did come home and take a nap.

Today I saw this adorable 3-year-old girl for a well child exam. She had this gigantic smile and these long eye lashes and every time I asked her any question, she would nod and then look at me with the huge smile and her eyes opened as wide as possible, and I would just crack up; the exam took forever. She was also running around the room in her underwear because that was more comfortable that the paper gown they had given her. I asked her what she likes to do a daycare and she said, fight with her cousin. I asked her how she fights with her cousin and she said, "I say that he hit me." Good strategy. Her mom is 7 1/2 months pregnant and told me that her daughter recently asked her how her new baby brother was going to get out. The mom called up her own mom to see how Grandma thought she should answer that question; Grandma said just tell her the truth. So Mom told her daughter how the baby would come out, and the 3-year-old says, "Mom, you're nasty!" and runs out of the room. That may be the funniest thing I heard all rotation.

If you are not in the center of a major city, take a look at the sky tonight. We should still be able to see the end of the Perseids meteor shower. There has also been a new moon which has helped with visibility. Apparently during its peak two nights ago, there should have been a shooting star every minute.

We have our last "modules" (homework discussion) tomorrow at duPont. It feels kind of weird because last Wednesday our third hour was led by Dr. Stine, a developmental pediatrics doctor; she had taught us once before. I thought she was quite old, but actually she has only in her late 60's or so but very ill with chronic lymphoma. She died at home the next day. She was very dedicated to teaching and it's a weird feeling to know we were her last students.

Another late night to bed... probably another nap tomorrow :)
I love naps.

This was one of those mornings where I had to lie to myself and say I was going to take a nap as soon as I got home from work in order to get myself out of bed.

Of course I have to share any squirrel news....


Squirrels Outwit Rattlesnakes in Infrared
Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News
Aug. 13, 2007 — Like Wile E. Coyote's hapless quest to catch the Roadrunner, rattlesnakes have attempted to catch California ground squirrels for well over a million years, and now scientists know one reason why the squirrels usually win.

Their tails freak out the snakes, researchers report in this week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The secret is the squirrel's ability to heat up its tail before flicking it in admonishment at a threatening rattlesnake, the researchers believe. For the first time, the scientists captured the phenomenon using a special infrared camera. [...read more]



In related news, today Glen saw a squirrel jump 8 feet from a fence to a tree, much like Superman.

Glen, after eating fresh cherries: "I look like I just voted in Iraq."

I have this feeling like it's the end of the school year (finally!).

Tomorrow is our last day at the clinic, Wednesday we go to A.I. duPont for our last day of lectures and homework, and Friday we take our test.  Then BAM off to back-to-back vacations!  Summer's not over yet!

It's so much easier to enjoy your weekends on the outpatient service - you know your patients are all at home enjoying their weekends too. Our first Friday on inpatient we all felt so weird knowing we weren't coming in the next morning but our patients were stuck in the hospital.

Either way, this is my last weekend of clinical work for a long time.

I've been looking at a lot of wedding stuff lately, mostly because I've been procrastinating writing this paper I have to do by tomorrow.

I found a website that will design 5 monograms for $15.
Which ones do you like the best?
Then, which ones have an historic/colonial feel and which ones would look good in a lilac color scheme?
See? All this wedding stuff is hard work!

This headline is just so great, even though the article is pretty sad:

Britney Spears Accuses Her Mom Of Sleeping With Kevin Federline

In other news, a tornado went down my block in New York City, knocking down a tree and a telephone pole, blowing out windows, and ripping shingles off the rooves. roofs? We're not in Kansas anymore.. we are in Kansas? The tornadoes aren't in Kansas?

Today I had to be videotaped while interviewing one of the patients at the pediatrics clinic. The woman who agreed to be filmed had brought her son in regarding a delay in getting potty trained, a follow up of his constipation medication, and a new foul odor coming from his stools. So, if anyone is interested in watching a 20 minute tape of me discussing the frequency, texture, color, odor, and greasiness of someone else's poop, come on over this weekend.

My revelation for the day is that if you haven't looked in a mirror all day, you should really try to avoid going to the bathroom right before you leave work. I finally saw myself in the bathroom mirror and was faced with the fact that I had just tried to give parents of patients serious advice (on camera, no less) with my hair looking like THAT. ...imagine a crazy art teacher you had in high school and then make it bright red. I also had some of my lunch stuck to my butt. Only a little piece.

Every time I say or write "revelation" I say/write "relevation" first instead (not a word). I think it's because I use the word "elevation" much more frequently.

This is a pretty disjointed entry and it's way past my bed time so I'm signing off :)

I just had to look up the definition of the Anal Wink Reflex.

Sometimes I don't love medicine.

I think the best thing about wearing pantyhose is how free you feel when you finally get to take them off at night.

Snack Attack!

It's kind of silly that I have to hide my snacks from my attending physician not because I'm not supposed to have them but because he'll eat them all within 20 minutes if I pull them out.

Sing to me!

I just saw a patient named Shakira and a patient named Aaliyah. I can't wait to see what other Pop stars come into the clinic today.

I also pulled ooey gooey smelly sugical packing out of an abscess in someone's armpit. And the girl has a history of and is probably colonized with MRSA, so it was doubly gross.

Back to lunch.

Apparently my health insurance just expired and it's going to cost me $147 to refill my Nexium. I better get on fixing that.

A little good news, kind of:

Op-Ed Contributor

A War We Just Might Win

By MICHAEL E. O’HANLON and KENNETH M. POLLACK

Published: July 30, 2007

We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms.

My blogging has seriously been falling off lately. I just don't have the mental energy to be creative when I get home.

This past week in the well baby nursery was fun. It was nice to be surrounded by healthy babies and their excited parents. It's amazing how aware a 12 hour old baby is -- they would often calm right down as soon as one of their parents walked over to the crib, especially if the baby could hear their voice. I was holding one of the babies and she was looking at the window and when I turned a little she craned her neck to keep looking at the window, with that look of perplexion (not a word) on her face. She was like 20 hours old! I don't think they're even supposed to be able to see that far. It was so amazing to watch them start to turn into little people.

The sad cases I saw had to do with the mothers, not the babies. One of the moms was just having bad complications from her C-section -- a lot of internal bleeding. She was stuck in the ICU for the first few days of her son's life. Oh, and that boy looked exactly like his dad, somehow, even though he was only a few days old and looked like a baby. Dad was so excited, doing the stereotypical thing of shaking the hand of everyone who walked in the room.
The other sad case was a mom who had been diagnosed with metastatic melanoma during her pregnancy. She needed surgery as soon as possible so they had to weigh the risks of waiting to operate on her cancer with the risks of her baby being born pre-term; they waited until she was 34 weeks along, just late pre-term. We send babies to the NICU if they weigh less than 2200 grams and he weighed in at 2210 grams, so he could stay with his mom in her room until they went home a few days later (probably earlier than the doctor would have liked, but he wanted them to get home and have as much time together as possible).

One interesting thing about the nursery at Christiana that I don't think I've mentioned is that almost every baby stays in the room with Mom, and Mom and Dad are responsible for feeding it and changing its diapers from day 1. Mom can have the baby sleep in bed with her if she really wants, although we don't recommend it. My attending said that this is pretty new, around for only the past 5 years or so, and it was totally new to me. Every time I've gone to visit a new baby, up to my cousin who was born just six year ago, the set up has been that the mom is in her room and all the babies are in one big nursery with a big window where you can point and find yours and ogle at it. This new system seems really nice, and I think the parents liked it too. There still were nurseries where the nurses could take the baby if Mom needed to get a shower or something, so it wasn't like they were totally on their own. Oh, and as of like this year, dads are allowed to stay the night in the room too... in an empty hospital bed or a chair... but nonetheless.

Tomorrow we start our three weeks at an outpatient clinic in Wilmington. We don't have to be there until 8:30am!!!!!! We don't get out until 5pm, but still, this is like a normal person's job. We are going to be so refreshed. Maybe we can even go to Quizzo this week!

Lastly, Glen and I are addicted to Philly's 104.5FM. We first discovered this station when we got our car back from Glen's mom Kathee after she borrowed it for one night due to a debacle involving income taxes and a heavily armored parking garage; she had left the radio tuned to the station, although I don't think she particularly listens to it. We kept the radio tuned there and were amazed that every time we turned the car on, there was a good song on. Then with school and the boards, we hardly used our car for a few months. I tried to find the station in the house once, but I mistakenly thought it was 94.5FM. That's a Top 40 station out of Trenton, and as is requisite with getting older, I think pop music is getting worse and worse. So recently, Steve mentioned 104.5 and reminded me that (1) it existed and (2) what its real frequency was. So since we've been commuting in our car over this past week, we've needed a radio station as background noise and tuned in to this. It's all 90's alternative rock! It's amazing! These radio stations had slowly been getting canceled; it happened in Baltimore, Philly, and I've heard NY. There was almost nothing for people our age to listen to. On top of that, their DJs don't talk at all, even in the mornings - its all music. Their commercial breaks are only two commercials long. I wondered how they stayed in business, but I just found out they're run by ClearChannel, the super mega radio conglomerate. I don't really like supporting one of their stations, but you hardly have any choice these days anyway. (and it's a lot easier when they're playing what I like, haha).

Dave Matthews, Pearl Jam, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Stone Temple Pilots, Weezer, Green Day, Foo Fighters, Live, U2... and some new stuff like White Stripes and the Killers... yum!