Ragefest

So, it has been brought to my attention by a loyal reader that the bulk of my blog is made up of rants about incompetant nurses. I have vowed to change in the past, but sometimes the circumstances force me to recant. I shall henceforth attempt to balance every humorous anecdote about a bumbling co-worker with a heartwarming tale of medical tenderness.
In the interest of ceasing my meta-blogging, I will return to the original premise of this blog, my premed life. I urge you all to use MDapplicants.com to follow how my application process is going, my profile is pretty easily found using the search functions. For those who are too lazy to do so, here is the process as it now stands:

Interviews:
University of Vermont

Rejections:
George Washington (snail mail 11/20)
Northwestern University Feinberg SOM
Indiana University
Boston University

Holds:
Albany Medical College

Remaining applications:
OHSU
Loyola
Jefferson
Loma Linda
Dartmouth (C'mon Dirtmouth!!)
McGill
St. Louis U
Tufts
Drexel
Temple
Louisville
Penn State
Rush University
Medical College of Wisconsin

Of those applications still outstanding, I expect interviews at OHSU and hope for one at Loma Linda and McGill. Of course any of the remaining schools would be great as well, but I think realistically those are my best options.

The Jerk Nurse

So, I won't name names, but Nurse M. from PCU is a schmuck! I can't stand this woman! She embodies incompetence! She was rude and inconsiderate both to me, her coworker and to the patient. I ask you this. After a patient finishes puking up his guts into an emesis basin, do you think he wants to think about eating more? No. Why offer him something? Perhaps he absolutely needed to have something in his stomach, and I don't know those mitigating circumstances. I've had run-ins with M before. She tried to do capillary blood glucose test from a patient's earlobe. Ok, but the protocols explicitly state that under NO circumstances is this to be done! Finger ONLY! Since the earlobe wasn't working, where should you turn to get blood. From the fingertip like you should? NO!, but from the forearm! Yes, there are plenty of veins and arteries in the arm. This, however, is a CBG, to be done from capillary blood. The moron tried 3 more times, and undoubtedly the 1 mm lancet barely pierced the dead skin on the guy's arm. Since she struck out, she finally resorted to following procedure, and what do you know? She got blood! WOW! Can you imagine? If you do something the way you should, it should turn out the way it should!

Interview

So it's been a long time since I've updated the ol' blog. Faithful readers, I HAVE AN INTERVIEW!! On nov. 28, I have an interview at University of Vermont! I'm flying out Nov 27, back home by midnight 28. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Sprint finish

WEll i'm finally puttin' the boogie on my apps. For two weeks I've had Loma Linda, Louisville, Georgetown, OHSU and McGill waiting to be finished and submitted. I finally just submitted Louisville. I don't really think they'll like me too much since I'm not a poor apalachian hick( they asked a lot of questions about underserved status, how big my hometown was, how much education my parents have, how much money they make, did I put myself through college etc.). I finally declared Loma Linda done today as well and submitted their app. I think I'm not going to finish applying to GT since they want a one page essay detailing why I want to go there. Since I can't think of any compelling reasons, and their curriculum is pretty non-descript, I think I'l forgo the $130 donation and apply elsewhere. It's not that I can't write an essay, It's just that I don't want it badly enough that the essay I write will get me in. Auugh. I'm just muddling things now. I just finished McGill's online portion, but there is A LOT of paperwork that I have to send in also. They want my AP, IB, SAT (who cares? i finished my undergrad! this stuff is OLD NEWS), plus some forms to go with my letters of rec. Gotta run

The Perforated Testicle

Yes, it is time for Dr. Fingerbottom's ramblings. He has changed his name, due to a syndicated column published by Aaron Tabacco who pioneered the Dr. Longfinger's name. In the interest of avoiding a copyright infringement suite, my sarcastic doctor is now Dr. Fingerbottom, Dr. Longfinger's partner (in a professional relationship).
As I was fixin' to leave work today, a histology tech grabbed my coworker and me and said "you gotta see this!". Curious, we trotted over to histology lab. The tech, we shall call him "Pooch", because I misheard his name and that's what it sounded like, showed as a small recepticle with 5 small pins in it. They looked about like those pins that hold your watchband to the watch. "Where do you think these came from ?" he asked. Umm, I give, where? "A man's testicle", he deadpanned. This begs the question: 'what was he doing? " He supposedly hopped into bed, where some pins were hidden in the sheets", Pooch answered. If you believe that, I have some clichés to tell you about real estate in florida and bridges which are for sale.
the moral of the story: If you're going to pierce your testicles, please, please, please, use a needle that's long enough to come out the other side. If you don't, I hope you're smart enough to realize that after the first one doesn't go all the way through, you don't have to try four others of identical lengt to achieve the same result.

Latin disclaimer: Caveat Lector: I am suspicious of this type of injury. The man's story could be entirely plausible. He might have mistakenly placed his pincushion in the bed, while performing some minor surgery on his favorite french-cuffed dress shirt. After succesfully repairing the beloved clothing, he was exulting at the prospect of donning the garment for tomorrow's gainful employement. He gleefully hopped into bed, so as to hasten the approaching dawn. To his ghastlly surprise, there was the pincushion, which, to his horror bit him in the You Know What. He must have rushed down to the ER, had the Pins of Inadvertant Perforation (PIP's to those in the medical field) removed and gone to work in the newly refurbished oxford cloth dress shirt.

More latin: Arma Virumque Cano, or " I sing of the man who might have pierced his testicles by accident, but who probably did not"

Still more latin: Yo No Soy Marinero, Soy Capitan, Soy Capitan. Or " Et tu Brutus, alla gallia in tres partitas divisa est" which, to those of us in english means "Brutus, where can I get some good cheap lares and penates for my penthouse domus?