I passed one exam in 2007.......

As part of my master plan to learn to drive, I had to sit my theory test and hazard perception test. Again! As part of my last masterplan to drive I sat the same tests in may 2003, and passed but then it became the uni holidays and then into BSc Honours year and I never got round to booking the final few lessons I needed to get ready for my practical test. Anyway, here we are, 4 years down the road and 9 years after I was first able to sit the test, and 2 years after my theory test (from 2003) expired.

In the last 4 years they have lengthened the test, but I got 46 or more (out of 50) in all my practice Theory tests without looking at the Highway code! However Hazard perception was something different and i spent most of 30th December practicing these tests, and getting less than 40 in every case (pass is 48/75).

After a night with very little sleep (read none) I turned up at the test centre at 8.10 on New Years Eve. there were a surprising number of people who appeared to have chosen to end their year with a Theory Test! I had half toyed with not going, since I had failed all the Hazard Perception bits but since you lose your money I you don't go, I thought "What the heck!" and went and sat it.

I wasn't sure how the Hazard part had gone, so i came out and collected my results sheet:

• Theory Test: 48/50 PASS is 44/50
  
• Hazard Perception: 57/75 PASS is 48/75
  

So now all I have to do is keep going with the lessons and maybe I can pass the Practical test soon, and before my self imposed deadline.

Still it was nice to PASS one exam in 2007..........

New Year Sales

I am making a list of things I want to buy in the new Year Sales - this does involve spending some Christmas vouchers as well.

• New vacuum cleaner
• George Foreman grill
• Some new shirts for Uni
  
• Print cartridges
• A4 paper
• Passport
  

Looking ahead to 2008.

Looking ahead to 2008, I have had a few thoughts.

• Getting more energy and feeling less tired after Uni etc
• Managing to achieve lots of uni work during the week to give me a day of at weekends
• Motivation for Uni!
• Some more exercise and weight loss / becoming fitter
• Becoming more organised.
  

Happy New Year!!!

Happy New Year to everyone. The tattooed drinker, Butcher Boy, Little Miss P, G-star and the rest of the crowd from work met up yesterday for an evening to bring in the new year. I proved my horrendous musical ability and thus was the worst performer at Guitar hero on the tattooed drinker Xbox.

After bringing in the New Year with Jools Holland's hootannay on TV, we sat round chatting etc before we all started to head home later in the evening. Thanks to the absence of taxi's, and the mizzle (mist & drizzle) it took a long 90 minutes to walk home round all the city centre street party & road blocks.

As part of our New Year's plan we had originally planned a cocktail party, and I had earlier been up to ASDA to buy Chambord (raspberry liquer) which you use with JD and lemonade to mkae a raspberry lynchberg.

Are they trying to annoy me?

I like traveling on trains, but the last few days have left me a bit cheesed off!

Virgin West Coast
On Thursday I was due to catch the 1903 VWC service from Birmingham - Glasgow. This was advertised as a Voyager

Upon arriving at Birmingham station at 1840 (my London Midland connection had been 15 minutes late) I went to the indicated platform (5), to see a Pendelino standing their. I tried to find a member of staff to check that this was the correct train, since the door LCD displays were not showing anything. The member of Network Rail staff just pointed to the TV screen, so hoping for the best, I got on board.

The train was a dump - empty bottles, cans, crisp bags and paper on all the tables, and most seats in standard, and crisps / bits of sandwiches under the seats and tables. The bins were overflowing.

The Train Manager came on at about 1858 to say this was the Virgin West Coast service to Glasgow, anyone not intending to travel should go to the platform etc. About 5 minutes out from Birmingham, she then announced that she would be serving complimentary tea/coffee as the shop would not be open before Preston as they had no trained staff.

Come Preston, there was a crew change, and the shop did open - albeit with no change. However, from no staff, we suddenly had 4 people sat round a table next to the shop, chatting and talking, all in VT uniforms - I assume one crew was traveling off duty to Glasgow (which is where they all got off). The Train Manager made one pass through the train, and when a passenger asked about the rubbish, she offered to get him a bin bag so he could clear it up.

First Scotrail
On Friday I went through to Edinburgh, and due to the engineering work, they are only running every half hour each way. However, my train instead of being 6-carriages (twice the normal) was only 3 and we were all squashed in at 3pm, by the time of my return at 11pm, they were running a 6 carriage train which was mostly empty.

On Saturday I had to go to Edinburgh again, and this time they canceled one train and then the following one was packed and the journey was slower than normal. then the return trip was delayed by 10 minutes due to "the number of trains trying to leave the station". Honestly, sometimes I think you couldn't make it up.

I'm starting to believe my sister when she says that once you have a car, you view trains as an annoyance, not an alternative.

Christmas is coming....

Presents
Only one christmas present to buy...that means I have got all the other ones! I started way back in October this year, and the one I was looking for there (or the most difficult person to buy for) is the one I still haven't got. It is for my sister who retains the role in my life as being difficult to buy for - she has most things she wants, is moving into a new house soon and getting married - more than enough opportunities for present buying.

In past years I have bought her joke presents, useful presents and jokey useful presents (Green Gecko shower gel dispenser anyone??!). And I really have no idea what to buy her. I always assume the worst reactions in other people such as "What do I do with that?" "Why?" and "Thanks, it's interesting". Thus I end up thinking about what to buy them for ages then wrack myself with worry about whether they will like it, until i give it to them.

This year, me and some school friends, whom I haven't seen for between 3 months and 5 years (bear in mind we left 6th form in July 2000), are all meeting up on Christmas Eve. We have decided to do a secret santa style thing which should be fun. This added a further complexity to my christmas present buying.

Christmas Dinner
This year I will be having two Christmas Dinners - next Tuesday with Mum, Dad and my sister down at home, and one tomorrow. The one tomorrow is with a group of my former colleagues from work. Ten of us are meeting at someone's flat for a full Christmas Dinner. Somehow I got roped in to do the cooking and shopping. So today Butcher Boy and I were out buying stuff - potatoes, carrots, sprouts, custard, chocolate tart etc. Oh, and you might notice the Turkey missing from that list - that is because the shop we were in (where we all used to work) had sold out for today, so Butcher Boy (like a ninja*) was going to wait around for the delivery tonight and grab one and buy it before the delivery reached the storage chill.

*Actually when I say wait like a ninja, I do in fact mean, do his normal shift, since his job involves waiting for, then bringing in the fresh food delivery anyway.

Expect a Christmas Dinner update at the weekend!

Christmas Videos
Following the sad death of Kirsty McColl, my favourite Christmas pop song has been surviving only in recordings from the 1980's and 90's. However Youtube has recently delivered this gem of Katie Melua and the Pogues performing it. The Pogues are hardly wearing well though, and the gumminess of singing is obvious compared to the clarity of the 1980's version.



Happy Christmas!

Eating a pet

Today I was over to see my Aunt & Uncle. My Mum & Dad are up to see me (and use up their A/L days before they retire next spring) and so they decided to drop in on my Aunt & Uncle and then my Uncle phoned and invited e as well.

Given the bizarreness of our family I did realise that despite no-one getting there until 4pm, we would be having Sunday lunch at 5 (it always happens). What I wasn't expecting was lunch to be one of my cousin's pets.

My cousin lives down in Somerset and until last summer he had some nice pets in the garden / field which his children loved to watch all day, eating the grass, with their fluffy coats. However, each summer one or two would disappear and be replaced by the children / lambs!

Yes, my cousin used to have a few pet sheep. And today we had one roasted for tea - it was lovely, with a nice nut stuffing made y my uncle, and with oven roasted vegetable and roast potatoes.

The meat was very tender and just fell off the bone (for Butcher Boy, it was a lamb shoulder), and was followed by home made (gluten free) raspberry tart!

Dentistry is a real emergency service

Having found my NHS dentist - bizarrely in the nice middle-class West-End, this week as my appointment to get my filling replaced, and also a scale and polish (no idea why I needed that, but it was on the list of treatment!). All in all, just over £20 for 20 minutes work.

I was a bit numb all morning after the filling, but no after effects, and I can now eat ice Cream without wincing. The rest of my teeth are all fine, and the dentist only wants to see me for my check-up.

Not a bad result really, and I think it would have been even longer without a dentist visit if I hadn't been getting pain due to wearing away that filling.

Mind my advice is not to go for a filling at 9.15am on the first day of your holidays!

This set me thinking that most people only really visit a dentist when they have an emergency.... and yet some dentists make you wait days for an appointment. Why?

A trip to Edinburgh

On Wednesday, Butcher Boy and I ventured forth into the great unknown, or Edinburgh as it's known. It was an afternoon of new experiences and some trepidation.

Firstly, a trip to Monster Mash - after all my raving, would it live up to my claims. Would the sausages and Mash satisfy, or would it be a flop, and I lose any reputation I had?

After a brisk walk through the meadows at dusk, we reached monster mash - we were the only customers - not good I thought. However, the food was lovely - the Monster Sausage with Mustard mash was lovely, and topped with Monster Gravy. The gravy was thick and rich, whilst the mash was creamy, and yet still absorbed any grease from the sausage to give a nice tasty meal, which was not stodgy at all.

With an hour or more to spare before the lecture, we wandered down the bridges, and round onto George Street before paying a visit to the Standing Order, where we managed to find a table - a first in my experience. After a leisurely pint, we sorted our ties and made ourselves loo smart for the walk round to the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh - the main reason for our visit.

As a Medical Student, who sins up for all sorts of ridiculous e-newsletters etc, I had signed up as an e-associate of the RCPE, and they sent out an email about their Christmas Charity Lecture - which was to be on the topic of Disaster Victim Identification, and given by Professor Sue Black from Dundee - a Forensic Anthropologist.

The lecture was interesting - combining both the politics and processes involved in setting up a victim identification capability in the UK, the training of Police Officers, and also some of the Biological aspects of how you identify someone, and what certainty can be put upon that identification. She also set this against examples of both the need for such a capability - London Bombings, Thailand Tsunami; and the UK Governments demands that the capability be able to deal with up to 9 incidents spread throughout the country occurring simultaneously.

All in all it was a very interesting lecture, and a good first trip to a 'proper' Medical event for me. Butcher boy was enjoying all the Police links, and pleased at scoring off another Police specialty he doesn't want to work in!

Birthdays

Age is a terrible thing. On Monday evening I was in my early twenties, and then with one swift movement of the second hand on the clock, into my late twenties, or 'almost thirty' as some people put it.

Actually my 26th Birthday went by with little fuss this year - just a meal with my sister and her fiancee, lunch with some friends and a night out with other friends (although I did have a Raspberry Mojito while sat with people drinking Appletini - it was starting to sound like a Scrubs script).

My present collection was quite unusual this year - in that I actually managed to think of things I wanted, and thus got real presents instead of vouchers and money (though I got some of that as well).

Thus my trusty (but heavy and large) 2.0Megapixel camera gets traded in for a new small sleek 7MP one, and I have a small 2 person filter coffee machine - very tasty and useful! I also got some books and Brain Putty which apparently can boost my intelligence....

Still no birthday cake though.

Depressing afternoon

Wednesday was a long afternoon. For the first time in a while, we had 4 hours of lectures (plenaries)n ina row. this is not unusual in many subjects or at old-school medical school, but for us in our FOFO teaching, it is very unusual.

The topic's for the lectures were well suited as well, especially for a wet, windy, cold, grey afternoon in December. 90 minutes on palliative care and end of life issues, 90 minutes on Lung Cancer, and 1 hour on sepsis and it's mortality and (lack of) treatment options.

In the middle of the Lung Cancer lecture, the rain was so heavy, that the thundering of the rain on the lecture theatre roof was so loud that the lecturer (who was using the microphone) had to stop as no-one could hear her!

The lecturers all made a good fist of it, and the afternoon passed quickly, but we all elft witha feeling of what a great way to go for christmas and thinking of medicine in such terms. it is justa fluke of staff availability and lecture timing, but was still not the best end to term.

The sepsis lecturer was one of the people who had taken me for a day in intensive care on my sumemr elective (see Elective Day 4)

So I went to meet Butcher Boy at the Grad Club, and had a rather tasty Steak Pie and coffee, before heading home to study more on Lung Cancer for Thursday's final PBL session of term.

Except it wasn't. The tutor had clinical commitments and couldn't find any cover, so the session was cancelled.

Where?

Up until now, lectures and FRS' etc have taken place in one of 4 buildings on campus and any offsite activities have had nice clear instructions on where to go.

However (you knew that was coming)

Today we had a FRS moved to the X Lecture theatre, Y Hospital. Now this hospital is nice and easy to get to, but finding the X lecture theatre was harder. Faculty's advice was that it was in the X department. Finding this department required some jugging on University maps, hospital maps pinned to the wall outside the main entrance etc. Then when we got to the building, no one seemed to know which lecture theatre we were talking about. The FRS wasn't in subject X, and thus the staff didn't even know the facilitator we were talking about.

Faculty had also changed the timings of this FRS, from Tuesday 9-12, to Tuesday 9-10.30, to Friday 9-10.30, to Friday 9.30-11. So all in all, no tutorial for me today as I couldn't find it. A failure in the timing, location and day I guess.

A strange weekend

This weekend has been quite odd. I was out to see some people from work on Friday which was a strange night which went kinda wrong but then recovered. I spent Saturday doing a wee bit on Uni work then pottering around at home - cleaning the bathroom, doing the laundry etc. Then today I found the huge pile of ironing and managing a long lie-in, did my nice Anatomy Colouring-Book and stuff.

I'm really not looking forward to Uni tomorrow as despite sleeping lots and drinking lots of water this weekend I feel tired and dehydrated!

Communication...

Yesterday was Comms skills, and despite Faculty knowing that there are only 5 roles per session, and only 4 sessions through the year, they put 6 people in each group!

Because I as off ill for our introductory session, I didn't have a role yesterday, so I watched the other 5 - who were really quite good, and tried to give useful comments in the spirit of our peer support curriculum.

I also noticed that faculty have been out spending money again. Not only do we have 3 plasma screens around the place with a list of what lectures / tutorials etc are taking place in which areas of the building each day, but we now have plasma screens in the Comms Skills rooms.

Until now, the camera / mic in the Comms Skills consulting room have been linked through to a small 24" TV/Video combi unit in the 'group' room next door. Soon though faculty wants us to move to a DVD based system. The idea is that each student will be able to record each consultation onto DVD for review later. In most rooms the DVD recorder's are in place, but in their wisdom, faculty have also purchased a 48" plasma/LCD screen (I can't tell which as it still had a cover on it) for each room.

My issues with it are:

a) why could the DVD recorder not just be hooked into the existing TV
b) how much are the plasma screens costing - my guess is about £8k for them all
c) if students are expected to record the stuff onto DVD, then the DVD will have to be finalised in that machine before it will play on any other machine, so this will be a 'cost' of one DVDR per session.
d) This outlay is despite the same department saying that copying all the Clinical Skills instruction videos onto DVD for students would cost too much.

Naval gazing.....

No, not a blog about reflective writing... but about the launch of a ship. On Tuesday, HMS Diamond was launched from BAE Systems over at Govan, so butcher Boy and I had agreed to go and watch it, as a way to fill a quiet damp November Tuesday.

We were a bit late getting organised and walking down from the nearest train station, so we didn't make it to the optimum viewing area (as recommended by the folk over at Hidden Glasgow) down at Glasgow Harbour. Sadly we couldn't persuade the viewing agents for the flats that we really wanted to look at a Penthouse apartment with a good view of the river. So we stood at the back of the crowd on the boardwalk, next to the Policemen and Council staff, all in their hi-viz jackets (who I'm sure were there in the interest of public safety and crowd control).

There were a few fireworks, then the national anthem, before the ship started to slide her way slowly backwards down the slipway and into the river, before some more fireworks were set off.

Then the rain seemed to get heavier, so we made a beeline back to Partick to the railway station, and home. All in all, a interesting hour out from studying.









According to Mum & Dad someone took me as a small child down to Swan Hunter back home to see the launch of a naval boat - wiki suggests either 1982 0r 1992 as the years, but since I don't remember it, I think it was 1982 to see HMS York. The logic of 1992 would be that one of the launches was HMS Northumberland, so we might have gone with school?

Flying through term...

Well, it's Wednesday already. Which bizarrely makes me 66% through my Uni week, despite having Tuesday totally free this week (it is the time when my quarter of the year are on Community Clinical Practice).

Monday
Monday was nice - Clinical Practice in Hospital in the morning, followed by our PBL debrief/briefing. I was shattered and slept very badly on Sunday night, so I was on the black coffee - 2 before Uni, one at coffee time and a 4th before PBL. We only examined / history-ed one patient in the hospital, and she was a confused old lady who had broken glasses and had no teeth, and was slightly deaf. We managed to get a fairly good story along the way, covering most of the main points. We missed a few social factors about her home care and family support, but managed ok on the medical bits I think.

Sadly I didn't eat breakfast, so I was full of nice black coffee all day, which probably made me feel worse. I headed back down to Uni to do some printing then met Butcher Boy for lunch.
He'd been working all day, so we both had lunch about 3pm.

Then I headed home to complete some more of my anatomy colouring book, and also to read through today's communication skills scenario's.

Hedgehog impressions

Inspired by a picture of the blu one and her rugby team-mates trying to do hedgehog impressions using only their hands (i.e. just your own body - no props or costumes), which she posted on facebook, I have spent 15 minutes trying to do the same. This has proved two things:

1. You need one hand to do the extended nose, and that only leaves one to represent the spines
   
2. Their impressions were actually quite good.

Roll up, roll up, Bargains to be had

One of the issues with a December birthday is the fact that any gifts come in one month. This means that you have spent them all by November. Due to the English LEA Student Loans system paying out on a termly basis for me (pre 2006 entrant) as opposed to the new monthly system which applies in Scotland and to new entrants in England, I also got my Student Loan at the end of September.

Thus November is always a bad month for me financially, and I;m having fun at the moment trying to find things to sell on Ebay / Amazon.

Examples include a textbook which I owned but then was sent for review purposes by a publisher (So as not to break the rules, i am selling my copy, not the one that the publisher sent me.) and some DVD's. Sadly I tend to break the CD cases so none of them for sale...actually i can't think of anyone who'd want to buy my CD collection... Anyway, this is how I'm spending my Saturday evening!

Please note he is glued to the bed.....

Friday was our Clinical Skills session- the clinical skills course is a random combination of sessions which runs through 3rd Year, with no regular pattern, or real connection to current academic or clinical practice topics.

This one was loosely themed around Cardiovascular examination technique, valvular disease and an introduction to Harvey.

Harvey
We were introduced to Harvey as "The chap in the bed next door with no legs, and a bad haircut." He is also glued to the bed (so you can't really examine his hands), at a fixed angle (so you can't make him sit at 45 degrees) making him somewhat useless for the finer points of cardiovascular examination.

Harvey can mimic several types of heart condition, and has a nice chart showing the condition you want and the magic code you have to type into him to get it. He/it then can move their apex beat and heart sounds within the chest, though these at any time are only audible if you hold the stethescope directly above the area - there is no sense of it radiating or getting louder as you get closer. Also His rib interspaces are well marked out with dirty fingerprints!

Still I feel sure that I will be back to see Harvey again this year to listen and try to understand valve disease.

Crap week.

This week is very very very crap.....

• No money for the next ten days - I can get food cos that comes from different account (makes it sound like I have loads) but no spending money except VISA.
• People owing money - my sister, an a job I did 2 months ago....
• Doing jobs for people and just getting shouted at in return.
• Feeling lethargic and tired all week.
• Sleeping in 2 days this week and missing morning Uni - had to send grovelling emails in both. cases
• Can't get to sleep properly at night and sleeping poorly.
• Not seeing friends all week due to a combination of 1 & 4.
• It's cold, dark, and raining all week. What happened to the lovely sunshine and clear weather we had las t week.
  

Still only 2 half days in Uni to go, then the weekend. Maybe I can catch up with everything over the weekend and feel better by next Monday?

I see numbers, floating before my very eyes

Today I was helping out the people who run the primary groups associated with DIMe and auditing their account which takes in donations, children's camp fees etc, and pays out for the Primary groups, the camp fees, the trips and office expenses and such like.

Now I can see numbers before my eyes, but after 7 hours with bank statements, receipts and such like, we got the account to balance for 2006-7. So that's sorted for another year.

Now I just have the DIME accounts to complete and get to the Team leader by Sunday.

The joys of dentists

For the past 3 months I have been trying to find an NHS dentist near where I live, or near Uni.

Due to living in the middle of town there are few NHS dentists (if any) around the place, and the nearest ones are in some of the less nice areas surrounding the city centre, or in the opposite direction from uni with poor transport links.

There are lots who have websites saying they do take on NHS patients, but upon phoning you discover that they only do that in March for one week.

So this week I tried phoning further afield, and still found that most of those I could get numbers for are taking on private patients only. This leaves me in a quandry:
1) Bite the bullet and pay up for a monthly dental plan
2) Risk not having a dentist and having to go to the dental hospital if it goes wrong.
3) Go to a dentist miles away, who takes on NHS patients.
4) Keep looking - this one kinda links with number 2!

Mashed Potato!

For a while I have been raving to Butcher Boy about the wonders of Monster Mash, the Edinburgh cafe which does sausage and mash etc - I had many pleasant meals there as a final year student, and even visited their Glasgow branch once during its' short life.

Butcher Boy and I tried to visit the Edinburgh cafe when we went to see the Amateur Transplants in the fringe, but it was full and had a waiting list, so we vowed to return later. Later is here and we need to decide a day etc to go over for the wonderous mustard mash and tasty sausages.

Just thinking about it has me almost salivating.

If it's Tuesday, it must be Edinburgh

Another Tuesday, another trip to Edinburgh - my 3rd in 8 days. This time was to setup a presentation about the work of DIME and the Primary groups. In principle it should be really easy - connect laptop to Data projector and voila it's ready!

Sadly due to people forgetting about an email I sent them, the data projector had been borrowed by someone else, and I couldn't get my laptop S-video port to output in colour, so the presentation was in black & white on a TV - not my finest technical moment.

A line of red lights....

On our way back from the DIME weekend, we came round a corner on the A9 to see a line of red lights winding across the valley as far as we could see. These roadworks, to do with the construction of anew roundabout, had delayed us about 20 minutes coming north, but this queue looked much much longer.

Half the traffic seemed to be heading up a narrow road up the hillside to our left, so after looking at a map, Rachel decided to give it a go. We followed as part of a constant line of traffic down this single track road (the drivers coming the other way were pulled over and looking very bored with it all), before coming to a junction and choosing to rejoin the main road at the new roundabout, with only a short (15 minute) queue to get through the traffic lights at the contraflow.

All in all we had saved about 75 minutes, and were not far behind the bus with the kids on by the time we reached Perth.

DIME Weekend

This weekend was also the DIME weekend up at Aviemore. We had great weather- a bit damp on the Saturday, but not enough to stop the activities, and clear cold weather on Sunday. I managed to escape having to go on the bus, and instead met two otehr Leaders at Perth, and went up by car.

I was with the S1's as a Dorm leader, which we knew would always be slightly challenging as they are youngest, and not so acquainted with being away from home. They were, as expected, a wee bit hyper when they arrived, and despite best efforts to run the energy out of them, they still were a bit disruptive at bed time, so much so they didn't get their bedtime story.

Saturday was despite the rain, a good day. I was running the craft bay and we made stress balls, using salt and balloons. this was a great idea and I wish it had been mine! The kids also had options to decorate photo frames or make Hama bead creations, so all in all it was more of a quiet hour amidst the adventurous activities outside.

On my free session, I went with the S5-6's on the ropes course, and was beaten in the forward rolls game and probably most of the others, but we had a laugh with the Leaders looking almost as silly as the kids at times. However, Rachel and the blu one videoing me crawling through a net tunnel wasn't very nice, as I hardly look my usual composed sophisticated self! Then they went off into Aviemore for a coffee and I stayed on site with the younger ones.

Our Saturday night film was Monsters Inc, which I haven't seen before. The Tattooed drinker recommended it by text when i asked him what it was like. Given that he is a gore / horror fan, i did wonder what we were about to unleash, but was pleasantly surprised - it is a great film, though I do worry about agreeing with the Tattooed Drinker on anything!

The Sunday was a nice clear day, and while the kids played games, we tidied the centre, so that just after the kids left, we were finished and on our way. We stopped for a nice coffee at House of Bruar on the way and looked at the necessities of 'country living'. In hindsight, I think the main necessity is money.

Block 12 week 1

The first week of this block was quite nervy really. I was a wee bit scared about being in hospitals - always am - I'm convinced that I will put my foot in it, mess up an examination or dry up completely. So much so that on Monday I couldn't eat any breakfast and felt nauseous until I got to the hospital.

I was also nervous about meeting my Clinical Practice/PBL group for the first time. In the event, the clinical practice group seems ok. They all seem so much more confident and smarter than I feel, but once we came to feed back, we all seemed to have got stuff at about the same level, which was good.

The afternoon PBL was interesting, especially in comparison to my 2 PBL groups in Year 3 last year. This year's group seems to have 2 or 3 groupings and is less homogeneous. This leads to interesting bits in the discussion of people ignoring each other (politely) and a general sense of chaos, as the questions end up not being in the correct order. We muddle through the scenario though.

On Wednesday, we started the day with Lectures at 1 (I hate early starts like this!?) which was a standard afternoon with a plenary on Statin's and one on Medical Statistics, focusing on likelihood ratios. We also had an OSCE briefing (its longer this year) and an introduction to the block, and exams. Focussing on teh exams now already has me feeling very nervous. Oh well.

I'm back

The last week has been quite chaotic, but a lot has happened that I want to write about, so I will do my best to catch up this week!

The first and most unusual piece of news, was the birth of a baby boy to some friends of mine today. Although they are a wee bit (4years) older than me, they are the first friends to have had a baby which has made me feel old. Mother and baby are doing well, and I;m really happy for them, as they strike me as perfect parents!

Now it starts to make me worry that people I think of as 'my age' are having children, and have proper jobs etc. I always knew that doing Medicine as a post-grad would involve some sacrifice, and self-denial, but at times in the past year it has seemed like I am giving for no feedback.

Anyway, I'm tired after the DIME weekend, where one of the themes was on sacrifice......but more on that story later.

Ceilidh

On Saturday night, a gang of people from work days (or at least who roughly worked tehre at some point over the past 3 years) went out to the local Hilton hotel as you do.

Well, not quite. One of the former checkout supervisors, who is now a teacher (who was also doing HR when I started there, and interviewed me) , is an events organiser for a charity, and we were all going to their fundraising Ceilidh.

The first surprise was drinks at 6.30pm, with Dinner at 7! We all thought that was very early, but all made it, dressed up to the nines, and looking smartly glamorous. The second surprise was just how nice they have now made the hotel inside. Butcher boy kinda spoiled this moment by spotting his nemesis manager*.

Then we headed in and noticed that they had sensibly located a whole table of ex-work staff in one corner, a short trip from the bar and dancefloor. We all sat chatting for a bit and reading the Menu, which had 5 courses (if you count coffee)

• Melon with a fruit coulis
• Carrot and coriander soup
• Roast Beef with potatoes and vegetables in a caramelised onion gravy
• White chocolate and strawberry torte
• Coffee with mints

The food was really really nice, and we had not too much, but enough such that by the end you thought you'd eaten well. The staff from work, true to form had all brought in some fortification, and thus were only buying soft drinks. Mind a smallish glass of coke was £1.50! Mid way through the meal, the table next to us, which included the organiser (our former colleague) and her family started singing the French national Anthem, in French, which was a nice touch.

Following the meal, and a few speeches and thank yous, we moved onto the dancing. This was mostly ceilidhing, but with a bit of discoing in the middle, and a raffle draw. The draw seemed like it was organised by ITV, because people at our table and the one next to it seemed to win about half the prizes, including the big prize!

We all had a great laugh, especially with Auld Lang Syne and Loch Lomond at the end, although one of our females did manage to break my big toe nail and leave me a nice black bruise under the nails using her heels! It was great fun, and we left about 1.30am, having had a great night and raised some money for a worthwhile charity.

*When butcher boy is working backshift, he has to get the delivery truck into the loading bay at work, but the cars from the Hilton often park in the loading bay, or block truck access, and he has to get the Hilton porter to come out and move the cars. Some managers are less helpful than others.

Integration Fair

Today was integration afternoon, and thanks to the benevolence of the 3 defence unions (MPS, MDU, MDDUS), the BMA, and the Sickness insurance (Wesleyan) people, I got an interesting haul of freebies.

Most novel goes to MPS, with a 64MB SB memory stick.... noit exactly cutting edge, but nice.
Basic of all goes to BMA and MDDUS, with biro's.
MDU were offering discounted books.
But best of all was Weslyan, who didn't want email addresses or any other info from us, but offered a leaflet about their services and loads of sweets.

PS. on later inspection, of the contents of my carrier bag, the MDDUS pen turns out to be a pen light for checking eyes etc.

Community Care?

Well the Medical faculty are certainly being interesting this year......

It had been said that although not having to do an LCP coursework this year, I would have to attend the Clinical practice in the Community section of the course. this is basically attending a GP's one full day every fortnight in pairs and practicing clinical skills, history taking and observing the Primary Healthcare team in action.

However, when the list of allocations was published yesterday (for allocations starting next Tuesday), my name wasn't on the list. In a mild panic, I emailed the administrator, and she said that she had been advised by the faculty that I didn't have to resit that component, and that as such, and because they are short on GP's to take students this year, I was being taken off the list, and would get a chance for skills revision in Springtime.

This means I now have alternate Tuesday''s free, and potentially more time if i do not have to attend the Communication Skills sessions as well.

Robot

You know, sometimes I wonder where Butcher Boy gets his ideas from. No sooner had we finished the piano-a-tron, than he decides he might need some help with his robot costume for the Hallowe'en Rev at the QM, which was on 30th October and fancy Dress.
The inspiration for the robot design was fro Osomo the South Park robot, and a little from Robot Chicken.The robot started off as a crisp box, before gaining arm holes, and such like, including lots of silver spray paint and varnish. The arms were to be made from silver tumble drier ducting, and the head would be square.

To cope with dehydration, there would be a tune running from the right wrist, up the arm, into the main body, and round to the mouth, allowing robot to drink whatever he liked.
There was to be a velcro-d shut door on the front, allowing access for micturation.
Butcher boy then decided that a little panache was required, and we started with the idea of flashing lights. Either my soldering is worse than when I was at High School, or the circuit boards have got smaller, as they failed to work, so I went back to basics and using 9V LED's we built 3 circuits, each of 4 LEDs, with switches. thus teh robot had lights, but could also be turned On and Off by passing company.

Further to yesterday's article on the piano-a-tron, tonight I was at butcher Boy's - more on that story later - and he and flatmate Rob (a fellow refugee from work) were busy installing the piano-a-tron PC and speaker connections as well as the power cables, on off switch and then rebuilding the piano around it. I am very pleased to say that it all works very well, and all the function buttons work. For your delectation, below is a photo of me flat on my back under the piano using cable clips to keep all the wires today so Rob can play (most of) the piano - there are a few broken hammers inside.