Surfin'

I tend to spend at least an hour each day trawling the web to read the latest (and not-so-latest) news and views, with a slightly skewed preference for the more liberal papers like the Guardian. But the beauty of the internet is that it has so much to offer, and one’s choice is not finite.

At times you get ‘gems’ like this, where you find out that one of the most vocal politicians of your country is also cause for great shame; especially when one of the more respected elders of the country has a different point of view.

And then you have stories from the other spectrum, like this story about the clam that has been proclaimed as the oldest living creature. How did the scientists know? They cut it open and killed it to find out. And in one of the understatements of the year, one of them said ‘For our work it’s a bonus, but it wasn’t good for this particular animal.’ Especially when you consider the fact that it was happily minding its own business for more than four centuries before being randomly hauled up. Tragically amusing.

I really should be spending more time on tidying up/updating my e-portfolio but neither the heart nor the body is willing. While the advantages of documenting every single thing you think and do at work are obvious to some, it also happens to sap the life and soul out of medicine at times. The last thing you want to do after a day at work is to go online and jot down the ‘interesting’ bits from the day. Nor do you want to chase seniors around the ward and get them to sit down with you in order to go through the niceties of patient interaction when time is of the essence.

But I guess one needs to tick all the right boxes, make the right noises and go through the paces. At least I’m on the ladder, and there’s no way but up. All I need to do is get my arse into gear, and that's not as easy as it sounds.

On a totally different note, I saw an Audi R8 the other day, and it's GORGEOUS.

Balik kampung

I must say that after all these years, I have yet to decide if I actually love or abhor flying. Part of the allure of being thousands of feet up in the air has classically been due to the mysticism of being part of a niche that is able to quite literally look down on the rest of society, along with the more cerebral (albeit subconscious) aspect of ‘being away from it all’. But things change, in an age where the skylines are dominated by the orange of Easyjet or any other colour co-ordinations that enables one to fly across the Channel at less than the cost of good evening’s meal.

In my case, the build-up to a flight is the most attractive aspect of the whole experience. There’s nothing quite like the prospect of going on a long trip away that helps maintain your sanity during a busy on-call. I have always made it a point to organise an ‘event’ in advanced so that no matter how horrid things may be from a workplace point of view, there will be something pleasant to look forward to.

I’m usually rather ambivalent about flights themselves, although I do find myself occasionally being awed by the fact that we could be so ambivalent about something as technologically (and philosophically) advanced as flying. One only has to look outside the window to gain a different perspective on humanity, and I once told Sweetie that one of the 3 things that made me believe in the existence of God was the immense beauty that is on display when our planet is viewed from above (hence my fascination with Google Earth).

The one bit I hate about flying though is that I inevitably get my sinuses all clogged up, which is not particularly helpful when you’re trying to equilibrate the pressure within your head during descent. So the latter part of most flights will find me cringing in anticipation (usually after the last meal) of a headache that is akin to having tiny little moles attempting to scrapper their way out of your skull.

It was particularly bad during the flight back this time round. Can’t blame anyone but myself though – I was back home for a meagre 7 days, and in an attempt to squeeze in as many friends and food-types as possible, I made do with minimal snoozing time. This allowed me to have a rather efficient trip back home, but it also led to me suffering from a perennial hangover-like sensation during the last few days and rather embarrassing Abdullah-Badawi-type episodes of nodding off in public.

Home was good – needless to say, the highlights involved the moments spent with Sweetie and the catching up with family and old friends over lots and lots of good food.

For some reason, the savoury pancake with Argentinian beef at Paddington’s House of Pancakes at The Curve stands out, but that’s probably due to the potent mix of delectable courses and highly agreeable company. Other gastronomic highlights ranged from the more traditional mango kerabu and hokkien mee to the more contemporary black-pepper venison (I resisted getting the rabbit in honour of Reem; probably ended up eating Bambi as a result).

I could go on and on about the food I had, but suffice to say I’ve probably put on a few kilos and food is going to taste remarkably bland over the next few weeks. Thankfully, I’ve got some kuih raya, maggi tom yam and Twisties as antidotes.

I have since returned to the notorious banality of living in Middlesbrough, which was recently deemed to be the worst place to live in the UK (woohoo!). Felt rather crap initially, but it’s amazing how your body recovers after sleeping for 12 hours. Next week’s going to be rather horrid workload-wise, but now I have something else to look forward to - my trip down south to catch up with the Geordie lasses that will involve catching Patrick Stewart play MacBeth and a glimpse of the Terracotta Army, and indulging in culinary delights of the likes that are not available from Boro and my own kitchen.

1 down, 2 to go

With almost suspicious timing, the former deputy-PM has released a video that casts the current chief judge and a prominent lawyer in rather bad (read : illegal/unethical) lighting. It serves to highlight the lack of exclusivity between the judiciary and the executive, but I doubt anything much will come out of it. The judge will serve out his remaining few weeks and retire with his pension. And the lawyer probably already has enough cash to live out the remaining years of his life in the Cayman Islands.

And the usual bleating by the cemerlang and terbilang folks are coming to fore. The latest involves the same intellectual who's been responsible for numerous other mind-numbing comments and goes along the line of 'the whistleblower will be protected - his identity will be safe and if need be, we will provide plastic surgery' (why would anyone do that?). And this was followed by the rather lame 'if he doesn't identify himself, then there's obviously no case'.

And obviously, the fact that our elite police force is currently in court over some rather mercenary activities is going to convince Mr Whistleblower that he'll be in good hands. And being the lawyer that he is, the good minister has probably not thought about the fact that all he really needs to do is check the authenticity of the tape to have a case. I mean, if you have a dead body and a murder weapon, you go by the facts of the case right? You don't say that there's no case just because there might be no witnesses.

Moving on...

Last week was rather crap, as I was based on the cardiothoracic ward. The reason it's crap is 'cause you spend lost hours on pointless ward rounds and surgical clerkings during which you act as a scribe. And that's about it. But it's only for a week though, and there are some advantages to it. Like on Friday for instance, I was able to participate in a practical session on porcine hearts that allowed me to test my surgical skills in inserting an artificial valve as well as a coronary bypass. It was good fun, despite the expected 'everyone, look at the physician trying to suture!' comment by one of the SpRs. And it just highlighted how difficult the whole procedure is to me and the kind of fine motor dexterity that's needed to do a good job.

This week's my fav though - an entire week of being attached to CCU. Which means I get to see weird and wonderful cases (saw my first Janeway lesion the other day, which was definitely anti-climatic) and get my hands on the management of the sickies. Highlight of the day was this patient who was in florid pulmonary oedema. Actually, the highlight was getting to know that I had passed my exam. So now I can look forward to the weekend with an even bigger smile on my face.

Wut the eff...?

Celtic beats Milan 2-1. The All-Blacks lose to France in the quarter-finals. Even Australia loses to England. What the heck has happened in sports this week? Sigh...

Ngantuk

It's been one of those weeks during which sleep has been pushed down to a secondary role, almost like a past-time as opposed to a necessity. Sometimes I impress myself with my ability to function with minimal amount of sleepy-time, but reality will then hit home when I wake up and my first thought is 'what day is it?' or trawl through the day wishing, hoping, nay, almost begging for that cup of coffee that'll never come during this month of fasting.

Can't really complain though, as it was a weekend of indulging in nostalgic trips down memory lane, that were compounded by other activities like playing tourist guide, being totally swept off the board in my (surprisingly) first game of RISK and the fucking up of the mind of a young dude which culminated in the poor guy probably being traumatised by watching the movie Irreversible.

So much for setting a good example for the juniors.

It was a perfect antidote of a week of nights though. Can't say it was the worst set of nights ever, but it was icky enough at times. The highlight was my first experience of percussion pacing (i.e. whacking someone's chest to keep the heart beating at a particular rate) which although educational, was a total oh-my-god-what-the-fuck-is-happening kinda moment. When the lady started losing consciousness, I actually muttered 'please don't do this to me...'.

This week is a no-brainer, quite literally, as I'm stuck on the surgical ward (which translates to losing the will to live by mid-day). At least I get to go home slightly earlier than usual, which has enabled me to clear things up a little around the house, and catch the first episode of Season 2 of Heroes as well as the pilot of David Duchovny's Californication (which is rather amusing and seems to have a fair amount of topless women in it). And speaking of hot women, I just found out that Angelina Jolie will be involved in the movie adaptation of Wanted, yet another comic that is making the big screen. Can't wait.