Had a Timtam explosion today. Made me feel energetic for a while. I think I should not dip my Timtams in boiling hot Milo.

However, I think the non-stop adrenaline high that I have been running on since Tuesday has finally caught up to me and therefore I will blog about it another day. I know that because even after a cup of Costa hazelnut latte, I still managed to fall asleep at the foot of Qin Yi's bed an hour later. In the meantime, though, here is the gist of what happened:

The Thank You email I sent to everybody -

YO EVERYBODY. I WANT TO SAY A VERY HEARTFELT THANK YOU TO EVERYBODY FOR YESTERDAY (even those like Yuvanaa who only turned up to eat the cakes and criticise). Much as I was shocked an embarrassed by the train station stint, more than that I was very touched that all of you put yourselves through that to shout such a loud chorus of Happy Birthday for me and all the other commuters. It does take a lot of skin to do that.

Great thinking on the organisers' parts too, to make use of my very convenient plans to think up this scheme! It was very cunning and well-thought out. There was no way to suspect that I had planned all this myself :/

And then, thank you to the hosts, who were very professional hosts in terms of layout, entertainment and clearing up. I have to say again, Qinyi, the steamboat stuff that you arranged on the plate was so professional! Haha! Like my mother! And the food was great too, although I claim credit for the novel idea of using curry for steamboat, even though Yuvanaa disagrees. The 3 cakes were great too! And so was the candyart. It did fulfil my criteria for coffee-flavoured teh tarik (milk tea) cake (: (yes, keewei your oreo cheesecake was reeaaally nice too! not ni4 when I ate (:)

In addition (haha like writing compo), thank you for the very novel way of making me choose my presents! I'm glad I gave a good wishlist hehe. Really happy with my presents and I'm sorry that I ripped Victoria's present before she got to, but in all fairness it was your faults.

Keewei, help me thank Josie and your sister and your brother for coming!

In conclusion, Thank you for everything again. It was an awesome party.. Despite looming Phase 1.. So sweet of everyone for managing to chill out and hee hee haha with the rest of us (:

Cheers
Yilun

Summary of Since Tuesday...

So. Tuesday was officially my birthday. Many people asked me what I planned to do/what I did for my birthday and I honestly did not know and scarily, I cared a lot less than usual! D: Perhaps it was because I had many things on my mind at that time, what with it being the end of my favourite block and all. In summary, I spent Tuesday staying up to finish my workbook and had 4h of sleep. I spent Wednesday feeling like shit in clinic, finishing off the remnants of my workbook, going late for Dr H's teaching, going for the nice SHO teaching, and finding out that we still had our silly screening programme to do. Got back at 7.30ish and Sania had to finish this ridiculous e-learning that we all had to do. We then had my birthday dinner (takeaway pizza, garlic bread, chips, onion rings and 7-up) at 10p.m. while watching the apprentice. It was really enjoyable and cosy, and Sania was so sweet for remembering.. Ended up sleeping at ~1.30a.m. though, despite the previous 4h-sleep night :/ Somehow, I managed to jump out of bed at 7a.m. the next day feeling extraordinarily cheerful and chirped my way through my last day at KGH with a really good Endocrine clinic, followed by card-giving and thanks-saying. Got to interpret an ECG and blood gas result as a farewell present from the Endocrine ward.

Not surprisingly, Kettering decided to snow heavily just as we were leaving. Had some trouble reaching the same place at the same time as the taxi and inhaled way too much snow for my own good as a result. It all ended on a good note though, when we found out that the undergraduate coordinator (the coolest 1 we ever had) had ordered the taxi for us and that we did not have to pay for it (:

Got home and finished my e-learning shit within 2.5h! XD Ok actually it was quite useful overall but I had been rather stressed thinking about it when some people had told me how long and tedious it was :/ Thought that meant I could squeeze in a spot of renal studying but I had decided to print off my e-learning certificate in Paula's room, so that meant we ended up talking, which meant that I ended up sleeping at ~1a.m. again.

Had to catch the 7.50a.m. bus to get to my assessment the next day. I jerked awake at 7.20a.m. and somehow managed to grab a copy of Metro and stride in coolly just as the bus pulled up at the bus stop *smirk*. Sat for the Endocrine assessment, which was okish but a bit tricky and did not know a few of the conditions. Had THE screening debate after that, where we shockingly managed to garner a whopping TWO votes. I believe they were out of sympathy. At least we did not get zero votes. Had lunch and renal assessment after that, which, while not easy, I somehow quite enjoyed solving. That is not to say I will get full marks or anything. Ended off with the poster, whereby Sania and I (and everyone else) waited with bated breath and found out..... that we were not chosen!!! Sania stole a half-glance back at me and we gave each other a :D and thumbs-ups. I think many people were secretly hoping that they would be picked though, because of some contradictory reactions I observed. Sadly, we did not know (well I did not, anyway) that besides the punishment of having to present the poster, there was also the incentive of getting a certificate for being 1 of the top 3 :/ Oh well, I do not think we would have done it much better even with that added carrot dangling in front of us anyway.

And then... Shuang Ning came! Walked a bit, talked a bit. Went with her to the Bham German Christmas market the next day which, despite the snow storm, was actually a really good market. If anything, the blizzard made it all seem even more Christmassy. You know how, when you take pictures of snow scenes they often end up just looking like a rainy day? The snow yesterday was so heavy and the snowflakes so fat that you could actually tell that the snow was snow from the photos! Got some hot German cake things and German sausage hotdog. The German sausage went 'Piak!' each time we bit into it. Did some more shopping, more eating, had scones and tea, and found out that Shuang Ning is a really fun shopper because she takes all the clothes she likes without looking at the price, tries them all on, and leaves without buying anything.

We arrived at the train station to find out that the previous train had been cancelled because of the snow and were all 得意that we had decided to spend that previous 1/2h shopping instead. Our smugness was short-lived however, as the next train still did not show up and the train station continued to swell with commuters. It got to a point where it got rather chaotic and little Shuang Ning and little me were in danger of being lost in the stampeding melee of frustrated commuters. Well, I say stampede, it was more of... like, squeezing toothpaste out of a very small hole. Train was delayed by a total of 1h in the end.

I think the continuation of my update warrants a new post.

Heard an interesting conversation in the toilet cubicle next to mine yesterday. Hm. Rewinding back... I was in the toilet at Bullring (Birmingham) and there was a toddler in the cubicle next to mine, and his/her mother was standing outside the door, keeping watch.

So. Heard an nteresting conversation in the toilet cubicle next to mine yesterday.

Child : Do you need to use the toilet?

Mother : Sorry?

Child : Do you need to use the toilet?

Mother : Yes.

Child : Why?

There was a stunned silence whilst I went about my business next door.

Mother : Huh?

Child : Why do you need to use the toilet?

Mother : Why do you need to use the toilet?

Child : I needed to wee.

Another brief silence as i flushed the toilet.

Mother : Well, I need to wee too.

I finished doing number 1 and left the cubicle.

Today is almost my birthday but being 8h behind Singapore it almost feels like I have 2 birthdays because I get wishes from the East today and wishes from the West (and late people from the East) tomorrow XD

Flew yesterday so since today is my 2nd day I was flying really high. Felt really exhausted but dragged myself out of bed and had a feeble attempt at making my workbook look a little more substantial. Felt really anaemic and weak today because of said condition. Unfortunately today is the day where we had decided to squish in loads of things including part of our assessment for this block, which involves signing off of ONE out of THREE of our OSCE assessment forms. The ticklist included taking a history, summarising a history, doing an examination, summarising our examination findings, problem solving, discussing management, some other things along those lines, and surprise surprsie, ethics. There were many really good/interesting patients on the cardioresp ward and I was really enthused about speaking to a heart transplant patient, but by 10.30a.m. I really felt like I had to sit down so I pretended that I had forgotten about the heart transplant person and just presented the other 1 I saw. Stupid me forgot to summarise (it was the only time I forgot to summarise) and got a C for forgetting even though I did it in the end :/

A bit surprised that we were asked to do a combo of cardio/respi/GI Ex merged into 1. A bit messy but went ok-ish I guess. By that time my shaky legs + adrenaline rush had made me shakier than ever so I guess I should be happy that I did not do too badly.

Clever reg managed to give us the AXR teaching she had prepared specially for us! It was useful coz I did not know anything that she taught us to begin with. Went to speak to a patient whom a few people had recommended to us, and he turned out to be psychotic :/ Typical. So... Not very useful talking to him, although it was, nevertheless, interesting.

Had an extremely good teacher who taught us fluids and sliding scale insulin today. He teaches in a lot of detail and is quite nit-picky, but he explained the details so well that he made us understand what he taught. I feel like I do not have to study these 2 topics ever again. Unless I become an anaesthetist. We may have been pretty drained by that time coz I think we were rather slow at picking some things up but he kept checking that we were at his pace and reassuring us that he could repeat anything as many times as we wanted until we understand. How many doctors like that do you get?? Will give him a good feedback form for his CV (-:

So... Tomorrow is my birthday... But does not feel very birthdayish coz everyone is so stressed. People are studying for Phase 1/end-of-block/IPE/finals and to be honest I am not that keen to celebrate, myself. But I dun wanna be a wet blanket so I have agreed to order kebab delivery for dinner tomorrow.

Met the most cheerful cashier ever at Morissons yesterday. Then again, it was a Friday after all. I had stocked up well on Reese's PB cups since it was potentially my last trip to the Kettering Morissons (also good "hi I'm back" presents for the Leicester people) and so a substantial porportion of my groceries was made up of the PB cups. So the cashier could not resist commenting, "Oh my god this is all for yourself isn't it?"

Me - "No." Then on further thought, "Honestly."

Cashier - "... You're lying."

I raised my eyebrows.

Cashier - "These are the BEST chocolates In. The. World."

Me - "Yea... And I've only found them here so far so..."

Cashier - "Have you tried the peanut pieces though?"

Me - "Hm. The peanut butter cups are still the best, I think."

Cashier - "Yea I always get my friend to buy loads from America. I didn't know they had them here. Did you get those from my till??"

Me - "Don't think so. I think it was from... another till."

Cashier - "Cool. I'll probably finish that lot in 20min."

Amazing how he could sustain a conversation throughout the course of my grocery paying. I do envy people who can sustain conversation so effortlessly.

Called home at 11.55p.m. last night to say Happy Birthday to Evon. Could hear the bustle of the Tay family morning routine - Yi Ling's sleepy voice (was still before 8a.m.), Evon's chirpy voice (was already after 7.30a.m.), the general hoohah that Snoozy causes, and strangely, I could smell Milo over the phone as well. This was a very nice end to the night/start to the day.

Woke up just before 7a.m. and thought I might as well do some work since I was up. Went for IPE practice session with Dr H who is a nice, fatherly old man who has the ability to make everything seem so simple and not make anyone feel stupid. He is one of the best teachers I have had, even amongst the many good teachers I have met in KGH. Suay suay because of a combination of factors like feng shui, strategic positioning, eye-contact etc. Sania and I went last i.e. had the worst examinations to do (in front of everyone!). I KNEW we would end up getting the shitty ones to do. But again, I will take this as a good thing coz even though we were caught off guard and had to do something relatively unfamiliar, the fact that we could still do it to a quite good standard certainly gives me some consolation. I was slightly miffed by the armchair critics, but Hilary (a nice girl we met doing Cardioresp block) was so sweet and whispered to me, "I thought you were really great, to be honest." Hm. Does it make people look cleverer when they are able to nitpick?

Went to the ward and was really enthusiastic. So as a reward for my enthusiasm I got to do my 2nd PR exam in this block, which is also the 2nd PR I have ever done. Shows a lot about Kettering... I was a bit disappointed that my finger is so short and therefore cannot deduce anything much from the few cm that actually manages to get into the rectum, but I did not want wiggle about too much/stay in there for an awkwardly long time. Dun think I felt anything sinister besides an enveloping warm softness, which turned out to be... I would say Grade 5/6 stools.

Just missed free lunch today so got my 1st ever hot meal from a hospital canteen coz the food is cheaper and nicer in KGH. Discovered that even the canteen staff here are unbelievably nice. I have a strong suspicion that the giant chimney in the middle of the hospital emits some gas that makes everyone in KGH nice. Instead of getting pissed off with Sania and I for standing around and not being able to make up our minds, the nice lady offered to give us samples of both the things we could not decide between. And not just a 意思意思 teaspoonful of the dish sauce, she gave us about 2 mouthfuls each on a paper plate! And she continued to be so pleasant and smiley even when we faffed our order up a bit and made her take plates when we wanted takeaway instead.

Because of a combination of my late night/early morning and my very satiable lunch, I was comfortably woozy during teaching with careful reg. Good thing the others were there as well this time so I did not have to answer so many questions. I did not know most of them anyway. Sania is so funny. She confessed to me later during our shopping trip (Morissons and Lidl) that during the teaching she wanted to go up to careful reg and give him a pat on the head.

We had to cancel a precious teaching with the super-nice, sweet clever reg who had arranged for us to do that GI presentation in front of everyone. She had specially prepared a powerpoint presentation with lots of cool pictures for us and was so disappointed that she had not been able to open it in any of the computers after running around the whole hospital yesterday. Instead we turned up for another teaching which frustratingly, did not happen in the end. Could have had teaching with clever reg instead. Now we have to allocate more precious free time for 2 sessions which were supposed to happen today.

I have probably said this many times but I am really grateful for being posted here so strategically (in terms of block and timing). I now have a newfound enthusiasm for being a medical student and all that "betterment for patients" determination we all had back in our medical interview but which had evaporated over the years in med school is starting to make sense again. To be honest my decision to choose Medicine had always been somewhat wobbly in Phase 1 and I always told people that it "just happened". Still I thought things would get better once I saw the practical side of things in Phase 2, how I could actually do things, how our actions can impact the outcome of someone's health... However, none of that happened and if anything, Phase 2 had merely become even more frustrating coz I felt we were not learning very much and worse still, we had forgotten a considerable chunk of what we had learnt in Phase 1 and had no time to catch up on all of that. We had always wandered aimlessly about in Phase 2, occasionally bumping into good people/opportunites by luck. At least now with this whole environment of good people, good teachers and the many scenarios and situations we have been put into, this constant reminder that we are expected to be able to handle the unexpected makes me feel way more able to handle things that are spontaneously sprung upon us. This place actually makes me feel happy to be busy and happy to learn and show off and apply what I have learnt.

Ok. So much for sleeping early :/

Another weekend is here. Boy does time pass quickly when I am in Kettering. Missed pizza again yesterday. Had an early day but did not make use of my time. We finally got round to finishing and actually sending off the silly poster we still have to do for this ridiculously busy block. Honestly. At this stage we should be focusing on doing as much of the basic simple things like being able to pick up basic signs on examinations/on investigations and being able to do basic procedures for when we become the bottom of the medical chain (house officers). I really do not think it is necessary to make students spend so much time and brainpower on these kinds of research things that we only need to know at reg/cons level. Still, Leicester being Leicester, I am sure they would still insist on grilling us on "no right answer" things like ETHICS while assuming that we will sort out things like what are the 1st steps we would take with a deteriorating patient doing into VF by ourselves/by magic.

Next week we still have to submit our screening programme. Goodness knows how this will benefit us.

I suspect I am potentially autistic. I find it hard to work with people and do not know how to tell people that my way is better. Yesterday when I was doing the poster with Sania I think I annoyed her quite a few times. I do try my best to discuss but I find it so hard to verbalise what I mean to say and it always comes out as something like, "Your idea is stupid. Pick mine. But I cannot explain why. Just pick mine." So finally I kept quiet and edited bits in the privacy of my own laptop and actually managed to express what I had wanted to express verbally. I wish I could have improved it more but I really do not want to appear like an ass. Same thing happened with the brief discussion we had about the screening programme. I got the impression that everyone thought I was being too anal when all we want, really, is just to get it done and over with. Still.. when there is a flaw some geek is going to pick up and question us about, I would rather pre-emt this by being the geek who spots these issues 1st. I think I did succeed in making myself the perfectionist, nit-picking, ocd geek D:

Today was a day of feeling stupid. Realise there are many things I do not know/forgot. And somehow, when it is not my turn to answer, I tend to know the answer. I feel so gutted (See, I am immersing in British culture and language).

For the past few days I seem to be getting quite a few hypos too. This makes me a bit unsteady in general (but still functional) and makes my hands quiver. As a result I can never aim at things (veins, for instance) properly and always end up completely missing, particularly when everyone has loose, wobbly skin. This is not good for patients, who therefore have to be subjected to my stabbing them twice or more each, and is really demoralising for me too. My excuse is my recently shaky hands and poor upclose aiming, but who knows? :(

No eventful dreams last night. Thank goodness for that.

Attended a clinical skills workshop that was supposed to be for midwifes and nurses and thought it was a bit irrelevant during the morning session, but there was a fancy free lunch! And in the afternoon we did some really cool and practical stuff that we NEVER get taught. It was not just giving IV drugs, which, in practice, is really actually always the nurses who do. Each scenario evolved to include a medical component as well (had anaphylactic reaction, did an IV insulin sliding scale and had a respi depression following IV morphine), which was unexpected and so was really good for keeping us on our toes. They were so nice to keep including us even though we were not scheduled to be there.

Had a spot of teaching with an enthusiastic FY. It was very practical and very realistic because he used to be a Leicester student and so could tell us what we needed/did not need to know. In a very informal and swearish way. I guess that promotes more active discussion from us, in a way.

Stole the pretty Christmas napkins and the last cheese bun left from the free lunch. It was such a waste to just leave them there. Got a free 3M pen and cannula documentation stickers too (-:

Meh. Have to finish our poster by tonight just to get it out of the way. Also have to finish designing a half-hearted screening process which obviously will have many major flaws, if not other people would have already thought of and implemented it by now.

This morning at 4.49a.m. was the 1st time I ever woke up with a scream (more of a pitiful cry really). And that was because it was the 1st time I had ever consciously experienced the phenomenon of sleep paralysis. I remember learning about it in sleep physiology, whereby in stage 4/REM sleep, we are in our deepest state of sleep and that it is in this deepest state of sleep where we experience the most vivid dreams which we are able to recall after we wake up. It is also in this stage of sleep where our bodies become flaccid and paralysed. Sometimes, not uncommonly, this state of paralysis lingers even after we have woken up and we find that we cannot move despite being awake. When the lecturer asked if anyone had experienced this phenomenon before, I was surprised to find that more than a few of my friends had. Still, I did not think much of it seeing as I had just been given a very logical explanation of why this happens. BUT. When you experience it yourself, it is bloody freaky.

Because of certain things I had watched and read, I had had a nightmare set in my old house, whereby I had walked into the living room to find all sorts of ghosts (animal, human, deformed...) swirling around the room and having a party. I was not supposed to see them, and apparently the house was usually "clean" and the ghosts had only come out (apparently there was a portal from the ghost world in my living room wall) because it was my uncle's birthday and they were there to celebrate just for 1 day. So this also meant that my uncle whom I always thought of as normal and alive was a.) 1 of them (i.e. dead) or b.) dibbled in the supernatural. It was all very real so I did what I would have normally done in real life and quietly left, hoping that I had not been noticed, and went to find a real living family member at home to interrogate. (That was how I found out that our house was normally "clean")

Later that night I was sleeping on my old pull-out bed and Yi Ling was sleeping on Evon's bed directly next to me. That was when I felt an invisible being restraining me and holding my mouth shut (clever). And that, I think, was me experiencing sleep paralysis because I could not move and could not shout to alert Yi Ling/the whole house. It was a pathetic struggle on my part, in all honesty, and I was very ashamed of not putting up a more decent fight. Anyway, my larynx struggled to get more than "hurk-" out and I finally managed to make an audible sound --> the pathetic cry.

So, that was the highlight of my day.

I did not get to present my case today. We were caught off guard and asked to examine a patient there and then instead. Wish I had gotten respi instead of cardio but oh well, all went well. The new junior doctors are nice. The old doctors are still nice. Nurses were nice. Cleaners were nice. Patients were nice.

Took blood from a deaf old lady with wispy veins and skin that was looser than a shar-pei's. Most of her accessible sites were very very bruised too and I suspect she is on some anticoagulant that made her bruise so easily. I am ashamed to say that the 1st time, because of her many many folds of skin, I had completely missed the precious vein I had finally located D: To my credit, I was very calm and got Sania to get me another butterfly while I acted as if this happened all the time and shouted conversationally to the patient while still looking like I was carrying out some procedure. I had another go, this time anchoring her skin, and obviously got the vein because a drop of blood blossomed healthily but not into my needle. Oh well. Got there in the end with a bit of tweaking and more conversational shouting. Sadly, I only got 1/3 of a U&E bottle before my butterfly tube hissed and started drawing up nothing instead. I suppose that was too much for that wispy vein to cope with. Neverthelss, I should take this positively because normally I would have just freaked out after the 1st try and passed on the job to the FYs but at least this time I refused to accept that I couldn't do this relatively simple task and got the bloods I wanted in the end. It was enough. I just feel more shiok with a full bottle.

Did a few more bits and bobs. Posted my letter to MOHH today. The stamp costs freaking 1.46. I used the Wallace and Grommit 1 because I did not want to lick the 1 1pound, 2 40p, 1 5p and 1 1p stamps in public.

Went to Msons (1 of my favourtie places in the world) and Lidl. Msons had lots of buy 1 get 2 free offers (XD) so we got the free chocolates for the nice nurses, doctors and cleaners on the ward. Also shared 3 boxes of cadbury fingers with Sania. Hm. I am actually not thaaat much of a chocolate person so I wonder how I am going to finish all of that.. I guess I will share with my housemates during Christmas as a generous contribution from me. Got my 25p 2L water from Lidl and some 19p decent-looking brand maggi mee. Spent 63p in total ;d

Am back in Kettering today. Did not get as much work done as I had anticipated so more work for me next week when I go back to Leicester!

Dear ol Halimah drove all of us back to Kettering. A few things happened along the way and made us 1h later than we had hoped. Still. Saved me 11pounds... All the Muslims that I have met so far are so nice. Perhaps it is a stronger community spirit. Everyone openly shares useful things they know and readily offers/agrees to help... I have been so used to the "be protective of your knowledge" culture in crazily competitive environments (Singapore) and feel ridiculously touched that quite a lot of people here actually do extend their help unconditionally. And it is (generally) true that how you treat others will come back as how others treat you. People are generally eye-for-an-eye, both in the good and bad sense. If you help people, most people are usually decent enough to feel grateful, or sometimes guilty, and repay the favour in the same way (either way it is to your advantage); if a person does not like to share, even if he does help people once in a while to get their help back for something else, somehow, people around that person reciprocate in the same way via instinct. It is kind of weird how these things work out.

True enough, when I remembered my friend and asked her to join us for the teaching we had arranged with careful reg this Tuesday, she told me about a nice SHO who was asking for students to give him a list of topics we want to be taught.

It does not take much to give help in a particular way to lots of people at once. If you give the same help (call it X) to 10 people, in future you get A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I and J back from the 10 different people.

Hm. Went off on a bit of a tangent there. So. I'm back in Kettering. Did not have much time to defrost my food (reached at about 5p.m.) so I hacked away at my frozen curry to retrieve a decent portion of it. The frozen fried cabbage was not as bad coz I could peel them off piece by piece without having to exert too much force. We have no toaster here, by the way. So we have to grill our bread. The grill was making minimal changes to my adaptably thin bread and so I turned it on to 6 and went back to my room for 3min, only to return to the kitchen to find that my thin bread had caught fire. Haaaaah.. I was not keen on grilling more of my bread, so I threw the little ball of fire into the sink and doused it in tap water and decided to eat normal, non-grilled bread instead. Alamak! I forgot to bring maggi mee for these 2 weeks! Mehhh... What a waste... I guess I will have to buy some frozen food from Morissons this week.

Searched my entire GI notebook for a passable endocrine case I might have seen in my 4 weeks here and I still have not found a case to present to my cool consultant tomorrow.

Took some professional shots of the cakes we made for Sook Yeen and Elaine last last week.


Elaine's carrot cake...

Sook Yeen's butterfly cake...

Ok it was a lavender opera cake... But from the decorator's point of view, it should be called the Ultimate Sookyeenish Butterflies Flowers and Swirls Lalala cake...

Not to show off or anything, but by the way, the butterflies are not bought. And neither are the chocolate pieces fencing the cake. Because of the ridiculous cold and dryness here, my chocolate kept hardening and so my flowers turned out so lumpy D: I know.. The swirl turned out wonky too.

Too bad my cake-decorating enthusiasm has to be put on hold for now, what with the ever-impending IPE and OSCEs looming over me. Everyone says "it is still 3 months away" but when you break it down, this translates to 2 weeks per rotation to study and that is not full-time studying either. We have 2 weeks to study each rotation, on top of still having to attend placement everyday. So, it is not "still so long away".

Did loads today (-: Did all my laundry before the morning was over, finally took down my sketch from my wall, and finished dementia + delirium! All before going to town!

Got my cheap Christmas cards from Card Factory. It is the place for cards and party things. They have cards going at 29p (!) and nice cards at 5 for 1pound, not so nice cards at 7 for 1pound and cards for not close people/politeness cards at 10 for 1pound! Giant cards also only cost 99p! I remember clearly that in Singapore, a normal card cost me over $4 several years ago and a good musical card used to be $10. Wth? AND Card Factory has cards for every occasion, to every kind of person (to mother/father/sister/brother/family/the house across/the family/neighbour/niece/cousin/fiance/husband/wife/girlfriend/boyfriend/friend/both of you/all of you/someone special...) and from every kind of person (from mother/father/sister/brother/our family to yours/our house to yours/neighbour/niece/cousin/fiance/husband/wife/girlfriend/boyfriend/friend/both of us/all of us/cat/dog/pet...)! I am not joking about the cat/dog/pet, by the way. We discovered something cool too. They had cards "from across the miles" and next to that, a series of "from Leicester"! How cool is that? Suffice it to say I got good cards at very decent prices. Ok I got 2 boxes of pretty cards for 99p each *squee* ><

I decided it would be more economical to give the lovely people at Kettering Christmas cards with a Thank you message in them instead of getting them Thank you cards. Anyway 1. Thank you cards are ugly 2. Thank you cards are not sold in boxes/packs 3. Every student and patient gives a Thank you card to show their gratitude so mine would just camouflage with the pile and waste my ink and money. Christmas cards, however, are more heartfelt and unique.

Got some overseas stamps from WHSmith. They are Wallace and Grommit so I might keep 1. Freaking expensive though. I'm sure I very recently successfully sent a biggish card home using a 90p stamp.

They have 99p baguettes in town! Sure beats the 2.50 coronation chicken baguette I

had in KGH :/

Meant to do more work upon returning from town but I ended up turning on my acer and going on facebook then checking my email and one thing led to another... and here I am posting up photos and blogging. Supposed to have left for AJs (I need my meat. I will be half-vegetarian on Monday.) 20min ago but no sound from Paula. Hm. I had promised to go for the Medics Oriental Dinner tonight too but... it is cold.. and wet... and dark D: and I need my meat. So, giant kebab it is.

My housemates left cake for me in the freezer!

Yay! Got my pictures from Xiaomeng yesterday. Looking through them, I realise that I have lost weight since starting Phase 2, although I still have a muscular face.

So, here is my gingerbread establishment...

Now to make it look as tacky as possible...

There is the fallen fence, the brown lady with cup G-ummy boobs and her black husband in his swimming trunks. We were very racially-balanced. You can see The Saurus at the front of the gate and the mailbox too. Ah. Even from this distance I still see the piece of cowpat at the front gate...

This is the Yuvanaa&Bingbing flatwarming cake..

The final cake minus 1 strawberry.

Back in Leicester today. I now appreciate the warmth of my frumpy Kettering room. I was surprised and upset to find Leicester ground covered in a uniform layer of ice. It had snowed quite heavily in Kettering and I didn't think it could be much worse in Leicester. My lips have been cracking and sore since Tuesday as I still do not have the habit of using lip balm (or any other beauty/healthcare products for that matter). I have been putting moisturiser though, ever since the new wash-your-hands-after-seeing-every-patient-even-if-you-don't-touch-anything-within-a-10metre-radius-of-them rule.

I have no more food and so turned to my freezer for something instant. I had planned to go to Morissons today and town tomorrow, but when I actually think about it, I think I can still survive without cooking for a while longer. I will get more frozen food when I am back in Kettering.

I recently discovered something awesome. It is called the Triple Whopper. I will definitely conquer it 1 day in the near future.

Finally discovered how renal ward round runs without a renal unit. We went on quite a good tour of Kettering General Hospital to visit the various renal patients scattered around the compound. Wanted teaching immediately after that to save time but another part of me wanted to go for the infallible Friday free lunch. Sadly, there seems to be something wrong in KGH these days as even my ever-dependent free Friday lunch failed to materialise. This forced me to spend an unreasonable amount on a very mediocre coronation chicken baguette as I had, in anticipation of a free lunch, not packed any food of my own.

We arranged teaching with careful reg for 2p.m. instead. It was very distorted because he got bleeped every 10min and had to go away for considerable periods to answer the bleeps, after which he would return and jot down another job to do on his growing jobs list. I even had time to go to the toilet during 1 of these intervals. Shamelessly, Sania and I pretended not to see the growing list and pressed on for the teaching. Although it was somewhat an incomplete tutorial, I guess we should be grateful that the reg was nice enough to be cornered by us to do a 1-on-1 session and to attempt to press on with teaching us despite the numerous bleeps. Still, being enthusiastic medical students, we had to be thick-skinned again and asked for another session for next week. I think Sania and I have accepted the importance of taking advantage of people and hardened our hearts against guilt/paisehness of repititive requests.

Met our cool consultant on the way out and he asked why we did not turn up for the teaching that we did not arrange with him. I insisted that we had NOT arranged a session with him but oh well. You can never have a victorious argument against your superiors. I stupidly suggested a session on Monday although I do not have a single case to present.

The grand plan (after sacrificing morissons and town) is to get some work done tomorrow. We shall how successful that plan is. In the meantime here is Victor, my new (free) usb drive

... and his twin, Gilbert.

Had 2 bouts of diarrhoea ?cause today. My working diagnosis is diarrhoea ?sour vegetables.

Today was, again, a waste of time. Turned up for Endocrinology clinic as stated in our timetable but my cool consultant had gone to the wards instead. This just shows the status of "Medical Student". We are always the last to know everything. We went to look at the haemodialysis machines instead then went back to do some reading in preparation for Nephrology clinic in the afternoon. I took the chance to have a power nap.

We turned up at Nephrology clinic only to find the venue had been changed to Corby and of course, silly us should have known -_-

Went to doctors' mess as it is supposed to be Free Pizza day today, but no such luck. Slumped in defeat, and having missed the free MDT lunch as well, we buried ourselves in our workbooks and demoralised ourselves by doing some of the renal cases. There were no more cups so we could not make tea at the mess either. After some good, hard work we gave up and went to get some food (using our own money) and found that the restaurant had closed. So we lolled about and got some cheap food from the upstairs cafe(still more expensive than the hospital restaurant). I had Eccles cake, which is my new favourite cake coz it reminds me of very English Tau-sar piah. I miss Ethel's bakery back in Leicester.

After we were well-filled (somewhat) we went for our dinnertime teaching and it was on Asthma & COPD. Again. We must have had at least 5 teachings on that by now (at least 3 of which were in Kettering). I (and I think Sania did too) wondered why everyone else really wanted to do it. Again. We didn't do it in the end because Sania politely pointed out that we had done the topic at least 3 times in Kettering.

It snowed heavily today. Large snowflakes floated into my mouth and eyes despite protection from my spectacles. I really wanted my hot, 2-week old Japanese curry even though I was not that hungry after teaching. Sadly, to add to my series of unfortunate events for the day, #1. the microwave here freaking sucks and did not heat up my food even after 8min and #2. my cabbages and the other vegetables in my Japanese curry had gone sour. The microwave had also somehow managed to selectively only heat up the soured cabbages well, but had left the meat at room temperature. My wonderful cheese-covered bread stick had also gone hard over the week.

I just remembered. Careful registrar had said, "Yep. So read up on nephrotic syndrome." 3 times to me on Tuesday and I had neotiated a teaching session out of him for tomorrow. Whether that was a silence filler/my renal knowledge was so dismal it scared him/I had to read it for teaching tomorrow I do not know. Any way I had better be well-equipped with nephrotic knowledge for tomorrow just in case. It would be quite embarassing if I have to admit that I still have not read up on it. Will go to sleep now so that I can read up a bit more tomorrow early tomorrow morning.

Yay. Free Friday lunch to look forward to. The 1 infallible free lunch of the week. Hopefully they will have packed sandwiches/wraps/salads and other foods. They are really useful for storing for times of emergency (like when my food goes sour).

No time to post pictures lately. Also, as many will know by now, my acer had crashed again and I am now using asus for more serious stuff and I have yet to install my printer into either of them. In addition, I am stuck in Kettering. I say stuck, Kettering is really a lovely place with lovely people and lovely patients. I must have gushed about it to everyone who reads this by now.

It has been snowing for the past 5 days even though it was only still November. Apparently it is going to get heavier over the week. That hopefully will be the end of the cold spell for the year although I doubt it.

Today was a bit of a waste of time. Spent 1.25h getting to Northampton in a bumpy taxi and only spoke to 3 patients and watched 1 renal biopsy. The 2nd one was the guy with CREST syndrome/?SLE we stalked over the course of last week and finally did our big presentation on. I think he was horrified to see us appear again even after he'd been transferred from Kettering to Northampton. 1 patient was trying to push us to talk to him instead but he gave a flat, "Oh they already did me" and gave a half-smirk :T In total we saw him 1. During the ward round 2. When we persuaded that other patient to talk to us 3. Later along a random corridor 4. Outside the building smoking. Imagine his consternation when he was wheeled in for his biopsy (which he didnt want in the 1st place) only to find us there, again.

Because no one was free to entertain us today (all the FYs change rotation today) it was somewhat a wasted trip and so we vented our dismay on a box of fries each on the taxi back to Kettering. So.. we went back to Kettering and were late for teaching. It was on topics I had felt relatively confident in before entering but which the tutor (and most of my fellow coursemates who should have been less familiar with the topics seeing as they were doing other rotations) had soon successfully managed to deflate. I felt rather shitty and worried after that session because other people know more than me. Good thing I am good at hiding my feelings.

What else this week... Yesterday was nephrology clinic. I kind of wanted to be the consultant because he is a Tan and I strongly suspected that meant he is Malaysian/Singaporean and felt it would be nice and familiar to sit in a clinic with my fellow continentman. True enough, the blunt features of a Singmala uncle poked through the door and the mixed English/Unidentifiable accent boomed through the supposedly soundproof walls. Unfortunately because of strategic positioning and having to feign nonchalance I had shrugged my shoulders in a "I'm cool" way and gone into the room nearer to me - with the registrar. I guess I got the better deal in the end coz although I saw a significantly fewer number of patients than Sania did with the consultant, I seem to have gotten a lot more teaching as well. And we only saw so few patients because consultants are paid more and should therefore do their fair share of the work. Nah, actually coz the reg was sooo careful and had to ring up and check everything before he made any decision. He was nice enough though, and showed me his i-phone with the protocol for treating vasculitis. Unfortunately, being a proud Singaporean, I seized this golden opportunity and began to explore the site for further mangement protocols to copy while he was distracted and so held on to the phone for rather longer than was appropriate, I think. I assume he will never show me useful protocols on his phone again.

Another long day ahead tomorrow. I miss my consultant so we are going to attend his endocrine clinic tomorrow. Actually coz we need to get signed off for attending it. Following that another nephrology clinic probably with the careful registrar. I think Sania is gonna get him tomorrow though. It's only fair.