the good old days are on now

feeling hung over sure isn't the best way to start a weekend. pfa last night was at pa's and it wasn't exactly a wild night. the bar tab ran dry at 9pm and i'd only arrived at 8pm (had to go to a lab do). however, despite this minor setback i still managed to find myself stumbling home past midnight with galaxy and brumbles in tow, drunk as a fish, trying hard to ignore my incessant vomition centre. a smattering of final years made a showing too, feeling quite ancient and cynical in the face of all the freshers: lou, mike, byron, paul, and a random belgian exchange student (who thought belgian chicks weren't naughty enough :-/ )

uni this week was palliative care at the good ol' peter mac. the senior consultant dr simon wein was a pretty cool teacher. the highlight for me was his tutorial on death and dying, where he quoted camus's the myth of sisyphis! the weather was really nice too all week, and brumbles and i walked home everyday. did heaps of things with group a again this week: i can't get enough of them. went to lygon street for gelati's on wednesday, went and learnt how to bake with lou that evening, then went and watched er at brumble's house on thursday. i cannot stop marveling at the incredible chance that brought us together way back in semester eight (the shrine).

went to uni on friday and re-experience the energy and hope that is university life. o'week was in full blast with clubs and societies, barbeques, freshers everywhere. bumped into gh handing out breakfast bars for his club. the dude is in final year as well, looking forward to finishing and earning big dentistry dollars. we reminisced about the good old days. i think it's time we all did a bit of moving on. uni has done well for us, but we're all ready for bigger and better things.

darren hayes = noise pollution

i still don't really feel settled back into things yet. while i don't really think the ten week sojourn has changed me in any significant way, i do feel more alert (less sedated) than i have for a long time. perhaps it also has something to do with the brand new specialty we had to digest this week: psychiatry. here at last is a subject which fascinates me unlike any other specialty we've been exposed to before. even oncology pales in comparison. watching the registrar present the formulation left me in awe: this is how i've always wanted to take a history, to allow all the aspects of the patient's story to flow easily, at the same time observing their mental state, learning about their personality, and on top of all this building rapport and exerting some therapeutic calm and alleviating the patient's worries. the only thing i find negative about it is the necessity to go to court and advocate for the patient, who may actually be trying to fight against your best intentions. it's so paternalistic it is scary.

we have a new person in group a: debra. it turns out she was in thommo's year at jch and there's a long story there but i think one should ignore hearsay as much as possible, and keep an open mind about someone and give them a fair go. it's always hard coming into a new group of people, especially one was joined at the hip as group a. however she's such a shy, quiet person i wonder if she'll ever become a part of us?

just got back from paula's beach house at blair gowrie. had a nice evening eating (la porchetta's: how original), drinking (xxxx stubbies, bourbon and coke, lychee vodkas) and listening to music (hotchpotch of stuff including darren hayes, much to my dismay). we all slept in and woke up slowly, moping around and drinking coffee, before heading out to portsea and walking along the beach. it was a very lovely night/day indeed.

i hate flying

well, i feel like a mess. the flight was a chaos of faces noise and anxiety. baggage claim and customs is always a bitch. got home and found a couple on my floor. *sigh* such is the reality of shared housing. they were nice enough to let me have my room back though so i unpacked and crashed for a couple of hours.

ten weeks is a pretty long time away from home if you're not used to pushing your boundaries. my travel journal is full of boredom dotted with insightful bullshit, but it's too early to reflect on anything. uni starts in a few hours and final year: it's almost ridiculous that i'm a final year med student already... but i still have a few hours of holidays left, so that'll have to sort itself out. all the friends that i haven't seen for ages, well they will have to wait awhile too because i'm too tired to be of any use in a semi-spirited conversation.

well, i suppose this means i have some time for myself, at last.