home alone

i have been a busy little bee.

weekend away with gal, brumbles and kermit at the grampians. we walked for miles. we played plenty of games. mount williams at sunset was really nice. lunch on top of the hallow mountain was fantastic fun. we were all exhausted on the way home. exhausted-silly.

med cover weekend reminded me how much fun acute medicine could be. it was steady, but not busy; easy but not quiet; no codes!

i love oncology. working with three interesting women (jackie, yen and kate). interesting patients. interesting problems. lots of palliative care. i have even managed to go to clinic once! it's a sign of bigger and better things to come, fingers crossed. and acute care nurses, thank the lord for them!

now for a weekend of rest and arts homework. brumbles is going away for five weeks to europe. aaron has a couple of weeks off in perth. i will be home alone. sigh.

time

a mate of mine recently got engaged. i only found out a little while after the fact. actually, many people did. a few were mystified by this delay. some have even been apparently offended. inevitably people are guessing, wondering, coming up with conspiracy theories, trying to justify to themselves why they haven't been told, casting a shadow on what should be a very exciting and happy moment. i must admit that i too was mystified and felt a general unease at how things have turned out. it's so unfair! why should this been happening to such a gorgeous person during such a wonderful time?

thank god brumbles (another mate) cut through all the crap and declared: it's none of their business.

perhaps she had wanted to keep it her little secret just for a little while, a promise just between two people. to be able to go about her daily business with a core of happiness bubbling inside, washing over all the stresses of day-to-day life. i think it's a brilliant thing to do. like eloping with your lover, it is a private moment shared, defiant against the world. fantastic.

i suggested to brumbles that perhaps a big engagement party is what will clear the foul air and make the atmosphere warm and fuzzy once more. she shook her head and said: why? it's not her style, and she owes nobody anything. but how else is this to be resolved? i wondered. she hrmf-ed wisely and said: time.

oh all bow down before the wise one.

not that im counting or anything

10.6 shifts down, 12.4 shifts to go.

it has actually been a lot better the second time around. as a resident, the ed consultants seem more likely to believe you when you tell them your patient doesn't look like they're on the brink of death. and the ed nurses even do ecg's and put in iv cannulas when you ask them to. even the patients appear less twitchy when you see them and actually trust you enough to go home when you tell them to bugger off because there's nothing wrong with them.

perhaps i have changed somewhat over the last 12 months... but how?

still, the ten hour shifts are pretty long and intense; and weekend night shifts still suck. and i still hate the lack of continuity of care. can't wait until i move on to oncology. oh sure it's not all doom and gloom. im learn a lot of paeds and acute medicine and general practice stuff. it's good to get back into the swing of things: actually using my brain to diagnose instead of just institute knee-jerk management; seeing interesting, baffling medical problems instead of just grappling with frustrating psychosocial issues that can never be solved. the joy of it all.

home sweet home

my first ed shift fizzed before it began. i had rocked up at ten, ready to rumble, my guts in a knot of anxiety, only to be told they had expected me to be at work earlier that day, where had i been, etc. turned out they'd changed the roster without telling me. so all i could do was trudge home, wide awake, trying to wind down, get some sleep. at least i caught the end of er. abby is so hot. even if she doesn't have an uterus any more.

madly planning my travels next year. so restless. but i know it won't be long before im consumed by work. then i'll have no energy to do or think about anything other than getting home and slumping on the couch.

back in the frozen grey landscape of ballarat. picked up a cold from someone already. how wonderful it is to be home.

homeward bound

had a couple of drinks with two randoms my last night in boston. richard, 27, from switzerland, ran a business offering overseas language courses. his mannerisms reminded me of dunno. tania, 22, from chile, is a teacher here on a booking buying spree. we had a good three hours, drinking, smoking, talking about the state of the universe.

i have been mostly vege-ing out this time around nyc, being a blob on the couches at the hostel, reading a tom clancy thriller, thinking, dozing. went on a walking tour of greenwich and east villiage yesterday. the guide, evan, is a middle-aged bronx native with a goatee and ponytail. very trippy.

white stripes at madison square garden was 4/5. could hardly have been further away from the stage, but at least i was dead in front and had a clear view, luckily with no tall dicks standing in front of me. meg's singing was off, the intriguing turns of her voice missing, as if she was too tired/drunk/sick to try. jack was manic, red, glorious. their use of colour, lights and shadow on the stage was magnificent as expected, and the disco light was out of this world. they took a ten minute interval, and the audience cheered through the whole thing, flicking little blue glowsticks across the darkness. it was surreal.

flying out today. willing be a long twenty-four hours. sigh. i hate flying.