Random Updated Updates

I'm seeing a lot of asses lately.

Surgery is not as bad as I thought it would be...but that's probably cuz my skin condition is much better than last year.

I've seen an operation which lasts less than 5 minutes.

I've seen an eyebrow-raising toe amputation.

I still wonder how (some) diabetics with foot ulcers don't seem particularly concerned about them.

I've seen a bad case of cellulitis with a weird-ish development.

I've been encouraged by a theatre nurse, telling me that my student life will fly past *snaps her fingers for emphasis* and then I'll join the workforce and have no life :) Concurrently wondering how much more 'no life' a person who already has no life can get.

I've had my name tested as various incarnations by the consultant in theatre. Problem was that the scrub nurse's name was also Ken. There was Ken, Ken1 (or 2...can't remember which), student Ken, and my personal favourite - Unpaid Ken :D

Wake Up

My energy levels seem to be going on a sine wave-like period. Just last week I was overcome by an unbearable desire to sleep. Anyone who knows me fairly well would probably know that I think sleeping, if it were not a requirement for life, is a waste of time. That, and the fact that my circadian rhythm wakes me up if my alarm doesn't, make me unable to have long lie-ins normally. I can't understand how some people, my cousins included, can sleep so much and frankly, sometimes I envy them. Anyway this came as a surprise to me, to say the least.

So on the first energyless day, I woke up and attempted to have breakfast as per usual. Now normally I'd managed to go through most of my morning bleary eyed and would properly wake up when I had to walk to the hospital. That morning my eyelids felt like they were tied to 10kg weights and a haze of tiredness clouded whatever thoughts I might have had. The only thing I could think of was sleep so I managed to stuff whatever remained of my breakfast down my throat and set my clock for another 15-20 mins of zzzs. Imagine my surprise when I woke up to find that it was already past 1230. So made myself some lunch and then felt sleepy again (which is normal for me). So I decided to have a power nap...which works more often than not for me...only that I woke up refreshed...at 1600++. At this point I was seriously considering that there was something wrong with me.

With all that sleep already having been slept off I thought I could actually study well that night. Well my body was obviously trying to prove me wrong as I was dozing off again at about 2230...and woke up 11 hours later. Most of the rest of the week I could function with my normal amounts of sleep but fatigue was my constant companion and he wasn't really fun to be with.

Friday came and I thought to myself, finally the weekend. I can have a lie in and begone with this fatigue business. That was the night I was cursing Murphy and his stupid law. I couldn't sleep!! I needed sleep - all the cells in my body knew it - but I just couldn't sleep! It was definitely one of the most annoying things in my life so far, even superseding that which annoys me most usually.

This wasn't the first time but it was definitely the worst. Had a less severe episode almost a month back and am pretty sure I've had at least one other episode sometime earlier in the year.
I'm guessing either respiratory or gastro bugs cuz I've had concurrent problems with both this time round. Whatever it is, I'm glad I'm finally over it...or at least I think I am. Who knows? Murphy has proven me wrong time and again...

Drum Tao

Just returned from a solo venture into the field of performing arts and I absolutely loved it!

Drum Tao - Martial Art of the Wadaiko

I chanced upon the advertising poster a few weeks ago and was instantly tempted, mostly by the opportunity to experience some new type of music. I asked around but nobody else seemed interested in it so I went solo. I was blown away by the performance. It was, quite frankly, one of the best things I've seen. Instruments aside, there were lots of shouts, leaps and amazing choreography to boot...and a couple of impressive-looking bo twirling sessions too.


As the title says, wadaiko were the main instruments of the night. However, to my pleasant surprise they included flutes, gongs, gu-zheng like instruments, xylophone-like instruments and monotonous trumpets (which looked like toilet plungers from where I was sitting) to great effect.
I particularly enjoyed a few of their bittersweet numbers. However, most of them were explosive, entrancing, addictive and energetic. It was so obvious that the performers were putting their all into their acts and they were enjoying it too. So much so that one could feel the energy influencing the audience.

The male performers demonstrated inhuman strength, dexterity and stamina with their drumming. On more than one occasion the drummers were beating so hard, so fast and for so long that I felt my arms ache. The choreography was exciting, sometimes mesmerizing and sometimes downright humourous. I'm not surprised that they've gotten amazing reviews (including 2 standing ovations) where they have performed. They definitely got a standing ovation from us tonight.

After tonight, I have a whole new appreciation for the drum. Kudos to you men and ladies for putting on such a great show.

Hontou ni arigatou gozaimasu.

If you get the chance to catch them, do so. You won't regret it!

Edit: Today (29/7/08) we broke our record. There were no patients on the ward for our team :) We were grinning away at handover while everyone else just stared at us in disbelief...or it could have been jealousy or hatred. It's hard to tell really :D

Went to hospital as usual today (28/7/08) and discovered that my team had all of...1 patient. Ward round consisted of us going to his bedside and attempting to wake him:

Reg: Mr X...*pats his hand*...Mr X?
Mr X: *grunt*
Reg: *shrugs* Well, Ken, that's our ward round :)
Reg+Intern+Me: *Lol*

For the record, Mr X needed some sedation the night before as he was somewhat agitated with altered sleeping patterns.

This must be some kind of record. I've never had a medical rotation with only 1 patient in the ward.

It's a sunny Sunday morning..well it was a sunny Sunday morning. It's overcast now and has pretty much been for the last few weeks. I miss the sun, the energy I derive from it, and most importantly the warmth it brings in the cold seasons.

Anyway, I'm currently doing a medical rotation at the Modbury Public Hospital which has been really quite good so far. The handover and ward rounds are inescapable but they're not too bad. The tutes are great though, and the best part is that we get lots and lots of food :)
The library on the 5th floor is where we spend most of our free time and it has a great view of the surroundings.

Rolling hills span across a great distance before tapering off into flatlands, which are the suburbs. The CBD is faintly visibile on a clear day too. The greenery is really refreshing and I've seen some great views from there so much so I wish I could have taken some pictures for memories.

On some cold days, the clouds hang so low that they seem to be emanating from the hills. At other times, sunlight and clouds create a play of moving shadows on the surface of the hills. Once the hilly side was clearly visible in bright sunshine whereas the suburbs and city were completely obscured by clouds and rain.

On a personal development note, I have long realised that many are the occasions when I subconsciously "wear a mask" (as Wee Jie said sometime back), and lately I'm getting annoyed by it. I have a couple of theories as to why 'I' do it but I want it to stop. The question is how...
I also need to start exercising again. The cold is just so...well...cold. Must get into shape. No, I do not consider round to be a shape.

Moss grows on blogs?

It's been a long while since I last visited this place. No surprises since Adel is so interesting. I have also been asked to de-moss-ify my blog as well so I'll put up another bit of random stuff.

Anyway, my last rotation was in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the Women's and Children's Hospital in North Adelaide. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I quite enjoyed the rotation seeing as how adult psych was fairly boring last year. It is unfortunate that there are quite a number of kids affected by a mental disorder with most of them suffering from what the staff call "Shitty Life Syndrome" ie abuse, neglect etc. There were also psychotic kids (the medical definition, not the layman one), those on drugs and one very memorable behavioural-related case.

Why did I find it interesting? I'm not too sure really. It could be because of the holistic approach towards treating the patients. It could be because of the skills applied during the entire course of said approach (never has BS been used more in all these years). It could be because if we managed to get on top of it, we would be ensuring the kid has a chance at having a decent future. Or it could be because I enjoyed the company of 3 great colleagues and a whole team of fun people. Hard to say really.

During the course of the rotation we met a Child Psychiatrist who asked us the question. That is the "So what do you want to be?" question. My honest answer then was "I dunno" because there's so much out there that I have yet to experience. His reply was "I'll be seeing you in a few years then." Apparently he has 'predicted' that some would join the ranks of Child Psych and quite a number of those predictions had come true. Interestingly now having completed the rotation, I wouldn't mind going into it in the future. A solid option to keep in mind perhaps?

Walking to and from the hospital had its benefits as well. The hospital being a good 30 minutes of brisk walking from my place has helped keep me from getting 'round' like I did last winter. One memorable night, after being on take, I was mesmerized by that very night sky.
It was a full moon and the stars were shining brightly. Cloudless except for a path of undulating clouds that seemed to go from one horizon to the opposite coming very close to the moon. It had a dreamlike effect to it - a silvery path to the moon. I wish I could have taken a picture of it...

On the TV front, NCIS is still drawing me like a moth to a flame. The season finale of House was shown as a movie length feature which was fantastically drama. Futurama has returned after 2 years of being off air! Got 2.5 seasons worth of 'Avatar - The Last Airbender (later it became The Legend of Aang)' and enjoyed all of it.

Oh, and I finally managed to bake some nice cookies. Got a recipe off the net and tried it last week except I think I added way too much baking soda (I mean, how the heck am I supposed to measure 5g?) and the cookies turned out more like pancakes. So I modified what I put in a little and remembered to add less baking soda and managed to turn out some olfactory-pleasing, gustatory-pleasing and cookie-like cookies! Yay me :)
Anyone for Raisin Oatmeal Choc Chip cookies?

Cleland Conservation Park

I've always wanted to visit the Cleland Conservation Park on Mount Lofty. I am, after all, a sucker for nature and wildlife. I believe things never got off the ground last year as everyone was waiting for everyone else. Earlier this year LH went with XN; they were nice enough to invite me along but I've had had enough of being a tiang lampu for 10 years by then so I declined. Finally sometime last week I heard Thinesh was entertaining thoughts of going there so I jumped at the possibility and attempted to make plans.

Lucky us as it was a fairly nice Autumn day and we took off. The forecast was a sunny 22-ish day. We arrived in due time, paid, bought a couple of foodpacks to feed the kangaroos, emus and waterfowl, and entered the park. As we were heading for the "You Are Here" map we saw a few of these creatures:

Potoroos @ Kangaroo Rats. Could be mistaken for the vermin back home but these are much cuter. They have the same beady eyes though.
We spotted them scurrying about everywhere in the park. However, outside the park they are apparently next to extinct.



We next went into the Kangaroo area. They seemed smaller than I had imagined them to be though. Furthermore the particular species in that area had heads that resembled those of donkeys. Most of the mobs were just lazing around on the ground. Interestingly the lazing position they assumed was incredibly similar to those of my pets back home. Heck, I think I may have been in that position as well when lazing around at home.
A few of the braver ones (almost all of them were fairly tame) came hopping as soon as they saw us/heard the food packs we were holding. Feeding wildlife has never been easier. Some were really insistent, attempting to keep a paw on the hand holding the pack, probably in an attempt to keep us from withdrawing the food. We saw a couple of albinos, a joey suckling, and more joeys in their mother's pouches. That looked really weird since the mom had an extra pair of legs sticking out of its abdomen.

Soon after, the Koala 'exhibit' was opened so we left for that.

It was basically a large enclosure with a huge central 'hut' and a few large Eucalyptus trees for them. We noticed a few that kept 'running' around the enclosure. We chalked it up to their version of exercise :)








The 'Pet the Koala' session. According to the keeper, that was a 10 year old male (Koala live an average of 15 years). One may pet them by stroking the soft fur on their backs as anywhere else will aggravate them apparently.

Koalas eat only Eucalyptus and have evolved such that the normally toxic leaves do not affect them. They have 2 thumbs. Their hearing is about 10 times greater than ours. In fact, there were quite a few times when it stopped eating when we were waiting in line. Apparently that happens when a 'loud' noise surprises them...and there was a baby in line ahead of us.


We next went to see the Dingos. Apparently they are pests in the wild and it is a crime to keep one as a pet. They happen to be the reason why the local carnivores such as the Tasmanian Devil are now only found in certain locations. They also happen to be the reason for the Longest Fence which practically spans across the country.

Next on the map was the Wetlands, where we saw a tonnes of avians.

<-- Can anyone guess why I took this picture?





A snakebird. No, seriously, that's what it's called. It looks really disproportionate because of the long neck. This particular one assumed that position for at least 30 minutes. No, I have no idea why. The ranger said that in the water, its body is submerged and only the head remains above water, hence the name.


When we tried to feed a few we attracted the attention of most of the birds. One really 'aggressive' duck came and pecked away at the pellets in our hands like a machine-gun. For some reason, it decided the tip of my index finger was food a pecked at it and tried to pull it off. As a result, my index finger is now 1cm shorter.

No, I'm kidding :) It was painful though.
Other birds there were swans, pelicans, different species of ducks, geese, stilts and ibises.

There were a couple of aviaries that we visited as well. There was also an enclosure for a Mallee (go Wiki it for more details) where there were a couple of huge Mallee ducks among other birds.

We next went in search for the famed emus that scared the living daylights out of XN. They weren't the only ones there though. More roos aplenty, although these were much cuter than the first group. Managed to get Thinesh to grab a pic of this one's head in my foodpack :)

Overall the roos were really tame. I could even pet them and they wouldn't bat an eyelid (but that's probably cuz they were more interested in the food I was holding).



Finally. The huge-@$$, flightless bird of Australia. Looks like someone just dumped a dishevelled shag carpet on it. About half of them were quite wary of us. The other half approached because we had food.
Feeding them was interesting. Their beaks aren't sharp and when they feed it feels like bucket scoops. Apparently they can grow up to 2 metres tall but all of them were, at most, slightly taller than me. Not sure why XN was scared of them though.



One of the areas we visited was reminiscent of a rock quarry which was the habitat of the rock wallabies. They were so well camouflaged that we had difficulty even locating them.

Another species of wallaby, the Tamaar Wallaby. This is possibly one of the cutest things I've ever seen!

I still can't really tell the difference between a roo and a wallaby yet. The rock wallabies looked quite like the roos.






Caught a pic of one eating an apple...I think...









One of the last creatures we saw was Knuckles. Eat your heart our Sonic!!

Echidnas, like Platypuses, are weird mammals. They lays eggs, then suckle their young. Isn't it cute?



We also saw 2 wombat couples dozing in their caves. They are the closest relative of the koalas but they are ground creatures. A large adult can reach 40kgs. That's like, heavier than Jebbrine.

The only other animal worth mentioning is the Tasmanian Devil. It had an enclosure all to itself, and was basically just running around the entire place the whole time we were there. Either it was really bored or decided to lose some weight.

I'd say it was a day well spent since I've been deprived of animal contact for months now. I'm happy.

Wow.

I should go buy some lottery. 2 incredibly rare occurences occured to me in the last day:

1. I *finally* met Bryan. It's been ever so long since I last met him (since most of us went back home last year actually) and we're both living in Adelaide.
2. I got an email from Eve...albeit it was just one line of randomness in response to one of the funniest emails I forwarded...but still! An email from Eve. That's like watching Haley's Comet!

A wise person (or at least wiser than me) once told me "It takes two hands to clap."

Recently a thought has been bothering me...

If one hand wants to clap but the other doesn't seem to want to, should the first hand stop trying? Or should it keep trying in hopes that eventually the other will respond?

It never ceases to amaze me that the orthopaedic team just waltzes into each and every room, have a minute discussion (or usually less) about the patient and waltz off into the next room.

What's even more amazing is they completely ignore (or are completely oblivious) to the big signs on the doors that say "STOP! Additional Safety Precautions Required".

And we wonder how MRSA and gastro bugs are spread around the hospitals...

*No I'm not dissing the ortho team. In fact I'm quite enjoying the rotation. It's just an observation*

Adelaide, the (literally) melting pot.

Summer ended a couple of weeks back, yet the expected relief with the expected autumn weather never materialized. In fact, quite the opposite happened. The unexpected has occurred with the last 2 weeks being hotter than the summer I've been experiencing so far. Daily peak temperatures hovered between 37-40 degrees with the nights barely offering solace. This is what my room and bed feel like most of the time:








<-- My room










<-- My bed






In fact, this is the first time I can remember in Adelaide that I've been sweating profusely in the house. It is so annoyingly hot that I can't study or sleep for that matter...ok that was an overstatement. I can only sleep after much tossing around on a hot bed or I just knock off if I'm too tired from lack of sleep due to the 1st reason. Add to that the fact that the heat just drains you of your energy just worsens the whole situation.

I so can't wait for the cold weather to arrive. That would probably make me the happiest person on Earth, if just for a minute or so. At least when it's cold you can just put on more clothes to feel comfortably warm. Pity the opposite doesn't work. After all, there's only so much stuff you can take off to cool off. Plus one of the greatest pleasures in life has to be crawling under a nice warm quilt in the heart of winter.
This is one of the rare times that I actually envy the Villagers with their unlimited use of aircon, however damaging it is to the environment.

Mega Pwnage

A gem I found on Youtube :)

I hate the Clipsal!!! Well I have nothing against them personally but it's the event they sponsor, the Adelaide Clipsal 500 V8 Supercar Race!

Dahlah to arrange the race they've cordoned off a section of roads on the east side of the city for the last week. Coincidentally one of the roads cordoned off happens to be the road leading from my area to the city, ie the bus doesn't run there for the week the Clipsal is on, ie I have to walk to the city to take a bus when originally I could just take one from outside my house.

Now the pretty big area cordoned off happens to be less than 500 metres from my place so I can actually here the engine revs and concerts from here. And for such a 'big event' they obviously need media coverage, which comes in the form of 2 choppers circling the area. The event starts in the morning and lasts till late at night.
And they seem to have daily airshows by some Hornets.



No, not these hornets.








These hornets!

The airshow they put on is fairly low altitude, I'm guessing it's so the spectators can clearly see the stunts. This is, of course, not very pleasant to the ears.


I was walking back from groceries yesterday when one flew overhead. In that painful instant I was acutely aware of some loss of hearing ability in my right ear. Fortunately it seems that it's just a temporary thing.

Today being the only day I've been in the house the whole day, I have finally discovered how wonderfully annoying the clipsal can be. The revs start in the morning, varying in intensities throughout the day. This is followed soon by a really annoying cycle of choppers circling overhead. Sometime in midday the Hornets appear, screaming their jet engines off. Thankfully the Hornet show is just about 5-10 minutes. The rest of it lasts the whole damn friggin day!

I can barely concentrate, let alone study.

Worse, I can't sleep from all that damn noise!

....I can feel my sanity falling apart...

Today in OPD, one symptom a patient was having was abdominal pain. After the usual pain history:

X : Hmm...have you had your gallbladder out?
Y : Yeah. Twice.
X : *blink* Excuse me?

I unprofessionally started laughing and the rest in the room soon followed :D

Turns out that Y had been involved in an accident and the surgeons who operated only removed half a gallbladder as it was all they could find then.
Some time later Y started having abdominal pains again and another doctor discovered half a gallbladder still left in him. Needless to say this doctor was less than amused having to remove it.

I am ninja!

Me : ...hey...
LH : *screams blue murder*
Me : ..... -_-"

Above is a scene which has repeated itself countlessly in our place. The only difference is what I want to say in each situation, our clothes and the location. It seems that I tend to surprise her with my 'stealthiness'.

In all honesty I tend to dismiss that and claim she just doesn't pay enough attention to her surroundings. But then today happened.

Today I found the surgeons changing room locked, which is unusual as I never remember it being locked before. So I went into the Admin's room, who was doing some work on the com, to ask if she knew the code.

Me : *walks in* Excuse me...
Admin : *startled with dramatic gasp, hand clasping chest looking as if she's just seen a ghost*
Me : O_O ... *apologetic smile* I'm sorry...I tend to do that to my housemate too...
Admin : *laughs with relief* It's alright.

So either I start wearing a cowbell to announce my presence or I have a natural talent to be a ninja!

No I do NOT want a cowbell for my birthday!

The Story of My Life..

...for the last 3 months now...sigh

Finally back here in the land of the dry where it's fortunately not as hot as it was.
Things here are still pretty much uneventful, but I guess that's normal for Adelaide...or maybe it's just me.

Anyway, the first thing I noticed when I entered the plane was that it was unnaturally warm, almost as if the aircond wasn't working. True enough, after about 10 minutes the captain announced over the PA that something was wrong with the aircond yet none of them seemed particularly bothered about it. I was hoping it wouldn't be that way for the whole journey because I'd be really unamused having to spend 7 hours in a hot stuffy environment.

Then came the usual prattle about who is flying, where we're going etcetera etcetera. Next was the announcement to watch the safety rules onboard and so we all turned to look at the screen when suddenly the whole plane was thrown into darkness. After a few seconds the emergency lights came on.
I remember being vaguely surprised that there was no MSI incident, instead one could here plenty of "Awwwww"s coming from around.

"Well that's reassuring" I said to the fellow sitting next to me.
"Oh definitely," he replied "Welcome to aeroflop."

After a period of time when nothing seemed to be happening, your fears start taking over - especially after having seen one too many plane disasters on the idiot box and I was fervently hoping that would not come to pass.

Finally the lights and warm aircond returned and the captain apologized for the incident and instructed the cabin crew to demonstrate the safety procedures (cuz all the monitors were still blank). Then we took off...

...when we were at last in the air there was another announcement from the captain. Now he was obviously of a Malay education but the annoying things was that he didn't(couldn't?) pronounce words very well and he spoke way too fast so that all his words sounded joined. It actually took some effort to decipher the English he was speaking. As it turns out he was saying how sorry they were for the blackout earlier because some generator had failed. Then, as if nothing had happened, he went on in a cheery voice that we were still scheduled to be on time, the flight would take 6.5 hours, that they were expecting clear skies but warned us to be alert in case of turbulence etcetera etcetera.

I could only come up with 2 conclusions:
One - these events happen frequently enough that it doesn't bother them
Two - the captain sucks at behavioural skills

And so 2007 has lapsed into the obscure realm of memories and 2008 has dawned. So many things have happened but it wasn't a good year, well for me anyway.

May the new year bring us all soothing rains, refreshing winds and bountiful harvests.