October

5 minutes into October. (well, 35 minutes now, considering I forgot about this blog post and left it unpublished for half an hour)

Well.
Damn.

Also, confession : I hate birthdays. I just. I really don't like them okay.

We'll leave it at that.


Someday I'll finally slip out of this funk and re-learn how to blog properly. Someday. Not today.
Because today is the day that I rush through last-minute work that I procrastinated the whole weekend.
Which, in this case, happens to be ethical issues related to children with hearing and speech impairments.

So fun!

Wouldn't you all want to trade assignments with me?


~vid~

UPDATE. sort of.

Okay, 
WHAT is with blogger changing their layout all the time??

I don't want a new layout!
I liked the old one just fine.
gaaaaaah.

I don't do well adapting to new things.
Took me forever to get used to the timeline crap that facebook forced on me (still not used to it).

Currently buried under a mountain of reports.

Fucking hell.

After this week the workload lightens a teeeeeeny weeeeeny bit, and then it all starts again week after next.

I hate this.
All I really want to do is curl up in bed with a good book and read, but I can't.

Dammit.


So unbelievably tired, but sleep is not an option until I've finished the bulk of this report.



Also, hello people from the US!
*waves*
My new dashboard has decided to tell me that a majority of my audience comes from the States. Which is a shame considering only one of you ever bother to comment on my posts.
The other two are most def not from the States.

yes.

so.

Gah.
I'll update this weekend. (I really will. honest to god)


In the meantime, 
here's some Gabriel Macht for you to stare at while I do battle with CFCS.

isn't he pretty? *_*

oooh. I can add captions to this!
huh.
I might not hate the new layout after all.


Oh that's right. I hate it because I can't adjust the font size properly and they have lesser colours.
psh.


~vid~

The soundtrack to your secret dreams

I've fallen in love with this :


Come here
and take off your clothes
and with them
every single worry
you have ever carried.
My fingertips on your back
will be the very last thing
you will feel
before sleeping
and the sound of my smile
will be the alarm clock
to your morning ears.
Come here
and take off your clothes
and with them
the weight of every yesterday
that snuck atop your shoulders
and declared them home.
My whispers will be the soundtrack
to your secret dreams
and my hand
the anchor to the life
you will open your eyes to.
Come here
and take off your clothes.

~Tyler Knott Gregson.



Struck home, that one.
Not entirely sure why.

I'm supposed to blog about Batu Pahat.
I know, I know.
I will.

Had a pretty good day yesterday,
except for the weird astrologer guy we bumped into last night.

All that and more, in the next post!
I'll try to write it by tonight or I'll never get around to it.

Currently working on my portfolio and blue sheets.
ugh.
I hate assignments.


~vid~

What Doesn't Kill You.

HELLO.

I HAZ INTERNET IN BATU PAHAT.

HALLELUJAH.

I've come to the conclusion that my happiness depends entirely on a stable internet connection.
I am such a sad person.




I am going to write a long, newsy post about Batu Pahat (not in this post),
but first,
I would like you guys to check this article out.

What Doesn't Kill You : An In-Depth Look at Pain



It's written by one of my readers (I feel so celebrity-like. ahem),

Butool Hisham, a first year medical student from Pakistan.
Written for the JPMS International Medical Writing Contest 2012.

40% of her scores comes from website hits and likes,
....and here, my dear readers, is where you come in.

:D

In my honest opinion, I think this is a very well-written article,
and definitely worth reading, even for you non-med folks.
(I'm actually a bit envious, I couldn't possibly write anything that sounded as professional even if I tried for years)

So
click on the link above,
read the article,
and then like it, tweet it, facebook it - share it! :)

Help a fellow blogger and med student out, you guys.
I honestly think she deserves to win, and you lot can help her do that.


Please and thank you :D




~vid~

3 days to the start of the new semester.

But we're leaving to Johor tomorrow.

Depressed as fuck.




~vid~

Suits

Completely moved out of Seremban yesterday.
Cleaned my room, locked up and threw the keys away (literally ...well, into the house, after I'd locked up)
2 years of my life, packed up into neat little boxes and whisked away.

I have too many feels right now.

So what I'm going to do about it is..
I'm going to write an entire blog post about Suits.





Because I'm deflecting my emotionsss.

And because Suits really is effing awesome and warrants a blog post of its own, instead of just the ILOVEHARVEYSPECTER /almost/picspam in the post below.
And as far as I'm concerned, everyone on the planet should watch it okay.

Plus I still have alot of Suits feels from the summer finale episode from Friday. :(



My mother yesterday :
Why did we finish watching Suits so fast? Why?

Me :
I dunno. Let's rewatch the last episode. That one was awesome.

Mum :
Let's rewatch the whole of season 2.

Me :
Let's rewatch from season 1.

Mum :
YES.



I think fangirling runs in my genes or something.
But it's really because this show is so wonderful even my mother watches it.

Anywayyyy.



(Now, I'm going to try and do this without too much fangirling over the characters, so..)

Suits.

Two lawyers, one degree.
(this tagline is everywhere)

Its basically a show about two men (hint : BROMANCE GALORE!) :



1. Harvey Specter

The suave, smart, sexy corporate lawyer - the best closer the city has ever seen - who works for the firm PearsonHardman.
He thinks he's better than everyone else (most of the time he is), is against having emotion or caring for people,
and pretty much just walks all over everybody. Because he can.



In the beginning of the show, Harvey gets promoted to Senior Partner at PearsonHardman,
which means he needs to hire a personal associate to work for him.
And PearsonHardman only accepts graduates from Harvard Law.
But Harvey's a lone ranger and doesn't want an associate, unless he can find another Harvey (make sense?)

So naturally, they have to hold interviews to recruit a new associate...

and in stumbles..



2. Mike Ross

Unemployed, stoned most of the time, and is best friends with a drug dealer.
Also has a photographic memory ("when I read something, I understand it, and when I understand it, I remember it for life") but no college degree.
The only way Mike knows how to make money is by getting paid to take tests/exams for other people.



Now, the only family Mike has left is his grandmother, and he wants to put her into a nursing home, for which, he of course needs more money.
Which he doesn't have, considering cheating on tests doesn't really pay all that well.

So he agrees to deliver weed (a one-time thing) for his best friend to - wait for it - the very same hotel where the interviews are being held for the new PearsonHardman associates.
The only problem is that the deal was a set-up and Mike has to run away from cops and runs riiiight into the PearsonHardman interview room.

And then, long story short - he impresses Harvey with his knowledge of law (he read some law book once - photographic memory yo) but the problem is of course that he doesn't have a law degree,
BUT, Harvey, being Harvey-I-DO-WHAT-I-WANT-Specter, decides to hire him anyway.
And keep it secret from everyone else, of course.


Cue DRAMAAAA. LOTS OF DRAMA.
LOTS OF BROMANCING.
LOTS OF EPIC LAWYER STUFF.

(I'm sorry, I can't write serious posts)

Disclaimer : I am not writing spoilers ok. Everything above happens within like the first 30 minutes of the pilot.
This not a spoiler post.

The rest of the characters that deserve to be mentioned :




3. Donna Paulsen

Harvey's personal assistant/secretary.
She is AWESOME.
Awesome.
She's one of the two people who can really stand up to Harvey, and who doesn't take his bullshit. They've been working together since forever, and Harvey treats her as more of his equal, despite her being his secretary and all.
(I want to grow up and be Donna ok)




4. Jessica Pearson

Managing partner of PearsonHardman,
also the only other person besides Donna who can put Harvey in his place.
She put Harvey through law school, and is sort of a mentor to him, and Harvey is fiercely loyal to her.
She's just incredibly elegant.
There's no other word for it. She's pretty damn awesome too. I honestly can't choose between her and Donna for the Most Awesome Female on The Show award.




5. Louis Litt


The antagonist.
I'm not calling him the villain, because he isn't really. He's just that annoying character who ruins everyone's plans and gets in everyone's way all of the time.
Louis is a Junior Partner at PearsonHardman, and he resents Harvey for being promoted to Senior Partner, because he obviously thinks he deserved that promotion instead.
He's also in charge of all the associates, which also makes him Mike's boss (so Mike technically has two bosses - Louis and Harvey, geddit?) and delights in annoying Mike simply because Mike is Harvey's personal associate, therefore annoying Mike = annoying Harvey.
You can't hate Louis. He's just so misguided and such a loser. He's annoying, but you can't hate him.




6. Rachel Zane

Paralegal at PearsonHardman. She wants to be a lawyer, but can never seem to pass the LSATs.
Mike's love interest.
She was a bit annoying the first season, but in the second season she grew on me.







The characters, individually, are wonderful.

Harvey is just. Sexy.
Gabriel Macht, you beautiful, beautiful man. What amuses me most is that in real life, Gabriel is all blonde and I-hate-wearing-ties, and in the show he's just Harvey.
It's like two completely different people.
And I have a HUGE weakness for arrogant, suave men who dress well.
And he's so horribly syok-sendiri. Its so cute.
Harvey's my favourite. (duh)

My mum's favourite is Mike.
Mike is adoraaaaaaaaaable, but for me he's just this really cute, adorable lost puppy, with his bike and his disheveled appearance and how he's always in awe of Harvey even though he feels the need to control macho and not admit it.
And you can see that Harvey cares for him although he's insistent on being a robot with no emotions.

Donna and Jessica, as mentioned above, are AWESOME.
And Louis is just Louis. You have to watch the show to understand Louis.



But what really, really makes this show work is the dynamics between all the characters.
The dialogue is gold.
So much sarcasm, so much witty banter, so many insults hurled every which way.
It's like heaven in a tv show.



And the Harvey-Mike bromance is like something out of fanfiction...you just want to grab them both and cuddle them together because they're so effing cute together ohmygod.
And the way they just randomly quote movies at each other. comelssss.





And Harvey-Donna is askdsjdfshgh. I love arrogant!Harvey, but I love Donna trampling all over his ego even more.


Mike-Donna is adorable. Mike likes Donna (and vice versa) but he's also a wee bit scared of her and her sharp tongue.

Harvey-Jessica is wonderful. I love Jessica trampling all over Harvey's ego too.
Mike-Jessica is hilarious because he's terrified of her. And Jessica is all "you, rookie, get out of my way" because she's THE managing partner of PearsonHardman and she can't be bothered with adorable puppy rookies no matter how wonderful their memory is.

Harvey-Louis is ...you have to feel sorry for Louis. He just can't win.
Mike-Louis is almost similar to Harvey-Louis.
Donna-Louis is epic. I think Louis has the biggest crush on Donna and Donna just. well. crushes him. All. The time.
Jessica-Louis is nice though.

Rachel mostly interacts with Mike during the first season, but in the second season we get to see more of her interacting with other people,
and she's really not bad.





I love how in each episode they end up working on cases that somehow reflect what's happening in their lives.

I just really love this show okay.

The first season was more of individual cases in each episode, so you can pretty much just start watching any random episode from anywhere in the season,
but the second season had more of a continuous storyline so you have to keep up with the episodes to really get what's going on.
(Did that make sense?)

I can't decide if I like the first season better or the second.
I just love them both okay.
I love the plot, I love the character development,
I LOVE THE SUMMER FINALE EPISODE.

I thought it was going to be a sad episode, and I was all mentally prepared to cry inside,
and then it just turned out EPIC.
EPIC.
I WAS SQUEALING IN FRONT OF MY TV.

The second season hasn't quite finished though, this is just the summer finale,
and NOW WE HAVE TO WAIT FOUR MONTHS FOR THE NEXT SIX EPISODES.
WHICH COMES OUT IN JANUARY.
WHICH IS NOT COOL BECAUSE I HAVE EXAMS IN FEBRUARY.

And after that they'll say we have to wait for the third season which (hopefully) will be out in July/August next year.

>:(

The only thing I didn't like about the second season was Harvey's hair colour.
I get that Gabriel is blonde, and they probably just decided to not dye his hair this season,
but
no
Harvey is not blonde. Harvey is brunette ok.

Fix that, USA.







...

This was a horribly written post.

I apologize for not being koality but.
I was trying so hard not to fangirl, and so it all just came out sounding...weird.

Just google the show ok, you'll find better written reviews on some other blog.


BUT ANYWAY SINCE I'VE TAKEN THE TIME AND EFFORT TO WRITE THIS YOU SHOULD JUST ALL HUMOR ME AND GO WATCH SUITS KTHXBAI.

:3


And now I'm going to go curl up with my fluffy blankie and wail about how I don't get to see Harvey Specter's awesomeness until January.

I think I'll just end up rewatching both seasons obsessively until the new eps come out.

yes.
good plan.






~vid~

The eternal struggle to title my blog posts properly.

I miss you so much its starting to feel like physical pain.
Please come back.

COME BACK, HARVEY.
COME BACKKKK TO MEEEE.

USA HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY TAKE A BREAK FROM THIS SHOW WITH ABSOLUTELY NO REGARD FOR MY FEELINGS?

HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO SURVIVE BATU PAHAT WITHOUT AT LEAST A WEEKLY DOSE OF HARVEY SPECTER? HOW.

Physical pain.

Legit physical pain.

I has a big hurt in my heart place.

And all because of a stupid show called Suits.


Summer finale. psh. Summer finale.
Whyyyyyy.









...I daresay that might have been the best opening paragraph to a blog post that I've written in a very, very long time.

Planned this post 6 hours ago (actually I planned this post yesterday), and totally did not plan on beginning the post like that.
But oh wells.
Aaaaaand, like I said, meant to write this earlier, but its already 2.30 am,
and I have to be up early (how many times have you guys heard this before)
...so this is going to be one of those rushed I-meant-to-write-alot-but-I-have-to-sleep-so-I-promise-I'll-write-a-really-long-post-later-eventhough-you-know-I'm-really-not-going-to posts.
phew.
That was a long sentence.

yep.



ITS THURSDAY!
Well, technically its FRIDAY.
But OMG FIRST WEEK OF MY HOLIDAYS IS OVER.

NO.

NOOOOOOOOOO.

I knew this was going to happen. I KNEW IT.

Don't think I've done anything much from my to-do-list (thats in one of the posts below)
hold on, let me check with it..

The only things I've managed to do are :

Bake a red velvet cake (which turned out really yummy btw)
aaaand...watch Suits.

SUITS HAS RUINED MY LIFE AND MY EXPECTATIONS OF MEN I CANNOT GO ON ANYMOREEEE.


Aaaaaand since I'm obviously too emotionally troubled to write anything worth reading today,
I am going to include in this post the source of my emotional turmoil :

Ladies and gentlemen (do I have male readers?),

Mr Harvey Specter.



The arrogant, smart, smooth-talking, sarcastic, and oh-so-sexy (SO SO SO SEXY) lead character on Suits.








AND HIS STUPID BIG BROWN PUPPY DOG EYES.


















And and.
I'm in love ok.
I could wax on about his face and his suits and his everything forever but you lot don't want to read that.

So.

Yes.

I've gotten that bit out of my system for now (at least for the duration of this post).








So.
Lets talk about the exams, and then I can get that out of the way and talk about something else in my next post.

EOS (end-of-semester) was...rubbish.

I felt like absolute shit at the end of every day,
felt like I had no idea why trying to study medicine and become a doctor when I evidently had no idea what I was doing.

I've already mentioned MEQs and OSPEs in a previous post, so let's focus on the OSCEs.

Horrible.


14 minutes for an OSCE station is entirely too long,

AND WHAT IS WITH THE EXTERNALS OMG. First day, my first station had 5 people in it besides me and the patient!
And the second day, I had two stations with 4 externals each.
I mean what.
Do you have any idea how horrible it is to have 5 people breathe down your neck in a cramped room while you try to stop your hands and voice from shaking as you examine a patient in a limited amount of time?

gah.

To be honest, in retrospect, I did pretty okay,
its just when you leave the OSCE stations and you're walking up to the library and you tune everybody else out and you think about how well you could have done.

...feels like absolute shit.

Compared to everyone else, I did okay.
But compared to what I know I'm capable of...gah.

But then again,
this semester I actually felt like I knew what I was doing,
like I knew medicine.
Like I could maybe become a proper doctor.

Yes, I know I just said I had no idea what I was doing or why I was doing medicine,

but that's just it about medicine, isn't it?
That constant self-doubt,
that constant swinging of the pendulum.

I know what I'm doing - shit what the hell is this what have I gotten myself into - I know what I'm doing - SHIT - no, I know what I'm doing...

Rinse, repeat.

But I have fallen in love with medicine.
Bits and pieces of it.

I do still love law.
(AND SUITS IS NOT HELPING)
but I do love medicine now too.

And sometimes I feel that maybe this is where I'm meant to be.

And sometimes I don't.

But its a huge step from hating medicine outright the way I used to before.





And I still don't know what I'm going to do with my life later on.

Pursue law the way I'd always planned to? Continue with medicine?

I honestly don't know right now. And for the first time in my life, I'm okay with not knowing.
I'm okay with going with the flow instead of obsessively trying to plan every step of my life.
Maybe it's because I'd be okay with both options.







I'm not sure how I went from ranting about Suits to this.

Well.

I'm going to blame it on the fact that its now almost the witching hour,
and so I'm going to sleep.



I'll be moving out of Seremban properly tomorrow.

There's a sense of melancholy attached to that too, so I'll probably come back and pour all that out in another blog post.
(key word : probably)

I'll miss Seremban.

2 years of my life were lived there,
and although I whined alot, right now I can't remember anything bad about the place.

(or rather, I can, but I choose not to)

We'll forget the bad and just keep the good memories, eh?







Goodnight peoples.

I will try to blog more often.

Currently feeling horribly guilty because I've abandoned this blog quite alot this year.
And the times that I do post, its mostly ranting or random outpourings of emotion that don't even really make sense.





well. Goodnight.




~vid~

Post-Exam

So EOS 9 was officially over yesterday.
Results and all.

AND I PASSED!

I PASSED!

WOOOOOOOOOOO!


We all did.
100% pass rate, yo!
Most dysfunctional batch ever to step foot into IMU and yet we're the ones who somehow managed to maintain a 100% pass rate in Seremban.
No one gets left behind.

I mean to write a proper post about this,
not a hurried one,
not a rant-ish one like the ones I've been writing recently,

but right at this moment I have a HUGE sleep-debt to be paid.
(honestly if you gave me a chance, I'd sleep this entire two weeks away. God knows I need it)

Sleep beckons right now, but I promise I will write a proper detailed emo post about leaving Seremban.
Soon.




WOOOOOO!

Thank you, God.
Thank you, you lot who have supported me this past one semester when I've needed it the most.



6 months to go!




~vid~

Two down, two to go.

Told myself I shouldn't blog during the exam period,
but I just have an insane urge to write okay.

So we're done with the theory part of the exams.

You ever get that feeling after exams,
like "ohmygod why did I write that? Why? What if the examiner finds that answer so stupid that he looks up the serial number to see who wrote it and thinks I'm an absolute idiot omg why"


Gah.


The MEQs were okaaaaay-ish.
(Modified Essay Questions - not sure if I've explained this before, each question is split into 5 parts, each on a separate sheet of paper, and once you've finished one part, you have to drop the paper into a tray before moving on to the next part. Each part has an allotted time, and you must move on to the next part when the buzzer goes. No retrieving the previous paper to change answers.)

I guess the good thing about it was that I got most of my diagnoses correct,
but I'm pretty sure I screwed up the counselling bits,
and the management.
And the Gynae question omg.
Was it just me or did we not have enough time for that question?!
ugh.

Not terribly happy about MEQs but not at the point where I want to hang myself in frustration about it either.



I do want to hang myself in frustration about the OSPEs though.

Didn't know half of what was going on.
I guess ENT and Opthalmo were okay, but the rest.
Just.
ugh.

I just. So demoralizing.

(OSPEs - Objective something Practical Exam (?), basically a sort of flag race, with 5-minutes per station where they give you pictures or lab results and you answer questions based on that)

Bit annoyed that they didn't have procedure stations for OSPE this time either though!
We didn't have any in Sem 7 either.
No fairrr.

I prefer procedures - you don't actually have to think. It's entirely mechanical.

Would it be too much to hope for procedures in OSCE?





Just have the OSCEs left - the clinical exams.
On Monday and Tuesday.
Monday would be the long stations - 6 stations, 14 minutes per station.
Dreading that more than anything else in the world rn. 14 minutes.
14 minutes is too long.
What if I run out of things to say/do within 5 minutes and have to stone in the room the remaining time?
What if the examiner fails me within the first few minutes or thinks I'm incredibly stupid and I just have to sit there and wait until its time to move on to the next station?
What if I don't know what to do?

AAAAAH.

And then Tuesday is the short OSCEs - 10 stations, 5 minutes each.
Although this is technically better than the long ones, (5 mins isn't so scary), I did worse for my Short OSCEs compared to my Long OSCEs in Sem 7. so.


AND THEN WEDNESDAY IS RESULTS. AAAAAAH.


Freaking out about the OSCEs, and yet I spent the whole of today doing absolutely nothing.
I'm tired.
My brain is tired.
My hand is still cramped from all the writing from the past two days.
But most of all, I'm demoralized.
We weren't demoralized in Sem 7 - then, it was just the stress of OSCEs.
This time, I just generally feel like shit.
Like I'm incompetent. And I'll never be good enough. And like I don't know what the hell I'm doing.


I just.
I don't know.

I'm leaving it to God.
I honestly don't know what I'm doing anymore.

All I know is I need to pass this.

I need to.

I cannot do this over again.



Please God, let me pass.
Let us all pass. (even the people I don't really like)
Heaven knows we've all been through enough. We deserve to move on.

Please.





My computer has died twice since I've begun this post.
I think this means I really should be studying instead.


The next time I'll blog will probably be on Tuesday, after the exams are over and I'm freaking out about results.

Til then.
Pray for me you guys!




~vid~

Panic

Alternating between

I'm done. I'm done, I cannot study anymore. Bring it on. Come what may.

and

omg no I need more time I have so much left to study just one more day ONE more day please



I don't know what my feelings are doing.
I feel like I'm going to throw up from all the nervousness.
...or that could just be because of the shitload of meds I'm on.
Just like the sinusitis to act up days before the exam.


I don't want to go back to Seremban.

I don't want this to be real.


Help.




~vid~