No wings, just thighs.

I've noticed that most of my wordier posts arise in response to my time spent in the anatomy lab, and this one will be no exception. First, let me start of by saying that I've been paying for it ever since we had that first, ridiculously simple lab - our exploration of the vertebral column involved so little time and effort (a mere incision along the dural sac), that everything we've done since then has resulted in the tedious removal of more fat and fascia than (I'm guessing) most plast surgeons do in a year. We cleaned out the thoracoacromial trunk from its fat-glob covered nest behind the pectoralis minor, we cleaned and separted the muscles of the forearm and demonstrated the structures within, and yesterday my group and cleaned the anterior and medial thigh compartments. It's funny...the group before us had to disarticulate the elbow and shoulder joints. What does my group get? Another muscle and nerve extravaganza. I'm not complaining - it was GREAT!

On another note, this stuff is starting to get thick, like the blood of a waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia patient. Just after the mini, they threw us into blood proteins, diagnostic enzymes, hemoglobin, and clotting. This week, it's been some more hemoglobin, a bit of neurophysiology, and some more histology (muscle and nervous tissue, the placenta, etc.) I don't know if the work is pickingup, or if it's just that I've been made aware that an entirely new and arbitrary level of detail is required of me. I don't think I'm going to let these Ph.D's slap me around anymore though - I'll show them; they'll be amazed at the useless trivia I can fill my head with.

On a more somber note, one of my roomates from MERP died last week - we had his memorial service two days ago. He'd had a bout with pancreatic cancer a few years ago, and, after some aggressive treatment (full whipple surgery), made a recovery. He passed MERP and was supposed to begin with us, but he must have relapsed, because he deferred. His girlfriend also goes to Ross, and he came down to visit her a few weeks ago, looking much thinner and much sicker (though he had all of his hair, so he probably wasn't on full-scale chemo).

Here's a picture of where I live. This is the view as I head back home from the special study space (which I havent' enjoyed as much recently; the home-desk has been sufficing). I'm planning on spending a big, fat chunk of time over there on Saturday; there's a level of comfort wtih the information I know that I need, and I'm going to get myself there, come hell or high water (Genetic pedigrees just aren't intuitive to me). I live on the third floor, so that top landing you can see just beneath the palm fronds is the entrance to my hallway. There are a couple telling things about this picture - first, the ocean is mere feet away. Second, that's actually a telephone pole with power-lines! I know, I know - the third world is coming alone. They've got telephones AND iguanas!