You can make up your own mind about which 4 letter K-word that is after you read my entry.
Today I had microlab and we were doing some Grams Stains. I'll quickly sum up what Gram Stains are.
Gram positive basteria: look purple
Gram negative bacteria: look pink
I was making my gram negative slide and everything was going swell. I followed the procedure and life was grand. Then I tried to find the bacteria under the microscope and I was having a hard time focusing on the bacteria. They weren't that colorful and it was hard to get a crisp image of them. My professor told me that they weren't looking right and I should make them again. But he wasn't able to tell me where I went wrong.
OK, fine. I just made another and let the Safarnin sit a little longer. I went through the process again just to realize that I forgot to heat fixate. That basically means that all of my bacteria were in the dye tray after I washed them off the slide 4 different times. Little annoying, whatever. I went and made a third one. They looked exactly the same and the TA and professor still had no idea what was going on. Uggggh.
I do it a fourth time and no dice. The professor then looks at them under a different microscope and what a surprise, they looked perfect. There was no reason to have done it four times. He was just being a jerk and not letting the non-perfect slide.
I moved on to doing a Gram positive. The TA took a look at it and told me that my bacteria weren't distributed well enough. Are you serious?!??!?!?!?!? Well I'm sorry if there mothers didn't teach them how to be more evenly distributed.
By this point I had had it. I declared that I was going home, which wasn't that outrageous since the lab period had been over for ten minutes. (Note: I only got half of my work done, whereas many other were on the verge of being done.) So I'm going to pick up my dye tray which is overly full from having to repeat making a slide 4 times. Guess what happened. Actually, no. I'll just tell you the end result. My shoes and brand new jeans that were amazzzzzing now have crystal blue dye, safaranin, Gram iodine and decolorizer all over them. Yeah, that's never going to come out.
Everyone was on alert not to go anywhere near me. My professor thought it would be a good idea to make small talk by saying, "Hey Dr. Wannabe, wasn't it funny how all those slides you made were fine and just looked lighter under your microscope."
::people running for cover:: ::crickets::
"Yeah, it was really funny."
I don't think I need to tell you that I said that in the most sarcastic asshole voice ever. I was actually quite impressed that I had the balls to speak to a professor that way.
Microbiogy hasn't officially become my least favorite class of the semester.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
How could I abandon such a weak and defenseless blog?!
I feel terrible that I haven't been updating my blog. Just lately I haven't felt like I've had a ton to say on the whole theme of my blog. Plus my workload is crazy and tonight was the first real night I've gotten to take "off." I say off in quotes because I actually have some microlab stuff I have to write up before I go to bed.
This is actually is a coincidently good time to post since today all the Juniors and Seniors who are applying to med school had to meet together with the chair of the pre-health committee. It wasn't all that informative since I've been OCD about the whole applying thing this spring semester freshman year. The number one thing the chairman wanted to get across to us is that it's uber uber important to get our applications in ASAP. Fortunately, I don't think that's something that I'm going to have to worry about. Horray OCD!
During the meeting I was having one of my typical anxiety-from-applying-induced-panic-attacks. Except this one was different. Yes, my heart was still pounding away a million miles an hour. And yes, I never thought I was getting full breathes in. But it was still different. While my body was freaking out about the whole thing my brain was like, "Oh, whatever. I'm so done with this whole getting worked up about applying BS." I think this might be the beginning of me calming down. Horrah! Really the only thing I'm worried about is the committee interview where they rank how highly they recommend you for med school. But I'm fairly sure that I'll have full blown panic attacks once the MCATs roll around though.
Speaking of MCATs
I recently registered for my Kaplan MCAT review course. That only put me back $1300... According to the chairman today the MCATs are the single most important part of a med school application, which is the same thing that one of the dean's at my top choice med school said. So really I'm banking on doing really well on that test. God knows that my 3.0 sci-GPA and 3.2 cum GPA aren't going to catch any eyes. Well, they might. Just in a bad way. If only one could get into med school by good looks alone...
Wait, what the hell am I talking about? I want to improve my chances.
My shadowing has been really interesting thus far. Still waiting for the elusive intubation though. I was thinking about maybe posting the journal entries that I have to write for my internship. I'm fairly confident that I'm allowed to post those as long as it's Patient #1, #2 and so on. I mean God. You don't even know who I am.
I'll post those later on. That way I don't make this post hideously long.
This is actually is a coincidently good time to post since today all the Juniors and Seniors who are applying to med school had to meet together with the chair of the pre-health committee. It wasn't all that informative since I've been OCD about the whole applying thing this spring semester freshman year. The number one thing the chairman wanted to get across to us is that it's uber uber important to get our applications in ASAP. Fortunately, I don't think that's something that I'm going to have to worry about. Horray OCD!
During the meeting I was having one of my typical anxiety-from-applying-induced-panic-attacks. Except this one was different. Yes, my heart was still pounding away a million miles an hour. And yes, I never thought I was getting full breathes in. But it was still different. While my body was freaking out about the whole thing my brain was like, "Oh, whatever. I'm so done with this whole getting worked up about applying BS." I think this might be the beginning of me calming down. Horrah! Really the only thing I'm worried about is the committee interview where they rank how highly they recommend you for med school. But I'm fairly sure that I'll have full blown panic attacks once the MCATs roll around though.
Speaking of MCATs
I recently registered for my Kaplan MCAT review course. That only put me back $1300... According to the chairman today the MCATs are the single most important part of a med school application, which is the same thing that one of the dean's at my top choice med school said. So really I'm banking on doing really well on that test. God knows that my 3.0 sci-GPA and 3.2 cum GPA aren't going to catch any eyes. Well, they might. Just in a bad way. If only one could get into med school by good looks alone...
Wait, what the hell am I talking about? I want to improve my chances.
My shadowing has been really interesting thus far. Still waiting for the elusive intubation though. I was thinking about maybe posting the journal entries that I have to write for my internship. I'm fairly confident that I'm allowed to post those as long as it's Patient #1, #2 and so on. I mean God. You don't even know who I am.
I'll post those later on. That way I don't make this post hideously long.
Friday, September 01, 2006
I Feel Like the Biggest Asshole in the World
I had my first day of Microbiology Lab today. Walking into class not really knowing anyone in the lab I didn't have someone scout out as a lab partner. People started entering the room and taking their seats. Some people knew each other but mostly people didn't know the others. Class started and "Phil" walked in a couple minutes late. Phil had been in a couple of my classes in the past and walking in late was a usual occurrence. But the teacher would never say anything because there is obviously something mentally wrong with him. If I had to guess I would say that it's some form of autism, but I really can't really put my finger on it.
Long story short....
The professor moves him to the station next to me, which makes him my lab partner. Throughout the lab he's having a very difficult time learning how to use the microscope. Now I know that a microscope can be tricky to learn how to adjust and see clearly using both eyes, but Phil was having a hard time with everything about it. When trying to adjust the height of it he took the headpiece off and couldn't get it back on by himself. The professor had to stop he lecture to help show him how to put it on. Trying to use the oil emersion lens was another story within itself. And it’s not like he hasn’t had plenty of experience with a microscope before, because it’s used a lot in Gen Bio. Following the step-by-step directions that we were being given seems to be the main weakness, which I believe is a sign of autism.
Saying all of this makes me feel like a huge jerk. But I'm not even trying to be mean. I'm just saying what happened. And I feel even worse that I'm worried about being his partner. I know that he had to get through Gen Bio and Gen Chem to get to this point, which is no easy task, but I still have my reservations. I’m afraid that I’m going to have to do all the work and explain everything to him. I've never been good around the mentally challenged although my experience is limited. I feel like the only way I can communicate with them sometimes is by talking down to them and I hate belittling people like that. I don’t even mean talking down to them in the “I’m better than you” sense as much as how a mother talks down to her child about the dangers of touching a hot stove.
Maybe I’m making a big deal about nothing. Only time will tell. In the mean time does anyone have any advice? I’m fairly sure I’ve lost any continuous audience I had but it’s worth a shot.
Long story short....
The professor moves him to the station next to me, which makes him my lab partner. Throughout the lab he's having a very difficult time learning how to use the microscope. Now I know that a microscope can be tricky to learn how to adjust and see clearly using both eyes, but Phil was having a hard time with everything about it. When trying to adjust the height of it he took the headpiece off and couldn't get it back on by himself. The professor had to stop he lecture to help show him how to put it on. Trying to use the oil emersion lens was another story within itself. And it’s not like he hasn’t had plenty of experience with a microscope before, because it’s used a lot in Gen Bio. Following the step-by-step directions that we were being given seems to be the main weakness, which I believe is a sign of autism.
Saying all of this makes me feel like a huge jerk. But I'm not even trying to be mean. I'm just saying what happened. And I feel even worse that I'm worried about being his partner. I know that he had to get through Gen Bio and Gen Chem to get to this point, which is no easy task, but I still have my reservations. I’m afraid that I’m going to have to do all the work and explain everything to him. I've never been good around the mentally challenged although my experience is limited. I feel like the only way I can communicate with them sometimes is by talking down to them and I hate belittling people like that. I don’t even mean talking down to them in the “I’m better than you” sense as much as how a mother talks down to her child about the dangers of touching a hot stove.
Maybe I’m making a big deal about nothing. Only time will tell. In the mean time does anyone have any advice? I’m fairly sure I’ve lost any continuous audience I had but it’s worth a shot.
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