it's wednesday, but i already i've had enough of this week. it's sheer torture to go to school nowadays, and i wonder why i'm feeling this way. i just want to lock myself at home and interact with snell and guyton and berne and levy and the rest. but no, since my parents have paid up a fortune for my studies, i need to get up at six everyday and drag myself to school and go for class while my mind wanders to far away places.


at least there are some vaguely interesting lectures. on monday there was an endocrine physiology review, and the lecturer did an excellent job integrating the science behind medicine and the ethics involved. he told us that a survey had been done about olympic athletes, apparently they all wouldn't mind consuming a drug that would boost their performance but would kill them when they reach thirty five. and in fact, a whole lot of athletes are dying, he showed us a long list of cyclists who were put on erythropoetin to increase their rbc and hence stamina, and they all died between seventeen and thirty five. the steroids/hormones industry is worth nearly a hundred billion us dollars, and for two weeks of treatment a doctor can earn up to two hundred thousand on each patient. so, he asked, would you let a woman who wanted to look younger for her husband know that her chance of breast and ovarian cancer is almost tripled or just give her the jabs? it made us all think hard, and we appreciated it.


perhaps it was more than a coincidence that i met zing, and matt for dinner later that day. he had a bit of trouble with his foot after all that marching during the ocs commissioning ceremony (and by gaw, he and tc got the sword-of-honor!) and he asked me about it. so i explained the stucture with the help of trusty snell, and to my surprise i found it a nice thing to be able to help someone understand more about his body. it's different from spitting it out in exams or having to explain certain concepts to a fellow medical student or being grilled by your prof because telling non-medical people what a marvellous thing your body is is like a revelation, and it has this child-like wonder to accompany it.


i've got more to blog about, but it's late. i've had a long day, but one last thing. i've been noticing from reading everyone's blogs that we all seem to be having some issues going on right now. someone has stopped completely but might restart, two have moved to a more private blog because they're trying to cope with something, and another is venting everything on the blog. is it just my imagination?