Test Week Approaches

Alright, so life has been crazy and hectic, but that's mainly due to the impending test week starting this Monday. We have 2 days of dissection, a day for review, a day off and then it's 8-5 testing on Friday. It will probably be the most time consuming test I will have taken since the MCAT. If you're looking for students on the brink of mental breakdown, visit the UFHSC this Friday.

---Mental Saturation---

Well, at this point of learning, I feel that I can't fit any more info into my brain. I'll just blank completely on information that I knew perfectly a week before. Hopefully I can train my brain to bring all that old info to the forefront before I hit test day. Thankfully, there is little to no more information that I have to learn. This week is all about packing it in.

---Weekend Partytime---

I feel that I am partying just a little too much on Friday nights now. I feel completely demolished by Saturday morning and it kind of robs the gator games of their typical joys (although that might be due to the way the Gators have been playing recently). I'm going to try and moderate my fun times over the next couple week to hopefully find a good balance.

---Undergrad Peeps and Piano Bars---

At the Gator game this Saturday, I had the pleasure of seeing my friend David from undergrad. We had a fun time at the game and then went back to Mother's Pub to have a few beers and watch the Alabama-Penn State game with my friend Joe. The game wasn't that great, but David, Joe, and I had some awesome conversations. I learned about the "Angry Dragon" I think it was called as well as David's experience with cougars. Overall, it was a great time. Enough so that this upcoming weekend after my big test, I am probably gonna head down to Tampa/Orlando to visit Dave and go to a piano bar and have some fun. It's just the something I need to look forward to after my test.

---JO Buddies and Trolling---

So I believe some of my new friends in med school are some of the most ridiculous people that I have ever met. For hours on end, we'll carry on talking about Craigslist ads and the term "JOing". Additionally, they have started going on the SDN website (a website for premed students to talk about MCATs and interviews) and trolling ("maliciously playing with" for you non-internet savvy people) the kids looking for info on UF interview days and the school. It's quite hilarious, because no one is more serious about med school than a pre-med student going into interviews and they're being met by the least serious (and probably least sane) people out there, current 1st year students. Hilarity ensues everytime. I love these people.

Regardless of how hard/tiring/burdensome/wild/crazy/overwhelming/sanity-grating it gets, I am having a blast through it all. Med school, FTW.

And So It Begins...

Monday morning, bright and early at 7:15am, I found myself seated in a room surrounded by over a hundred new faces. While many of these people seemed vaguely familiar, this time may have been one of the first in a long period when I felt like I knew no one. In a matter of minutes, I had made 2 new friends, then 3, then 5, until my memory was overloaded with all of these new interesting people. Orientation began with the dean and associated faculty saying a few words. Eventually, our first 5 hours turned into a fury of associate deans telling us about the "most important" part of our medical school career, their parts. After an hour long presentation about how to fill out faculty evaluations, we were given a moment to breathe. The afternoon continued with more speeches about professionalism and our medical school community. During lunch, the second years came in and played a video for us that they made. It was very funny and was soaked in parody and memes which kept me cracking up. They then split us up into two groups. The first group went to get CPR training while the second got to talk to second years about interest groups and extra-curricular events. I used this time to get to know a lot more of my classmates. The CPR training was interesting, but it was so hurried and strange that I don't think I learned much more than how to beat up a mannequin . By this time, it was 6pm and everyone was exhausted. However, the day wasn't over yet.

That evening, Dr. Good, the dean of our great college, was hosting a dinner at the UF President's house where we as students would get to meet and talk with the faculty. It was very nice and the food was delicious. I met some more cool people and even ran into my old friend, Emily, that was working with the caterers. However, my exhaustion was getting the better of me. After downing a few Diet Pepsi cans and a piece of Key Lime Pie. I decided to head out, but not home yet. The second year students, in hopes of getting to better know our class had invited us all out to The Swamp Restaurant to have a few drinks and socialize. Went there, did that, and met some even cooler people. I had actually met a lot of the second years already, and it was good to see them again. I finally got home at 10:30pm and was in bed by 11pm, since we had another nice early morning on Tuesday.

Tuesday started off nice at 8am. I chose to sit away from people I had already met, and I found some more interesting people. One cool person next to me knew a bit about Student Government at UF and it was interesting to see his take and perspectives on stuff that I had already experienced. Then our first assignment of the day began, writing our code of ethics. Using our own work and other students input, we broke off into small groups and each wrote our own example of a doctor's code of ethics. We then appointed a group leader to share our draft with the other groups. I chose to volunteer for said position because it would give me a better chance to meet more people. During lunch, all of the group leaders were taken away to a small conference room in the Academic Research Building and asked to put together a single code of ethics. This challenge was more difficult than it should have been. So many people got attached to their wording or their phrases that it took us an hour to just finish each point we wanted to cover. We would have to come back later to finish it. At noon though, we took a recess and went on a tour of the Health Science Center. There were a lot of locations that I wasn't even familiar with having been at the HSC for 5 years. Also, I got to meet some neat people that share my end of the alphabet (V-Z). Most importantly though, our wonderful tour guides, Vikram and Elizabeth, made sure we knew everything and anything we could/should know, from what books you'll use or cover to what books you'll never open. They also talked about their study habits and what other people would do. Listening to them talk was simultaneously intimidating and invigorating. However, they showed a clearly strong resolve to helping any and all students they could which is an awesome resource that I am glad I have now. At the end of the day I had to go back to the conference room and finish the code of ethics, but I decided to take a quick trip to steak and shake for drive-thru. By the time I got back, they had finished it. To repent for my excursion, I drove some of my leader-mates to their cars and parted ways.

I believe that I've made some awesome acquaintences over the past two days, and I'm sure I'll make some more over the next semester. Most importantly though, I believe I've found some really cool people that will end up being some of my best friends.

The rest of the week shows countless activities to come, and I can't wait to check them out, starting up again in 2 hours. Time to rest now.

My Car --- Still not fixed. I haven't had time to bug Allstate about it, but I hope to hear from them soon.

Logistics --- I really want to put up some pictures on here to supplement some of the stuff I am saying. As such, I used some Best Buy gift certificates to purchase a camera that is on it's way to my apartment as we speak, so look out for some sweet pictures to come.