I'm officially embarrassed to have had a crush on Matthew Sweet in middle school; the only thing that looks worse than his new covers album is Sweet himself.

asides

Travis the Doctor picked Sarah "Launchpad McQuack" Boringgirl to be his on the Bachelor last night. They should have a wonderful life being boring together; I'm sorry I bothered to watch this season.

Seriously, she really does look like Launchpad McQuack.

****


And now a story about the only Oscar nominated film I've seen this year:

I dreampt last night I was in bed and I received a text message saying "Goodnight" to which I responded with another textmessage (still in my dream but so clear that when I got up this morning I felt around in my sheets for my phone that was in the kitchen) "et bonne chance" which is the end of Goodnight and Good Luck, but, um, in French.

I recommend betting heavily on the film to win a lot of Academy Awards; this dream can only be the cosmos telling me the big winner in advance, and not sheer exhaustion from learning so much in so little time.


I'm listening to:
Super Furry Animals- Radiator

Hey, you know what's fucking cool? Learning the anti-arrhthmia drugs. The anti-arrhthmic drugs I'll use in a matter of months to save someone's life. A matter of months, reader. It's not imaginary anymore, even though I'm still imagining it.

I spend the better part of an hour a day watching the PandaCam. Butterstick is my constant companion through repetitive classes of anti-arrhythmic drugs I must learn for Pharmacology and the meanderings of a eight page Pathophysiology transcript. If there's anyone that could accurately use the Zoo's slogan, "Everything's better with Butter," in everyday conversation, it's me. As proof: I walked home in the drizzle yesterday, frustrated by my lack of knowledge on all things gastritis, just to take a break from coffeeshopping and watch five minutes of the Stick adorably struggle with some bamboo leaves.

But the vision I get of my panda smeared on a toast and then covered with strawberry preserves is actually a complete turn-off. Nice, try FONZ.


I'm listening to:
The Spinanes: Arches and Aisles

well, I'll be

Our girl Robin Givhan has a blog. I suppose if a silly medical student can have one, why the heck not. But in her top post (the only one I read; I do, after all, have a lot of tests on Monday, thank you very much) she manages to:

1. not actually write a thing about the fashion at fashion week in Milan
2. forget the name of the awesome, impeccable, girl-crush-worthy Nina Garcia. That woman, single-handedly and with out a doubt, makes Project Runway the blissful entertainment it has become for me. (Her snip to Santino on his lingerie line, "It's aesthetically not-pleasing," was the quote of the season [that is until Santino asked Kara if the pants she was making for him were moonpants, because his "ass is out of this world."] Oh, I digress)
3. retread ground on Sienna Miller that was already muddy and over-trodden in December when I sheepishly brought pictures of Sienna's awesome shag to the hairdresser to copy her style.

I'm listening to:
Aimee Mann- The Forgotten Arm

It would’ve been too easy to post this on Valentine’s Day; the truth is I didn’t think of it. For all my obscure interests in the other arts, I remain a passionate fan of the crappy romantic comedy (A best friend of mine justifies his love of Journey by turning an imaginary “ironic light” on in his car every time he wants to rock out to ‘Open Arms’. In that way, he hopes that the cars around his mundane ford Exploder watching him jam to ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ with the windows down will see that he is so above anyone’s snobbery that he can enjoy a good cockrock tune like a normal plebian. He compensates by owning the entire collections of an arsenal of [perfectly awful] early punk bans. I’m not as bashful.)

I cover up my mostly awful taste in movies by mostly refusing to watch them. (The sole exception is Fall 2003, after I’d deferred my admission to medical school and was scrambling to find a way to Senegal. I joined Netflix and rejoined the public library; between those two venues I had only to visit the local video store (this was my ardently anti-corporation phase) once or twice a month. I watched a movie a day and read (most of) a book a day. So now I can say I’ve seen the black and whites and every New Wave films snobs namedrop.)

But a few weeks ago, I flipped by Turner Movies right as Out of Africa was starting, and settled in for most of the haul. Now this, this is a crappy romantic comedy masquerading as an outstanding arthouse film.

Meryl Streep is quirky and obstinate, everything you want in the heroine of a romantic comedy. Also, she’s an imperfect beauty, allowing a girl to pretend she too could be as witty and desireable to Karen. As her vagabond hunter, Robert Redford has the charisma and fucking hotness required of the protagonist. She lusts after him, he toys with her. They enjoy hot trysts and then there’s the obligatory, true to life, unhappy ending. A shameless pleasure.


I’m eating:
String cheese. Seriously, what is wrong with me?

je m'ennuie, Asterix.

always on the ball

Rhymes with Dead School has discovered YouTube. While this development clearly does not bode well for this writeup on Actue Myelogenous Leukemia, it does mean that I can now relive the best goal I've ever seen, the goal that had me convinced France could win the 2002 World Cup in Korea, the goal that allowed me to finally contact my ex-something to gloat- anytime I like.

Awww, damn.

totally awesome

How awesome is Johnny Weir? He named his costume Camilla? That may well be the most unselfconsciously young thing I've ever heard. I watched some Olympics last night, and in the backstory piece on Weir he wore the cutest CCCP sweatshirt while boldly proclaiming how real he keeps it. That, dear reader, is a lot of awesome.


I'm listening to:
Air- Talkie Walkie

Aside from planning my summer around the World Cup, I haven't paid the least bit of attention to the sport in seemingly months. Arsenal is sucking pretty hard, at least as far as I can tell, and that's all I need to let me ignore this season entirely. I did, however, catch this article on Soccernet today, stating that our man in the back Sol Cambell has an ankle injury. I'm actually only posting this to make myself feel better; this season is clearly a wash for Arsenal, but at least this way England may suck a little harder than France at the World Cup. And since France's victory over England was for me the highlight of the 2004 Euro, I'll just accept that I'm willing to root for injuries as long as they help my team. I have no soul.


I'm listening to:
U.N.K.L.E.- Psyence Fiction

obviously a surgeon

My friends and I ate lunch at the hospital yesterday, a sight made ridiculous by the fact that we were all ten of us sporting our white coats before heading out to our weekly hospital roations. After finishing, we cut up to the second floor to get back over to our building. Three of us continued a conversation (on Fox's complete abandonment of Arrested Development, pitting four of the last new episodes against the Olympic Opening Ceremonies) while ascending a small staircase. We ran up against a group of long-coated doctors, prompting one of the more asinine men to say,

"Single file, guys"

implying that because we were wearing short jackets, we were so incompetant as to be unable to successfully navigate a spiral staircase.

Jerk.


I'm listening to:
The Dismemberment Plan: !

Sometimes, learning the medical root of a word is informative. Dr. Nuland taught me about the four humors first described by the ancient Greeks, yellow bile, black bile, phlegm, and blood. They've integrated themselves so seamlessly into our vocabularies that I never thought to think that phlegmatic describes a sluggish state resulting from an imbalance of phlegm and melancholic from too much black (melanic) bile.

Sometimes, though, I wish I'd never learned the damn concept. Why do I sit here ruminating over this?

Well, it's because of this, particularly unpleasant, definition of rumination:

Rumination refers to repeated, involuntary postprandial regurigitation of recently ingested food. The food is expectorated or chewed and reswallowed. This cycle can recur repeatedly for up to an hour after a meal. It typically ceases when food begins to take on an acid taste.

Thank you Lippincott's Gastrointestinal Pathophysiology. Clearly it is going to be a long month.

I'm listening to:
M83: Before the Dawn Heals Us