and so the "just in time" scenario begins!!

It's hard to believe it is the first day of fall, and was also the day of my first midterm!!! It was a relatively slack course and the midterm was very easy, but we'll see what the verdict is in a couple weeks when the grades arrive. The course is called evidence based medicine and currently has been teaching us about the science of trashing research papers. Very scintilating
Second midterm is Thursday and is Virology. Pretty self explanatory there, but we still have crazy long days and are starting to drown in the memorization piles. Between the different viruses, bacteria, parasites, and drugs we have thousands of things to memorize. Big thanks to who ever invented the flash card!!
I am also anxiously awaiting the arrival of fernvalley's mare Classy, it will make being out here so much more bearable and give me an incentive to get the homework done in a timely fashion and not waste time on certain websites.....
peace out!
Angela
I leave you with my boy Digger...

the weekend

Well, not a lot of studying went on to say the least.
Friday night was the annual "round - up" event which consists of dinner, silent auction, and a huge dance. We were lucky this year in the fact that the first graduating class of wcvm, the class of 1969, came to party with us! Room mates and I started out at a friends house "predrinking", in order to save money once at the party. We play a drinking came known as sociables which is quite fun. We then walked to the hall where the dinner and dance was at.
The wcvm has a tradition known as "skits", where the class hosting the upcoming event does 5 short 5-8 min skits to advertise the upcoming event to the other classes every day. Here are a couple examples. They can either be digitally done or live.

skit examples

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4K7wiu9FBo

Room mates and I dressed up for the party! (I am in green)

So partied hard Friday night.

Saturday was the annual softball tournament. I have never played softball before so figured I would give it a shot! There were about 30 students who crawled out of bed hung over and got to the field. Had a lot of fun, actually managed to hit the ball as well as get hit by the ball (I have a few bruises). There was also a lot of beer drinking going on! It was a beautiful sunny day around 26 degrees so It was a lovely way to spend the day.

my first attempt at hitting the ball, I not only managed to hit the ball but also get hit by the ball in the course of the day.

That's hard work!! Refueling between matches

Look alive!

Pets had fun too!

Sunday I did the dreaded landry now that our machine was fixed. Also caught up on homework by studying in the backyard and enjoying the lovely hot weather. Roomies and I ate lots of icecream too ;)

click!

Have you ever had a day when everything just "clicks"? I finally did!! Had a lot of general pathology today which is a very interesting course as it is the first time we are learning the science of how things go wrong.

We have an amazing professor who uses great analogies to help us get the concepts and is a big supporter of jumping right in and getting in there, "you learn nothing from the sidelines and we are all here to learn from every ones mistakes" are his famous quotes. He expects a lot of us and ensures everyone gets a chance to practice.

So far we have been learning how to describe lesions, come up with morphological diagnoses and learning the pathology behind things like the different kinds of abscess', cell death, organ change, etc.

The class really comes into its own though during the labs. The labs are held in the pathology seminar room, and 24 students from the class head down and working in pairs diagnose a lesion. The rest of the class then enters the bleachers and the 24 students take turns going through their specimens with the prof correcting them at the end of their presentation, I unfortunately was in the first group of students to have to do this.....

So I have a brain covered with these little black spots. Description: random multifocal to coalescing black round lesions 2mm to 5 mm in size. The lesions are invasive into the cortex and not well demarcated. morphological diagnosis: multifocal melanosarcoma of the brain. Sounds impressive right? after only 1 lecture? AmAZING! (fortunately the profs other favorite quote is "you are allowed to remember" and I remembered the brain from a photo in the previous lecture ;) ) This is never the less a harrowing experience as you stand in front of your peers blowing smoke out your you know what and preparing to get a lecture from the prof on how everything you just said is wrong.

And yet I am amazed at how much we have learned. We actually sound like doctors!! Another component of the class is a seminar at 430-530 Tuesdays and Thursdays as the clinical pathologists from the schools diagnostics center for the public presents interesting cases from during the week. Not only did I understand everything in seminar today but I actually was able to clarify some lingering questions from a case I saw this summer!!!

It is so nice to be learning something that comes off as being so relevant to our future careers, but also that I understand it!! This is reassuring....

Pathology lab during open house:

the room has an amazing video and live streaming televisions so no matter where you sit you always can see the good parts!

Whirlwind weeks!

Wow! Busy first couple of weeks.

The first week of class went really well. Lots of parties as we now second years welcome the new batch of firsties to the program. Welcome bbq Monday, Tuesday recovery, Wednesday night was hurricane party(where we have house parties, get our first year buddies tipsy, dress them up in silly costumes and take them to the bar), and the list goes on. Lots of fun.

The jello shots for hurricane party that I hosted

The start of the party

The costumes

The end of the party, oh dear!!! At least it wasn' me this year!

First weekend was pretty slow, not a lot of homework yet so went for ice cream, to a nice pub called Winston's, and spent Sunday sun tanning down at cranberry flats, a local beach along the south Saskatchewan river (it was +30!) Also biked over 35km till i got a flat tire.

The second week we buckled down to class. We are currently taking general pathology, virology, evidence based medicine, micro biology, pharmacology, medical imaging, pain and analgesia, and parasitology (enough with the _ologies!) It was a long 3 day weekend this last weekend so my room mate from last year who house jumped with me came home with me for the weekend. We had fun riding horses, playing badminton, and enjoying my moms fabulous cooking!! I sure makes me miss living rural though.

What biking in Saskatoon looks like!

Sun tanning by the river

Swimming in the river!

Sydney and I our for a ride at Fernvalleys place on Greymares horse Blue and my gelding Digger!

Go Sydney!