January 2006

Friday, January 27, 2006
1 more week till we are done with endocrine!
01-19-06-->01-27-06

Hello to all,

Well, I’m about a week and a half behind on writing my entry, and my (now regular) apologies to all who follow my journal.

Last I left you, I believe it was last Wednesday… the rest of the week wasn’t too bad—we had a collection of pediatrics lectures, internal medicine, Female Athlete Triad, more peds, more internal medicine and radiology. All in all, it was very fun.

On Friday afternoon—from 2-10pm we had our Kaplan review course—it was very fun (and loooooooong), Saturday 8am-4pm we continue reviewing microbiology and then Sunday 11am-7pm we finished up. Wow… what a weekend! I loved the review, but had to work hard on making sure I didn’t get behind. So I worked hard, finished going through class material in between the breaks, and at the end I was fine.

This week wasn’t too bad—I have been going to bed earlier and earlier, and it is making my life so much nicer! I exercise at night, take a shower and off to bed before 10:30. Going to bed so early made it much easier to wake up early in the morning and go to Smith Hall to do Board Review in the morning—Sleep is just amazing :o)

On Monday we had histology of the parathyroid gland, physiology of the parathyroid gland and pathology of the thyroid gland. The afternoon was free for independent study (hurray!!!) Tuesday was just SUPER! We had only a path lab in the afternoon, which means that I had time to get to all of the material and make sure I reviewed again some of the material from last week. I was in nerd’s 7th heaven…

Wednesday was really easy too—only 2 internal medicine (hyper and hypocalcemia) and then on OMM lab (we learned to palpate the thyroid)—then the afternoon was free again!!! (I am very excited about all of it because I am normally overly busy and don’t have 3 free afternoons in a row!

Thursday wasn’t too fun… we had a full schedule and it was hard not having extra time… We started the day with 2 pediatrics lectures by an Israeli doctor… it was hard for me to think in English when he had the thick Hebrew accent going… the whole day afterwards I was thinking in Hebrew. Later on we had a looooooooong physiology lecture and then the great Dr. McCandless with prevention medicine. I think very highly of her, and it is nice to get a lecture from a clinician who wants to teach us the important stuff.

Today we had 2 pediatrics lectures again (they were great!), internal medicine and pathology. I spent the afternoon in Smith hall finishing everything I could. I wanted to go chat with Dorothy, but she was busy the whole afternoon, so… I got loads of work done instead :o) Always good, right?

The weather has been just amazing here—in the 60’s, absolutely gorgeous! This is much-much nicer than the frozen January of last year!!! I have been in a great mood these past few days, and I have to attribute it to: sleep, working out, and this great weather!

The Cats are doing great—Vega is my ‘wanting to be outside’ cat, and KC is my scardy cat… I’ll post new pictures of them as soon as I can.

Well, that’s about all,
Love to all,



Reut
PS-- I'm flying home in 1 week!!!!!!! I can't wait!!!
27 jan 06 @ 10:08 pm

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Wednesday, January 18, 2006
Forgot to mention-- Mom and Dad, thanks for all of the great wonderful delicious lemons!!! everyone just LOVED them! :o) (and... I made some lemonade tonight... yum)
01-09-06-->01-18-06

Hello everyone!

Sorry for the late entry—this past weekend I was studying for a quiz and then went out on Monday night, and by Tuesday I was already behind and had to finish everything up and… well, you get the point… I have caught up now and decided it was the perfect time to put in an entry.

This past week was really fun. I love biochemistry! I spent a lot of time understanding the pathways and it was just great fun! As you all know, I hate memorizing… biochemistry is anything but memorizing. The way I look at it… it is a story—a process, and it is just explaining how we work on a very basic lvl.

In anycase, sadly there are no more biochemistry lectures for this section :o(

Monday was… Monday… we had a pediatrics professor in the morning and I couldn’t hear a word he was saying—I mean, I heard it, but I wasn’t able to make anything up from his mumbling. Uggg! It is a very good thing some of my friends understood him and took notes, because the material wasn’t difficult (infants of diabetic mothers) and it was interesting. Following that we had a biochem lecture, then a long pharmacology lecture and another biochemistry lecture :o) That afternoon was spent going through everything and figuring it out.

Tuesday was kind of long—we had 2 biochemistry in the morning and then we had internal medicine (ugggg…. Now that is straight ‘list memorization’), preventive medicine and a pathology lab. One of my friends told me that I would probably change my mind about internal medicine when we go on rotations… I hope so.

Wednesday was too short—we had a histology lecture and then a clinical skill lab that was a tad too short. That afternoon I reviewed everything we have had up to that point. Not a very exciting day, but important one, b/c I integrated everything together and made sure I was really understanding the material

On Thursday morning my KC had to be neutered :o( I felt very bad taking him to the vet to have him fixed. I suppose it is the right thing to do, but it really broke my heart. After I drove there, I hurried back to school and had a pathology lecture, an internal medicine lecture and then 2 online physiology lectures and a med-case. All of the online material was a bit time consuming.

Fridays was filled with internal medicine, anatomy and then at the end we had a patient conference—we had a presentation on how the insulin pump works, and then later on, my friend Melissa presented her family’s experience with her son’s type 1 diabetes. She did a wonderful job. That afternoon I picked Mr. KC up from the vet and brought him home. Vega (who enjoyed being an only cat for a day) begun hissing at him… how bizarre! Well, she got over it pretty quick, and now they are back to their normal self. KC is fine, by the way—he is running and playing and is having a good time.

My weekend was filled with studying, and then Monday morning we had the quiz…
Monday night I took my friend Katie out for dinner as a thank you for taking care of my cats when I was gone during break—we had a great time eating in California Pizza on the plaza—yum!

Anyways, that’s about it. We have started a new week, and this coming weekend I have my first Kaplan course—I joined it to study for the boards… it has always been easier for me to study for standardized examination in a group. As this weekend is basically shot, I have been trying to catch up on all of my school work and go over everything enough times that I don’t feel like I’m missing important study time during the weekend.

Much love to all,

Reut
18 jan 06 @ 11:15 pm

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Sunday, January 8, 2006
"back to the grind"
01-03-06-->01-08-06

Hello friends and family,

As my friend Kendra says… “back to the grind.” It is so true. It’s amazing how fast days of vacation seem when you have loads to do. That’s okay though… I like endocrine a lot better than Renal section!!!

This week started out on Tuesday (Monday was still vacation) with internal medicine lecture, physiology lectures, biochemistry and a pathology lab. I really think our biochemistry professor is great! He has been teaching here for about 20 years or so, and he is just so good at it. Then again, I might be biased… I like biochemistry (sick? Nah… I just like logical things that has a story to them, a path—something I can see versus memorize.) In any case, I decided not to waste any time and went full force during lunch and afternoon.

Wednesday started with a BANG… Vega apparently attempted to eat one of the plants, and it dropped on the floor and broke at about 6 in the morning. It gave all of us a startle, but it was a better alarm clock than I have had in a while. Beside that early excitement, the rest of the day was a little boring… we had an OMM lecture, internal medicine, biochem (that wasn’t boring), Histology (That wasn’t boring either) and another biochemistry (not boring)… Later on in the afternoon we had End-of-Life lab—it was interesting, but I was a little tired and wanted to go finish my studying.

On Thursday we had two biochemistry lectures in the morning and then two internal medicines. Fairly normal day. At night, my friends Matt and Erika came to visit me and the cats—they were so sweet and brought me a really cool present (brownies mix in a jar—all ready to bake!!! How fun!—it was all pretty in a basket with candy around it). I gave them some home grown lemons from Arizona—I think they enjoyed playing with the cats and hanging out.

Friday was busy with Pathology, biochemistry, pharmacology and immunology. I would like to get better in my immunology. I really need to review the old material from last year…

I spent the weekend reviewing everything (alone, as Tala was sick)—I feel like I understand it all, and yet have to review it a few more times for it to really stick. After I was done today I went shopping—It is so nice to have fruits and vegetable in the house…

Oh… I changed my boards date, time and place one last time—it’ll be on June here in town. So much better than having to drive up north to a place I don’t know.

Much love to all, have a wonderful week!

Reut
8 jan 06 @ 9:39 pm

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Monday, January 2, 2006
Back to school
12-23-05-->01-02-06

Hello friends and family,

Happy 2006! May it will be a healthy, happy and exciting year!

That’s it, I’m back at Kansas City—this is after a nice vacation :o)

Dad and I finished so many projects (yet, we still have a bunch on the list… next vacation I guess). This past week was fun—we finished installing the handles in the kitchen, and I finished painting the gate and the bridge. Both turned out really nice.

Just the other day Mom and I watched Pirates of the Caribbean—I loved this movie! How fun! Last time I saw it, I saw it all in mute (someone was sleeping, I didn’t want to wake anyone up)—this time it was so much more impressive and fun!

Well, I can’t say we did a whole lot, but just resting and enjoying one another was wonderful :o)

On Sunday afternoon I packed my stuff (Midnight was sad when he saw the suitcase), and then I flew back here. The flight had turbulence and it wasn’t too pleasant, but I finished half of “Code Blue” by Tzvika Amit (קוד כחול/ צביקה עמית) I still haven’t finished the rest of it, but I’ll do so during the next week or so.

I got home at around Midnight, and found my fur balls in good shape—I am so glad Katie is the one who took care of them these past 2 weeks—I felt so much better about leaving them knowing that she’ll be here with them. Thank you Katie! It took me about an hour or two to get the house cleaned up (my two cats have the unique ability to move stuff around in the house for no apparent reason), and then I went to bed. This morning I woke up late and made my way to the store to get some groceries.

Now after the food is made, and the binder is ready for tomorrow, I am going to enjoy the last few bits of vacation.

Love to all,

Reut
2 jan 06 @ 7:46 pm