naughty or nice...

we put up our christmas tree this weekend.
before...

after...


as you can see, santa claus has already dropped by & has left some gifts under the tree. he was also kind enough to label the gifts so that we don't get confused/fight over them.

i had a quick peek through all the gifts but i couldn't find anything with my name on it. :(

dejected, i was ruffling around in the kitchen and guess what i found... my label.

don't know if this is a good thing or bad thing. on one hand, it could mean that santa just hasn't put my name on anything yet. i mean, he still does have 2.5 days of shopping. on the other hand... hm... i'm pretty sure i wasn't THAT naughty this year...

come to think of it, i can't remember what i got for x'mas last year!!! did i even get anything???

still love the white stuff.

my aunt & uncle are away for another week or so for my cousin's graduation (stella's a doctor now!!!).

so after yesterday's snow storm my brother and i went over to their house to shovel their snow. before...

and after...

:)

toronto: the good & the bad.

the GOOD.
starting around thursday night, we got 15cm of snow. it was a white out! we're expecting another storm starting tonight at midnight. yay!

the GOOD.
toronto police are now the best paid in the province. by 2010 a first-class constable will earn $81,249. good for them. in my opinion, they put their lives on the line day in and day out and are deserving of every penny. if david miller wants to talk about not having enough money in the budget, we can start looking at cutting his $163,040 salary.

the GOOD.
last night went to go see toronto symphony orchestra's rendition of Handel's Messiah. i enjoyed it very much. it was made sweeter by the fact that through tsoundcheck i got $79 tickets for $24 each!

the GOOD.
after the concert, i drove my date home. the roads were a mess, but that just meant that i had an excuse to drive slowly. :) just as we got to her place, the car in front of me got stuck on the mini off-ramp. so i grabbed my shovel and gave him a hand. he was stuck pretty good, but while we were digging out, 2 other cars stopped to give a hand. it wasn't even their exit, just good samaritans that stopped to help out.

the BAD.
besides the 2 cars that stopped to help out, another guy in a black gmc jimmy (i should've taken a mental note of his license plate) stopped and offered to pull out the stuck driver... for $40. come on! what a jackass. if you want to help someone out of the goodness of your heart, that's great. if not, just keep driving. just keep driving man.

mount st louis moonstone...

mi hermano finished his exams on monday so we decided to hit the slopes. had a great time, took some great pictures. the weather was perfect, and best of all, it was SO EMPTY!

you can't see the ground, but i assure you that i got some air in this pic!

will you...

pass the gauze?
:)
i had one of my wisdom teeth removed the other day.
it was actually not as bad as i had imagined it to be. just some local anesthetics, a big wrench-looking tool and some gauze.

i've pretty much been limited to congee for the past few meals but it's alright. i'm just glad it's out.

check your brain!

as previously mentioned, my buddy punster is overseeing a bunch of psych research that's going on at the local university. one of the projects involves an fMRI machine, some simple response tasks and a willing volunteer. on tuesday, I was that willing volunteer.

things didn't go quite as smoothly as initially planned. the MRI technician was over an hour late because of traffic. and if that wasn't enough, there was a very brief power outage that left me stuck in the fMRI machine.
:(
but all's well that ends well. in the end i got paid a decent amount of money and even better, got to keep my scans!

i wish i could show you all the scans but that would require a software download and a whole lot of work.

pretty cool huh???

rugby? who needs rugby?!?!

so on saturday, the leafs held a news conference to announce their new general manager and president Brian Burke.

i gotta say, so far, i'm impressed. i was particularly impressed with his 3 "mission points".
1. exciting & entertaining brand of hockey
2. financial prudence - it's not his money that he's spending, so he'll be careful when spending it.
3. community service - Burke says that his players will be more involved in the community than ever before and if any player is unwilling to fulfill his "civic duties" he can find another place to play. i especially like this one.

bottom line is that regardless of how exciting the leafs are, how much he spends on the payroll or how much his players give back to the community, UNFORTUNATELY brian burke's time here will be evaluated based on only one thing: the number of wins - and ultimately a stanley cup win.

*****

went to church with my friend jenn today and then chilled with my cousin justin in the afternoon. we decided to go check out a marlies game. had a great time. it was an entertaining game with the marlies winning in a shootout after the 7th shooter 4-3 over the rochester americans.

you know what the BEST part was though??? captain crunch was in the house!!! by complete chance, wendel clark was at the game signing autographs. what what!!!

best idea justin's come up with in about 6 years i think.

***so sore...***

after back-to-back workouts (cardio plus weights) for the first time in ages, my body is NOT impressed with me at all right now. my abs are KILLING me. it hurts to sneeze, it hurts to laugh, heck, it hurts to twist around and wipe my butt! >.<

i must be getting old... :(

new pet peeve.

students that leave their stuff to "save" their spot and disappear for extended periods of time.

so today i'm at robarts, just to switch things up a little. i came in just before 1pm after working out with my brother. being exam time and all, the library is pretty busy. the slackers tend to show up 2 weeks before exam period.
:p
but what i really want to rant about is how everyone dumps their stuff on chairs and desks and then LEAVES! no lies here, 1/3 of the seats in the reading rooms on the 2nd and 3rd floor have jackets/notes/umbrellas/power adapters/highlighters, but NO BODIES!!!

i mean if you're going out for 2 minutes to use the toilets or even 5 minutes to answer a phone call that's cool. but don't leave your stuff here then go off for a 45 minute chat session with your girlfriends. don't leave your stuff here and then head out for your 3 hour lecture. and yes the hot dog vendor/chinese food truck is JUST outside, but don't leave your stuff here to go out for a meal.
case in point, the table next to me has 2 power adapters, 3 jackets, 1 backpack and a whole pile of notes. the girls that are/were sitting there haven't returned since i got here - which was 90+ minutes ago!!!

if everyone actually took their stuff with them when they left there'd be plenty of space for everyone when people actually need it!!!

i wish the library could police this. but it's near impossible to do so. aside from the lack of man power, how would they know how long these people are gone for - although to a trained eye, that can be pretty obvious:
if there is no jacket and just some loose sheets of paper with a few pens, chances are they've left for lecture or a long meal. no jacket means they have LEFT the building. definite grounds for a boot in the butt.
if there IS a jacket, well chances are they are in the cafeteria yakking it up.

maybe we could do what parking enforcement does. a librarian comes by once or twice an hour and chalks the desk/back of seat or whatever. if you've been chalked but you're not back by the time the librarian comes around again, your stuff gets taken to the front desk where you have to go and re-claim your stuff. you could add a $25 fine for good measure.

an even better idea would be to increase the amount of theft that occurs at these libraries. if we could only get these theives to steal not just laptops, cell phones and wallets but also textbooks, handwritten notes, pencil cases and coffee mugs. :)

yo check this out! part 3.

i have a friend. i'm going to give him a pseudonym - just in case. let's call him "punster" because he's good with puns.

anyways... so punster is the head of some research labs at UofT. he was showing me around his new labs and we came across the coolest thing EVER. in one of the labs there was a driving simulation machine. and i got to try it!

it was so cool. when you turn the ignition on, the car and steering wheel hum just like a real car. from the master computer, you can control the weather, the amount of light, the amount of traffic, you name it and you can control it. it was quite real.

that brought a smile to my face. and i thought i'd share that with you. :)

bitin' the bullet.

so i'm at the library at UofT. yes you heard me. i'm at the UofT LIBRARY. gerstein to be exact.

why??? well, cause i booked my USMLE test date yesterday and it's time to get my butt back to the books. :(
it's weird being back though. seems like nothing has changed since i was here for undergrad. i might start keeping a tally again. for the record it's going to be 9-5 study days to start and then i'll slot in week nights and weekends once pat starts his exam study. if you're on campus come find me. i'll most likely be at robarts or gerstein.

we got our first major snow fall last night. little parkette by my house...


UofT king's circle with university college in the background.

isn't it beautiful??? :)

feels good to be home!

after about 33+ hours of travel, i am HOME. it's so good to be home. weather is cold. thermometer in the car was reading -6 degrees. there was also some light snow. nowhere near enough to accumulate but just enough to bring a smirk to my face. i know toronto is a big city but it seems humongous compared to brisbane. there seems to be more cars, more people, more skyscrapers, more everything.

my house is completely different from when i left last january. most noticeably, the gray carpets have been replaced with shiny new hardwood. i love it. there's also a huge 47" lcd tv in the living room and my brother has a sparkling new desktop with a huge 20" flat screen - which i'm on right now. i suspect that my parents may have had some sort of cash infusion of which i am unaware of. hm... ??? maybe it's from not having to feed their eldest!
:)
the last leg of my flight was long. really long. like 15 hours long. but i was incredibly lucky and got a seat in the emergency row. if you're ever flying in an airbus 340-600, ask for seats in row 20 - so much leg room it's not even funny.

Abu Dhabi. 11:36pm local time

i'm now in abu dhabi.
it's not quite as flashy and luxurious as i had imagine it to be. there is free wireless internet though! :)

the terminal has this fishbowl/bathtub feel to it with navy blue & lime green tiles that extend from the floor all the way up to the domed roof. i want to take a picture for you but there is a "no photos" sign. i could probably plead ignorance but let's not try that.

it's also packed. Despite being almost midnight, there are more people here now than there were this afternoon in Brisbane. I don't think this airport sleeps. On the depature board right now, there are flights every hour until 6:50am.

On tv Djokovic is giving Davydenko a pretty good whipping. Don't know what tournament it is though.

i'm pretty pooped.
next stop: HOME!

Singapore. 6:26pm local time

I’m about a ¼ of the way home. After about 8 hours of flight I’m now in Singapore for a 1 hour fueling stop.

So far this etihad flight has been awesome. The food is really good, the TV screens are huge and the headphones aren’t the crappy rigid foamy ones you get on air Canada. They even have complimentary alcohol! Man, that’s ol’ school service right there! i had a glass of white wine with lunch :)

Something that I found interesting: right before taking off, along with the safety announcements, they had a travel prayer from the Qur’an. i have no idea what exactly was said in the prayer (i'm pretty sure it was in Arabic) but I found that quite interesting.

Next stop: Abu Dhabi.

looking back...

in a few days i fly back home. back to family, back to friends, back to the cold. :)

i gotta say, it's been a good year. some highlights include:
-shaving my head bald for leukemia research
-trip to Fraser island
-painting my toe-nails :)
-pat's visit and mini reunion in adelaide
-finding a church
-bridge to brisbane
but most importantly, it's been a year of good friends, good food and good times. (sounds like a kelsey's commercial or something!)

as i look back on year 2, i would like to think that i've grown.
around this time last year i was feeling pretty smug about myself cause i had made "big steps" in my life. i learned to cook my own food, wash & iron my own clothes and really live independently.
but this year i'd like to think that i leave australia with not only more medical knowledge in my brain but hopefully as someone who's grown in character and maturity. mmm... maybe that's stretching it a little. :)

t-minus: 2 days, 3 hours and 35 minutes until my flight!

blah...

so i'm all done second year.
at this time last year i was getting wasted in the red room.
this year i didn't have a single drop. part of that was cause i forgot my id and couldn't get in. but the other reason is cause i just don't feel as ecstatic about being done as i did last year. i don't know why.

i don't think i did poorly. it's not that.
i dunno what it is... just feels so anti-climatic. ???
maybe i'm just tired. i'm going to take a nap. :)

0 days, 1 hour, 31 minutes.

why the heck am i blogging at this point in time?  to be honest, just to try and keep myself sane... :s

i could not sleep last night.  i went to bed a little earlier than usual at 10:30pm thinking i'd try and get a good 7.5-8 hours of sleep.  now normally i couldn't count to 100 before dozing off but last night i laid their for well over 1/2 an hour.

i'm not sure if it was the nervousness or the coke that i had during dinner (the kind that you drink through your mouth and not the kind you snort through your nose) but i couldn't sleep.  the only reason i think it might've been the coke is that my caffeine tolerance is zilch.  i don't drink any coffee, barely tea and the last time i had a coke with my meal was probably a few months back when pat was here.

i think i finally fell asleep just after 11.  but this morning, i woke up at 4am.  4!  i was so alert that i contemplated just getting up and reviewing some stuff but i forced myself back to bed.  i laid in bed for the next hour & a half, 1/2 sleeping and 1/2 awake.  so now i'm up for good.  and as alert as can be. just hope this adrenalin-induced buzz doesn't wear off until after 11am today.

:s

1 day, 10 hours, 56 minutes

not a whole lot of time left before my exams. normally at this stage i've given up hope and just want to get the stupid thing over with but this year i find myself still reviewing and still looking over stuff - dare i say still LEARNING. i don't know if this is a good thing or bad thing. maybe it means that i'm not quite as prepared as i would like to be and there is still plenty of stuff to learn. or perhaps it means that for some reason, i care just a little bit more than usual. hm... i sure hope it's the latter.

had my MSATs (multiple station assessment tests) yesterday. i think they went ok. no major blunders.  my simulated stations were...

• history taking: patient complaining of chest pain
• clinical physical exam: patient with distended abdomen
• ethics/communication station: obtaining consent from a patient scheduled in for surgery
• clinical reasoning station: patient complaining of shortness of breath on exertion, examinations & investigations pointing towards some sort of anemia/hematological origin
• ALS/CPR station: demonstrating my CPR skills, as well as my ability to use a defib, use drugs (adrenalin, atropine, amiodarone), etc...

now i've just got these two big written ones on tuesday and wednesday.  wish me luck!

obama!

he's done it!
i get goosebumps just thinking about it.

sorry i forgot...

ahahahahahaha!!!
my brother just sent this to me.