Thursday, March 22, 2007

Lockdown

Our Director of Studies encouraging us to revise.
Rifle included purely for effect-enhancing purposes.

Term ended last Thursday here at Cambridge, and so begins the five-week-long Easter vacation. This means most Cambridge students (even those lazy dossers doing Land Economy and SPS who spend all year rowing and prancing about on stage stealing good parts from poor hardworking medics who obviously deserve them better [not that I'm bitter or anything] --Editor) start to realise how close they are to exams (67 days, but hey, who's counting? --Ed), get all penitent about not doing enough work, start to work, freak out after realising how much work they ACTUALLY have to do, go home and fall at their parents' feet apologising for shaming the family and bringing dishonour into their homes (and if you're Japanese, possibly try harakiri --Ed) and then go into lockdown mode for the rest of the vacation to prepare for exams.

College libraries stay open around the clock. Porters patrol the libraries at night. And at St John's College, the famed Suicide Watch will soon start patrolling St John's Tower to deter any poor sod who realises he's in the wrong university and decides he wants to go scream "WHY ME?!" at God in person.

As for me, I'm starting to get my act together and will soon instruct the porters to forward my mail to 'Room With Plastic Skeleton, The Library, Jesus College'. Unfortunately, I'm not the only medic determined to move into the library. I'm anticipating a blogworthy battle coming up. Wish me luck. In the meantime, go check out what happened when I became a disability patient* on Medscape. No smartarse cane jokes please--you quickly find out how useful they are for bashing people on the head...

*Tell me you love the post title. I spent HOURS dreaming up the title. You MUST love the title! Love the title or die by cane bashing!

23 comments:

Anonymous said...

and yet, even after harakiri, life goes on. hang on there. you'll survive.

* loved the title :)

Anonymous said...

You shouldn't be using a cruthc because of a pulled muscle. Get walking on it before it seizes up and becomes completely useless.

The Little Medic said...

I've seen exam term at Cambridge first hand and its not pretty. All those people setting up home in the library is rather amusing from an outsiders perspective.

Keep on going, don't forget to eat and drink and try not to work yourself into oblivion. Gd Luck.

ps - the title was cool.

Anonymous said...

Eh, no wonder la, no phone calls/SMS/emails/MSN already. This isn't lockdown, it is more like darurat already :D

Good luck studying, and for my sake, do reply my sad SMS ba.

T_T

MedStudentGod (MSG) said...

I feel for you. Trying to live in the library is definitely "Lockdown" and therefore was a good title.

SeaSpray said...

Hi A.M. - off topic , but just want to say I am really getting into the Apprentice now.

I do think the manager of the losing team should have stayed to oversee the production and if she had she may have done it differently. Gee - that was a good cliff hanger they had. I wonder how it ended? :)

Dr Michelle Tempest said...

Good luck with the Easter work and don't forget library's aren't always the most healthy place to be ALL the time! All the very best. Michelle

medstudentitis said...

67 days? It's 19 days until exams here and I've only finished going through 2 weeks of notes... You guys are hardcore.

The Angry Medic said...

Anonymous 1: Hey thanks. You sound verrrry familiar. (You're not a harakiri survivor are you? I hear it's quite bad for your health.)

Anonymous 2: Whoa really? Thanks for the advice. I'm off the cane now, but it did seem to make walking just a bit faster for me.

Little Medic: Hahaha yeah, you would've been here during exam term wouldn't you? It DOES get ugly. Some of us are even reduced to *spits and brushes dirt off shoulder* using the CITY library, horror of horrors!

Thanks mate, you've always got a little nugget of encouragement for everyone.

Eugene: You...you went to watch Hot Fuzz WITHOUT me! You heartless BASTARD! I thought you LOVED me! *overly dramatic crying and slamming of doors*

MSG: NOOO nonono I was referring to the title of my MedScape post "Cane and Dis-Abel-ed", not the title of this one. (Which was witty too, I know, but hey that's just me. Wit all the way, even when it's WIT-hout *bada-BING* Geddit? Oh, I slay myself.)

But thanks for dropping by, sweetie ;)

The Angry Medic said...

SeaSpray: Yes - exactly! Even Ivanka on her blog says that she'd have fired them BOTH, and a lot of people agree with her. I'm posting a longer reply on your blog.

Dr Tempest: Aww thanks. Hope you got my comments on your blog about your great work promoting the march - Blogger seems to be eating up my comments everywhere recently. And I doubt the library could give me any more brain damage than I already have - but thanks for the caveat, it was really nice of you :)

Medstudentitis: Oh don't worry, that's the sane way to go. It's just that 2nd-year medicine at Cambridge is apparently in the Guinness Book of World Records for something. It's widely known as a very hard course around here. Sigh. I'm doomed aren't I?

Shrinked Immaculate said...

man, I love ur blog

SeaSpray said...

Ivanka has a blog?? thanks for your comment - I left one for you too. :)

Calavera said...

No, seriously, is there actually a suicide watch? A friend and I were debating this for a long time some years back. There isn't, is there??

The best of luck with the revision, Angry! Though you had better keep updating the blog. I need my daily dose of humor.

Bo... said...

Hi Angry Medic! I've come to your blog for some cheer, and it worked! You always crack me up and I love your positive attitude---you inspire me when I'm "down".

Harry said...

Hey angry!

I remember hearing horror stories last year when my bro was revising for his finals - some girl in his year got drunk and fell into a river but impaled herself on an old water pump or something which went through her stomach! She didn't have to sit the exams in the end. Sounds a bit farfetched, but apparently it's true?!

Anonymous said...

yes, the drunk girl story is true.
although it happened after the exam term, during the inebriated celebration post-exams. she jumped off a punt into the cool river, and ended up impaling herself on an old water pump. she survived though, so all is well in the world.

best of luck AM in times such as this. And you have to come over to my place to watch movies. before I go completely bonkers.

svna

Anonymous said...

Haha- walking on crutches is hilarious. I did something odd to my knee, which caused me mucho pain, a bit of swelling, but the complete inabilty for me to bend it unless someone else did it for me (doc and nurse could do it, but I *really* couldn't).

So, it was all bandaged up and I was given crutches for two weeks. I wasn't allowed to leave the hospital until i could walk on them, made even harder by the fact I could not do it without laughing- which caused me temporary weakness which left me in piles on the floor.

It was brilliant. I eventually got home- them realised doing anything with crutches is ridiculously hard.

Glad you are on the mend!

Phoenix said...

Some people (especially boys in their teens and early twenties) get very good at using crutches. They can move at an incredile speed on them, with exceptional agility.

If Angry has managed to cause trouble with a cane, I suspect giving him crutches might be a recipe for trouble...

The Angry Medic said...

Shrinked Immaculate: Aww thanks man! Haven't seen you around the blogosphere in ages (apart from on your own blog, of course), hope everything's ok (and you're not turning into a lifeless nerd like me).

SeaSpray: Yep, Ivanka has a blog. Come to think of it, I should prolly link to it. Righty-ho, watch for it in my links soon. And I'm coming over to reply your comment right now :)

Bohemian: As usual, you always cheer ME up with your compliments. "Cheerful and positive" aren't exactly words usually used to describe me (try "brain-damaged" and "irritating whiner", but that's a different story --Ed.) Sorry my posts can't be as eloquent as yours though, but hey, everyone needs drivel to read sometimes, don't they? :)

Harry: You're...you're ALIVE! Heh. But yep, there ya go. People fall into the River Cam all the time. Not all are as lucky as that girl, though. We lost a poor man last year whose body was found when they drained a section of the river. Doesn't pay to be drunk alone at night near the river.

Svna: Ditto! I need to avoid going crazy here...please tell me you have 'The Meaning Of Life'? 'Life of Brian'?

Faith: Aww, thanks for the wishes. And yep, walking with crutches is difficult - I have friends who use them regularly thanks to recurring sports injuries (this one friend of mine broke one knee after the other last year so regularly you could set your clock by him. Didn't even need mafia gunmen to cap him.)

HP: Bwahahaha! I realised after a while that crutches were a more manly option, as my friends started laughing at me and calling me "old man". Whereas all the macho sports heroes used crutches. Dangit.

Ooh, and check your email!

Anonymous said...

oi. that isn't a rifle in the poster, it's a submachine gun. big difference.

Anonymous said...

You should have gone to Oxford as it seems like it is less effort and no one seems to work so hard. Maybe they do though...

Anonymous said...

however, i doubt it.

Anonymous said...

It's not suicide watch on the tower - the tower is actually shut until exams are over :) Don't worry, you'll honestly be fine with the exams if you keep plodding through the work and make sure you get enough sleep :)

Katie