BiochemiStories

A Collection of Tales from the 24 Hours Preceding the Biochemistry Exam:

1. I always wondered what exactly carbohydrates were. It turns out that they're chains of CARBON atoms that have been HYDRATED by -OH attachments. I get it!

2. Richie on how to remember amino acids that contain amide functional groups in their R chains: "It's easy, their names all end in "-ine." I believed this until I realized that ALL of the amino acids end in "-ine."

3. Cameron on someone we know who breaks out when she's stressed: "She has a RIDICULOUS danger zone!" [excessive laughter] "Three points for Gryffindor!"

4. I was videochatting via iChat with Kathryn and Cameron walked behind me and mooned her. AWKWARD!!

Don't find these stories funny? Try studying for 15 hours straight; I assure you they'll be HILARIOUS.

A Question

If I fail out of medical school, will they still let me be the Class of 2012 Social Co-Chair?

We just took our Anatomy exams, and I'm a little concerned about whether or not I passed. And like any good emo teenager, I'm going to release my feelings by blogging about them. EVERYTHING ABOUT MY LIFE IS SO HARD! I'M SO ALONE! NOBODY UNDERSTANDS ME EXCEPT FOR PETE WENTZ! [grows bangs, puts on hoodie, listens to more Fall Out Boy]

But seriously, it takes a lot of ATP for this phoenix to keep rising from his ashes. I really need to stop bombing everything that comes across my path in medical school before I run out of glycogen stores and go into a diabetic coma. On the bright side, I'm surviving my cadaver wound, Nosheen and I are going to start planning awesome social events, and tomorrow is a brand new day. One exam down, two more to go!

Breaking News

Okay, I know I said I wouldn't post again until exams were over, but I just stabbed myself with a cadaver probe while studying in the Anatomy Lab. I was trying to scratch my back while holding the probe in my right hand when I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my left cubital fossa. I could literally feel the cadaver juice seeping into my arm. If I die from cadaver AIDS, please use all of my financial assets to construct a shrine in my honor inside the Jordan Hall Lobby. I want it to say something along the lines of Sam: The Boy Who Lived (JK! He Died from Cadaver AIDS! Joke's on Him!)

Oh, and please bury me with my beloved MacBook.

BRB

Exams, LOL!

My Spoon Is Too Big

The cafeterias in the hospital have really cool dispensers where you pull a lever and one utensil drops out. I noticed today that the dispensers in Wahoo West Cafe are labeled "Knives," "Forks," and "Multi-Purpose Spoons." So, are we supposed to be doing something with the spoons other than eating? I can't think of anything funny, clever, or even dirty to do with spoons. Maybe I'm just not thinking hard enough, but it seems like spoons are pretty much the LEAST multi-purpose tools in the entire world. And if I can't trust the hospital cafeteria, then what CAN I trust? Oh, right: Scientology.

Shiver Me Timbers!

Thanks to my unparalleled stalking abilities, I noticed that some of my friends had switched from Facebook to Pirate Facebook. "I wonder what that is," I thought. After a quick Google search, I discovered that if you go to Account Settings > Language, you can set your Primary Language to English (Pirate). Instead of Friends, I now have Me Hearties, instead of a Wall, I now have News Ahoy!, and instead of Videos, I now have Bewitched Portraits. All in all, a good exchange and an even better method of procrastination.

And now, back to studying Biochemistry. I mean, back ter swarshbucklin', mateys!

Extreme Dream

I was leading a medical school skydiving trip to the Grand Canyon. The plane took off and when it got to the right altitude, people began jumping off. I wanted to go last just to make sure everyone else got off safely. Finally, only Juan and I were left aboard, when all of a sudden one of the plane engines exploded. For some reason I didn't have my parachute pack on yet, so we both jumped and I was initially in freefall, narrowly escaping being sucked into the still functioning plane engine. I grabbed onto Juan and we coasted down to earth. A surfboard magically appeared in Juan's hand, so we skysurfed for a while. I kept yelling at him to deploy the parachute, but he kept saying that we had plenty of time. I got distracted from my impending death by pulling out my camera and taking a few pictures of the beautiful desert scene below us. Finally we hit the ground and landed safely without even using our parachute. It was pretty hardcore.

When I looked up, I realized we were in the middle of an outdoor Miley Cyrus concert that was being recorded for TV. They were getting ready for her to perform the finale, which was a duet with Meredith, one of my friends from high school who had apparently become a pop singer.

The next thing I knew, I had teleported from the concert to the driveway of a giant ranch-style home in Texas. It turns out it was owned by an oil tycoon who was married and had two kids. However, he had recently been having an affair and now wanted to marry his mistress. He didn't believe in divorce, so instead he had decided to hire a hit team on his current wife. I found myself in the rescue team that was supposed to extract the wife from the home. We rang the doorbell, introduced ourselves as washing machine salesmen, and entered the home. We gave what I thought was a great sales spiel, but somehow the oil tycoon realized what we were up to. When his wife showed us to the door, we attempted to sneak her out of the house to safety, but instead we found that the front yard was filled with men pointing guns at us. Before we could even react, they had released a volley of bullets that killed the wife and hit me in the neck. Luckily they missed my carotid artery, and the next thing I remember was being taken to the hospital by ambulance.

The dream ended with me sharing my story at dinner with Dean Pearson. Honestly? Must everything in my life begin and end with medical school? Yes, by order of the king!