Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

"When someone sees the same people every day, they wind up becoming part of that person's life. And then they want the person to change. If someone isn't what others want them to be, the others become angry. Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but non about his or her own."

I really enjoy reading books like this, just told like a story, with some morals but often just telling of things that happen, without too much interpretation, letting you make of it what you will.

Two books finished and only on the second day of basic science!
So strange how medical school ebbs and flows...

A Short Guide to a Happy Life by Anna Quindlen

"Don't ever confuse the two, your life and your work"

"remember that love is not leisure, it is work"

I'm trying to decide exactly how those two statements fit together...

Silence: Lectures and Writings by John Cage

Didn't actually finish this one. Seems like John was quite a character. Lots of his notes and letters remind me of my dad. Statements that are heavy on facts and observations and descriptions.

One of my mentors encouraged me to read some of this since I have set out to study how silence is used in medical conversations, and John Cage explored silence in music.

Anyway, I could only renew it twice, and now I'm in between shelf exams and should really keep reviewing my flashcards for neurology, so I'm just going to go check this book back in to the library and get back to remembering what mesial temporal sclerosis looks like on MRI images.

ACLS H's and T's of PEA

Hypo/Hyper Kalemia

Hypothermia

Hypovolemia

Hypoxia

H+ acidosis

Hypoglycemia

Tamponade

Tension pneumothorax

Thrombosis

Toxins

Trauma

Born to Run by Christopher McDougal

Absolutely fascinating chapter on the anthropology of running, explaining how our species adapted to running after we split from chimps, giving up speed and strength in exchange for endurance. The best answer he has for this is persistence hunting, though the evidence for this is rather slim.

I wish I had run barefoot my entire life, but now, with my achilles tendinitis, I don't really know where to go. My achilles have to stretch over large bone spurs on my heals, themselves probably a result of shoe wearing. At least I won't feel the need to buy new running shoes so often.

Still Life with Woodpecker by Tom Robbins

Author reminds me of my dad, saying so many things that just don't make sense yet with some really profound wisdom interspersed.

The most important subject that this book stirred in me was "how to make love last", and taking about what that exciting mystery is in new romances and what happens to it later on. Romance in solitude, romance in mystery, romance in new things and forgotten things. Overall hopeful, but with plenty of realism. Reminds us that the mystery will tempt us in "the next pair of eyes that smile at us". But in the end, as in real life, there is no single answer for how to make love stay.

December Snow Week!

Ol' Blue  It's all melted now, but it was fun while it lasted. One morning, Sarah's Subaru got stuck on the berm that the plow made between street and driveway but Ol'Blue made it and got her to work despite its two wheel drive. Think it was a combination of pure snow tires and a bit more clearance. View image

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