a new life begins, very soon

Just a quick update for all those I don't speak with frequently. I am always curious about the new developments in my friends live so I am making a supposition that others may share that same curiosity. The update is now:

I am graduating freakin' medical school in May. It has been 4 years of feeling dumb. One attending (a doctor post residency) commented that he didn't really know what he was doing (or hit his groove) until 5 years after residency. If I follow my current goal and have a similar experience, that will be in 10 years from this May. My goal is to become a surgeon. One step closer to that includes getting into a surgical residency which I call "surgery school". I have been "matched" in a general surgery residency with St. John's Hospital-Oakland Campus and start my first year (internship) in Late June. I have most of May and June off so if any of my peeps want to see me before my life ends in July, give a holler.

More soon...

wow. new post... really.

Ah, insomnia...
My friend James knows all about that. I suspect that my decaf coffee this evening was contaminated with caffeine. I suppose it's a good enough excuse to stay up late and blab about senseless nonsense. So, here we go:

The wife and I now live in Royal Oak. Finally the move came (with a furry) and settled. We thankfully had help on the receiving end of things. Total Big Help. I don't recommend moving.

I am studying for my boards right now and am getting used to this lifestyle of just sitting and reading. I would enjoy it even more if the fate of my career wasn't quickly honing in on Aug 8th. Then, back to the hospital. I will have G.I., Gen surgery, vascular surgery and then downtown to the "big house" for trauma surgery. Each one month in duration.

So far, I am totally digging this side of the state. Things new to me include:

- The best Indian food I have ever had.
- The most amazing little sushi place I have been to yet.
- The "coney island" or just "coney". A wonderful blend of greek and american food.
- The most amazing library I have ever been to (Southfield) It's designed for people, not just volumes.
- My new gong. No, I really do own my own gong now. I will let you gong it sometime.
- 7 -over the air- HD channels for Carrie's new tv. She totally uses it more than I.
- Ikea is now dangerously close at about 30 mins away.
- Cats hate gongs.

I will try to post more. Of course I'm gonna say that. We'll see...

onions

Flippin' A, I love The Onion!



I am a science geek and used to work in the field doing research on various things like models of cellular tension, molecular fly genetics and carcinogenesis. While at MSU, I worked in the Heidemann lab and worked with various cell lines from chicken brains to human tumor cells. We looked at axonal growth via tension and cell adhesion via a micro manipulator needle set up. Anyway, I was lucky to get my name on two papers while there. Shout out to Phil, Kha and old man Heidemann (a damn good chef and fantastic boss). Check out the abstracts. I got 2nd author on one of the papers! Fun huh?


Open-dish incubator for live cell imaging with an inverted microscope.

Here we describe the design and fabrication of an inexpensive cell culture incubator for the stage of an inverted light microscope for use in live cell imaging. This device maintains the temperature of the cell culture at 37 degrees C with great stability and, after reaching equilibrium, provides focal stability of an image for 20-25 min with oil-immersion lenses. We describe two versions of the incubator: one for use with standard 60-mm plastic culture dishes, and the other version for imaging of cells on glass coverslips. Either can be made for less than $400. Most components are widely available commercially, and it requires only simple wiring and 3 h to assemble. Although the device is generally useful for live cell imaging on an inverted microscope, it is particularly suitable for work in which instruments are introduced into the culture, such as electrophysiology or micromanipulation. The design is based on the principle that control performance is limited by the lag time between detection and response. The key element of the design is a heated, temperature-controlled aluminum ring serving as a mini-incubator surrounding the culture vessel. For this reason, we call our design a "ringcubator."

Heidemann SR, Lamoureux P, Ngo K, Reynolds M, Buxbaum RE.
Department of Physiology, 2201 Biomed. Phys. Sci. Bldg., Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824-3320, USA.
Biotechniques. 2003 Oct;35(4):708-14, 716.


The culture of chick forebrain neurons.

Dissociation of the forebrain of a single 8-day chick embryo produces > 10(7) neurons in nearly pure culture. Our methods allow 50-70% of these neurons to develop an axon and typical pyrimidal shape after 3-4 days in culture at low density (10(4) cells/cm2) by a stereotyped developmental sequence similar to that of rat hippocampal neurons. The culture method for chick forebrain neurons is unusually rapid, inexpensive, simple, and could be used in undergraduate laboratory exercises. The dissection and dissociation of the tissue are easy and rapid, requiring less than 30 min from cracking open the chicken egg to plating the cells. Axonal development by these neurons and growth for about a week do not require glial support. The neurons are grown on polylysine-treated culture surfaces in either CO2-dependent (Medium 199) or -independent (Liebovitz L15) media with 10% fetal bovine serum and a supplement based on the classic N2 supplement for neuronal culture.

Heidemann SR, Reynolds M, Ngo K, Lamoureux P.
Department of Physiology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan 48824, USA.
Methods Cell Biol. 2003;71:51-65.

detroit cars

I just recently went to the Detroit Auto Show with Mat & Haley and of course Carrie. I am not crazy about cars, but it has been something I have wanted to do since childhood. Some cars are cool. I am an admirer of good design and thus cars that are built well and look flippin' incredible are kinda fun. I was disappointed that there was not much talk about future fuel technology, but this is Detroit we're talking about. American cars are not really into advancement and ingenuity. Alternative fuel tech is so taboo in these parts. I am a big fan of Scion, a division of Toyota. Hondas are acceptable too. Here are some highlights from my little automotive adventure:

The Mini rep gettin frisky


sweeet VW


I want this Honda


Carrie embracing 'The Box'


Reunited with an old friend

myspace, not yospace

I have joined the masses and created a myspace account. I am not sure what this means, but I'll be trying it out for a bit. Feel free to let me know how it goes. Visit the my virtual closet @

http://www.myspace.com/45566073

Post comments if you wish, send me friend invites or just laugh at me. So many options!
I am going to try and keep up this blog going. Myspace is not a good format for blogging, but is much better for participating in an online community.

!!!

b-day

FYI to all my peeps. My b-day is coming up on Nov. 17. I will be a cynical and cranky 28 year old. Thanks Sara for remembering! I also share a b-day with Danny Devito. Please wish him well if you see him. I have no concrete plans for the special evening. It may involve buying a song (maybe 2) from iTunes, eating a donut from Marge's, a robust game of solitaire, eating an extra piece of chocolate, and of course wearing my lucky pair of underwear. Sounds like a HOT evening! I will also be taking suggestions so please post some comments.

puting the urge in surgery

I am in the 3rd week of my surgery rotation (out of 4 weeks). Surgery is freakin' sweet! There are always so many surprises and you get to see the patient in so many different perspectives. Some include: anatomically, post anesthesia (which usually involves moaning and flailing), happy happy stage from removing what ever was causing them pain (and also a morphine drip doesn't hurt) and of course you see the sad side of their pre-surgery status. I love the skill involved that only comes from years of practice. In the med school classroom, the people who shine are those who read, comprehend and regurgitate the best. In the surgery room it's not just what you have read, but what skills you have developed through practice. I like that I get to work with my hands and I like that the scrub nurse can yell at the doctors about such things like obeying the rules of the sterile field. You don't see that much in the pure medicine disciplines where nurses are usually stepped on by the docs.

Yesterday I scrubbed in an atypical hernia case. This fella had a huge, grapefruit sized, bulge in his abdomen. It turned out to be strangulated small intestines that necrosed. It was dilated, green and oozed foul funk that you could smell outside the operating room. I didn't even want to eat dinner later on in the evening because I could still smell that rancid odor! We had to take out the badness and suture the two free ends of his bowel back together. The cool part is that we left the wound open and packed it with gauze to encourage healing from the inside out. If we closed it, he would just get septic and more badness could happen. I changed his dressing today and had to peel out the gauze from his open wound. Awesome. He didn't seem to mind since he said that he experienced much worse during his service in Vietnam and again, the morphine drip doesn't hurt.

Hope this was at least minutely amusing. Many more stories to tell...

it continues...

I survived my 1st round of medical boards. This does not mean that I actually passed. This will become evident in 7-8 weeks so until then, life is good. Just to give you an idea about how much of a pain in the ass this whole exam process is, I will break it down a bit for you:
I took what is called the COMLEX-USA (Comprehensive Osteopathic Medical Licensing Exam) level 1 (out of 3).
This is hosted by NBOME (National Board of Osteopathic Medical Examiners) and is currently a 2 day exam of 4 sessions completing just under 800 questions in total.
What this means to my ass is that I sat on it for 4 hour stints with no potty break! The subject ranges widely as one would expect, but every exam is unique with what is focused. You don't know what the buzz topic will be. This year to my misery, they focused on Psych drugs. Why oh why!?!? I will have to take 2 more steps of exams before I get my medical degree and as of now, they are still 2 day exams. Quite a process, but hopefully soon a 1 day exam will emerge. My most memorable moment is on the last book I had 20 or so Q's still unanswered towards the end of the exam. A disproportionate amount of "C's" were bubbled in on that section.

Other news of note:
Colorado is too expensive to fly to. Go to another state or just don't fly anywhere.
My cat cut his foot and now has staples in his skin (and a comical collar). That bastard! Stop breaking things!
I start my surgery rotation in less than a week. Need to practice suturing.