LIVEALITTLE

Amazingly, I enjoyed being disoriented for the first time. Justin, Ranjeet, Lydia and I participated in the Metrogaine for the first time. The Metrogaine is a urban derivative of the Rogaine which is an extended version (6+ hours) of orienteering (~1-2 hours). Our team was appropriately dubbed "LOST" and although we were off-course a couple times, it was nonetheless exhilarating for the entire 6 hour duration. I actually felt like I was on an Amazing Race episode. The race was very well organized. Teams were left to create their own course. Interestingly, we started our planning with the assumption that we would have ample time and ability to hit EVERY marker. Duh. We didn't even get through half at our speed-walking rate. Underestimating our competition, I assumed we would definitely beat out the family-with-young-children teams (which seemed numerous when we started) and the novice teams. I put my bet in for 67th place. We finished at 85th. Not too bad for our first attempt. We did a bit of mingling with our competitors and met the 2nd place couple who RAN the whole thing. Wow. I'm going to have to get in better shape for the June Paddy Pallin Rogaine in the bush!
Pics: http://www.flickr.com/photos/livealittle/sets/72157594561834335/

Gung hay fat choy! Happy Chinese New Year! All you single folk out there, go and get some money!
Despite not receiving money, I was more than happy to see my name in the Tropfest special edition of the Sydney Morning Herald. Yes, I camped out for the festival again at the Domain. But Brian did the big sacrifice and laid our tarp down at 1:30pm -- 6.5 hours before the festival began. I showed up around 5pm after massage class. He even got deeply sunburned and dehydrated.
Although I loved "My Imaginary Friend" -- the Tropfest winner of 2007, I can't say I was entirely satisfied with all the finalists. I can't help but think there was Aussie nepotism involved. I wonder how many international films made the top 60 as none made the top 16... Maybe next year. I've started brainstorming for "7" ideas. Yup, for the first time ever, the Tropfest Signature Item for the next year was released.

Happy Valentine's Day! Vday passed yesterday for us, but I thought I'd do a shout-out for those of you in the later time zones.
I had my first near death experience this morning. I was in the shower actually shaving my legs (I gotta include that so you can easily picture what happened!). My left leg was propped up against the wall and slipped whilst I shaved. Come to think of it, everything seemed to happen in slow motion as if I was given extra time to save myself. My head was going straight for the shower faucet. Luckily my left hand grasped it stabilized me before my forehead slammed into it. But it was close.
I was a bit rattled and wondered if anyone in the house would have noticed my extended shower and saved me before all my blood drained out of my body.
Have I changed since? Don't think so but I'm extremely grateful to still be alive. At this point of my life, I'm very eager to live and be. What a close call...

Believe it or not, the thing that has troubled me the most in my new job is streaking the slides. The photo attached is of my better-than-shitty slides after I'd already practised on half a box of them already (about 30). I think the method that has worked best for me so far is streaking with the slide horizontal so I'm simulating flying a toy plane off a slide runway. Does anyone else do this method?? Why am I having so much trouble?
BTW, I did my first venipuncture with a patient today. My first was quite successful but my second was a total bomb (not in the cool sense of the phrase). Not only was the patient nervous and needed to lie down for the procedure but I hit a superficial vein (so the tube filled like molasses) and yanked the needle out when replacing the gel tubes. Argh! Luckily, my supervisor, the doctor was watching over me and he quickly took my place. Poor girl. She was SO nervous and we had to prick her twice. Any suggestions for distracting patients so they don't jump as much when we are piercing?

There's been a bit of news about a 22 yr old girl's walk from Brisbane to Sydney to promote climate change awareness. The trek culminates on March 31 when she arrives in Sydney at 7:30pm striking the start of Earth Hour. Everyone in Sydney is expecting to turn off all power for one hour. Part of her inspiration came from the movie An Inconvenient Truth. So I decided to rent it out. Now I see why she was so inspired. It's a very nicely spun presentation of Al Gore's long time passion. I've always been a sucker for 'the rising of the underdog' especially in cases where the message affects many people. And this message affects all of us. I am so joyous for him to have finally found an avenue to effectively relay something that has been so obvious to him for so long. His determination is quite amazing. I am reminded of a conversation I had with a friend the other day where he took the stand that all of us lead insignificant lives... We are each too small to make any ripple in the vast ocean of the world. Well, the cascading effect of this movie and Al Gore's efforts has made more than a ripple -- it's turning off Sydney's lights and cooling down the oceans. I don't think we need to be an Al Gore to affect the world. Everything we do has a butterfly effect on our friends, our family and our surroundings. I believe each of us are significant.
To quote Mother Teresa:
"We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop."

So I've been MIA coz I found myself a full time job in a pathology lab. What a great opportunity it has been for me! The lab is attached to a private doctors' clinic. We process the samples of those patients and ultimately send them to a processing lab in Melbourne for testing. So my job has really not been that complicated. Alot of the testing has been for HIV, syphilis, gonorrhea and hepatitis. It's mostly specimen sorting mixed in with some aliquoting (extraction of a small sample of serum/plasma from a blood tube), centrifuging, streaking plates and... venipuncture! Bob and Natalie have dropped by the lab as volunteer victims for me and tomorrow will be by first real patient attempt. I feel confident but also still a bit timid that I will hurt the patient. My co-worker, the doctor, tells me I need to separate myself from the patient and only see the arm when I am going to puncture the it. If anyone has any suggestions out there, I'd like to hear them before I do my first blood extraction tomorrow!