Just keep swimming...

Ever since getting down here, upper semesters have described second semester as the semester you "survive" or "just get through." It's basically back to back to back exams until finals week. The last four weeks have been a hellish rollercoaster ride and I only get two weeks in which to rest, recuperate and review everything I was just tested over in preparation for the next intense round of exams.

This semester has definitely been an eye-opener. My lowest exam score last semester was an 80%. This semester I have already failed two exams. Failed in the sense that at Ross anything below a 70% is failing. I haven't failed failed anything yet, but of course as far as my continued enrollment here is concerned, that doesn't matter. The good news is that one of the fails was in a class with a steep curve such that I am still passing the class with a high C. The other exam I failed was only by 4 points and so I feel confident that I can recuperate and pass that class as well. Still, these grades are a far cry from where I was at last semester and from what I am capable of. In all honesty I've had a pretty bad case of apathy this semester. It took me several weeks to get my head in the game and by then I was far behind. Talking to my friends in their second semester of vet school both at Ross and elsewhere in the U.S. this seems like a fairly common thing. Like "senioritis" you just hit a wall and can't bring yourself to put in the effort. Eventually you either pull yourself up by the short hairs or fail out.

I'm slowly coming out of my funk. I've forced myself to start reading ahead before anatomy lab and actually take an active role in going over structures with my group instead of sitting there staring at dead flesh like a zombie. I'm reading ahead before immunology lectures, because the lectures for that class are supremely boring and unhelpful but luckily the written notes are much more beneficial and easy to understand. Unfortunately with physiology, I don't know what I can do to bring my grade up. On top of useless lectures, the written notes are dense and narcolepsy-inducing and the professor tests in such a way that even if you know the material 100% in and out you can still fail the exam because the way he asks questions is completely counter intuitive to most students. We have a popular phrase for failing one of his exams here which I won't repeat because it contains his name. Luckily there is usually a huge curve for this class. Needless to say he's not one of my favorite professors and I'll be glad to see the tail end of him in 3rd semester.

In better news, I found an even better deal on an apartment and changed my plans to move into the original one I mentioned before. This place is $100/month cheaper, with more amenities included (free WiFi and premium cable) and includes a dishwasher, dryer (which the other didn't have - a lot of Kittians use a dry line) and a pool! Yes, a pool! I am so entirely psyched about this place I can't even tell you. Pics posted below. I'll change things a bit when I move in, mostly in the bedroom with my sheets, rugs, yoga mat and knick knacks being bright orange, yellow and pink. But for the most part, this is what it's going to look like.

Gaaahhh!

I'm sorry! I know I haven't updated in awhile, but second semester is crazy-go-nuts. There's pretty much at least one exam every week. I had one last week, one this week, two next week and and then another the week after next. Then I get a two week break during which I need to study my open-water scuba certification material and schedule my first closed water dive. This is on top of trying to find a new apartment, which thankfully I've found. I was able to remain in the same area that I live in now, which I love because where I live right now is very quiet and residential compared to other student living areas. And I was also able to keep my current landlord, which I'm also very happy about because she's a great lady. I won't move until late August, but I promise pics of the new place when I've gotten settled in.

I've also been trying to find hotel information for my family when they come visit during the semester break, which actually turned out to be fairly easy. I called a few places and asked if they offered a Ross student discount and spoke to a few Ross students who've had family come down and they said that the Timothy Beach Resort was very nice, clean, the staff were friendly and they offered a great discount for Ross students. I stopped by and took a look, confirmed the discount, and sold! They're getting a full suite complete with separate kitchen, living room and bedroom as well as a deck with patio furniture for less than $100/night. Sweet!

In closing, Dolly is still adorable and still unhomed. She has something to say to those people who passed her over for her siblings...

Two down.

Both Amelia and Roman have gone to their new homes. Dolly is the only one left to be adopted. Last Saturday at the adoption event everyone kept remarking on how soft Roman and Dolly's fur was. I guess I never thought that they were softer than average for kittens, but then realized that Mama's fur is incredibly soft as well. I guess they got her good genes!

It helps that I'm friends on Facebook with their new owners and get to see all of the pictures they're posting and how well they're doing.

Some of their best photos in a proper send off:

Roman 

Amelia

 And the last videos I have of all three of them together:

Hey, Dad!

Check it out.

Nyaah! Nyaah!

Sincerely,

Your daughter.

The conversation between me and my Puerto Rican friend when I saw this in Ram's went like this:

Me: "OMG BIRCH BEER!"

Angie: "Birch... beer?"

Me: "Yeah, it's like root beer only more spicy."

Angie: "Like Dr. Pepper?"

Me: "Kind of! But not really..."

Club ideas.

After several weeks of putting it off, I've finally started concentrating on the evidence-based medicine club I want to start. I have a few ideas that I'm pretty proud of.

- A critical thinking "toolkit" workshop that would consist of 3-4 lectures on how to evaluate journal articles. There will be one lecture on how to calculate effective sample size, a lecture on how to calculate a p-value using t-tables and evaluating appropriate margins of error, a lecture on determining if the experiment is controlled, if the article's conclusions are supported by their data, if there were appropriate blinds in place, etc.

- After these skills are in place we will hold monthly get togethers where we do a literature review on a topic that we've voted on and evaluate the existing research on that particular treatment modality, animal behavior, etc.

-This morning in the shower another idea came to me that I'm really proud of. It'll be called "The Genuine Article" and will be a fundraiser where as a club we have three journal article abstracts on something that seems outlandish and unbelievable. Two of them will be fake and one will be real. Students will buy tickets to vote on which one they think is the real deal and place them in a bucket under that article, and at the end of the contest we will pull a name out of the winning bucket and buy that student dinner.

I'm so excited!

Awwww!

I just realized that Dolly inherited Mama's nose smudge. It's exactly the same size and shape, only orange instead of black.

In other news, Amelia has found a home! She's going to one of my fellow classmates in one week. I've got seven days to say goodbye. It'll be tough, but I'm ready to start my new life with just me and Mama. These days the new fun game is, "Let's wake the food provider up at 5am by running laps around her bed and nomming her toes!"

Itchy all over.

This is the result of having to sleep with my windows open for just three nights:

Ditto for the left leg and my back. My roommates? Hardly a bite between them. I don't know why the bloodsuckers love me so much. My blood type is hardly a delicacy; A+ is practically plebeian! I have such awful reactions to the mosquitoes down here, it's downright miserable.

Come to think of it, though, I need to redo my blood typing test. The last time I did one I came up with very difficult to interpret results on the Rh antigen portion. Maybe I am A- after all, and at 7% of the population that would explain why mosquitoes consider me such a tasty treat.