Brief Sojourn

After the exam, I attended the Hamilton Research Symposium at Mission Bay on "Life in Extreme Environments." The talks were bizarre, but interesting. They focused on microbes living in unusual places: H. pylori in the acidic stomach, bacteria in termite hindguts, and thermoacidophiles in deep sea vents. Weird stuff. People do research on this? Actually, it didn't sound too bad; researchers are forced to go to places like Costa Rica, Australia, and Japan to find termites or deep sea vents. I can't say I learned an incredible amount that's applicable to what I want to do, but at least it widened my perspective on...stuff (I guess).

The next day, I made up a preceptorship I missed when I was sick. Because of the nature of my preceptorship, I don't do too much physical exam, but I've learned that even without an exam, I can make many useful observations. "In general, the patient is an elderly woman in no apparent distress who appears her stated age and is confined to a wheelchair." And even some remarks about her appearance, speech, movements, extremities, and mental status.

I then flew home where I had a really relaxing time with family and absolutely no brain, mind, or behavior.